A twisty sci-fi classic.

Rating: 9/10 (29 January 2014)

After enjoying Rian Johnson's first film Brick a few years back, I was inspired to check what films he was working on. I noticed Looper in his bio and upon reading what it was about, I was instantly hooked and couldn't wait to see it.
I looked at the film as a sort of great hope for Hollywood. An R rated Sci-fi film that was wholly original. If it could succeed at the box office, then there was hope that Hollywood would start to green light other films that don't just have numbers in their titles. It's safe to say that Looper might very well live up to my expectations.
Looper takes place in the year 2044 where Joe, played by Joseph Gordon- Levitt, works as a Looper. His job is to dispose of bodies that are sent back in time from the year 2072. The job seems to be a piece of cake until his future self is sent back. Joe's reluctance to kill his older self sets up a chain of events that will change the future forever.
In Brick, Johnson puts a noir twist on high school. He administers the same treatment to Looper, which feels like a Sci-fi noir film set in the not too distant future.
Unlike many Sci-fi films from the 70's, Looper envisions a future society not unlike the world we live in today. Whereas many of the old Sci-fi films don't hold up today, Looper should stand the test of time 30 years from now. The future is not portrayed as a new and shiny metropolis filled with flying cars or slick gadgets.
Instead, it's a more bleak and mundane version of our world today. The cars are the same except they've been outfitted with solar panels and the gap between the haves and the have nots is even wider than it is today.
Looper is a tight, slick film that knows it's cool. Time travel films can sometimes collapse upon itself, but Looper never feels confusing. The rules are laid out to us and the film sticks to them. Looper never tries to bog the viewer down with the ins and outs of time travel, instead it forces you to invest in the characters.
This is where the film really succeeds. Joseph Gordon-Levitt continues to turn in great performances and solidifies himself as a legitimate box office draw. JGL also has many of Willis' mannerisms and looks down pat. The slight crack of a smile, the furrowed brow gives the illusion that we are watching a young Willis with hair. Bruce Willis returns to form and actually seems like he's invested in the film. Jeff Daniels steals every scene he's in as a mobster sent from the future to run the Looper organization.
Unlike most Hollywood films, Looper's characters aren't portrayed as black and white. Many of them, including Willis and JGL, are operating in shades of grey. We aren't totally sure we agree with the older Joe, but we can understand his actions. We can't help but applaud, but at the same time, scratch our heads at the younger Joe, who so dedicated to his profession that he is determined to finish the job and dispose of his future self.
The last act of the film slows down a bit and introduces new important characters. This is where some viewers may be turned off and could get confused. In the end, the threads tie together and the pay off is worth it.
The other problem with Looper is the same thing that plagues all time travel films and that is the inevitable loop holes. I've thought about Looper a lot since I watched it and I have indeed found a lot of loop holes and paradoxes. In the end, Looper doesn't want you to get caught up in time travel and diverging timelines, it's more concerned about making the viewer think about what it means to make the right decisions in life that will determine the future. A future where you can live with the decisions you've made or be destined to relive them in an endless loop.