Movie Review: Looper
Don’t go into Looper expecting to see a thinking person’s time travel movie. If so, you’ll be disappointed. But if you like your science fiction packed with suspense and action, then you’ll love Looper. Featuring excellent performances by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Pierce Gagnon, and especially Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt. Writer/director Rian Johnson delivers an intelligent, mind-bending plot and richly complex main character arc that more than make up for the fact that the how and why of time travel is never adequately explained.
The year is 2042. Time travel doesn’t exist yet, but it does thirty years in the future, and it’s highly illegal. Regardless, like booze during Prohibition, organized crime embraces the banned vice and uses it to its advantage. In the case of time travel, mob bosses in 2072 send back people they want killed to 2042, where assassins known as Loopers await at the precise spot of the doomed travelers’ arrival and deliver a kill shot that can’t miss. Of course, that is unless a Looper finds himself staring at the 2072 version of himself. This is precisely what happens to Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an efficient Looper with a troubled past. Unable to successfully close his own loop, young Joe allows the 2072 Old Joe (Bruce Willis) to escape, which sets in motion a major conflict between the two Joes and a brilliant plot that drives the rest of the movie.
Revealing anything else story-related would only lead to spoilers, but Looper’s greatest strength lies in its ability to make you wonder who to root for, Joe or Old Joe? Both versions of Joe commit good and bad deeds, and both versions show genuine remorse about the bad things. You’re left scratching your head and saying to yourself, “I’ve never seen anything quite like this.” In the end, most will agree that the right Joe prevails, but how he does so will surely surprise you.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt in “Looper.” Photo by Alan Markfield – © 2011 – Looper, LLC.
Looper is dark and disturbing at times, especially because children are often involved, but overall it’s a must-see for sci-fi, suspense, and action fans. Willis hasn’t been this good since The Sixth Sense. His compassion and conviction as Old Joe tears at your heart strings, yet Willis still has plenty of tough-guy, Die Hard-esque action hero in him. In fact, the best action sequence in the film features Willis in an obvious Die Hard-style tribute as Old Joe lays waste to a mob-run compound.
It’s difficult to say much about Sara (Emily Blunt) and the young Cid (Pierce Gagnon) without revealing spoilers, but Gagnon is spot-on as a special boy with terrifying abilities, and Blunt proves yet again why she’s one of the most appealing film actors working today. As for Joseph Gordon-Levitt, he does a wonderful job of making Young Joe both likable and unlikable, but his acting really shines once Young Joe settles into his relationships with Sara and Cid.
The ending of Looper will leave you asking questions, but this is a good thing. After all, not every loose end has to be tied up, especially in a time travel movie.
