Looper - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

Looper



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:

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Movie
Has it really been 10 years since Looper came out? Wow, I still remember going to the theater with a couple of friends and chomping on red hots and popcorn! For some reason when I saw the 4K UHD press release my first thought was “dang, didn’t this movie come out 4-5 years ago?” before having to do a double take and realize that it was actually a decade ago. No, no, I’m not getting old! You are!!

Before Rian Johnson became, well...controversial, with Star Wars: The Last Jedi, he sort of had his claim to fame being the surprise Sony hit of Looper. Time travel stories are (don’t shoot me) “as old as time” (sorry, not sorry), but what made 2012’s Looper so special was that it crafted a specific set of rules for the universe, then grabs the bull by the horns and deflects from most, if not all, of the questions and uncertainties and double backs that usually have a time travel film unraveling if you think about it. There’s a phrase part way through the movie where JGL’s character ask’s Bruce Willis a time paradox question and before he can finish it, Bruce yells out “Don’t! Just DON’T!” and ends that line of questioning. That interaction pretty much sums up the entire snooty discussion complex that people have about time travel films in one succinct scene. Here’s the rules that Rian has revealed, and he rams the viewers face straight in them, intentionally not trying to dig too dip and uncover the threads that start pulling and unraveling when you focus on them too long.

In the year 2044 time travel hasn’t been invented yet. But 30 years in the future it will be. The technology will be instantly made illegal for obvious reasons, but this creates a booming underground business for the mob, who illegally use it for nefarious means. Hiring people in 2044 to become “loopers”, said future mob sends back people from their time period that they want to erase, and has the looper waiting in time to execute said person in the past, and get rid of the body so it can never be traced back to the future. They’re called loopers simply because the future mob doesn’t want any trace or any hint of their secret plans getting out, so if any of the 2044 assassins are still alive in 2074 where they are, said assassins are sent back in time to be killed by their younger selves, effectively closing the “loop” so to speak.
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Joe is one such looper who does the unthinkable. After a lifetime of service and having killed himself in the past, goes back through time to change history after a mysterious gangster known as “The Rainmaker” starts eliminating ALLLLLL of the loopers in the future at once, and effectively takes over the entire world’s mob bosses in a matter of months. Heading back to the past, Joe (Bruce Willis) is able to evade the bullet of young Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) who finds out that Joe isn’t here to be killed. Instead, his future self is here to hunt down and eliminate the Rain Maker before he’s ever able to rise to power, meaning that young Joe is either going to have to kill him, or work with him to change their future/past forever.

Looper is genuinely a great movie for the first two acts. Rian Johnson keeps a tight lid on the rules of time travel so you don’t get distracted with paradoxes, and does a fantastic job making old Joe and younger Joe both into a hero and a villain at the same time. At first future Joe seems like the good guy, whole young Joe is a junkie who just is looking out for himself, but as time progresses the roles start to reverse when you realize just why old Joe is really here. However, the 3rd act of the movie is where things start to fall apart. Young Joe figures out which young kid in his time period will become the Rain Maker, and ends up trying to figure out a way to have his cake and eat it too. The only problem is, Rian Johnson bases the whole premise of “what if?” based upon a shaky utopian hope that “good parenting” will keep Cid (the soon to be Rain Maker) from becoming a monster in the future. Once that happens the audience is left wondering why Rian is painting Old Joe as the villain here, as he seems to be making the only rational decisions based upon the information he’s given. It doesn’t help that the kid Cid is played like he’s the demon spawn of Chucky himself, further alienating the audience from what is supposed to be a sympathetic villain. The same concept is played around with by Deadpool 2, but at least that had some reasoning for WHY the kid might not grow up to be a killer, and has visual cues that it actually happpened. Here, you’re just supposed to hope for the best, based upon young Joe’s musings over a kid who has killed several times already. I know I’m in a minority here, but the last act of Looper frustrates me to no end, as Old Joe seems to be the only one to really root for based upon the information Rian Johnson gives us.




Rated R for strong violence, language, some sexuality/nudity and drug content




4K Video: Video:

Sony’s 1080p Blu-ray from 2012 was a stunner of a disc, with great visuals, a distinct visual tone, and almost no artifacting. The new 4K UHD remaster (with Rian Johnson’s approval) looks generally great, with one small caveat. Rian Johnson is known for HATING HDR/Dolby Vision, so while the disc has Dolby Vision on board, the color grading and use of HDR/DV is severely muted. In fact, it’s almost an SDR appearance in an HDR wrapper if you will. It’s not horrible, it’s not a detriment as that is Rian Johnson’s perogative, but don’t go in expecting the new transfer to have massively richer colors and deeper blacks thanks to HDR. The film definitely is an upgrade in terms of visual clarity, with a nice grain structure and very very clean colors. Comparing the 1080p Blu-ray vs. this UHD disc the 4K handily outclasses the 10 year old Blu-ray. There’s a lot more detail, and an even cleaner look to the grain levels. You won’t see a ton of added depth to darker shots, nor super “popping” colors due to Rian Johnson’s very minimalistic approach to HDR/DV, but it is still a very nice looking disc.







Audio:

Looper sported a fantastic audio mix on the 1080p Blu-ray (and is actually a secondary track on the 4K UHD disc) that was a powerhouse to listen to, but has given us a nice little upgrade with Atmos. The mixes are fairly similar in many ways, but the Atmos track simply fine tunes an already incredible sounding 5.1 mix. The track is wide and expansive, giving us tons of surround activity with the blast of guns, whine of turbine driven hover bikes, and the swirling and swooshing of telekinetic energy. Gun battles are startling in nature, and the already wide dynamic range seems even wider on the 4K disc. I noticed some very judicious use of overheads in many scenes (such as when Joe escapes his apartment), and the bass is powerful and deep. Great mix, a nice upgrade over the already great Blu-Ray, and all around demo track.







Extras:

• DOLBY VISION/HDR PRESENTATION OF THE FILM REVIEWED AND APPROVED BY THE FILMMAKERS
• BRAND NEW, DIRECTOR-APPROVED DOLBY ATMOS AUDIO TRACK, plus original 5.1 audio track
• Feature Commentary with Director Rian Johnson, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Emily Blunt
• Looper: The Future From the Beginning — Making-of Featurette
• 22 Deleted Scenes with Commentary
• Scoring Looper
• The Science of Time Travel Featurette
• Looper Animated Trailer

Final Score:
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Looper is a good movie that gets hamstrung by a problematic 3rd act, and a lot of that goes straight into TOO MUCH time spent with the child Cid. I think it could have been done a bit better if he was left out of most of the film, and just hinted at, but when you watch Cid on screen it’s very hard to get the emotions that are necessary for the conclusion that Rian chose for the movie. Luckily it’s not the end of the world as the movie as a whole hits way above it’s pay grade. For once we have a time travel movie that actually makes sense when you watch it, and the lack of paradoxes keeps it from becoming unnecessarily complicated like so many other films of it’s ilk are. The 4K UHD is a solid upgrade over the Blu-ray, and the extra ARE a clone of the Blu-ray, so nothing lost there. Fun watch for those of you who want a fairly intelligent time travel flick.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, Jeff Daniels, Piper Perabo
Directed by: Rian Johnson
Written by: RIan Johnson
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 HEVC
Audio: English: Dolby Atmos (Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Core), English DTS-HD MA 5.1, Spanish DD 2.0
Subtitles: English SDH, English, Spanish
Studio: Universal Studios
Rated: R
Runtime: 119 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: February 15th, 2022

Recommendation: Good Watch

 

[tripplej]

Thanks, will check it out.

 

[Todd Anderson]

Such a great film... have to say, I'm not moved to upgrade my Blu-ray copy. Sounds like I can get nearly the same experience with the BD and an upmixed 5.1 track!

 

[Jon Liu]

I loved this movie so I picked it up on UHD. It is an appreciable difference in clarity and I didn't mind that this was essentially an SDR in HDR container. It will appear pretty dark to those who are used to viewing their SDR content to higher APL than industry standard.

I honestly didn't mind the time they spent on Cid in the third act. Maybe that's partially due to me being okay with Rian's choice for child actors for Cid. I thought Joseph Gordon Levitt and Emily Blunt knocked it out of the park in this film.

 

[Todd Anderson]

I loved this movie so I picked it up on UHD. It is an appreciable difference in clarity and I didn't mind that this was essentially an SDR in HDR container. It will appear pretty dark to those who are used to viewing their SDR content to higher APL than industry standard.

I honestly didn't mind the time they spent on Cid in the third act. Maybe that's partially due to me being okay with Rian's choice for child actors for Cid. I thought Joseph Gordon Levitt and Emily Blunt knocked it out of the park in this film.

Hmmm. Now you're kind of making me change my mind. I liked this flick too... AND, I know you have good taste (*cough* Interstellar)...

 

[Michael Scott]

I loved this movie so I picked it up on UHD. It is an appreciable difference in clarity and I didn't mind that this was essentially an SDR in HDR container. It will appear pretty dark to those who are used to viewing their SDR content to higher APL than industry standard.

I honestly didn't mind the time they spent on Cid in the third act. Maybe that's partially due to me being okay with Rian's choice for child actors for Cid. I thought Joseph Gordon Levitt and Emily Blunt knocked it out of the park in this film.

agreed, the lackluster HDR is very much a director's decision, and the uptick in visual clarity is excellent. Not perfect, but a distinct upgrade over the Blu-ray