Anthony Breznican: Best of 20123 of 11
#9: Looper
The best time-travel stories are all about paradoxes – what happens if we go back and somehow interrupt the flow of the future? And writer-director Rian Johnson has crafted one of the greatest films in the genre, focusing on hitmen who literally kill their future selves. Joseph Gordon-Levitt is a young version of the killer played by Bruce Willis, who can’t kill his youthful pursuer because it would erase him from existence, too. It’s a great cat-and-mouse (or, cat-and-own-tail, if you will) action story, but evolves into something larger and more meaningful: We often see our own fates quite clearly, so why is it so hard to get out of the way and change them?
The best time-travel stories are all about paradoxes – what happens if we go back and somehow interrupt the flow of the future? And writer-director Rian Johnson has crafted one of the greatest films in the genre, focusing on hitmen who literally kill their future selves. Joseph Gordon-Levitt is a young version of the killer played by Bruce Willis, who can’t kill his youthful pursuer because it would erase him from existence, too. It’s a great cat-and-mouse (or, cat-and-own-tail, if you will) action story, but evolves into something larger and more meaningful: We often see our own fates quite clearly, so why is it so hard to get out of the way and change them?