Rating of
2.5/4
Energetic theme, with believable characters
sreekirch - wrote on 01/15/13
Rian Johnson with the haunting score of his brother Nathan, brings a sci-fi film that might be slightly down the level, may be due to the budget. Looper is a different film that sticks mainly upon few characters both in past and future. This is not like cloud atlas connecting the past and present, but it is a different idea of time travel, to bring the past and future in the same frame. I like the way some scenes are presented with both the past and future seems likely same. Johnson ensures that narrative is tight enough to make audience understand the concept of loopers. The viewers get clear idea of the various terms in the film, and later on will be used for understanding the film’s plot. Nothing deep or really remarkable is in Looper. I don’t understand the point that this film is given as the best films of the year. I do in fact say that in terms of time travel, it is good. Looper should have been more interesting and gripping. Johnson keeps the narrative at brisk pace for the plot to move.
So technically, specialized people called loopers, take out the ones from the future. They get paid for that. There is something called the closing of the loop, where if a looper misses the target, he would be terminated by specialized group headed by the rainmaker. Rainmaker ensures the loop is closed always. Joseph Gordon Lewitt , plays Joe a looper who finishes many targets. But trouble comes when his future version (Bruce Willis) comes and Lewitt hesitates. Now the rainmaker is all ready to close the loop. But Joe escapes from them and reaches a farm house. He meets a lady with a small boy. Older Joe is after the rainmaker to avenge the death of his wife Xi. The plot leads to many twist and turns, and the two Joe’s must face a do or die battle against time to fulfill the good to come through. At once with the run time I was surprised, that movie was not even 120 minutes. Yes in fact looper is well paced grippingly narrated with good pieces of action here and there. The plot begins when the older Joe appears and escapes from death. But the trouble with all such stuff is it moves too fast and takes quite a bit to understand the concept behind. If one carefully spends the first 15 minutes on the narrative, then plot would not be a problem. I would simply say the theme is very good, but the plot is so linear and one-liner (revenge). Time travel works in a way for some time, till things get perky. The climax is done well. But an average moviegoer needs lot of brain to understand the narrative. Believe it or not! Looper could not construct a strong plot with enough depth.
Joseph Gordon Lewitt looks a bit graphically modified and altered to look like Willis probably. His acting needs no emotions, as he is a hitman. All he needs to do is wait for the targets looking at his watch and shoot em up. This is done by Lewitt. He carries guns, of future (2044), drives shorter cars and does look cool in his coat. Willis has a normal role with few action scenes for him, as there is more of emotional context towards the pinnacle of the plot. Not quite tailor made, but quite effective. Emily Blunt, plays the lady of the small boy in the farm house. She holds guns, utters sharp dialogues and also takes plot with her rich accent and emotional scenes. She takes the upper hand in the second half of the film. But the winner of Looper is the small boy, who is terrific with his expressions and ideas of explaning his problem and also the best of him comes in the climax. Nathan Johnson’s score is electronic thunder with lots of whish, bam type. Intentional editing gives sudden surprises and keeps the viewers engaged for the things to wrap up. Action scenes are quite normal with loud sound, great chases in the air jet- bikes (no name) and lots of gun shooting. It lacked a punch in it, but the scenes in which the rainmaker makes objects fly in space is quite an interesting sequence that reminded me of Inception’s zero gravity scene. Lewitt has the experience of such scenes. No panic! Inception recalled. So Looper is not quite hard hitting, neither boring, but it is nicely made action sci-fi film, based on a time travel theme, with quite believable characters. The main drawbacks would be the cheesy make, due to budget issues and sophisticated narrative for a normal moviegoer. Inspired from Source code and Inception partly, Looper is a believable sci-fi film. Not to the level of Source Code or Inception, but it does promise a good utilization of their ideas for the good. If I would have been the maker, I would consider investing more on the film because of the brilliant idea in place. The action scenes lacked the Hollywood spark in the film. Not a treat for a hardcore action fan, but quite appealing for its simplicity.
With a strong narrative and believable characters, Looper becomes a credible low budgeted sci-fi film that possesses an energetic theme of time travel.
