Three stars. Rating: R, for strong violence, gore, profanity, nudity, sexuality and drug use
By Derrick Bang
Clever time travel stories can be
intriguing head-scratchers; I just wish Looper weren’t so vicious, nasty and
morally bankrupt.
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| Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt, right), a professional assassin for a mob boss in the year 2044, should have killed his future self, "Old Joe" (Bruce Willis), in order to retire gracefully on his hard-earned savings. But Old Joe isn't interested in being offed, and in fact offers a partnership with his hot-headed younger self, in order to tackle a bigger enemy whose activities will affect them both. Confused yet? The time-travel issues only get more complicated... |
This is one of those stories
populated solely by thugs, killers and other assorted low-life scum; by the
time our one truly sympathetic character steps onto the stage, we’ve been
numbed almost senseless.
Writer/director Rian Johnson is
known for his off-center sensibilities, which have ranged from the whimsically
eccentric (2008’s The Brothers Bloom) to the downright brutal (a few episodes
of TV’s Breaking Bad). His career-making debut, 2005’s Brick, starred
Joseph Gordon-Levitt as a teenage loner who turns amateur Sam Spade in order to
figure out who killed his former girlfriend; rarely has high school looked so
corrupt and seamy.
Johnson re-unites with
Gordon-Levitt for Looper, another in a recent line of science-fiction
concepts that takes place in a near future where society and compassionate
behavior have gone straight to hell. (See In Time, Repo Men and the remake
of Total Recall, among others.) Such films borrow strongly from Blade
Runner, but generally without the intelligence, wit and fascinating ethical
undercurrents of that 1982 classic.
That said, I give Johnson credit
for an intriguing premise. The year is 2044, the setting a major American
metropolis that has failed, its dilapidated infrastructure barely able to
support the 99 percent who now appear to live in slums, and look with envy upon
the few sophisticates wealthy enough to purchase things such as slick hover
vehicles. The economy has fallen apart, and manufacturing appears to have
stopped; as a result, the “common folk” drive old cars and live in apartments
that could have sprung from a 1950s-era Raymond Chandler novel.
And, as with the sci-fi/western
mash-up Joss Whedon concocted for his short-lived but much-loved TV series, Firefly, the weapons of choice are 19th century pistols and a shotgun-esque
nightmare known as a blunderbuss.
Time travel doesn’t yet exist,
but it’s known to have been invented 30 years in the future, where it’s illegal
and available only on the black market. Since disposing of a dead body is near
impossible in 2074, mobsters employ time travel in order to “vanish” their
enemies. The hapless victims pop up at pre-determined spots in 2044, where a
“looper” — a hired killer — blows them away and then cremates the remains. No
muss, no fuss.
