Looper

There doesn't seem to be a discussion thread for this yet. Its premise is that, in a future world where time travel has been discovered, crime syndicates will use it to commit perfect crimes: they capture and restrain people, then send them back in time to operatives (Loopers) who will execute them.

It's a creative concept that's done very well, the characters are nuanced and developed, and there's one major setting element that's left out of the trailers ( telekinesis). I liked it a lot, especially the role of Phoenixboy. It's basically this year's Inception, a rare non-adaptation action movie with some intelligence and an original plot.

Has anyone else seen this? What did you think?

edited 29th Sep '12 5:59:57 PM by WarriorEowyn

Good first half, then it got weird.

Weird that there isn't already a thread, I thought this would be more popular. Anyway... I liked it, but it's not in my top ten list or anything like that.

It feels like the whole TK thing was an unnecessary thing to throw in. I do like how they handled it, especially that quote at the beginning - which I am sure I am remembering wrong - where he says something along the lines of "Everyone thought we were going to have superheroes, but it's just assholes at clubs floating quarters.

Was a pretty good action/suspense film, but nothing phenomenol.

Bruce Willis and time travel? I have to see this film!

One thing I did loved was how all the staple future tropes were in the film Crapsack-ized. Hoverbikes existed but only worked half the time, telekinesis was useful for nothing more then parlor tricks, tIme travel was just used by the mob to disposed bodies ect.

Relevant:

http://thepunchlineismachismo.com/archives/1265

Hehehe.

I think I know what I just watched.

"And that was the story of The Hitman Who Leapt Through Time." - Homer Simpson, film critic

Also I was amazed that somebody succeeded in making a Western AKIRA adaptation that didn't suck. Racelifts and all, they achieved it!

So is every film containing a young male psychic with powerful abilities going to be considered a better AKIRA adaptation than the one planned?

You know what scrap that I answered my own question.

edited 5th Oct '12 7:46:21 AM by JRPictures

Where was the laser gun?

edited 6th Oct '12 3:33:13 AM by joeyjojo

Just came back from seeing it. I found it highly enjoyable for the most part (I was especially impressed with the two Joes and their Freudian issues), though I did leave the theater with some niggling doubts about the portrayal of female characters. The motherhood-positive message seemed to encompass and define all the women in the film a little too much.

Oh yeah, and JGL did a hell of a job evoking Bruce Willis's facial mannerisms. The make-up no doubt helped, but the link between them was very believable on all accounts.

edited 6th Oct '12 8:35:08 AM by BornIn1142

Motherhood is not a bad message per say, but everything in the movie after the farm is at odds with cold amoral nihilistic tone of the movie.

edited 6th Oct '12 3:40:52 PM by joeyjojo

No, motherhood is a very good message in itself. I liked how the movie stressed the importance a mother has on a person's deveopment, but when this is appellated with "These women only exist to raise their children" and "This woman only exists to devote herself to her husband and creating a family," things get awkward.

I agree that the "mother's love" message is a little messed up, considering that the only women we ever see are all caretakers in some fashion. A less creepy subtext would be "selfishness leads to disaster." All of the problems in the movie are caused by the characters acting either apathetic or malicious towards other people. Old!Seth runs from his younger self; this leads to his mutilation and death. Young!Joe is a druggie who murders people for money; this eventually creates Old!Joe. Old!Joe tries to ignore his past and live with his wife; his wife is murdered because she had no idea what was happening, and Old!Joe didn't take steps to prevent her getting involved. The mob uses the past as a dumping ground; this leads to the Rainmaker coming out and slaughtering all of the higher-ups. The Rainmaker starts closing the loops; this causes Old!Joe to go back in time to kill him.

no not kill him blow his jaw off and complete the time loop, if young is to be believe.

speaking of Seth's grisly fate what will happen, going to happen, has happen to him? When his older self dies can he be taking out of the picture? because the odds of him living another 30 years to complete the time loop have seriously dropped for him.

I just got back from the movie theater and fuck that kid. Seriously, just... fuck that kid. They should have killed him. They really should have. Willis could've just gunned down the mom, and Seth, realizing the smart thing to do, could've run after the kid while Willis was doing that and brained the little fucker. But nope. They let a potential mass murderer roam free and unmolested. One who has already displayed an alarming number of sociopathic tendencies and has murdered two people. At ten years old. Seth sacrificed himself, and Bruce Willis, denying him, his future self, and his future wife the happiness they deserve all so some stupid kid who's already killed two people and is likely to kill many more even if he doesn't become evil can walk free.

Fuck. That. Kid.

Harsh man, harsh.

Especially when the kid was trying to protect his mother from Bruce Willis, Child Murderer.

Yeah... as soon as a character starts murdering children my brain starts to lose sympathy for them. TK powers or not.

Well, it was decent. Time Travel was barely consistent, but, I've learned not to let that bother me too much.

Even if the kid is already a murderer himself?

Cid was never a murderer. He was, at worst, guilty of manslaughter.

If a kid happens on a loaded weapon and accidentally discharges it, killing someone in the process, does he deserve to be executed for it?

You realize that literally anyone could be called a "potential mass murderer?"

edited 7th Oct '12 5:40:40 AM by BornIn1142

The difference here is that this kid is a clear and evident danger to everyone around him. He's already killed two people with his mind without even realizing it, and all parties are aware that he has the potential to use this power to one day conquer the fucking world. And even if he doesn't grow up to be evil, how many other people do you think are going to die in similar "accidents" in the amount of time it takes him to learn how to control it? And even if he does learn how to control it, he could still easily lose control of his emotions again. It happens to everyone, except when it happens to this kid, people die.

And even if you disregard all of the above, once the world learns about this kid's power, it isn't going to matter whether he's good or evil. No one will ever have the balls to tell him "no". Would you mess with the kid with massive psychic powers? Would you? He could get whatever he wanted without question. Hell, he could run for office with a 100% approval rating. He could take over the fucking world simply based on the premise that everyone is too afraid to say "no" to this kid.

To be fair, if people had stayed off her property like they were told, no one would have gotten killed.

Lots of people are. Many adult criminals are dangers to people around them as well. Since we live in a civilized society though, we imprison them and ideally try to rehabilitate them instead of just putting bullets into their heads and dropping them in ditches. And those are adults, not children.

I refer you to my example about an innocent child fatally discharging a firearm by accident (which you seem to be ignoring for some reason). Whether it's done with a tool or inborn abilities is ultimately irrelevant - hell, what about a kid that accidentally shoves someone down a stairway, causing them to die? It makes no difference. Anyone that would execute the child for that would have to be pretty ballsy to think they're qualified to make moral judgements.

But anyway, I don't think you realize how using the word "potential" completely destroys your credibility. Literally anyone has the potential to grow into a mass murderer by conventional means.

Which is why Sara took reasonable steps to isolate him from society and other human beings since the first incident. It took exceptional circumstances (danger) for Cid to harm anyone again.

Once again, you could make that argument for anyone. I could flip out and kill tons of people. I wouldn't need telekinetic powers to do it.

Everything else you complained about is completely irrelevant. There's no reason to go public with the powers at all. (You also fail to take the rest of the TK pheonomenon into account. The implication seemed to be that power levels like Cid's were the end result of humanity's gradual evolution into telekinetics. If there's eventually going to be many with powers like him, this becomes a moot point.)

Oh, and by the way... sociopathic tendencies, really? You think a sociopath would have felt enough empathy for Joe to bring him a cup of water when he was thirsty? A socipath would have apologized for acting out against his mother?

edited 7th Oct '12 11:31:51 AM by BornIn1142

Hmm. Unless Cid is examined, and they find out how to give everyone TK powers, how much good is he actually going to be able to do, I wonder? Discounting the possibility of him turning into the Rainmaker anyway.