Looper

In 2004, an unknown writer/director named Shane Carruth made a film about time travel named Primer. I was one of the, I can only imagine, few people who saw this film in the theater. I was thoroughly blown away. I have probably seen it, literally, a dozen times since, and it still never ceases to amaze me. I never thought anyone would release another time travel movie, at least not this soon, that would meet or surpass it, but Rian Johnson has done just that, with his new film Looper.

Looper tells the story of Joe (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), an assassin who kills targets that are sent back in time from the future. The logic is, in the future, everyone is so easily trackable, that it is impossible to kill someone without the police knowing it, and being able to easily identify the killer. Therefore, the mob sends the target back in time, where they can no longer be tracked, and has someone like Joe kill them in the past. When Joe's next target is his future self (played by Bruce Willis), though, things become much more complicated.

I don't want to say too much, as I feel like this film could be easily spoiled. I will say, though, that I loved it. Not surprising, though, as Johnson's previous films have all been fantastic. Johnson's dystopian "present", which is our future, feels like something that could genuinely happen thirty or so years from now. Gordon-Levitt and Willis's back and forth is great. They are, genuinely, cut from the same cloth as characters, and you can see the youthful impetuousness in Joe and the aged wisdom (and desperation) in Willis.

To be honest, the make up prosthetics that Gordon-Levitt wears always bugged me in the trailers, but, as I was watching the film, I definitely got used to it.