The Forgotten Harrison Ford Movie That Inspired Rian Johnson's Looper
By JEREMY SMITH
Writer-director Rian Johnson's 2012 neo-noir time travel film "Looper" draws significant inspiration from an unexpected source: the 1985 Harrison Ford movie "Witness."
There is a sequence in "Looper" where Joseph Gordon-Levitt's character takes refuge on a farm, similar to Harrison Ford's character hiding within an Amish community in "Witness."
"When I was writing the back half of the script, I looked at the way that they sustain the tension in that movie, even when they're out on the farm," Johnson said in an interview.
Johnson also praised "Witness" for its brilliant storytelling and acknowledged that it shaped the emotional and thematic depth of "Looper" more than any other sci-fi film.