Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Please continue pre-release discussion here.

Movie:
"Looper" (Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, Jeff Daniels, Piper Perabo, Noah Segan)

Release Date:
9/28/2012

Rating:
R (for strong violence, language, some sexuality/nudity (you see a girl’s rear for a bit, and some ittie bittie titties) and drug content throughout)

Running Time:
118min. (1h. 58m.)

Budget:
$50 million (estimated)

IMDb Synopsis:


IMDb Info and Rating:
8.5 (6,372 votes as of 9/29/12)

Rotten Tomatoes:
Fresh:168 Rotten:13 (93% as of 9/29/12)

Metacritic:
84 metascore ('Universal acclaim reviews' as of 9/29/12)

Trailer:
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Poster Art:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...oster-quad.jpg

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Paul Dano is in this? huh. I didn't notice him in any of the trailers I've seen.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

He appears in the trailers but very briefly. I think he appears even less than the blink-and-you'll-miss-it footage of Piper Perabo in the trailers.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

thank you!

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Caught a screening of Looper tonight in the Bay Area, was excited to check it out after reading the interesting premise and seeing the well put together trailer. Plus I'm a fan of sci fi and I thought Rian Johnson's Brick was great (Brothers Bloom underwhelmed me).

It was a great movie. The advertising for this movie was perfect, I won't be giving anything away, but everyone does a fantastic job and the movie has more going on than I anticipated. It takes it's time to build up the story and characters before really rolling into gear, but once it does it had me completely hooked and I was super interested to see what would happen next.

No, the makeup on Joseph Gordon Levitt does not detract from the movie or his performance.

I'd say ***1/2 out of ****, I look forward to seeing it again. I'm in for whatever Rian Johnson has coming next too

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

nice review. don't forget to vote.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

I saw it last night for free through Gofobo.

It was completely different from what I was expecting, much more complex and layered. Not predictable (at least for me). Terrific performances all around. I'm not sure I got everything and I'm looking forward to repeat viewings to further sort it out. Not that it's all about the mechanics of time travel and the paradoxes etc. It's about much more than that and the time travel, while clearly the framework of the film, becomes almost secondary.

Masterful filmmaking. I voted ****1/2.

Edit: This has nothing to do with the film but the theater was full (comes with "free") and some were turned away. (With Gofobo, they tell you the passes will be overbooked and some may not get in.) When we went into the theater, it was going very slowly. I was perplexed. When we got closer I saw they were "wanding" everybody and looking inside women's purses. They said it was because of the incident in Colorado and also to prevent video piracy. When we got in they announced that they were told to collect cell phones (which I don't believe - what a nightmare) but they weren't doing that but if anyone turned one on during the movie they would be thrown out.

Anyone else ever run across something like this?

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

I, too, saw it last night at a free screening. I thought it was great. Entertaining, violent, complex but not convoluted. A solid 4/5.

They were also handing out these at the screening:

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

You just described a majority of free and test screenings.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

His part is rather small.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

^Yeah, that is standard for most advanced screenings and has been happening for years.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Really? I hadn't been to one since Warrior last year and they didn't do it then.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

They didn't use the wand on anybody at my screening, but they had security guys with night vision or infrared cameras making sure no one was recording it.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

We had that too.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Not uncommon for studios to do when a movie hasn't been released yet. Tapes for screenings, for example, are usually transported by studio staff (not contractors or security guards).

Last movie I remember this happening was when I saw <b>127 Hours</b> early.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

My review:

Doing a concept for a sci-fi movie isn't too difficult. It's probably the easiest part about making the film. Take our world, and just juice it up differently. Let's say currency is now time, and everyone transfer it through their skin. Or we're all batteries enslaved by a machine hive-mind. Or people can enter your dreams.

For the average sci-fi film, this is enough to fill about half of the running time. You have a voiceover or a character explaining how things work in this world, and you get some nice little FX set pieces to hold your audience's attention.

The problem is, at some point you run out of the show and have to start with the tell. And the <i>average</i> sci-fi film that hits your local multiplex does a really, really bad job with this. By the time you actually have to tell the story, most filmmakers have either forgotten that there <i>should</i> be a story, or have been so busy working on the intricacies of their universe that they're not able to pull a worthwhile story through the maze of rules they have created.

Luckily, Rian Johnson is not most filmmakers. <b>Looper</b> throws in two separate, major sci-fi developments:

One, time travel has been invented in the future but has become highly illegal. Only the most powerful crime syndicate in the world has access to it, and uses it to disappear people into the past.

Two... well, two's not in the trailers (that I can remember).

The story itself is about straightforward as a hard-boiled time-travel crime story can get, although there's one chicken-and-egg sequence that I am still trying to wrap my head around. The crime story turns into a revenge tale. Then the entire movie suddenly shifts towards becoming an elegiac discourse on the power of love and the endless cycle of human abuse that reminded me of <i>A Perfect World</i>. But with science fiction.

There's a lot of points I wasn't too keen on (and the ending is a bit predictable) but this is still one of the better sci-fi films of the last decade. You'd be doing yourself a disservice if you miss it.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

^ Great review.

Since this is the review thread, I don't know if spoiler tags are necessary, but...

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

I would say yes. Reviews threads should contain Spoiler tags unless the topic specifically says "Spoilers" in it. A lot of people want to read other peoples opinions of movies before dropping $14 and 2 hours+.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

I would say no. If you want to discuss the movie with spoilers go to the original thread.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Yeah. Original thread deserves spoilers. Reviews don't. That's part of the point of a review. To review.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Just got back from seeing it and it was bloody fucking cool! Bruce Willis is the Terminator! This one will probably go on my top 10 of the year. I did enjoy it more than The Avengers, though. Still not better than Dredd, but that's just personal opinion.

Good shit right here!

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

BTW, Piper Perabo shows of the itty, bitties. You're welcome.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Review threads don't need spoilers, but I'd say usually the first week or so most people do it out of courtesy.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

I really expected not to like this one. I have to nitpick the time travel stuff...

STILL, this movie was awesome. Great action and actors working together. Fun fun movie.

Re: Looper (Johnson, 2012) — The Reviews Thread
 

Saw it.

My only beef with the movie was your beef. If criminals have access to time travel, they would be using it to do a hell of a lot more than what they were in this movie. I think TimeCop did a better job of illustrating what would happen in that regard than this movie. Still, the time travel is just a plot device for this movie, not the actual plot.

Overall, very well made. The best parts of the movie are what you can see from the world created that aren't mentioned or made part of the plot (rich people non-chalantly killing the poor in the street). JGL did a great job, and if they want to re-boot Die Hard with him as John McClane, I say go for it. Too many twists and turns to go into detail, but good sci-fi that actually was sci-fi, not an action movie posing as sci-fi.

That said, I see this getting bad word of mouth. A lot of the TV ads are trying to make it look like another Willis action movie. While there is some good action, it is far from that in just about every regard. Joe Public will go on thinking it's one thing, and when they get what it truly is, they will hate it and trash it to their friends. I hope I'm wrong, but that's what I see happening.