Looper - Grade, Review, Discuss, ect.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Guess what?

No, seriously. I'm proven absolutely correct;
from this interview

What was the first germ of the idea for Looper?

Back before Brick, I wrote a short film that I never ended up shooting: hit men in the present who work for a mob in the future who send their victims back in time. A guy is sent his future self, he lets him run, and the whole short was them chasing each other across the city. That sat in a drawer for 10 years until after I made Brothers Bloom.

Next time give me a challenge!!

[Robert Maxwell]

Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote:

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Guess what?

No, seriously. I'm proven absolutely correct;
from this interview

Next time give me a challenge!!

You are still wrong, because the entire basis of your argument is wrong.

You claimed that the writer-director was compelled by external forces to "pad out" a "scant screenplay" from the "core idea" of the loopers. This is, in fact, not correct. It was Johnson's own decision to tell the story this way, and he obviously realized that the looper concept itself wasn't enough to hang a feature film on, so he tied in the larger themes and built the story around those. The looper concept is the catalyst for the real story.

You claimed he should have "stuck to his guns," when in fact he made the exact movie he wanted--he's said as much.

Your assertion that he was forced by others to pad out a short screenplay is simply wrong.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

My assertion was that this started as a short film, and the core of that film was not about family and a look violence and raising kids right, as you say, but was about the Looper concept and the idea of meeting and having to kill your future self. That was the core, and the citation I provided proved it. Sorry.. he added the other stuff to it to make a more rounded screenplay.

Even watching the movie you can feel the padding the stretchmarks, and the shift in focus.

[Trekker4747]

The filmmaker rarely has much control over how his movie is promoted by the studio, including the cut of the trailer.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Circus Peanut wrote:

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The filmmaker rarely has much control over how his movie is promoted by the studio, including the cut of the trailer.

True.
Clearly the hook of the movie though is not a a sappy drama of violence and family (these are themes that came when the idea was expanded on).. clearly what helped him fill up that blank page was the idea of the Looper and the time travel..

[Robert Maxwell]

Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote:

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My assertion was that this started as a short film, and the core of that film was not about family and a look violence and raising kids right, as you say, but was about the Looper concept and the idea of meeting and having to kill your future self. That was the core, and the citation I provided proved it. Sorry.. he added the other stuff to it to make a more rounded screenplay.

Even watching the movie you can feel the padding the stretchmarks, and the shift in focus.

I took issue with your original assertion that the writer/producer was forced by outside interference to pad out his script. This clearly did not happen. You were wrong.

The rest is just you trying to backtrack in order to save face.

No kidding the script began as the looper concept, but you asserted that everything else was added just to pad it out to feature length, as if the writer/director never intended to do so and only did it because of studio interference or whatever your explanation is.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

No that was not what I said as an assertion.. the comments of padding being forced by the studio is a comment to be pointedly critical about how the film felt. Critics do this all the time.. sometimes in a critical review, even by professionals like Ebert, the line between fact and how a film felt is blurred because critics will make the comment with equal force. I will apologize insomuch as I can but I will not agree with you at all that I am have, or will backtrack in any way. I was correct about how the idea started I still maintain that much of the rest of the story was padding. It might have had its own sense of heart and emotion, but it derived form a need to turn a short subject to a feature length film.

[Robert Maxwell]

Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote:

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No that was not what I said as an assertion.. the comments of padding being forced by the studio is a comment to be pointedly critical about how the film felt. Critics do this all the time.. sometimes in a critical review, even by professionals like Ebert, the line between fact and how a film felt is blurred because critics will make the comment with equal force. I will apologize insomuch as I can but I will not agree with you at all that I am have, or will backtrack in any way. I was correct about how the idea started I still maintain that much of the rest of the story was padding. It might have had its own sense of heart and emotion, but it derived form a need to turn a short subject to a feature length film.

Critics just make things up out of whole cloth about how a given film was made? I doubt that.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Maybe not, but they will state in an almost factual way how the the film feels, if it ift contradicts some of the actual facts. If a film feels more like a production made by the studio suits, or if a sequel hits all the beats of the original, a critic will state those things as if fact, because that's how it feels when watching it. Usually they are correct, but even if their are not, the film will usually play as if they are.

[JD]

Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote:

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I use the same argument with the Dark Knight Rises the people that praise it to the level of the Dark Knight are simply not being honest with themselves. They can't buy Bruce being able to function as Batman with no cartilage is leg in a superhero film that attempts to be at all realistic. They don't like the plotholes (such as how Bruce got back into the city) or the mysterious science (punching a broken back to heal it, et) in a film series that was more grounded in story, drama, and morality. I wish those people were honest with themselves and wouldn't blindly praise something that clearly doesn't merit accolades.

Right, because nobody could possibly disagree with you about the quality of a movie.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Maybe, maybe not.. I just think that people have to be honest.. honest with themselves!

[Set Harth]

Flying Spaghetti Monster wrote:

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They don't like the plotholes (such as how Bruce got back into the city)

Really?

That's not a plot hole - just something you wanted to see.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

For the sake of brevity I didn't feel like listing all the plot holes.
But that is a valid one. He's bankrupt, no passport, in another country, and tries to enter an American City that is in lock down.

Plothole!

[Set Harth]

He's Bruce Wayne, he knows smugglers in foreign countries, he has many other connections on both sides of the law, other people got in, he has access to a flying vehicle, he's Bruce freaking Wayne.

Not a plot hole. Just something you didn't see.

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

he has access to a flying vehicle

considering how necessary this stupid ugly vehicle was to the resolution of the convoluted plot, they might as well have made him turn to Superman instead of Batman so he could fly. The story would have been the same in every way if they did