For a movie that’s concerned with the passage of time, “Looper” allows the pacing to get painfully flaccid in its middle section. More’s the pity, because the strong first act promises a smart and stylish movie about the vagaries of time travel.
While the stylish never goes away, the smart does, making this the second Rian Johnson movie in a row (following “The Brothers Bloom,” the writer-director’s sophomore effort after his Sundance hit debut “Brick”) that looks great but meanders while doing it.
In a requisite grimy-city-of-the-future, Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is a “looper,” which is a very specific kind of hit man.