Looper

Plot

In 2044, 25-year-old Joe works for a Kansas City crime syndicate as an assassin or "looper". Since tracking systems in the future of 2074 have made it nearly impossible to dispose of bodies undetected, the syndicate sends its enemies back in time to be executed. Managed by a man from the future named Abe, loopers kill and dispose of victims whose faces are concealed, recovering silver bars attached to their targets as payment. To hide connections to the syndicate, any loopers who survive until 2074 are sent back and killed by their own younger selves, referred to as "closing the loop". These targets are identified by gold bars instead of silver, marking the end of the looper's contract.

Joe's friend Seth comes to see him after Seth fails to kill his future self. Old Seth escaped after warning Seth that a jawless telekinetic called "The Rainmaker" would overthrow the five major bosses and close all loops. Joe reluctantly hides Seth in his apartment's floor safe, but later reveals Seth's location after Abe threatens to confiscate half of Joe's saved silver. Abe's elite "Gat Men" capture Seth, carve an address into his arm, and begin severing his body parts surgically. These effects appear on Old Seth's body. He then goes to the address on his arm and is killed by Kid Blue, one of the Gat Men.

When Joe's next target arrives, it is his older self, but with his face uncovered and hands unbound. Old Joe knocks him out and escapes. Returning to his apartment and finding it ransacked by the Gat Men, Joe fights with Kid Blue, falls off a fire escape, and blacks out.

In another timeline, Joe does kill his older self. He moves to Shanghai, but burns through his funds in 10 years, due to his drug addiction and wild party life. Broke, he becomes a hitman. Seventeen years later, he marries and breaks the addiction with his wife's help. Three years after that, his wife is killed when Joe is taken to close the loop. Overpowering his captors, Old Joe sends himself back to 2044, altering his history by evading Joe and escaping.

Old Joe experiences vague memories of Joe's actions in the present and meets his younger self at a diner. He wants to save his wife by killing The Rainmaker as a child. He acquires a map from a local library using numbers written on his hand that supposedly pertain to the Rainmaker's identity. Kid Blue and the Gat Men appear, and a gunfight ensues. Both Joes escape with pieces of the map.

Production

Development and casting

Looper was written and directed by Rian Johnson, originally conceived as a short film starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, shortly after making Brick, Johnson's first feature. After Johnson released The Brothers Bloom in 2008, he re-teamed with producer Ram Bergman, who produced Johnson's previous two films, with the goal of starting production of Looper in 2009. In May 2010, Gordon-Levitt was cast in one of the lead roles, which he would play after completing Premium Rush. Later in the month, Bruce Willis was also cast. In the following October, Emily Blunt joined Gordon-Levitt and Willis. Noah Segan, Jeff Daniels and Piper Perabo were cast in January 2011.

Filming

Filming began in Louisiana on January 24, 2011.

Makeup artist Kazuhiro Tsuji created the prosthetics that Gordon-Levitt wore in the film so that he would physically resemble Willis.

Music

The film's score was composed by Nathan Johnson, Rian Johnson's cousin.

Post-production

Talking about Looper and time travel in film, Rian Johnson said:

Even though it's a time-travel movie, the pleasure of it doesn't come from the mass of time travel. It's not a film like Primer, for instance, where the big part of the enjoyment is kind of working out all the intricacies of it. For Looper, I very much wanted it to be a more character-based movie that is more about how these characters dealt with the situation time travel has brought about. So the biggest challenge was figuring out how to not spend the whole movie explaining the rules and figure out how to put it out there in a way that made sense on some intuitive level for the audience; then get past it and deal with the real meat of the story.

Other influences cited by Rian Johnson include The Terminator, Witness, Akira, Domu: A Child's Dream, 12 Monkeys, Timecrimes, and Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World.

Release

Theatrical

Looper premiered on September 6, 2012, at the opening night of the Toronto International Film Festival. The film was then released theatrically in the United States on September 28, 2012, by FilmDistrict, who obtained the domestic rights from production company Endgame Entertainment at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. In turn, FilmDistrict chose to release the film with Sony Pictures, over their genre label TriStar Pictures.

The Chinese release of the film reintegrates a substantial number of scenes set in Shanghai. The move was requested by Chinese production company DMG Entertainment in order to further appeal to Chinese audiences. Several of these scenes were shortened or cut for the American release.

Johnson released a free audio commentary on SoundCloud (which was heavily requested after making one for The Brothers Bloom) to be downloaded and listened to during the film, with the warning: "Needless to say, this is NOT to be listened to on a first viewing, or before you've seen the film."

Home media

The film was released on Blu-ray and DVD in North America on December 31, 2012. The film was also released on January 28, 2013, in online UK stores, with a general release on February 4, 2013. The film made $20,583,583 in domestic DVD sales and $11,468,974 from domestic Blu-ray sales for a total of $32,052,557. The film was remastered for an Ultra HD Blu-ray release in 2021.

Reception

Box office

Looper opened on September 28, 2012, in 2,992 theaters in North America and grossed $20,801,522 in its opening weekend averaging $6,952 per theater and ranking #2 at the box office. The widest release of the film in the U.S was 2,993 theaters and it ended up earning $66.5 million domestically and $110 million internationally for a total of $176.5 million, against its $30 million production budget.

Critical response

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 93% of 275 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 8.1/10. The website's consensus reads: "As thought-provoking as it is thrilling, Looper delivers an uncommonly smart, bravely original blend of futuristic sci-fi and good old-fashioned action." On Metacritic the film has a weighted average score of 84 out of 100, based on 44 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B" on an A+ to F scale.

James Mottram of Total Film gave Looper 5 stars out of 5, concluding that it was "the best sci-fi movie since Moon. The best time-travel yarn since 12 Monkeys. And one of the best films of 2012."

Todd McCarthy of The Hollywood Reporter gave the film a positive review, calling it "an engaging, neatly worked-out time-travel sci-fi thriller", but also criticizing the effects involved in making Gordon-Levitt resemble Willis: "At first, the effect is a bit odd, and you can't quite put your finger on what's off; then it feels downright weird to be looking at a version of Gordon-Levitt who is no longer the actor you've known for a few years now."

Peter Debruge of Variety also gave the film a positive review, writing that writer-director Johnson's "grandly conceived, impressively mounted third feature shows a giddy, geeky interest in science-fiction, then forces it into the back seat and lets the multidimensional characters drive. In a genre infamous for loose ends, this thinking man's thriller marshals action, romance and a dose of very dark comedy toward a stunning payoff."

Kim Newman of Empire magazine gave Looper 5 stars out of 5, writing, "Intelligent science-fiction sometimes seems an endangered species—too much physics and there's a risk of creating something cold and remote, too many explosions and get lost in the multiplex. Looper isn't perfect, but it pulls off the full Wizard Of Oz: it has a brain, courage and a heart." Noel Murray of The A.V. Club gave the film an A− grade, writing, "Looper is a remarkable feat of imagination and execution, entertaining from start to finish, even as it asks the audience to contemplate how and why humanity keeps making the same rotten mistakes." Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times gave the film a positive review, writing, "Looper is way inventive but it wears its creativity lightly, like it's no big deal. This is a highflying, super-stylish science-fiction thriller that brings a fresh approach to mind-bending genre material. We're not always sure where this time-travel film is going, but we wouldn't dream of abandoning the ride."

Top ten lists

The film was included in the following top ten lists for the best films of 2012: