Writer and director Rian Johnson offers fans first look at project in very early stages

Oct 14, 2012 10:44 GMT  ·  By

“Looper,” written and directed by Rian Johnson and starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis, turned out to be the surprise release of the fall. Above is the pitch trailer Johnson showed studios to get them on board.

It comes straight from the man himself, with a brief explanation as well.

“This is a strange curiosity I thought might be interesting - just after I finished the script for Looper but before we began preproduction I asked Joe [Gordon-Levitt] to record some voice-over, and with help from my friend Ronen Verbit constructed this ‘fake trailer’ using clips from other movies,” Johnson writes.

“This is a fairly common thing to do when you're trying to get a movie off the ground, but it was the first time I tried it. It was meant to show more some of the film's tone, and to show how the odd concept could be presented in a clear and compelling way in the marketing. Zach Johnson did the sketches,” he further says.

Casting had not even started at that point, so the faces shown in it (Brad Pitt’s most notably) have no relevance.

What stands out about this pitch trailer, though, is the fact that Johnson was probably considering going for a much darker tone than the one he adopted in the final film.

Speaking of which, have you seen “Looper”? If so, what did you think of it?