Looper

Looper (2012)

Written and directed by Rian Johnson

Stars: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Pierce Gagnon, Jeff Daniels, Paul Dano, Noah Segan, Piper Perabo and Garret Dillahunt

Today is a bittersweet day for me, this is the end of the blog-a-thon and it is my 32nd birthday. It's weird. The blog-a-thon overall has been a good experience. I crossed off a couple of movies that I should have seen. I wanted to end this blog-a-thon by watching the latest film from Rian Johnson, Looper. The movie asks some interesting questions, but it feels like a cheap shot.

In 2034, the whole is different place even thought it looks same as 2012. Time travel has been banned so underground crime families used the technology from 2074 to send victims back to the past to be wiped out of existence by Loopers. Joe (Gordon-Levitt) is one of the best Loopers out there until his best friend, Seth (Dano) tells him that the latest victim was supposed to be him from the future. He tells Joe that a person called The Rainmaker are killing all of the Loopers from the future. It was not until Joe comes face to face with himself from future (Willis) that they need to stop The Rainmaker in the present.

I was eagerly anticipating this movie, because the trailers looked so cool. I was following this movie when Rian Johnson did an episode of the /Filmcast about preparing to write this movie. He sought inspirations from another time traveling movie, Primer. I got that vibe from this movie. I enjoyed the movie overall, but I thought the themes were thrown by the wayside at the end of the film.

I understand that Johnson wanted to have a movie that ask the question to the viewer, "If you could go back a change something from the past to affect the future, would you?" I get that. People ask themselves that question since time began. It feels that Johnson made the message overly complicated when it didn't need to be.

There are some questions that I have with the movie that I hope the ten of you reading this will help with. Why were the Loopers paid in silver bricks? What was up with those eye drops? I didn't understand the telekinesis angle. Somebody help me here.

My Rating

Terms of Endearment

Terms of Endearment (1983)

Directed by James L. Brooks

Screenplay by James L. Brooks

Based on the novel by Larry McMurtry

Stars: Shirley MacLaine, Debra Winger, Jack Nicholson, Jeff Daniels, John Lithgow, Danny DeVito, Lisa Hart Carroll, Huckleberry Fox and Troy Bishop

Terms of Endearment has been a movie that I have been avoiding for the longest time, because I cannot stand obvious tearjerker movies. Since I'm doing a blog-a-thon, I might as well add this movie to the list. The movie was nominated for eleven Academy Awards and won five including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screeplay for James L. Brooks, Best Actress for MacLaine and Supporting Actor for Nicholson.My only thought is why did this movie get so much acclaim?

An overbearing mother Aurora Greenway (MacLaine) tires her best to raise her only daughter, Emma (Winger) the best way that she can. Their relationship is tempestuous to say the least. Emma tries to beak away from her mother's controlling ways by marrying Flap Horton (Daniels) and moving from Houston to his new teaching position in Iowa. With over a thousand miles separating them, Aurora tries to butt into Emma's business over the phone. Emma thinks that her mom needs to have a man in her life and she finds it in her next door neighbor, Garrett Breedlove (Nicholson) who is an astronaut.

Let's get this out of the way, all of the characters are assholes. They are so mean to each other I didn't care what happened to them. I don't understand what was Aurora's problem with Flap. Was it that he was not good enough for her daughter? Was Danny DeVito in the movie fawning for Aurora and that other guy? Why was John Lithgow nominated for essentially five minutes of screen time?

The ending of the movie was spoiled to me over the last couple of years. The characters dwelt in the chain of events  way too long. I was bored with the movie. There was a lot of eye rolling, yawning, getting distracted by other things, etc. The overly melodramatic score by Michael Gore did not help matters. I was like, come on. Really? This movie won Best Picture. Are you kidding me? It must have been slim picking back in '83.

My Rating