Twelve Monkeys

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KLAXXON

Twelve Monkeys

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A nightmare journey between a holocaustic future of 2035 and the past is the mission faced by volunteer Cole. He must find the source of the viral infection responsible for the deaths of five billion people which started in 1996.





A convict, sent back in time to stop a devastating plague, is sent too far back and is hospitalized as insane.




Terry Gilliam makes films, not videos. The downside of that is that most of his films look murky and feel slow when shrunk into a box for home consumption, and his tendency to fill dialogue scenes with people shouting at each other is also a trial for the most well-balanced surround sound home entertainment system. However, Twelve Monkeys is a rare film not because of its top-lined performers or even its visual dazzle but its plot, and so this plays much better as a rental re-run than it has a right to. If you saw it theatrically you might even find it worth another look now that you know the ending, so you can see just how much of the Möbius strip time-travel storyline adds up.
Taking a Twilight Zone-ish nugget from Chris Maker’s classic short
La Jetée, screenwriters David and
Janet Peoples throw us into the mind of Cole (Willis), a bald loser in a futuristic underground hellhole who is sent back to the 1990s to locate a sample of the virus which will wipe out most of humanity in our immediate future. However, as he is whipped back and forth between World War I, 1990, 1996 and the future, Cole fixates not on his mission but on psychiatrist Kathryn (Stowe), who manages to convince him that it’s all a delusion.
The horrible irony is that as soon as Cole starts trying to rationalise all the science fiction stuff as a neurosis, Kathryn turns up physical evidence that suggests it’s all true. Meanwhile, loony animal activist Goines (Brad Pitt, who seems to have been maintaining Dennis Hopper’s brain cells) is planning a major coup of some sort, and that deadly virus is nestled in Goines’ dad’s laboratory, just waiting to be set loose.
Gilliam is a past master at nightmare futures and bizarre images, and post-Terminator viewers will be able to follow the story — the realisation of just what the woman from the future is doing on the plane in the last scene is a kicker — but the strength of Twelve Monkeys is its heart. Willis finally proves he can really act in a daring knockout of a performance — which ranges from terrifying violent outbursts to a childish, touchingly desperate nostalgia for
“20th century music”.
Though initially disorienting, Twelve Monkeys really gets it together at the half-way point and then becomes masterly, transcending its apocalypse nuttery with a last-minute realisation, cued by an all-night Hitchcock festival, of what perception might be for. A single misstep might be the use of Louis Armstong’s Wonderful World, which seems like a borrowing — along with supporting player Simon Jones, aka Arthur Dent — from The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide To The Galaxy.




Disorientating, but good performances all round. Will have you thinking for days afterwards.













Joseph Melito ...  Young Cole
Bruce Willis ...  James Cole
Jon Seda ...  Jose
Michael Chance ...  Scarface
Vernon Campbell ...  Tiny
H. Michael Walls ...  Botanist
Bob Adrian ...  Geologist
Simon Jones ...  Zoologist
Carol Florence ...  Astrophysicist
Bill Raymond ...  Microbiologist
Ernest Abuba ...  Engineer
Irma St. Paule ...  Poet
Madeleine Stowe ...  Kathryn Railly
Joey Perillo ...  Detective Franki
Bruce Kirkpatrick ...  Policeman No. 1
Wilfred Williams ...  Policeman No. 2
Rozwill Young ...  Billings
Brad Pitt ...  Jeffrey Goines
Nell Johnson ...  Ward Nurse
Frederick Strother ...  L.J. Washington (as Fred Strother)
Rick Warner ...  Dr. Casey
Frank Gorshin ...  Dr. Fletcher
Anthony 'Chip' Brienza ...  Dr. Goodin
Joilet Harris ...  Harassed Mother
Drucie McDaniel ...  Waltzing Woman Patient
John Blaisse ...  Old Man Patient
Louis Lippa ...  Patient at Gate
Stan Kang ...  X-Ray Doctor
Pat Dias ...  WWI Captain
Aaron Michael Lacey ...  WWI Sergeant
David Morse ...  Dr. Peters
Charles Techman ...  Professor
Jann Ellis ...  Marilou
Johnnie Hobbs Jr. ...  Officer No. 1
Janet Zappala ...  Anchorwoman (as Janet L. Zappala)
Thomas Roy ...  Evangelist
Harry O'Toole ...  Louie / Raspy Voice
Yuri Korchenko ...  Thug No. 1 (as Korchenko)
Chuck Jeffreys ...  Thug No. 2
Lisa Gay Hamilton ...  Teddy
Felix Pire ...  Fale (as Felix A. Pire)
Matt Ross ...  Bee (as Matthew Ross)
Barry Price ...  Agent No. 1
John Panzarella ...  Agent No. 2
Christopher Plummer ...  Dr. Goines
Larry Daly ...  Agent No. 3
Arthur Fennell ...  Anchorman
Karl Warren ...  Pompous Man
Christopher Meloni ...  Lt. Halperin
Paul Meshejian ...  Detective Dalva
Robert O'Neill ...  Wayne
Kevin Thigpen ...  Kweskin
Lee Golden ...  Hotel Clerk
Joseph McKenna ...  Wallace
Jeff Tanner ...  Plain Clothes Cop
Faith Potts ...  Store Clerk
Michael Ryan Segal ...  Weller
Annie Golden ...  Woman Cabbie
Lisa Talerico ...  Ticket Agent
Stephen Bridgewater ...  Airport Detective
Ray Huffman ...  Plump Businessman (as Franklin Huffman)
Jodi Dawson ...  Gift Store Clerk (as JoAnn S. Dawson)
Jack Dougherty ...  Airport Security No. 1
Lenny Daniels ...  Airport Security No. 2
Herbert C. Hauls Jr. ...  Airport Security No. 3
Charley Scalies ...  Impatient Traveler
Carolyn Walker ...  Terrified Traveler




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preet

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