A testament to the importance of endings, Looper is fantastic for the majority of its run time only to stumble its way across the finish line so badly that it tarnishes everything that came before it.

Taking place 30+ years from now, Looper offers up a world of the near future in which time travel has not yet been invented but a traveler from the future, Abe (Jeff Daniels) has come back to set up shop to facilitate organized crime assassinations. Apparently hiding bodies in the future of the future is nearly impossible so when they want someone killed they stuff the victim in a time machine and sent them back in time where they will be killed and disposed of by hit men called Loopers. The killers are called Loopers because when it is time for them to quit they close their loop and the version of themselves 30 years in the future is sent back for them to kill. They are paid enough gold to live large until it is time to get sent back to die. Occasionally, a Looper will let his future self go and that is very bad and things get complicated. Things get complicated for Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) when his future self (Bruce Willis) escapes him.

There is a lot more going on in the plot than that but in interest of avoiding spoilers, that is pretty much all I am going to say about it. I will say that what it looks like it is about in the trailer is not what it is about. Not really.

This is a difficult review to write because the movie is incredibly good for 98% of its run time and only falls apart at the very end. Without spoilers it is impossible to spell out why that is and just how damaging that ending is to what has come before it. So there will be a lot of praise for a movie that doesn’t match the ultimate score which is kind of why number scores are bullshit. What I can say about the ending is that I don’t feel it is supported by the material in the film that leads up to it. It can work if you make assumptions but those assumptions are not supported by what we are given in the film which is a fairly major flaw. I have loved director Rian Johnson’s previous two films Brick and the Brothers Bloom and  it was shocking to see such a misstep in this one.

A lot of the marketing for the movie suggests that it is a straight up action movie but this is really not accurate. It is really more a science fiction drama that has action in it. This might seem like a niggling distinction but comparing this to something like Dredd illustrates the difference. While there is a lot of action, and it is very impressive action, the majority of the almost two hour running time is character driven drama and a very serious meditation on the nature of free will vs determinism. Johnson allows the characters the room to explore these themes and has the confidence to allow scenes to play in silence when it is needed.

As deeply down the philosophical rabbit hole the film goes, Looper doesn’t concern itself much with the logistics of time travel and paradox which is generally refreshing despite the lampshade hanging hand wave ‘old’ Joe gives about how you shouldn’t dwell too much on the details of time travel as it will scramble your brain. I was glad not to have a Doc Brown style chalk board explanation about how time travel works in the movie but I feel like it could have done with a bit more than the audience is given.

The performances here are terrific from top to bottom. There is not a single missed note in the performances at all. Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis complement each other very well as different versions of the same person and play each with enough complexity that it is difficult to know who to root for at any given time even in the face of the character doing some pretty horrifying things. Certainly much credit goes to the writing here for providing the characters the needed depth in the first place but without the strong performances from the leads that complexity would have been left on the page.

Jeff Daniels also stands out as Abe, a man from the future who is running not only the Loopers, who use clumsy blunderbuss weapons, but also the Gats, a sort of warrior class of enforcers who keep the Loopers in line, and who has given up his life in the future to run the past. Daniels plays the part with just the right amount of laid back confidence and makes Abe much more terrifying than if her were a psychotic badass.

Looper is not particularly effects heavy but what effects it has are very good. The prosthetics and make up used to make Joseph Gordon-Levitt look like Bruce Willis is uncanny and seeing them together in a two shot together is pretty creepy. The other effects are very solid and make for some downright beautiful shots.

So all of this comes together to produce a smart and thoughtful science fiction movie that asks hard questions about not only what is important in life but also whether or not people have the ability and the right to determine that for themselves. I can’t think of another time travel story that so effectively calls into question the validity of determinism. Sadly, I can’t think of another time travel story that so thoroughly botches the answers to those questions. Again, it is less about the actual conclusion and more about how that conclusion is arrived upon. There will always be differences of opinion regarding basic morality and on that level the ending is up for debate but I find it very hard to understand those who think the ending presented works in any way in the context of the film that precedes it. Watching this movie is sort of like having the best two hour philosophical and existential conversation ever that digs really deep to get to poignant insight and then, right at the point you feel you are about to be enlightened, the other person says something that lets you know that they are an idiot. The rest of the conversation isn’t nearly as satisfying as it had been.

Conclusion [7.5 out 10]

A lot of this comes down to whether or not you are cool with the ending. For me, the adage that it is more about the journey than the destination is inadequate as it does not address a destination that invalidates the journey. Still, the rest of the movie is incredible and I still have to recommend it for anyone who wants to see quality sci-fi drama that is about more than just special effects and shooting people. The performances alone are worth enough to check this out. So, I recommend it but I cannot completely approve of it as it should have been one of the best pictures of the year and must now settle for being a potentially great movie with a terrible ending which is absolutely heart breaking.