Category Archives: Sci-Fi

SIFF 2015: Beti and Amare ***

October 1, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on May 23, 2015)

It’s an old story: In the midst of the Italo-Abyssinian War, teenage Ethiopian girl meets mute alien boy, who has hatched from an egg that has appeared out of nowhere next to a desert well. Girl brings boy to her uncle’s isolated home, where she is hiding out from Mussolini’s invading forces and marauding members of the local militia while her uncle is traveling. Romance ensues (how many times have we seen that tale on the silver screen?). German writer-director-DP-editor-producer Andy Siege has crafted a fairly impressive debut feature that is equal parts harrowing war drama, psychological thriller and sci-fi fantasy. I don’t know if these were conscious influences, but Siege’s film strongly recalls Roman Polanski’s 1965 psychodrama Repulsion, and 1970s-era Nicolas Roeg (more specifically, The Man Who Fell to Earth and Walkabout).

Action, Corporate Intrigue, Dystopian, Sci-Fi

I bling the body electric: Chappie ***

September 29, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on March 7, 2015)

The mathematician/cryptologist I.J. Good (an Alan Turing associate) once famously postulated:

Let an ultra-intelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any man…however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultra-intelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an ‘intelligence explosion’, and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus, the first ultra-intelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make, provided that the machine is docile enough to tell us how to keep it under control.

Good raised this warning in 1965, about the same time director Stanley Kubrick and sci-fi writer Arthur C. Clarke were formulating the narrative that would evolve into both the novel and film versions of 2001: a Space Odyssey. And it’s no coincidence that the “heavy” in 2001 was an ultra-intelligent machine that wreaks havoc once its human overseers lose “control” …Good was a consultant on the film.

While the “A-I gone awry” prototype dates as far back as the metallic “Maria” in the 1927 silent Metropolis, it was “HAL 9000” that took techno-phobia to a new level, spawning a sci-fi film sub-genre that includes The Demon Seed, Colossus: The Forbin Project, Blade Runner, The Terminator, Robocop, I, Robot, and (of course) A.I. Artificial Intelligence.

There are echoes of all the aforementioned (plus a large orange soda) in Chappie, the third feature film from South African writer-director Neill Blomkamp. In this outing, Blomkamp returns to his native Johannesburg (which provided the backdrop for his 2009 debut, District 9). And for the third time in a row, his story takes place in a near-future dystopia (call me Sherlock, but I’m sensing a theme).

Johannesburg is a crime-riddled hellhole, ruled by ultra-violent drug lords and roving gangs of thugs. The streets are so dangerous that the police department is reticent to put officers on the front lines. So they do what any self-respecting police department of a near-future dystopia does…they send droids out to apprehend criminals.

The popularity of these programmable robocops has created lucrative contracts for Tetravaal, the company which employs mild-mannered designer Deon (Dev Patel). In his spare time, Deon has been working on an A.I. chip that approximates “consciousness”.

Jacked on Red Bull, Deon pulls an all-niter and makes his breakthrough. Excited, Deon approaches Tetravaal’s CEO (Sigourney Weaver) with a proposal to work up a prototype. Unfortunately, she doesn’t share his vision, and Deon is laughed out of her office. Who needs a police droid with “feelings”, right?

Determined to carry out his experiment, he re-appropriates a damaged droid scheduled for destruction. Before he can make it safely home, he is carjacked and abducted by a trio of inept gang bangers (Ninja, Yolandi Visser, and Jose Pablo Cantillo) who figure they can coerce Deon into securing them a remote control that shuts down police droids (they are only speculating such a device exists).

What they do end up with is a droid with self-awareness, and the ability to absorb and mimic human behavior. Will he “grow up” as the enlightened being that his Gepetto-like creator intended, or will he turn into the “gangsta” that his thug “Daddy” wants him to be?

Through their creation of the character “Chappie”, Blomkamp and co-writer Terri Tatchell have managed to put a fresh spin on a well-worn trope. When you cut through all the obligatory action tropes, “his” story resonates at its core with a universal, timeless appeal. The film has more in common with Oliver Twist than with Robocop. Chappie is, by definition of his inception, an “orphan”; innocent and pure of heart. The child-like droid is shuffled by fate into the thug life, where he is tutored in street smarts and criminal behavior by “Ninja”, who plays Fagin to his Oliver (on one level, Blomkamp and Tatchell are exploring the “nature vs nurture” theme).

This is a return to form for the director, especially after his slightly disappointing sophomore effort Elysium. I really got a kick out of the performances, especially the scene-stealing Ninja and Visser, who are slumming from their day job as rap outfit Die Antwoord (apparently popular with the “zef” crowd…I’ll let you look that up, like grandpa had to prepping this review). Hugh Jackman hams it up as a heavy, and Blomkamp’s favorite leading man Sharlto Copley does a marvelous job breathing “life” and personality into Chappie (move over, Andy Serkis). BTW, despite my references to Pinocchio and David Copperfield, this one is definitely not for the kids; it’s rated ‘R’ .

Adventure, Armageddon, Sci-Fi

Move over, Smaug: Ragnarok **1/2

September 28, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on August 23, 2014)

According to my exhaustive research on Norse mythology (OK…one-clicking to Wikipedia), “Ragnarok” was the Viking version of Armageddon; warning of an apocalypse that culminates in a worldwide flood, after which all begins anew (not to be confused with “Raga-rock”, which was a sub-genre of wild, far-out hippie music that Grandpa used to zone out to after a hit of Windowpane).

In the context of Norwegian director Mikkel Braenne Sandemose’s eponymous new film, it’s a major concern to a harried, recently defunded archaeologist widower (Pal Sverre Hagen) who specializes in Viking artifacts. He’s been attempting to translate mysterious runes found amongst remains of an ancient shipwreck.

When he and a fellow researcher (Nicolai Cleve Broch) become convinced that Ragnarok may 1) not in fact be a myth, and 2) be imminent, he grabs his teen daughter and young son and heads north to an uninhabited part of Finnmark, where he and his colleague hope to find the missing pieces of the puzzle. After adding a sexy-tough love interest…I mean, assistant researcher (Sofia Helin) and a crusty yet benign guide to the team, the expedition is afoot.

While what ensues in Sandemose’s film can be called out as a shamelessly derivative mash-up of Raiders of the Lost Ark and Jurassic Park, it’s still kind of fun, in a contentedly mindless way. Actually, amid all of the typically big, dumb, loud and over-produced action-adventure summer fare currently flooding the multiplexes, it stands out as a refreshingly old-fashioned yarn. The story clips along without unnecessary padding, most of the violence is (thankfully) off-screen, and it says everything it needs to say in 94 minutes.

Armageddon, Journalism, Nuclear Paranoia, Sci-Fi

Blu-ray reissue: The Day the Earth Caught Fire ****

September 17, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on December 6, 2014)

The Day the Earth Caught Fire – BFI Blu-ray (Region “B” )

Written and directed by Val Guest, this cerebral mix of conspiracy a-go-go and sci-fi (from 1961) has always been a personal favorite of mine. Simultaneous nuclear testing by the U.S. and Soviets triggers an alarmingly rapid shift in the Earth’s climate. As London’s weather turns more tropical by the hour, a Daily Express reporter (Peter Stenning) begins to suspect that the British government is not being 100% forthcoming on the possible fate of the world. Along the way, Stenning has some steamy scenes with his love interest (sexy Janet Munro). The film is more noteworthy for its smart, snappy patter than its run-of-the-mill f/x, but still delivers a compelling narrative. Co-starring the great Leo McKern (who steals every scene he’s in).

The releasing studio is BFI, a UK-based reissue outfit that employs the same grade of high standards that Criterion has become known for here in the U.S., with meticulously restored prints and extras geared toward the film buff. Please note that this review is based on the region “B” release, so it requires a region-free Blu-ray player.

Action, Dystopian, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Stop the world, I want to get off: Elysium * & Europa Report

September 16, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on August 10, 2013)

It’s tempting to take the political allegory in Neill Blomkamp’s new sci-fi action adventure Elysium and run with it. But I am going to take the high road. I’m not going to shoot you a Palin-esque wink as I tell you the year is 2154, and the human race is reduced to two classes: the super-rich, who have ensconced themselves in a glorified gated community called Elysium (a gargantuan bio-domed space station in Earth’s orbit) and the rest of humanity, who have been ghettoized back on Earth, which has fallen into ecological and economic ruin.

The Earth rabble try to infiltrate the 1 per-centers’ big wheel in the sky via “illegal” shuttle crafts, but those lucky enough make it past Elysium’s formidable Star Wars missile defense system and land are captured by police droids and deported back to Earth (note I’m still keeping a straight face). Screw it. I reveled in the political allegory.

I especially reveled in Jodie Foster’s turn as Elysium’s icy Secretary Delacourt, who usurps the President’s ineffectual requests to take it down a notch on these strident Homeland Security measures (and if she didn’t base her characterization on Governor Jan Brewer, then Stephen Colbert actually is a conservative pundit).

Meanwhile, back in the States, we meet Max (Matt Damon), an ex-con who works at a dreary droid manufacturing plant in L.A. The Los Angeles of 2154 resembles a giant favela (it makes the Blade Runner rendition of the City of Angels seem Utopian). Nearly everyone speaks Spanish (now…settle). Those lucky enough to have a job are mercilessly exploited by their employers (I said: settle!). While there are hospitals, they are understaffed and ill-equipped to treat catastrophic illnesses; whereas on Elysium, every mansion come equipped with a miracle medical appliance that seems to cure everything from paper cuts to cancer via cellular regeneration.

All of these mitigating factors are about to converge into a perfect shit storm for our protagonist. A work accident exposes Max to a lethal amount of radiation. He’s told he has 5 days to live and given a bottle of painkillers. His only chance for a cure is on Elysium.

Desperate, he reaches out to an old acquaintance (Wagner Moura), now a successful smuggler, to see if he can arrange passage. As Max is somewhat short on funds, the smuggler offers a trade deal. If Max does a special “job” for him, he’ll get him on a shuttle. Max agrees, but the gig goes south, and he’s on the run from an odious mercenary (Sharlto Copley) who does covert operations for Secretary Delacourt.

What ensues is a mashup of Escape from New York with Seven Days in May (granted, Max is no Snake Plissken, but he’s in the same ball park). As he did in his 2009 feature film debut District 9, Blomkamp deftly delivers a strong political message and slam-bang sci-fi action entertainment all in one package. While Damon is unquestionably the star, I think Copley (who seems to be establishing a Scorcese-De Niro/Herzog-Kinski type partnership with the director) nearly steals the movie with his deliriously over-the-top performance (his character is the best scene-stealing sci-fi heavy since Dennis Hopper and his eye patch played to the back of the house in Waterworld).

Oh, by the way…the best part about this film is that the real show hasn’t even started yet. There is an unmistakable, marvelously unapologetic pro-Obamacare message in the denouement that is surely going to leave the “Aha! It’s another piece of Hollywood lefty socialist propaganda!” crowd apoplectic and sputtering with impotent rage. They are going to go absolutely spare (if they haven’t gone so already). Personally, I can’t wait. Pass the popcorn…

Film makers who aim to create “realistic” sci-fi dramas are faced with a conundrum: While it may be true that “It’s not about ‘destination’, but rather the journey”, an inconvenient truth remains…real life space journeys are tedious (Apollo 13 aside). Even our nearest interstellar travel destination (the Moon) takes 4 days (I don’t know about you, but I get antsy after 4 hours on a plane). So if you want to do a realistic film about a Jupiter mission, how do you add drama? OK, Kubrick did it in 2001: A Space Odyssey, but that set a high bar.

To their credit, for about two-thirds of their hyper-realistic sci-fi drama Europa Report, director Sebastian Cordero and screenwriter Philip Gelatt seem headed for that bar. Framing the narrative with the “found footage” gimmick, the film is a faux-documentary that “reconstructs” a privately-funded mission to Jupiter’s moon of Europa to probe for signs of aquatic alien life beneath its ice pack. The six crew members have each been chosen for expertise in their respective fields. Shipboard footage capturing the workaday mission minutiae is interspersed with somber “present day” interviews telegraphing that it all ends in tears (don’t worry…not a spoiler).

Most of the filmmaker’s effort focuses on making us believe that this is all really happening, and indeed the overall “look” is right. Special effects are seamless; all the hardware, the radio chatter, EVA procedures etc. etc. suitably authentic and convincing, but there’s one thing missing…an interesting story. There’s simply no “there” there, and the sudden 180 into The Blair Witch Project territory in the third act cheapens the film and destroys all credibility.

The cast (which includes Michael Nykvist and the ubiquitous Sharlto Copley) do the best they can with woefully underwritten parts, but the resultant lack of emotional investment on my part as a viewer made it hard for me to care about what happened to whom once the mission (and the film itself) began to go horribly, horribly awry.

Mockumentary, Sci-Fi, Social Satire

The electric Kool-Aid Turing test: Computer Chess ***1/2

September 16, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on July 27, 2013)

One of my guilty pleasures from the 1980s is an endearingly dated romantic comedy, Electric Dreams. It’s an age-old story…you know, the one where the nerdy protagonist buys himself one of those newfangled home computers and promptly shorts it out by spilling a drink on the keyboard, which unexpectedly transmogrifies the unit into an ersatz HAL-9000, which then becomes his rival for the affections of the cute upstairs neighbor babe (oh, how many times have we heard that one?). If you’re like me (isn’t everyone?), and would like to believe “that totally could happen” you have the perfect mindset for Andrew Bujalski’s off-kilter 80s retro-style mockumentary, Computer Chess.

Conjuring verisimilitude via a vintage B&W video camera (which makes it seem as if you’re watching events unfold on a slightly fuzzy closed-circuit TV), Bujalski “documents” a weekend-long tournament where nerdy computer chess programmers from all over North America assemble once a year to match algorithmic prowess.

Not unlike a Christopher Guest satire, Bujalski mixes up a bevy of idiosyncratic characters, like the boorish independent programmer Michael Papageorge (Myles Paige), who wanders the hotel halls at night like a Flying Dutchman, knocking on random doors to see if anyone would let him crash on their floor. He seems particularly fixated on getting into the room occupied by shy Shelly (Robin Schwartz), the only female programmer (about whom the conference chairman gushes to the crowd: “M.I.T. has a lady on their team this year!”). Shelly wisely spurns his creepy advances, preferring to hang with kindred spirit Peter (Patrick Reister), who works for a rival team headed by the enigmatic Professor Schoesser (Gordon Kindlmann).

It’s a particularly busy weekend at the hotel; they are also hosting a couples retreat, led by “a real African” therapist, who puts his clients through some classic New Age exercises (further accentuating the vibe of 80s nostalgia). In one of the film’s most amusing scenes, the ever-wandering Papageorge gets roped into a “rebirthing” session (“He’s crowning! He’s crowning!” ecstatic group members joyously exclaim as they “deliver” the spiritually reconstituted Papageorge, who later gloats to himself about getting his “catharsis for free”).

Another highlight borne of this oil and water mix: The painfully shy (and, we assume, virginal) Peter nearly gets sweet-talked into a ménage a trois with one of the couples after the wife gently admonishes him to metaphorically break free of the chessboard’s 64 squares and open himself to Life’s infinite possibilities.

However, just when you think you’ve got the film sussed as a gentle satirical jab at computer geek culture, things really start to get weird. And then they get even weirder. In fact, the final third (and Bujalski’s overall deadpan sensibility) stirred up memories of Slava Tsukerman’s 1982 cult curio, Liquid Sky.

While this marks the director’s fourth effort, it’s only the second Bujalski film I have seen other than his 2002 debut, Funny Ha Ha, a hit and miss affair which holds the dubious distinction as the prototype for the “mumblecore” genre (I remember when it was called “actors with bad elocution”). So based on the two I have seen, this is my favorite. I could watch it again; there’s a lot more going on than first meets the eye (pay close attention to the Blade Runner-inspired final shot!). There’s nothing else quite like it in theaters right now.

Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi

Walden pondering: Upstream Color ***

September 15, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on April 20, 2013)

You know all those Weekly World News-type stories about people allegedly kidnapped by aliens, who perform horrible experiments on their hapless captives before returning them to their original upright position behind the wheel of their car, now mysteriously relocated in the middle of a cornfield somewhere in Iowa? While they may have vague recollections regarding anal probes and such, these folks are generally a bit fuzzy on details. In Upstream Color, writer-director-actor Shane Carruth may be offering an explanation. At least that’s one explanation that I can offer for this fuzzy cipher.

To say this film is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma is understatement. To say that it redefines the meaning of “Huh?!” may be more apt. A woman (Amy Seimitz) is jumped in an alley, tasered and then forced to ingest a creepy-crawly whatsit (all I know is that it appears to be in its larval stage) that puts her into a docile and suggestible state.

Her kidnapper however turns out to be not so much Buffalo Bill, but more Terence McKenna (I believe the original working title of this film was When Ethnobotanists Attack!) As he methodically cleans out her financial assets over a period of several days (with her “willing” cooperation) while encamped at her house, he next directs her to commit passages of Thoreau’s writings to memory (it was either that or waterboarding).

What happens next is…well, what happens next is, erm…OK we’ll just say it’s the creepy, fuzzily recollected part involving anal probes and such. All I know is that it takes place at a pig farm and fuzzily reminded me of that really creepy part of O Lucky Man! where Malcolm McDowell inadvertently stumbles into a top secret government medical research lab, where he’s tortured and then the next thing he knows he’s coming to on a gurney next to some poor wretched creature that appears to be half man and half sheep.

Anyhoo, the next thing the woman knows, she’s back behind the wheel of her car, parked alongside some cornfield off the interstate, and spends the rest of the movie slowly retrieving memories of her bizarre experience in bits and pieces. Oh, and along the way she meets and falls in love with this sullen dude (played by Carruth) who may have had the same exact experience! Wild and woolly metaphysical/transcendentalist hi-jinks ensue.

While I will give Carruth some points for originality (the closest I can come to a tagline for this one is A Man and a Woman meets Eraserhead) and find it admirable that he is making such an earnest effort to be compared to Andrei Tarkovsky, unfortunately he’s falling short, just this side of a glorified Twilight Zone episode.

This seems to be the latest entry in a burgeoning sub-genre that I have dubbed “emo sci-fi” (alongside the likes of Another Earth and Safety Not Guaranteed). That being said, if you are predisposed toward such challenging fare, I wouldn’t dissuade you from checking it out. And don’t feel bad if you don’t “get it” the first time you see it. I didn’t get it the second time I saw it, either.

Mystery, Sci-Fi

Scott goes Kubrick (ish): Prometheus **1/2

August 25, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on June 16, 2012)

My God, it’s full of stars: Michael Fassbender in Prometheus

I really need to get this out of the way first. “From the director of Blade Runner.” Really? Really, marketing mavens at 20^th Century Fox? That’s your best tag line? I think we both know that Mr. Scott is not likely to concoct another genre film as perfect in its seamless blend of hard sci-fi and existential noir. That counts as his “Sorry, only one per career” grant from the Movie Genie. Besides, virtually no one makes that kind of sci-fi anymore: just enough CGI to render a futuristic tone, yet on the whole, believably organic. You’re setting the bar way too high. So don’t tease. OK…I feel better now. On with the review.

As we teeter on the cusp of the movie season I call Big, Dumb & Loud, hope may have arrived for sci-fi geeks. It is in the form of the latest film from director Ridley Scott, returning to the universe of the “Alien quadrilogy” (his own franchise kickoff Alien, James Cameron’s Aliens, David Fincher’s Alien 3 and Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Alien: Resurrection) with a prequel called Prometheus. Does it live up to the hype? Since I coughed up top dollar to see it (in 3-D IMAX), I feel justified in paraphrasing J.R.R. Tolkien: I liked half of it half as well as I should have liked, and less than half of it as well as it deserved. And if that is akin to saying that it isn’t as good as 2001: a Space Odyssey, yet not as bad as Plan 9 From Outer Space, well…then so be it.

Not unlike 2001, Scott opens his film with An Enigmatic Yet Profound Event. Through an impressively mounted bit of CGI wizardry, we observe a humanoid creature making like a 17-year cicada on the banks of a roiling, primeval river (I can say no more). Flash-forward to 2093 and our introduction to the primary players, the majority of whom are tucked away in stasis pods on the good ship Prometheus, currently nearing the end of its deep space journey to an obscure moon. Their caretaker is HAL 9000…I mean “David” (Michael Fassbender), an android employed by the corporation that owns the ship and is funding the mission. As the humans groggily emerge from their hibernation, the makeup of our intrepid team comes into focus.

In addition to the requisite AI character, and in strict accordance with the Alien series template, there’s the Prickly Yet Pragmatic Ship Captain (Idris Elba) and the Corporate Weasel (a very strict Charlize Theron). The remainder of our pod people turns out to be field scientists of various stripes; including a biologist (Rafe Spall, son of Timothy) and a geologist (Sean Harris). The scientific arm of the crew is being led by two archaeologists (Noomi Rapace and Logan Marshall-Green), who have sold their corporate sponsors on the idea for the expedition based on the commonality of “star maps” they discovered among the relics of several otherwise unrelated ancient Earth cultures. All roads lead to the aforementioned moon.

Also in accordance with the Alien universe, the team stumbles across Something Probably Best Left Undisturbed. But you know scientists, they always have to touch (as Buckaroo Banzai once sagely advised: “Don’t tug on that. You never know what it might be attached to”).

While Prometheus is imbued with a vibe similar to his 1979 film (thanks in large part to the visuals by DP Dariusz Wolski, whose previous credits include darkly atmospheric sci-fi/fantasy thrillers like The Crow and Dark City), Scott has largely eschewed the classic horror film tropes in this outing; opting for a more ambitious script (by Jon Spaihts and Damon Lindelof) that tackles bigger themes.

In other words, he isn’t providing an “origin story” that merely serves to explain the alternate Alien universe; he’s suggesting an alternate version of mankind’s origin story ( What does it all mean?). As the film progresses, it becomes increasingly apparent that he’s taken on more than he can handle in 2 hours. Perhaps the problem is that Scott is beholden to his Alien universe, and that for the disappointing finale, he fully acquiesces to the season of Big Dumb and Loud.

There are positives. Performances are solid; Rapace (the ‘Ripley’ character here) displays an ability to flex her instrument beyond the indelible persona she created as Lisbeth Salander in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and Fassbender brings subtle complexity to his android that transcends the material he’s given to work with. From a technical standpoint, I have no complaints. Scott is a filmmaker with a deep grasp of filmic language; he meticulously composes every frame (I consider his 1977 debut, The Duellists, second only to Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon as cinema’s most visually stunning period piece).

That said, you still have to tell a cohesive story, and this one is all over that star map. There’s also too much dialog devoted to spelling everything out for the audience. Sometimes it’s good to leave a little mystery (why do you think that 44 years after its release, people are still debating the “meaning” of 2001?). As Rod Serling said, sci-fi is “…a dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind.” What Serling (and Kubrick, and Tarkovsky) knew, and what Scott may have forgotten, is that while the best sci-fi has a lot of imagination behind it, the best sci-fi also leaves a lot to the imagination.

Action, Dystopian, Sci-Fi

Will it go round in circles? – Looper ***

August 18, 2015 Dennis Hartley Leave a comment

By Dennis Hartley

(Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on October 6, 2012)

My dinner with me: Willis and Gordon-Levitt talking to themselves.

If there’s a cardinal rule of time-travel I’ve gleaned from watching sci-fi movies over the years, it’s this: make sure that you never, ever “meet” yourself. Why? Dunno, really, just that you’re not supposed to. I imagine it could be quite unnerving, in either direction. I mean, it’s traumatic enough looking at that dorky version of my younger self in that yearbook photo, and who in their right mind is chomping at the bit to get a sneak preview of themselves in drooling dotage?

In his stylish and ultra-violent sci-fi thriller Looper, writer-director Rian Johnson not only breaks the cardinal rule, but manages to violate a few that haven’t been invented yet (see what I did there?). Johnson has himself a jolly old time exploring the potential fluidity of the time-space continuum, toying with causality and paradox like a kitten batting a ball of yarn all about the room with gleeful abandon.

The year is 2044, and America is a dystopia (it took that long?). The economy has gone 2008 for good, crime is rampant and 1 out of every 10 people has a mutation that gives them the power to levitate objects at will (although for a majority of the afflicted, their abilities are limited to the occasional Uri Geller parlor trick). Jobs are scarce; the biggest “job creator” is organized crime (again…it took that long?).

And yes, they still have plenty of gigs for hit men in the future; especially for “loopers”. Loopers have a relatively easy time of it; unlike your standard assassin, who has to meticulously plan the right time and the right place to do a hit, the looper simply shows up for “work” at a designated spot, where the target-bound, hooded and festooned with a set of silver bars, is delivered to him like an overnight FedEx package…from 30 years in the future (don’t ask…just enjoy your delicious buttered popcorn and accept it).

Pretty easy job, wouldn’t you say? The hours are good, the wages are decent, and loopers party like rock stars when they go out on the town. However, there is a calculated risk every looper takes by choosing this career path. “Retirement” (at least in the traditional sense) isn’t necessarily part of the equation. Should your bosses (who can be a fickle lot) determine that for whatever reason your services will no longer be required, they send the older version of yourself back to the present so that your younger self can take you out. This is referred to by the higher-ups as “closing the loop”.

Naturally, they don’t give you a heads up; it’s just another anonymous hooded victim who appears out of thin air in the middle of a cornfield somewhere in Kansas. Either way, you never see it coming. Ergo, as looper Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) confides with self-effacing irony in voice-over, this is not a profession that attracts “forward-thinkers”. Joe does have plans; he’s stashing all his silver bars and learning to speak French. Everything is going swimmingly for young Joe until that one fateful day in the cornfield, when his Victim du jour turns out to be… “old” Joe (Bruce Willis), who manages to flee. Uh-oh.

I’ll leave it there, and let you discover and enjoy the surprising twists and turns in your own time (in a manner of speaking). While there are some obvious touchstones here (primarily 12 Monkeys, The Terminator and Logan’s Run, with a few echoes of Groundhog Day) Johnson has fashioned a clever and original thriller that’s smarter than your average modern sci-fi action flick, yet not so self-consciously “meaningful” as to drown in its own self-importance (i.e., the director remembers to entertain the audience along the way).

Most notably, there’s an emphasis on character development (remember that?) and a palpable focus on the quality of the writing that is sorely lacking in most genre entries these days. The production design, special effects and atmospheric flourishes are “futuristic” without going over the top. It’s the little touches I especially enjoyed, like the fact that the time travel device is clearly modeled after George Pal’s design for his 1960 version of The Time Machine. Gordon-Levitt and Willis are terrific, and there are strong supporting performances from Jeff Daniels and Emily Blunt. See it now. See it later. It doesn’t really matter…time being relative and all.