Closing the loop
Present and future collide in Rian Johnson’s action-packed Looper
Photo by Alan Markfield. courtesy of Sony Pictures
★★★★✩
Looper
Directed by Rian Johnson
Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt
Rated R
Now Playing
Despite the fact that Looper’s entire premise is time travel, it’s not your typical sci-fi film. It is hard to give a summary of the film without unraveling the plot, which speaks to how intricate the storyline is. Without giving too much away, the film centers on Joe (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), who is meant to kill his future self (played by Bruce Willis). Little does he know that his future self has a plan of his own to both stay alive and prevent future events.
Director and writer Rian Johnson cleverly evades the complications that come with time travel by having Bruce Willis’s character state outright, “I don’t want to talk about time travel shit.” Viewers who want to see a true science fiction film will be disappointed (the time machine, resembling an old-fashioned scuba diver mask, is also rather lackluster next to the futuristic computers and printers), but the film proves to be perfectly entertaining and well-made. By sidestepping the issues of time travel, Johnson makes room to ask questions like whether “the ends justifying the means,” — a theme that facilitates a twist ending which left me speechless.
I was particularly impressed by the jargon Johnson created. “Looper” refers to a person, like Joe, who kills people sent back in time from the future (so that there is no dead body as evidence). The term is apt because these assassins operate under the knowledge that they will eventually have to “close their loop,” or kill their future selves to tie up loose ends. Throughout the film, characters use phrases such as “letting your loop run” and “it’s the second loop this week,” which helps legitimize the alternate reality Johnson has created.
Cinematographically, the film was a consummate work. Motifs like close-ups of cigarette smoke and ticking clocks are intricately placed, the camera work while Gordon-Levitt is on an acid trip is breathtaking, and the details necessary to maintain consistency between the future and current Joe are painstakingly accurate. For example, in a diner scene, we see a newly injured, bandaged ear on Gordon-Levitt and a disfigured ear on Willis. Most of all, the dialogue is sharply witty. Jeff Daniels, whose character is from the future, utters one of the best lines: “I’m from the future, you should go to China.” I could even swear I heard Willis yell “yippee ki-yay, motherfucker!” over a machine gun, but that could just be wishful thinking.
Another nearly flawless aspect was the casting. Veterans Bruce Willis and Jeff Daniels bring their usual prowess to the screen, while Paul Dano and Emily Blunt successfully transform into roles that are unlike any others they have played before (Blunt even tackles a Southern accent). A highlight comes in the form of Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who supposedly spent hours in make-up having prosthetics applied so that he would look more like Bruce Willis. Gordon-Levitt is an incredibly versatile actor, but his kind features usually hinder him when playing serious roles. Though his contrived voice and strangely perfect eyebrows are distracting at first, he is able to capitalize on the disguise and adopt a convincing tough guy persona. Unfortunately, child actor Pierce Gagnon, who plays Cid, does not bring enough depth to his character, and although he only has a few scenes, these scenes are crucial to the plot.
My largest grievance is that the film is disguised as a sci-fi film when it is actually a drama with sci-fi elements. Sci-fi has often produced some of the most philosophical films, and these films have the technology at the forefront. Looper was publicized as a time travel film, but Johnson chose not to address the muddiness of the concept and to just take the best parts of science fiction — cool graphics, an arsenal of weapons, and the “trippy” factor.