For me, Looper was one of those films that had me by the stones from the second I saw the trailer. I couldn’t wait to get my bum in a theatre seat for a healthy and much needed fix of sci-fi action. And when the first round of reviews hit, I only grew even more excited; on RottenTomatoes, Looper’s aggregate review score is 94%, which as you can probably tell, represents a pretty resounding critical success.
So I waited patiently and tried to push Looper out of my mind, but I just couldn’t seem to. I watched the trailer, re-watched it again, and again, I commented on YouTube, I tweeted about it; in short, I got massively involved in the hype. One thing I always worry about when entering into hype of any sort is that it’ll create an unrealistic expectation in my mind. That I’ll expect whatever the hype is admonishing to be so perfect that what I get will actually disappoint, regardless of the standard.
So, with how excited I’d allowed myself to get for Looper, I was, deep down, worried that I was manufacturing an impossible standard, that it couldn’t possibly live up to the bar that had been set by a hundred gleaming reviews.
I caught Looper two nights ago, and I can tell you, my expectations weren’t high enough. Looper blew my mind, it blew it to such a degree that I’ll probably go again before the theatre run is over. I’d even go so far as to say that Looper was, for me at least, the best film of 2012 so far. Why? Well, you’ll just have to read on won’t you? And don’t worry if you haven’t seen it yet, I’ve been careful to steer clear of spoilers.
So without any more introductory chatter, let’s get right into the argument shall we?
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9 Comments
I thought it was great, but not a five-star movie. The time travel was shoehorned and contrived, and that really put me off.
Also (and SPOILERS FOR ANYBODY WHO HASN’T SEEN IT AHEAD) wouldn’t it have made more sense for Young Joe just to shoot himself in the leg or something at the end instead of killing himself? Seemed his decision to actually end his life was ill-judged and not logical at all.
I get why he went the whole hog but I agree. It’s the fist thing I thought too but then I guess it would only buy him some time, future Joe would still want to kill that kid.
I can say that Looper was a good movie but not great. I don’t know what all of the hype is about. It seems full of plot holes that are not fatal to the movie but tax any suspension of disbelief.
I completely agree. My favorite movie of the year so far.
The more I think about this movie, the more brilliant I think it is. I’ll be honest – I almost LEFT in the first 40 minutes because of the violence. It’s not the shooting that bothers me – it’s the…disturbing stuff that haunts the imagination (ie: Old Seth). It was distracting and I remember wishing that they’d get more into what happened in the future rather than showing us (or implying) the typical mob violence that gives me nightmares. ;)
I was just about to give up on the movie and leave…and then we were introduced to Cid…and then the ending happened and I was left with my jaw hanging open. When my BF asked me what I thought, I said the weirdest thing: “I hated it…and it blew my mind.”
Now that my “violence hangover” is done, I find I can’t stop thinking about various aspects of the movie…and how brilliant it is. I think I might have to watch it again, because…wow. It’s amazing how a profound ending can completely redeem any of the faults in the movie that came before (looking at you, Bioware…way to screw up an entire series with the most shallow, vapid ending in the history of SciFi).
Leaving the theatre, I was so blown away I couldn’t really define how I felt…but 8 hours later, and I can’t wait to see it again. Go figure. ;)
Ahh, Stuart, this article might be what convinces me you’re the most enlightened of all the WC contributors. I agree 100% with every item on your list. Your introduction is almost an exact description of my exponentially excited anticipation of this movie except that I’d been privy to it since the end of 2010 as I’m a huge fan of Johnson. Everyone who seems to be hung up on the time travel related inconsistencies or plot holes are completely missing the point. There’s so much going on in this movie and it offers so much to the audience! The premise, the writing, the pacing, the acting, the directing — it really is about as damn near perfect a subjective pieve of art can be. There’s definitely shades of Terminator here but you’re right — this is a completely original story and Rian Johnson is my favorite Auteur because of it. The Brothers Bloom is very good and it definitely works within Johnson’s noir wheelhouse (it’s a movie about con-men (and women) pulling a really long con), but it definitely skews a lot closer to romantic comedy than Brick or Looper. Anyway, you’ve done a really great job breaking down why this movie is so great. I highly recommend the article published today by Charlie Jane Anders of the wonderful io9 on why Looper works so well specifically as a genre film ( http://whatculture.com/film/10-reasons-why-looper-is-best-film-of-2012.php/2 ). The site has a ton of great material on why the movie is one cinephiles and sci-fi fans will be talking about for many years.
ooops, I meant http://io9.com/5948478/what-looper-teaches-us-about-how-to-do-genre-right
I really liked this film, it was awesome. But still, thinking back again, I can find one incoherence, a plot hole if you like.
Lets talk about Old Joe, He came back for the Rainmaker, to kill him while he’s still a kid to save his wife right.
But at the end when young Joe realized everything and seeing that with the death of Sara, Cid will be a vengeful Rainmaker when grown up. He killed himself to protect Sara and Cid and in the same time preventing the Cid from becoming the Rainmaker.
But think about it a sec, When we see Old Joe’s story from when he closed his loop when he was young,no one came from the future, to go after Sara and Cid. No one was trying to kill Cid, and Sara didn’t get killed, so Cid was not supposed to grow into Rainmaker in Old Joe’s timeline, but still, he existed.