Astoundingly average

Rating: 5/10 (14 October 2012)

I saw Looper touted as 'This generation's The Matrix' and thought that as unlikely as this was, I would give it a shot. Unfortunately, it did not even come close to living up to the expectations that it's own marketing campaign generated. Nothing about this film excited me. The whole premise of time travelling 'Loopers' is deeply flawed, and you are better off taking Daniels' character's advice and not thinking about it.
Gordon-Levitt adequately portrays a drug addled killer with zero personality and Willis barely gets enough screen time to convince us that Joe's life is worth saving (and still doesn't). There are barely any characters worth noting in this movie beyond the main characters, and even less likable ones.
The vision of the future portrayed in this movie is both depressing and lazy. We know it's the future because that Toyota Yaris has some cables glued to it. Maybe there were budget constraints?
Where the beginning of the film is reasonably fast paced and feels like the beginning of an action flick, it loses it's pace when the focus shifts to Blunt and her child and I found my interest really start to wane at this point. It feels to me like the makers of this movie thought that it is a lot more cerebral than it actually is (you can't ask us to dismiss intelligent interpretations of the plot in the opening scene and yet expect us to be entertained solely by it's flawed premise later on). I feel like Rian Johnson tried to do something unique with this film, but I don't think he necessarily judged it perfectly and in my opinion a few more action scenes may have livened things up enough to keep my attention.
I genuinely can't understand the level of praise for this movie, it was mildly entertaining in places but I couldn't recommend it as a great Sci-Fi Action Thriller.
5/10