I’m a sucker for time travel stories. Ever since I read Jack Finney’s Time and Again, I’ve been hooked. So when I read that a time travel movie called Loopers would be out at the end of September, I marked it on my calendar as a must see.
Here’s the premise: It’s the middle of the twenty-first century. Time travel hasn’t been invented yet. But thirty years in the future, it hasn’t only been invented, it’s illegal and only the mob has use of it. So when they want to get rid of someone, the target is sent 30 years into the past, where a hired gun waits to perform the execution and get rid of the body. The victim usually has a supply of silver bars strapped to his back, payment for the kill.
Joseph Gordon Levitt plays the younger Bruce Willis, Joe, one of these executioners. I remember him from Inception, another movie that appealed to my enjoyment of the weird and the strange. Bruce Willis, of course, needs no introduction and he’s terrific in the role as Old Joe.
The paradox that most time travel pundits tell you can’t happen in a story happens here and is brilliantly executed: Old Self (Bruce) meets Young Self (Joseph). The initial confrontation is one of the most riveting scenes in the movie and takes place in what looks like an updated version of the old hamburger joint down the road. Old Self remembers what happens and has happened on various time lines to Young Self. But as he explains, when certain choices are made, those memories for him either become foggy or shockingly clear, depending on what the choice is.
Throughout the first half of the movie, there are subtle references to TK mutants – telekinetic individuals whose talents don’t seem to extend much beyond levitating coins. (But hey, I’d like to be able to levitate a spot of dust!) Then a woman enters the picture, a young woman and her son who live on a farm. I won’t give any spoilers here, but this part of the movie feels like another movie altogether until the dots are connected.
Yes, there are plot flaws in the movie. But they don’t occur to you until you’ve left the theater, and they are similar to the flaws in Inception. In any story that involves travel through dreams (Inception) or travel through time (Loopers), or in any story for that matter, that involves something other than consensus reality, the rules have to be established. The writer has to spell out what can and can’t be done within a particular reality or world.
James Cameron does this superbly in Avatar; Ridley Scott excels at this in Blade Runner and Alien; Spielberg pegs it in E.T. The flaw with Loopers, I think, is that the script tries to explain too much about how different choices create different timelines, different probabilities.
In some ways, this is what happens when you go to a psychic for a reading. Assuming the person actually has psi abilities, there’s an element of interpretation for the psychic in that he or she must be able to translate images, impressions, visions, for the client, in a way that makes sense. In the context of life, these interps can be perplexing.
It’s this very thing that intrigues me about Loopers. Interpretation. What the writer/director did with this movie is very much in line with the Seth books, similar in some ways to Sliding Doors.
We exercise our free will, we make choices, and those choices have very real repercussions in terms of what we experience, of who we are and who we become. And based on that, our decisions are often moments of epiphany. And the ultimate decision in this movie is a shocker I didn’t see coming. This movie will be one I watch again.
I am DEFINITELY going to see this movie. Thanks for the review, Trish.
not sure how i’ve missed even hearing of this intriguing new film – but to my list it goes – the concept of self meeting self is one of the most intriguing things of travel to me – love the idea of it – and i’ve earmarked atlas too – love tom hanks –
CLOUD ATLAS with Tom Hanks, yes. He never makes a bad movie, (in my opinion), so this one has to be good!
I’ve loved very movie hanks has been on!
Time travel always makes my head buzz with so many ‘what ifs’. If our present self could meet our old self, as per the movie, does that mean there are millions of versions of ourselves living different lives … and so on …
Onto my list it goes. Have you seen the commercial for the new Tom Hanks movie? It appears to be either a Time Travel story or a Reincarnation story, or a combination of the two. It looks fascinating and I can hardly wait for it to be released. allmark made a mesmerizing movie-for-TV some years ago, title: THE LOVE LETTER. It stars Campbell Scott and Jennifer Jason Leigh. It’s listed as a “fantasy” but is a very strange, captivating story about a man and a woman…he in the current time and she in the Civil War time….who somehow manage to break the barrier and communicate. I enjoyed the movie so much that I purchased it, and once in a while when in the mood, will watch it yet again. It isn’t a complicated story at all; not a brain-teaser or a challenge to understand. It’s rather a simple but beautiful love story, however, if you take a bathroom break, you will need to pause it while you’re away from the screen because it does quickly move back and forth between time periods and you’ll lose something. If you enjoy a movie that is unusual and enetertaining without taxing your brain to the max, this one is wonderful.
I did see that Hanks trailer. Cloud atlas, isn’t that the name of it? It’s on my list, too.
That’s one for my “to watch” list.
I’ve heard that it’s been getting extremely good reviews.
I’ve just finished watching “The Grey” (third time I’ve seen it now) on DVD and now I’m going to watch “Salt” (not seen this one before) .
I love “The Grey” and highly recommend it,but it’s not for the faint of heart.
Just a note if you do watch it though ***SPOILER ALERT,KIND OF ***,
well if you’ve watched the trailer you already know there’s a plane crash,but when the plane crashes you can either take it as a straight action movie….or here’s a thought to bare in mind…or you can imagine that nobody survived the plane crash and that the so called survivors are in a sort of limbo and they don’t know it.
There is fairly strong evidence that this was how it was really meant to be written anyway,since the movie was adapted from a short story called “Ghostwalker” by Ian MacKenzie Jeffers, who also co-wrote the screenplay with Carnahan.
A Ghostwalker (also referred to as Deathwalker) assists souls that have died and been stuck on the earth plane to transition to the next realm.
I don’t really know much about “Salt” though,but I did notice the picture of Jolie (Salt) and Neeson’s eye’s (The Grey) on the DVD covers look very similar.
There is a picture on this post of mine in the update section to show the two DVDs side by side –
https://brizdazz.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/flow-like-poe.html
The only reason I hired “Salt” out was because this guy –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=XMNv99gyCtI
Richard Martini was assistant to the director of the movie “Salt”,and Richard has just written a book called “Flipside”
https://flipsidetouristguide.blogspot.com
about life after death.
We saw the grey. My sense was that it was an afterlife scenario. But I don’t think any of the reviews said that.
No they don’t,you have to work it out for yourself.
I saw the movie when it was first released,and I came out thinking it was a bit of a nothing movie.
But after a few days of thinking about it I came to the conclusion that they must have all died when the plane crashed.
I went back and saw it with my boys (who surprisingly liked something I had suggested for once.-) and that confirmed what I thought,although my boys strongly disagree with me over the all dead theory.They like it as a straight forward action film.
Watching “The Grey” again tonight and seeing the credits roll with Ridley Scott’s name as producer and his brother’s name
(Tony Scott) as executive producer really brought the poem of “The Grey” to mind.
” Once more into the fray.
Into the last good fight I’ll ever know.
Live or die on this day.
Live or die on this day. ”
I still can’t fathom what would make Tony do what he did.
I don’t mean suicide,I can understand that to some degree,I just think there are more peaceful ways to do it then that way.
I hope at least he is at peace now,where ever he is.