Looper, or Blooper?

Rating: 6/10 (21 October 2012)

What did I want from Looper? Rian Johnson's science fiction film throws you right into the loop, so why not do the same?
Picture a tennis match between Roger Federer and a P.E. teacher. That could be the finest method of description for this cycle of exchange in quality. We were served with a highly original premise that set us up for a thrilling two hours, only for the return to be anything but. The binary opposition in this picture that is foremost conspicuous, regards no thematic presence, yet is the conflict of quality and enjoyment you attain from it. Some moments in Looper are highly respectable; we are witnesses to great acting, a unique premise and sensationally explained narrative complexities. When dealing with time travel in film, the likelihood of having your audience disperse from the theatre with more questions to ask than they had before they arrived is not uncommon. Looper phenomenally clarifies the enquiries you may have gathered throughout the feature, though it fails in many other respects.
If maintaining its form as a time travel film was not intricate enough, the writer decides to evolve the concept of telekinesis within the already crowded plot. Though we are lead to believe this incorporation exists as no more than a device to show us of the 2044 time period, we eventually discover its fundamental contribution to the climax. This is disappointing. You begin to suspect the projectionist of switching reels with a different film, as you feel two separate stories are being told, and all you paid to see was Joseph Gordon-Levitt's interaction with Bruce Willis (his older self), which you get briefly, and is the prominence of pleasure one gains from the film. Another disappointing element to Looper would be its unnecessary inclusion of comedy and romance. I have no issue with these genres, though I must when their involvement in a narrative has about as much place as Looper will in my DVD collection. It will not be there! If one is to integrate these aspects into an abundant plot, at least do so with some class or dignity. The humour was so forced, you almost felt as if you had to laugh to prevent the screening from feeling awkward; the editor seemingly permits moments of silence for us to commence in robotic laughter, though I am confident in saying it failed to work. Meanwhile, Sara (Emily Blunt) engages in an inevitable yet needless instance of intimacy with Joe (Gordon-Levitt), which is not again revisited and you feel no desire for their peculiar relationship to progress, if initiate at all. While minor components of the two hours, these, along with the evolution of telekinetic powers cause a dynamic post-summer blockbuster, where dynamic is not a positive, and renovates Looper into our final product and perhaps more appropriate title: Blooper.
So, what did I want from Looper? The theatrical trailers and copious varied marketing insinuated a simple narrative, as simple as time travel can be. By this, I mean the underlying premise of our protagonist Joe and the complications that arise with his future self. While this occurred at times during the 118 minutes, the enjoyment levels were indeed elevated amongst the otherwise unsatisfactory sequences, that the studios' marketing departments did a capital job of concealing. Taken as a whole, Looper certainly does not fulfil the expectations, principally due its attempt to show and tell too much, like the kid whose plentiful discussion on their generic item overshadows the next child on the list with their time machine, whom gets cut short because of their disappointing predecessor.