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Looper (dir. Rian Johnson; Gordon-Levitt, Willis)
- Thread starter Expendable.
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beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
awesome awesome movie. funny and fun and lovely.
question w/r/t ending:
question w/r/t ending:
why was sara petting the dude in the road? was that significant?
I loved this movie for sure, but I was getting weird vibes from
Great movie, though. Man I love when Garret Dillahunt shows up in movies.
Jeff Daniels and that guy who kept getting shot in the legs. At first I was sure that Jeff was that guys older self, which is why he kept him around, but treated him like shit. Some of those scenes just felt kind of there. Like he was supposed to be a bigger player in the story. Anybody could have brought Bruce in. It just felt like there was more to their story.
Great movie, though. Man I love when Garret Dillahunt shows up in movies.
faceless007
Member
Just got back. Overall I love the visual inventiveness and use of the premise and world, though I feel like it dipped into generic Hollywood action tropes a few too many times.
But the film definitely made up for those with the rest of the story.
Was it ever explained how they send back what time the loopers need to be there to kill the victims? I think I saw a handwritten note saying 11:30 but don't remember anything else about that.
Bruce Willis mowing down henchman at the club and Sarah wanting to bang Joe after he gets hurt and she bandages him up and Joe wanting to save the hooker with a kid all made me roll my eyes.
Was it ever explained how they send back what time the loopers need to be there to kill the victims? I think I saw a handwritten note saying 11:30 but don't remember anything else about that.
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
through abe i'd guess
Yeah I agree, I thought he'd play a bigger part. Unless I missed it, I don't know why he "wanted to please" the old leader so much. He just came off as a weak "rival" character who in the end just got shot one too many times.
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
this will definitely make g.dillahunt blow up.
When Joe was with the Covert Affairs hooker, he revealed that he wanted to just have his hair messed with because it reminded him of his mother.
Haha I doubt that, but I like it this way.
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
oh duh,
for some reason i registered that both joes disappeared and she was stroking that goober sycophant who was riding the bike.
When examining it piece by piece, Looper owes a lot to a variety of genres. However this specific synthesis of sci-fi, neo-noir, and family drama is something actually original. I enjoyed it a lot. No one element of it blew me away so I can't call it top of the year or anything, but I honestly see no major flaws. No achilles heel in this one, unlike just about every single other big release this year.
That's right: I even think the ending worked. The film fuses three stories with thematic through-lines derived from the genres above:
Looper balances a lot, and I think its themes are very well-written developed. The snag is that none of its thematic aspirations are that profound. The messages are simple and executed professionally. They don't keep you thinking. What they do do is solidly frame all of that action. There are a lot of big, brassy moments in here. The film aims to thrill and succeeds wildly.
I think the film stumbles slightly on the plotting and pacing. Odd that I've seen complaints in here that it was slow, because the group I saw it with agreed that it went at a breakneck speed. One person fully didn't like it because it threw too much at you too fast. I would have enjoyed it if Johnson had spent even more time simply building up the world. Diving right in throws you off. Plus, there are some odd start-and-stop rhythms to it all (like the diner scene, which would be way more jarring if it weren't for Willis and JGL's rapport).
On a technical level the film is nice. Editing builds momentum in a great way, special effects are exhilarating without being overly ornamental, cinematography is tense and colorful. Not much in the way of visual meaning, but I did enjoy what seemed to me like a visual motif of filming Young Joe from a low angle, kinda stresses his detachment.
Oh, and the art design. Really great. Western and mobster accents all over the wardrobe, a wicked cool gun in the blunderbuss, a believable-looking future that has crumbled and is now weirdly sterile and quiet.
Looper is damn enjoyable. A lot of fun between its blending of genre, bombastic action, and satisfactory thematic statements. I've been considering that there's some freudian action going on with
but so far haven't come up with anything meaningful, and beyond that there's not a lot of complexity to parse out of the film. But if you test Looper solely on its ability to pull you into a fully formed world and excite you, it passes with flying colors.
(Also, I'm glad I chose to not post in this thread for a few days just in case. Lotta idiots getting liberal with the spoilers. I was pretty sure the policy was "tags until it seems reasonable to ditch them" but I guess that changed for this flick)
That's right: I even think the ending worked. The film fuses three stories with thematic through-lines derived from the genres above:
the tried-and-true sci-fi exploration of what a new technology does (good and bad [well mostly all bad here]), the noir examination of fatalism or defeatism in a crumbling society, and an empathetic story about the importance of mothers. The first two dominate the opening half of the film, but I didn't find the introduction of the family elements jarring. It contextualizes Joe's becoming a Looper and, thanks to the kid's honest performance, digs the emotional hooks even deeper. Though they were already pretty deep due to that swift but effective montage of Young Joe becoming Old Joe, true. Anyway, all of this builds up to the ending being 1) an attempt to use new technologies/abilities for good 2) a rejection of the predetermined nature of the loop while still containing an admittance of defeat from Joe; he's destined to die 3) Joe's selfless gift of what he could never have, a mother, to Cid. It works on every level. Would I have liked a depressing, fatalistic ending? Probably, but it's hard to gauge whether that would have been better than or as functional as this conclusion.
Looper balances a lot, and I think its themes are very well-written developed. The snag is that none of its thematic aspirations are that profound. The messages are simple and executed professionally. They don't keep you thinking. What they do do is solidly frame all of that action. There are a lot of big, brassy moments in here. The film aims to thrill and succeeds wildly.
I think the film stumbles slightly on the plotting and pacing. Odd that I've seen complaints in here that it was slow, because the group I saw it with agreed that it went at a breakneck speed. One person fully didn't like it because it threw too much at you too fast. I would have enjoyed it if Johnson had spent even more time simply building up the world. Diving right in throws you off. Plus, there are some odd start-and-stop rhythms to it all (like the diner scene, which would be way more jarring if it weren't for Willis and JGL's rapport).
On a technical level the film is nice. Editing builds momentum in a great way, special effects are exhilarating without being overly ornamental, cinematography is tense and colorful. Not much in the way of visual meaning, but I did enjoy what seemed to me like a visual motif of filming Young Joe from a low angle, kinda stresses his detachment.
Oh, and the art design. Really great. Western and mobster accents all over the wardrobe, a wicked cool gun in the blunderbuss, a believable-looking future that has crumbled and is now weirdly sterile and quiet.
Looper is damn enjoyable. A lot of fun between its blending of genre, bombastic action, and satisfactory thematic statements. I've been considering that there's some freudian action going on with
old joe replacing his mother with his wife and young joe almost doing that with sara and cid having such an odd relationship with his mom
(Also, I'm glad I chose to not post in this thread for a few days just in case. Lotta idiots getting liberal with the spoilers. I was pretty sure the policy was "tags until it seems reasonable to ditch them" but I guess that changed for this flick)
Wait...what? Did he tell her that? Is she his
mother
EDIT: I really loved the cinematography in this one. The montage scene when he was getting older was done perfectly. Great shots in that.
Hardly a flaw in this movie come to think about it. I really really love how the movie changed pace and feeling through out.
That leg dude gave me vibes of revolver ocelot...with the revolver and hover bike or what not. Lol
For people saying
why not have different Loopers kill ex-Loopers and not themselves, why does killing a young Looper mess up the timeline more than maiming one, etc.: time travel hasn't been successfully experimented with in the future, they have no idea how it works and their damn terrified of it. they use in ways that they know should work, but it seems like they are too timid to experiment (and rightly so). which is why even Young joe's suicide isn't all that sweet, it's very possible that this new timeline is eventually corrected if we follow a semi-Whatever Happened Happened mode; if it's a BttF mode then his act of self-sacrifice seemingly for good could cause further destruction, and so on. The outcome is unclear.
well the way they make fun of him and talk about how he shot his own foot off tell you that he's a kid trying hard to be a gangster who keeps failing to prove himself. then, given chances to do so, he fucks up over and over. he's a small fry sack of shit continually looking to please because he's been kept down his whole life, and I think that's all he needed to be.
I thought they said it was to let them know that they are done looping? Sworn that they clearly said that.
They also explained that the rainmaker forced them to closed the loops. That's why all of the loopers was killing their future selfs all of a sudden.
Oh, also, for the guy that said why the future couldn't get rid of a body
, joe in the beginning said that they have taggings or something to that nature
I mean that part was fairly obvious, but how he got in that position in the first place is what confuses me.
It seemed as he had tighter connections to Jeff's character than we were let known and he seemed to have a dislike for JGL from the moment we meet him. It seemed as if this character had a much larger part of this story, but was left out.
killertofu
Member
Part of me thought he was Jeff in the past/present, seeing how much time was spent on him
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
this makes some degree of sense actually.
This is what I thought, too. I wish they would have been able to finish and flesh out his story more, because that would have been pretty interesting.
I understand there was already enough in the film, a film which I loved, but I feel it would have been tighter to have left this character out. It feels loose and sloppy in an otherwise tight movie.
Man I loved the sequence of thirty years and Joe growing up. Bruce was so great in this movie.
Tpthrlldragster
Member
@boxofficemojo said:
Wow.
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
i'm from the future. go to china.
Lionel Mandrake
Member
Good movie, if a little strange.
Crowd reaction to the ending was also very unusual. It was dead silent (compounded by the lack of music when the credits rolled) Nobody said a word.
Crowd reaction to the ending was also very unusual. It was dead silent (compounded by the lack of music when the credits rolled) Nobody said a word.
xXBetter Off DadXx
Member
Same reaction at my theater too. Plus the theater lights didn't come on after the movie, so everyone was stumbling over themselves trying to leave. It was kind of surreal.
Really liked the movie.
Didn't really like the answer to question 2. That is the only "paradox" that doesn't have a satisfying answer to me.
Didn't really like the answer to question 2. That is the only "paradox" that doesn't have a satisfying answer to me.
I just originally assumed that the kid became the Rainmaker for a different reason in the original timeline, but he implied it's because old Joe killed his mom. But that doesn't make sense because he would be dead in that timeline.
PinkCrayon
Member
If it was true, Jeff Daniels would've been limping, and REALLY limping after OldJoe shoots Blues other foot.
NotTheGuyYouKill
Member
Saw this earlier today. Really, really enjoyed it. JGL and Willis were great as Young Joe and Old Joe. I liked all the supporting cast (Garret Dillahunt, that was awesome seeing him). The film looks visually gorgeous. Great noir film. Also Piper Perabo naked, nice.
I'm not the only one who predicted how the film would end at the halfway point, right? There's a lot of questions, but I can forgive them because what we saw on screen was so damned good. I'm sure I can fill in the gaps in my own mind.
I'm not the only one who predicted how the film would end at the halfway point, right? There's a lot of questions, but I can forgive them because what we saw on screen was so damned good. I'm sure I can fill in the gaps in my own mind.
About the ending,
was it supposed to be ambiguous? I think a lot of people at my theater was annoyed they didn't show the future to confirm the kid didn't become the Rainmaker, but I'm guessing that was the point. We don't know for sure he doesn't still become the Rainmaker. Young Joe just assumed him killing himself would prevent it. But in the original timeline, old Joe didn't kill the kid's mom, and the kid still became the Rainmaker. So we don't really know for sure.
NotTheGuyYouKill
Member
Right now, I'm running under the assumption that
Old Joe and Young Joe's battle here has created an alternate time line altogether, a parallel universe, something like that. Cid maybe won't grow up to be the Rainmaker since they've altered things so dramatically (Old Joe killed like fifty fucking guys and a kid). But since Old Joe and Young Joe occupy the same space, what happens to one happens to the other. Or something. This time travel shit just fries your brain.
JoshuaJSlone
Member
Kind of bugged me too. Regardless of who'd send the loopers back, some/most of them wouldn't be ready to go. It seems like the Rainmaker was being something of a crazy menace even beyond that, though, so their worries might not have been completely self-centered.
Different standards for different things. If a filmmaker doesn't want their time travel nitpicked, don't make a time travel movie.maquiladora said:
I've thoroughly enjoyed him as two murderers involved in time travel; here's hoping for more.
beelzebozo
Jealous Bastard
yes, this role certainly elevates him
Seriously, though, the man is a genius. If you haven't seen him on "Raising Hope", you're missing out.
Dude wil never blow up (except literally in some of his movies, lolz; punny, beezle, very punny). If it were gonna happen, it would have years ago.
China BO of a Hollywood movie outdoing the NA BO on OW?
Sign of the apocalypse.
jokingbird
Member
I enjoyed the movie. Pretty fun ride, was a little surprised to see it took place in the future. For some reason, I thought the movie was in the present with the time traveling being from the future.
One thing I really liked is how Cid's toys and posters were the basis for his mafia men in the future.
reptilescorpio
Member
Loved it, everything was great and perfectly executed.
Also loved what I assume was an homage towards the end
Also loved what I assume was an homage towards the end
with the Mad Max bike vs. shotgun standoff, always did love that in Mad Max and it worked great here too.
The only thing that bugged me was
Also the
How did the Looper group know that they had let one of them go? Considering you kill someone in the middle of nowhere, how would they know? Do they have tracking techniques for future people?
Also the
scene where the friend's future self was slowly falling apart was fucked up. Really freaked me out
reptilescorpio
Member
Present day Loopers are probably expected to return to base within 2-3 hours of the execution to check in and hand over their share of the silver.
This! Scene was so disturbing, not sure I've ever seen a scene quite like it before
But then
the first guy could have given the silver over, say "yeah, I killed him!". The people in charge of the Loopers seemed to know why they had fucked up
reptilescorpio
Member
Good point. A tracker wouldn't make much sense since it is travelling through time. Maybe something to do with the disposal point? Could also mean that a Looper could not kill any future person, just take the silver and tell the future person to stay quiet about it.
Time travel!
It was magic is the answer to all questions!
killertofu
Member
She wanted to smang?
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