Twelve Monkeys [12 Monkeys] ***** (1995, Bruce Willis, Madeleine Stowe, Brad Pitt, Frank Gorshin, Christopher Plummer, Jon Seda) – Classic Movie Review 689

‘Between the past and the future, sanity and madness, dreams and reality lies the mystery of the Twelve Monkeys.’

Bruce Willis, Madeleine Stowe and Brad Pitt kick up a storm in director Terry Gilliam’s dazzling-looking, mind-bending 1995 time-travelling sci-fi mystery thriller film Twelve Monkeys [12 Monkeys].

In the year 2035, humankind subsists in a desolate netherworld after the eradication of 99 per cent of the Earth’s population, a holocaust that makes the planet’s surface uninhabitable and mankind’s destiny uncertain. Convict James Cole (Bruce Willis) reluctantly volunteers to be sent back in time to 1996 to gather information about the origin of the epidemic and lethal virus that has wiped out five billion people.

But Cole is mistakenly sent back to 1990 and is arrested and locked up in a mental institution, where he meets Dr Kathryn Railly (Madeleine Stowe). Together, they have only two clues to solve the mystery of the Twelve Monkeys which threatens to erase humanity from the planet.

The story and screenplay by David Webb Peoples and Janet Peoples (based on the 1962 film La Jetée by Chris Marker) about a plot to erase humanity is a bit of a puzzle, and even if you manage to work it out, it perhaps doesn’t really seem entirely worth the effort. But Gilliam’s inspired movie is a wonderfully exciting visual and visceral experience.

Willis puts himself through hoops of fire to please in a really offbeat, sometimes brilliant sci-fi thriller that somehow became a box-office hit and one of Gilliam’s finest films.

Pitt is a ball of fire as Jeffrey Goines, the insane son of a famous scientist and virus expert whom Willis meets in the mental institution. Pitt won a Golden Globe as Best Supporting Actor and was Oscar nominated.

Also in the cast are Frank Gorshin, Christopher Plummer, Jon Seda, Michael Chance, Vernon Campbell, H Michael Walls, Bob Adrian, Simon Jones, Carol Florence, Bill Raymond, Ernest Abuba, Irma St Paule, Joey Perillo, Joseph Melitol, Rozwill Young, Frederick Strother and Joseph McKenna.

Twelve Monkeys [12 Monkeys] is directed by Terry Gilliam, runs 123 minutes is made by Twelve Monkeys Productions, Universal Pictures, Atlas Entertainment, BBC, Classico, Shochiku, Telemuenchen, is released by Universal Studios (1995) and PolyGram Filmed Entertainment (1996) (UK), is written by David Webb Peoples and Janet Peoples, based on the film La Jetée by Chris Marker, is shot by Roger Pratt, is produced by Charles Roven, is scored by Paul Buckmaster, and is designed by Jeffrey Beecroft, with special effects by Anthony Simonaitas.

It is inspired by La Jetée and borrows several concepts from it, acknowledged in the opening credits. Gilliam was entranced by La Jetée, describing its combination of editing and soundtrack as ‘simply poetic’.

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