Looper
Go! And go again. And go again. And go again. And go again....
Assassin time traveller & crime unraveller.
Humour me while I succinctly "explain" the storyline. "Loopers" are assassins from the future... well, they're actually from the past of a more future future than our immediate future. In the future future, there is time travel. It is illegal, but organised criminals in the future future use it to kill people by sending them back to the past (our future) where Loopers in that future (but the person's past) kill them. Killing people from the future in the past means they are still alive in that past and will eventually reach their future (the future future) but will then be sent back to the past (our future!) to be killed again...over and over again...forever and ever, amen.
That may all sound like nonsense on paper and it is called Looper precisely because of those confusing loops, but to everyone's relief, the film doesn't dwell on its complications. Instead, it is violently intense and fantastically absorbing, which are four very good words in any sentence about a film - bonkers or otherwise.
That may all sound like nonsense on paper and it is called Looper precisely because of those confusing loops, but to everyone's relief, the film doesn't dwell on its complications. Instead, it is violently intense and fantastically absorbing, which are four very good words in any sentence about a film - bonkers or otherwise.
Bruce Willis stars, and the champion baldy delivers. In our real-life past, he already rocked the 23rd Century in The Fifth Element, so in Looper , he's going back to the future (I couldn't resist) to do more punching, shooting and havoc wreaking. This time he plays assassin Joe in a dystopian world only thirty-odd years from now. His younger self is sent forward in time by his mysterious crime overlord to kill his future self – a process known as “closing the loop” - to get rid of loose-ended criminal undesirables. Refusing to face his fate, the old Joe confronts his young self, beginning a chain of ever more elaborate events. Playing Willis' younger self is Gordon Joseph-Levitt (Inception) who has been successfully Bruce-ified with some clever make-up and a chunky nose. It is initially disconcerting to see him looking so similar to Willis, yet unlike Willis’s actual younger self, but it works as soon as you get over it and accept that it's a film, so they're just pretending he's Bruce Willis.
The film is driven by the interactions between Joe's older and younger selves. A major highlight was seeing the pair thrash it out in a cafe - imagine if you met yourself in thirty years' time - things could get funky. Your older self is likely to be a bit pissed off for all those things your younger self did or didn't do (or will or won't do). Contrasted with Marty McFly making out with his mum in Back to the Future (which was just plain weird). this is a completely different level of time travel intrigue.
The film is driven by the interactions between Joe's older and younger selves. A major highlight was seeing the pair thrash it out in a cafe - imagine if you met yourself in thirty years' time - things could get funky. Your older self is likely to be a bit pissed off for all those things your younger self did or didn't do (or will or won't do). Contrasted with Marty McFly making out with his mum in Back to the Future (which was just plain weird). this is a completely different level of time travel intrigue.
Besides the muscular and engaging performances of those two, Emily Blunt successfully plays an American farmer, and mother to a young boy who rather owns this movie. He must be only five or six years old, but he is spectacular - truly, truly spectacular. Unnervingly precocious and wonderfully show-stopping.
Overall, it's phenomenal. There are cool guns, cool fight scenes and cool special effects that will boggle your imagination. It's as mind bending as Inception and as basass as The Matrix, but it is also nothing like either of those films, or any preconceived idea you may have of it. This is largely because of a humongous twist which is gratefully not even hinted at in the trailers (or this review). In the end, it's not a film about the future so much as a cool story about the effect of love on many interesting characters, some of whom just so happen to be badass assassins (*badassassassins*) from the future past and the future future.
So go quickly – miss it and your own older self may just come back from the future future and slap you right around the chops. If so, you'll deserve it.
Overall, it's phenomenal. There are cool guns, cool fight scenes and cool special effects that will boggle your imagination. It's as mind bending as Inception and as basass as The Matrix, but it is also nothing like either of those films, or any preconceived idea you may have of it. This is largely because of a humongous twist which is gratefully not even hinted at in the trailers (or this review). In the end, it's not a film about the future so much as a cool story about the effect of love on many interesting characters, some of whom just so happen to be badass assassins (*badassassassins*) from the future past and the future future.
So go quickly – miss it and your own older self may just come back from the future future and slap you right around the chops. If so, you'll deserve it.
#looper #cinema #moviereview #filmreview #movies #films #godontgo