Looper (film)
Looper | |
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![]() Theatrical release poster | |
Directed by | Rian Johnson |
Written by | Rian Johnson |
Produced by |
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Starring | |
Cinematography | Steve Yedlin |
Edited by | Bob Ducsay |
Music by | Nathan Johnson |
Production companies |
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Distributed by | |
Release dates |
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Running time | 118 minutes[1] |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $30 million[2] |
Box office | $166,521,158[3] |
Looper is a 2012 American science fiction action film written and directed by Rian Johnson. The film stars Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Emily Blunt. In Looper, time travel is invented by the year 2074 and, though immediately outlawed, is used by criminal organizations to send those they want killed into the past where they are killed by "loopers", assassins paid with silver bars strapped to their targets. Joe, a looper, encounters himself when his older self is sent back in time to be killed.
Looper was selected as the opening film of the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. It was released to positive reviews in Australia on September 27, 2012,[4] and in the US and the UK on September 28, 2012 by TriStar Pictures and Alliance Films.[5][6]
Plot
In the futuristic gangland of year 2044, 25-year-old Joseph Simmons (Gordon-Levitt), works for a mafia company in Kansas City as a "looper". Loopers kill and dispose of agents sent back in time by their employers from corporate headquarters in Shanghai from the year 2074. Loopers are foot soldiers, paid with silver on the condition that all targets must never escape. When crime bosses want to end a looper's contract, they send the older version of a looper back to be killed by his younger self and pay with gold, referred to as "closing the loop". Joe's boss, Abe (Daniels), was sent back in time to manage the loopers and also owns a club where Joe frequents and spends time with Suzie (Perabo), a showgirl.
One night, Seth (Dano), Joe's friend and a fellow looper, visits him in a panic telling him that he was supposed to close his own loop but couldn't do it. Joe hides Seth in his safe and visits Abe, who tells Joe he can either give up half of the silver he has saved as a looper or give up Seth. Joe eventually tells Abe where he hid Seth, and is wracked with guilt over betraying his friend. Seth is tortured to lure his future self (Brennan) to the gangsters, who kill them both.
When Joe is sent to close a loop, he hesitates when he recognizes himself (Willis). When Old Joe manages to escape, Young Joe cuts a message into his arm to get Old Joe to visit him at a diner. As they have breakfast, Old Joe explains that when the Rainmaker, the mastermind behind the time travel assassinations, sent his men to send Joe back, they killed his wife (Xu). He killed his captors and sent himself back in order to kill the boy who becomes the Rainmaker. Young Joe still plans on killing his older self to fulfill his contract and escape the mafia. However, they’re both forced to flee when they are attacked by Abe's men led by Kid Blue (Segan), but not before Young Joe tears a part of a map out of Old Joe's pocket with coordinates and ten digits.
Young Joe follows the coordinates to a farm house owned by Sara (Blunt), who lives with her son Cid (Gagnon). When Joe shows Sara the map, Sara recognizes the ten digits as Cid's birthday and the serial number of the hospital he was born in, prompting Joe to explain the situation about the Rainmaker. However, when the database shows two other children born on that date and in that hospital, Old Joe decides to systematically kill all three children. After killing the first of the three boys, he changes his mind on the second when he sees it is Suzie's son.
As Young Joe and Sara become close, he learns that she is a telekinetic, and that Cid was raised by Sara's sister for most of his life until she was killed, and Cid doesn’t believe that Sara is his real mother. One morning, they are attacked by Jesse (Dillahunt), who is killed when Cid falls down the stairs and lets out a telekinetic blast. His extraordinary telekinetic powers – which are far more powerful than most telekinetics - cause Joe to realize that Cid is the Rainmaker. At that moment, Old Joe makes a second attempt to kill Suzie's son, but sees through Young Joe that Cid is the right kid before being taken by Kid Blue.
Young Joe tells Sara and Cid to drive away while Old Joe is taken to Abe. When Old Joe breaks free, he kills everyone except Kid Blue. As the two Joe's confront each other near Sara's house, Kid Blue attacks and is killed by Young Joe. Old Joe then blocks Sara and Cid from driving away and when they try to escape into the corn fields, Old Joe shoots Cid without killing him, prompting Cid to let out another telekinetic blast. Before Cid can kill Old Joe, Sara calms him down and gets him to accept her as his mother. Old Joe tries to kill Cid again, but Sara stands between them. Young Joe realizes that Sara's death at Old Joe's hands will lead to Cid becoming the Rainmaker, thus creating a closed time loop. He decides to kill himself to erase Old Joe from existence, save Sara and prevent the Rainmaker from rising. In the aftermath, Sara finds Young Joe's silver in the van Old Joe drove.
The final scenes show a parallel between Joe and Cid where Sara is shown combing her hand through each characters hair at two different points in time. We see Cid's jawline but Joe's is left a mystery begging the question, "Who is the Rainmaker?"
Cast
- Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Joe Simmons
- Bruce Willis as Old Joe
- Emily Blunt as Sara Rollins
- Paul Dano as Seth Richards
- Noah Segan as Kid Blue
- Piper Perabo as Suzie
- Jeff Daniels as Abe
- Pierce Gagnon as Cid Harrington
- Xu Qing as Old Joe's Wife
- Tracie Thoms as Beatrix
- Frank Brennan as Old Seth
- Garret Dillahunt as Jesse Goldhar
- Nick Gomez as Dale Walters
- Marcus Hester as Zach Henderson
Production
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b8/Rian_Johnson_%26_Joseph_Gordon-Levitt_by_Gage_Skidmore.jpg/220px-Rian_Johnson_%26_Joseph_Gordon-Levitt_by_Gage_Skidmore.jpg)
Looper was written and directed by Rian Johnson. After Johnson released The Brothers Bloom in 2008, he re-teamed with producer Ram Bergman, who produced Johnson's previous two films, with the goal of starting production of Looper in 2009.[7] In May 2010, Joseph Gordon-Levitt was cast in one of the lead roles, which he would play after completing Premium Rush.[8] Later in the month, Bruce Willis was also cast.[9] In the following October, Emily Blunt joined Gordon-Levitt and Willis.[10] Noah Segan, Jeff Daniels, and Piper Perabo were cast in January 2011.[11]
Filming began in Louisiana on January 24, 2011.[12]
Makeup artist Kazuhiro Tsuji created the prosthetics that Gordon-Levitt wore in the film so that he would physically resemble Willis.[13]
The film's score was composed by Nathan Johnson, Rian Johnson's cousin.[14]
Talking about Looper and time travel in film, Rian Johnson said:
Even though it's a time-travel movie, the pleasure of it doesn't come from the mass of time travel. It's not a film like Primer, for instance, where the big part of the enjoyment is kind of working out all the intricacies of it. For Looper, I very much wanted it to be a more character-based movie that is more about how these characters dealt with the situation time travel has brought about. So the biggest challenge was figuring out how to not spend the whole movie explaining the rules and figure out how to put it out there in a way that made sense on some intuitive level for the audience; then get past it and deal with the real meat of the story.[14]
Release
Looper premiered on September 6, 2012 at the opening night of the Toronto International Film Festival.[15] The film was then released theatrically in the United States on September 28, 2012.[16] The film's studio Endgame Entertainment negotiated a deal with FilmDistrict at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2011, for FilmDistrict to release the film in the United States through TriStar Pictures.[17]
The Chinese release of the film reintegrates a substantial number of scenes set in Shanghai that were edited out due to pacing reasons. The move was requested by Chinese production company DMG Entertainment in order to further appeal to Chinese audiences.[18]
Johnson released a free audio commentary on SoundCloud to be downloaded and listened to during the film, with the warning: "Needless to say, this is NOT to be listened to on a first viewing, or before you've seen the film."[19]
Home media
The film was released on Blu-ray and DVD in North America on December 31, 2012.[20][21] The film will also be released on January 28, 2013 in online UK stores and a general release on February 4, 2013.[22] The US iTunes store released the film on 12/21/2012 to own in HD and SD forms as part of an early release deal it has on certain films.
Reception
Critical response
Looper holds a 94% "Certified Fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 231 reviews and an average score of 8.1/10, with the reported consensus: "As thought-provoking as it is thrilling, Looper delivers an uncommonly smart, bravely original blend of futuristic sci-fi and good old-fashioned action."[23] On Metacritic, the film holds an 84/100 average rating based on 44 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[24]
Toronto International Film Festival
James Mottram of Total Film gave Looper 5 stars out of 5, concluding that it was "[t]he best sci-fi movie since Moon. The best time-travel yarn since 12 Monkeys. And one of the best films of 2012."[25] Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter gave the film a positive review, calling it "an engaging, neatly worked-out time-travel sci-fi thriller", but also criticizing the effects involved in making Gordon-Levitt resemble Willis: "At first, the effect is a bit odd, and you can't quite put your finger on what's off; then it feels downright weird to be looking at a version of Gordon-Levitt who is no longer the actor you've known for a few years now."[26] Peter Debruge of Variety also gave the film a positive review, writing that writer-director Johnson's "grandly conceived, impressively mounted third feature shows a giddy, geeky interest in science-fiction, then forces it into the back seat and lets the multidimensional characters drive. In a genre infamous for loose ends, this thinking man's thriller marshals action, romance and a dose of very dark comedy toward a stunning payoff."[27]
General release
Kim Newman of Empire magazine gave Looper 5 stars out of 5, writing, "Intelligent science-fiction sometimes seems an endangered species—too much physics and there's a risk of creating something cold and remote, too many explosions and get lost in the multiplex. Looper isn't perfect, but it pulls off the full Wizard Of Oz: it has a brain, courage and a heart."[28] Noel Murray of The A.V. Club gave the film an A− grade, writing, "Looper is a remarkable feat of imagination and execution, entertaining from start to finish, even as it asks the audience to contemplate how and why humanity keeps making the same rotten mistakes."[29] Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times gave the film a positive review, writing, "Looper is way inventive but it wears its creativity lightly, like it's no big deal. This is a highflying, super-stylish science-fiction thriller that brings a fresh approach to mind-bending genre material. We're not always sure where this time-travel film is going, but we wouldn't dream of abandoning the ride."[30]
Claudia Puig of USA Today gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4, writing, "Looper's heady blend of time travel, gritty action and a jot of romance is such a thrilling and cerebral mind-bender that it will likely have moviegoers gathering outside the theater afterward to hash out details of its intricately constructed universe. Not that that's a bad thing."[31] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone also gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4, praising the performances of Willis and Gordon-Levitt and concluding, "Lacing tremendously exciting action with touching gravity, Looper hits you like a shot in the heart."[32] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times also gave the film 3.5 stars out of 4, praising its screenplay and writing, "Looper, a smart and tricky sci-fi story, sidesteps the paradoxes of time travel by embracing them. Most time travel movies run into trouble in the final scenes, when impossibilities pile up one upon another. This film leads to a startling conclusion that wipes out the story's paradoxes so neatly it's as if it never happened."[33]
Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a B+ grade, writing, "The time swivels in Looper evoke some of Inception's fancy temporal tricks (some of which, of course, also involved Gordon-Levitt straddling multiple time zones at once). But it's the glimpses of Children of Men-like societal dystopia that give the movie its real weight".[34] Richard Corliss of Time magazine gave the film a positive review, calling Looper a "hybrid, mashing Quentin Tarantino and Philip K. Dick into a species of pulp science fiction" and also writing, "A fanciful film with the patina of hyper-realism, Looper is well served by actors who behave not as if they were dropped carelessly into the future but spent their whole desperate lives there."[35] Dana Stevens of Slate gave the film a mixed review, writing, "Looper felt to me like a maddening near-miss: It posits an impossible but fascinating-to-imagine relationship—a face-to-face encounter between one's present and future self, in which each self must account for its betrayal of the other—and then throws away nearly all the dramatic potential that relationship offers."[36]
Audiences polled by the market research firm CinemaScore gave the film a B+ grade on average.[37]
Awards and nominations
Top ten lists
The film was included in the following top ten lists for the best films of 2012:
Publication | Rank |
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James Berardinelli | 1[46] |
MTV | 3[47] |
The Skinny | 4[48] |
New York Post | 8[49] |
Total Film | 9[50] |
The Huffington Post | 10[51] |
The Atlantic Wire | N/A[52] |
Further reading
- "Payback Time" by Iain Stasukevich, American Cinematographer magazine Vol. 93, No. 10; October 2012, ISSN 0002-7928, Hollywood, California; pages 64–70, 72-75. Behind-the-scenes article focusing on the film's camera work, lighting, etc. 11 pages, 20 photos.
References
- ^ "Looper". British Board of Film Classification. Retrieved September 29, 2012.
- ^ Kaufman, Amy (September 27, 2012). "Animated 'Hotel Transylvania' to scare off 'Looper'". Los Angeles Times.
- ^ "Looper". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved January 6, 2013.
- ^ "Australians to see Looper a day before the rest of the world". August 7, 2012. Retrieved August 16, 2012.
- ^ "US Release Date". June 9, 2012. Retrieved June 14, 2012.
- ^ "UK Release Date". June 27, 2012. Retrieved June 30, 2012.
- ^ Zeitchik, Steven (September 17, 2008). "Rian Johnson's future target: 'Looper'". The Hollywood Reporter.
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(help) - ^ Kit, Borys (May 4, 2010). "Joseph Gordon-Levitt eyes two action thrillers". Reuters.
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(help) - ^ Fleming, Mike (May 14, 2010). "CANNES: Bruce Willis Plays Mature Joseph Gordon-Levitt In Time Travel Pic 'Looper'". Deadline.com.
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(help) - ^ McNary, Dave (October 1, 2010). "Emily Blunt set for 'Looper'". Variety.
{{cite journal}}
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(help) - ^ McNary, Dave; Coonan, Clifford (January 21, 2011). "Actors in 'Looper' group". Variety.
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(help) - ^ "Official Looper production blog".[verification needed]
- ^ Whipp, Glenn (August 31, 2012). "'Looper': Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Rian Johnson are a tight team". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved October 8, 2012.
- ^ a b Kit, Borys (September 27, 2012). "'Looper' Director Rian Johnson on Reuniting With Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Tackling Time Travel and His Love of 'Inception' (Q&A)". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Vlessing, Elan (September 6, 2012). "Toronto 2012: 'Looper's' Bruce Willis, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Emily Blunt Bring Star Power on Opening Night". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ McClintock, Pamela (September 29, 2012). "Box Office Report: 'Hotel Transylvania' Wins Friday, Headed For Record $38 Mil-Plus Debut". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ McNary, Dave (May 14, 2011). "TriStar, FilmDistrict set 'Looper' deal". Variety.
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(help) - ^ Zeitchik, Steven (June 19, 2012). "A more Sino-centric version of 'Looper' will be released in China". Los Angeles Times.
{{cite news}}
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(help) - ^ https://soundcloud.com/rcjohnso/looper-theatrical-commentary
- ^ Romano, Paul (November 19, 2012). "LOOPER Coming To Blu-Ray This December". ComicBookMovie.com. Retrieved November 20, 2012.
- ^ "Looper Blu-ray Release Date, Details and Cover Art". TheHDRoom.com. November 19, 2012. Retrieved November 20, 2012.
- ^ "Looper Blu-ray release announced". Blu-raydisc-reporter.com. November 7, 2012. Retrieved November 20, 2012.
- ^ "Looper". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved October 17, 2012.
- ^ "Looper Reviews, Ratings, Credits, and More". Metacritic. Retrieved October 17, 2012.
- ^ Mottram, James (September 6, 2012). "Looper review". Total Film. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ McCarthy, Todd (September 6, 2012). "Looper: Toronto Review". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Debruge, Peter (September 6, 2012). "Looper". Variety. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Newman, Kim (September 17, 2012). "Looper". Empire. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Murray, Noel (September 27, 2012). "Looper". The A.V. Club. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Turan, Kenneth (September 27, 2012). "Review: Gordon-Levitt and Willis take 'Looper' full circle". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Puig, Claudia (September 28, 2012). "Circling, action-packed story makes 'Looper' intriguing". USA Today. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Travers, Peter (September 27, 2012). "Looper". Rolling Stone. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Ebert, Roger (September 26, 2012). "Looper". Chicago Sun-Times. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Schwarzbaum, Lisa (September 26, 2012). "Looper". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Corliss, Richard (September 27, 2012). "Looper: (500) Days of The Terminator". Time. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ Stevens, Dana (September 28, 2012). "Looper". Slate. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ McClintock, Pamela (September 30, 2012). "Box Office Report: Sony's 'Hotel Transylvania' Smashes Records With $43 Mil Opening". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved October 4, 2012.
- ^ "National Board Of Review Best Film: 'Zero Dark Thirty'". Deadline.com. December 5, 2012. Retrieved December 5, 2012.
- ^ "The 2012 WAFCA Award Nominees". Retrieved December 9, 2012.
- ^ "The 18th Critics' Choice Movie Awards nominees". Broadcast Film Critics Association. Retrieved December 12, 2012.
- ^ ""The Master" rules 2012 CFCA Awards with 10 Nominations". CFCA. December 14, 2012. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
- ^ "Lincoln leads Houston Film Critic Society Awards with eight nominations Nominees". Retrieved December 17, 2012.
- ^ "Austin Film Critics Association". Retrieved December 28, 2012.
- ^ "Florida Film Critics Circle". Retrieved December 28, 2012.
- ^ "Online Film Critics Society". Retrieved December 28, 2012.
- ^ James Berardinelli. "Rewinding 2012 - The Top 10". James Berardinelli. Retrieved January 1, 2013.
- ^ "Best Movies Of 2012". MTV. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
- ^ "Light and Shade: The Films Of 2012". The Skinny. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
- ^ Lumenick, Lou. "Critics pick best films of 2012". New York Post. Retrieved December 8, 2012.
- ^ Kinnear, Simon. "50 Best Movies of 2012". Total Film. Retrieved December 12, 2012.
- ^ "Best Movies of 2012". Huffington Post. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
- ^ Richard Lawson. "The Best (and Worst) Movies of 2012". The Atlantic Wire. Retrieved December 14, 2012.
External links
- Official website
- Looper at IMDb
- Looper at AllMovie
- Looper at Box Office Mojo
- Looper at Metacritic
- Looper at Rotten Tomatoes
- Looper at The Numbers
- 2012 films
- 2010s science fiction films
- American films
- American science fiction films
- Fiction narrated by a dead person
- Tech noir films
- English-language films
- Films directed by Rian Johnson
- Dystopian films
- Films set in Kansas
- Films set in Shanghai
- Films set in the 2040s
- Films set in the 2070s
- Films shot in Louisiana
- Films shot in Shanghai
- Films shot anamorphically
- Time travel films
- TriStar Pictures films