WonderCon 2012: ‘Looper’ Panel with Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Rian Johnson
Over the weekend at WonderCon 2012 in Anaheim, California, director Rian Johnson (Brick, The Brothers Bloom) took the stage along with star Joseph Gordon-Levitt on a panel to talk about their latest film together, Looper.
The film’s concept is pretty damn cool. It’s a futuristic sci-fi action thriller and takes place in a world where time travel exists, but is illegal. The only way to use time traveling is on the black market, which is exactly what the mob. Whenever they want to get rid of someone, they will send them 30 years into the past where a “looper” – a hired assassin – is waiting to shoot them. And that’s exactly what Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) does. Everything seems to be going fine until the day the mob sends Joe’s future self (Bruce Willis) to be killed by Joe.
The audience got a chance to watch the trailer for the film and I am personally very curious to check out the film. Let’s just say it poses interesting questions and it a pretty cool concept. You can find a couple of photos from the film here.
Here are some of the highlights from the panel:
– Rian Johnson had been working on Looper for a long time. Right after they finished doing Brick he had already thought of the idea.
– The cast includes Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt, Paul Dano, Jeff Daniels and Piper Perabo
– Bruce Willis and Joseph Gordon-Levitt play the same character at different ages.
– Joseph Gordon-Levitt explained that this is the most transformative he has ever been in a movie, some of it because of the make-up he had to wear (to look closer to Bruce Willis) and also because he wanted the character to match Bruce Willis a bit because they are the same character. He studied Willis in order to be able to integrate that into his performance.
– Rian Johnson wrote the movie for Joseph Gordon-Levitt to be in it, and turns out it’s the first that that happened to Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
– The film was shot in New Orleans and China.
– The big challenge for Rian Johnson was figuring out how to write the time travel without it becoming too big of a thing to think about.
– Rian Johnson felt like he knew what he was doing a little more on this film versus his previous ones.
– The film explores all sorts of morals since the film is about killing your future self.
– For fans of Breaking Bad, Rian Johnson is going back and directing another episode this new season.
– Joseph Gordon-Levitt loves musicals and he would like to do one one day, but it would have to be really good.
Looper will be released to theaters on September 28, 2012.
Here are more photos from the panel:
