There are no original movies anymore. This is the argument many people have about today’s blockbusters. Almost all movies follow some similar plot: there’s the typical boy-meets-girl romance, action movie with a car chase, psychological horror movie or little kid adventure.
Some movies do a pretty good job at masking their similarities, or some movies, like James Cameron’s “Avatar” just rip off Disney movies and don’t even try to hide it (if you didn’t already make the connection, it’s basically “Pocahontas” with blue people).
So, no movies are original, right? Wrong! For the first time in over 10 years, I was absolutely astounded at the end of a movie.
“Looper”, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis and Emily Blunt was, in one word, amazing.
I’ll admit, when I first sat down in the cozy theatre, I was more excited for the previews than the actual movie. I’ll also admit that in the beginning, I was a bit confused. But within 10 minutes, I was hooked.
Taking place in the year 2044, Gordon-Levitt plays Joe, a 20-something ex-criminal who was recruited as a hired gun, or “looper,” at a young age. Thirty years in the future, time travel exists and is used by mobs to send targets to the past to be killed. That way, there’s no evidence: the perfect crime. Joe’s job is to wait for these targets and shoot them as soon as they appear in his time.
Have I lost you yet? If you’re confused, that’s pretty much how I felt at first. But wait, there’s more.
When a target is sent to the past, they’re sent with their head covered and payment in the form of silver blocks attached to their back. But, when a looper goes to collect his payment and finds blocks of gold, that means he has just killed his future self, which is a process called “closing the loop.” When this happens, a looper is allowed to retire and live out the next 30 years of their life however they choose.
But, when something goes wrong and Joe realizes his target is himself in 30 years, he hesitates, and the older Joe (Willis) escapes.
I’m not going to go too much further into the plot, because I don’t want to ruin anything (or confuse you anymore), just trust me when I say, it’s a well-thought process.
Even with this brief summary of a complex movie, I think it’s already safe to say this movie has never been done.
Gordon-Levitt does an amazing job playing a younger Willis, from his facial expressions to his voice, the relationship is very believable. The hours of makeup didn’t hurt, either.
Between “Inception,” another rare, original movie, “The Dark Knight Rises” and “Looper,” I see a very, very bright future for Gordon-Levitt. He’s come a long way since his nerdy role in “10 Things I Hate About You.”
Willis plays his typical hard-core role, and he still does it well. I mean, there’s really not much else to say about that.
In terms of script, effects and all that technological movie stuff, I’m no expert, but I feel I am a cultured enough movie watcher to know there was an experienced team behind this production.
Dialogues and interactions between characters were very believable and natural. Narration, spoken by Gordon-Levitt, was very explanatory, but not unnecessarily so. It was needed to explain the setting and background, but never got too wordy.
The only thing I thought should have been changed was the clothing and some set design, like the inside of Blunt’s house. How far have we come since 1982? Our hair got smaller and our clothes got tighter. Even in the past 10 years so much about our culture has changed. The only big different in “Looper” was that it seemed like America had gone extremely downhill: lots of homeless people and violence in the streets.
I really wasn’t too excited to see this movie. But when it ended, I just had to take a second to say “wow.” It is a well-produced original movie, which is almost impossible to say about movies these days.
