Twelve Monkeys
TWELVE MONKEYS (15)
D: Terry Gilliam
Universal/Atlas/BBC/Polygram/UGC (Charles
Roven)
US/UK/Germany/France/Japan 1995
130 mins
Science Fiction/Mystery/Thriller
W: David Peoples & Janet
Peoples [inspired by the screenplay "La Jetee" by Chris Marker]
DP: Roger Pratt
Ed: Mick Audsley
Mus: Paul Buckmaster
PD: Jeffrey Beecroft
Cos: Julie Weiss
Bruce Willis (James Cole), Madeliene Stowe
(Kathryn Reilly), Brad Pitt (Jeffrey Goines), Christopher Plummer (Dr. Goines), Jon Seda (Jose), David Morse (Dr. Peters)
One of the greatest sci-fi films of all time and
certainly one of the finest of the 1990's. Bruce Willis gives one of his best and most mature screen performances as James Cole, one of Earth's few survivors following an global
epidemic which has all but wiped out humanity.
He is used as a guinea pig in a time travel
experiment to gather information in the past so a cure can be found, but is accidentally sent to the wrong year and ends up condemned in a mental asylum where he meets a wacky
environmentalist (a scene-stealing Brad Pitt) whom Cole suspects as being the main culprit behind the outbreak.
With the help of a sympathetic psychiatrist, Cole
attempts to unravel the complex puzzle of the "Army of the Twelve Monkeys" in a plot which successfully plays on butterfly effect theories and paradox upon paradox.
Inspired by a French art-house film called La
Jetee, which had a similar theme, but was mostly told through still images, Twelve Monkeys presents a labyrinthine mystery which begs to be watched more than once.
As good as Willis' performance is, he simply can't
act crazy the way Brad Pitt does crazy, who picked up a Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor and also received an Oscar nomination.
Twelve Monkeys makes a profound and complex
viewing experience, but it's all very well done by director Terry Gilliam, arguably his best ever work and certainly his most accessible for the mainstream.
9/10
