Twelve Monkeys (1995) Dystopian Sci-Fi Noir

Directed by Terry Gilliam. 

Of the films he directed I've seem Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Time Bandits, Brazil, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Fisher King, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, and maybe The Brothers Grimm. Monty Python is funny and cheap. I don't remember much of Fear and Loathing will have to give it a rewatch. Didn't get grabbed by The Fisher King, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus or Brazil, (I recently tried to re watch Brazil but fell asleep). 

But I did catch The Twelve Monkeys again on TCM and was pleasantly surprised. Written by David Peoples and Janet Peoples, based on Chris Marker's 1962 short film La Jetée. 

The premise of La Jetée is that after a nuclear war the surface of the earth is uninhabitable due to radioactive dust. Scientists in subterranean shelters turn to using prisoners of war in experiments with time travel, to see if they can escape a dying world through time,  The breakthrough experiment is when they find a prisoner who has a vivid memory of an incident with a woman on the terrace of the gate "La Jetée" at Orly Airport.  This vivid memory provides the key to make it work. 

In The Twelve Monkeys its a biological catastrophe in 1996 that wipes out most of human life on Earth and a regular convict / prisoner, again with a vivid memory from his past. becomes again the key to time travel. In this scenario the prisoner James Cole, is sent to the past with a mission to try to find and stop the nut job intent on biological sabotage. James Cole becomes our de facto detective.

The films excellent Cinematography was by Roger Pratt (Brazil, Mona Lisa, Batman, Chocolat). Music was by Paul Buckmaster. 

The cast is comprised of Bruce Willis (Pulp Fiction, Die Hard, The Sixth Sense) as James Cole, Joseph Melito as young James Cole, Madeleine Stowe (China Moon, Blink) as Dr. Kathryn Railly, Brad Pitt (Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, Thelma & Louise, True Romance, Se7en) as Jeffrey Goines, Christopher Plummer as Dr. Leland Goines, Frank Gorshin as Dr. Fletcher, Jon Seda as Jose, Ernest Abuba as Engineer, Bill Raymond as Microbiologist, Simon Jones as Zoologist, Bob Adrian as Geologist, Carol Florence as Astrophysicist/Jones, H. Michael Walls as Botanist, David Morse as Dr. Peters, Christopher Meloni as Lt. Halperin, Vernon Campbell as Tiny, Lisa Gay Hamilton as Teddy, Annie Golden as Woman Cabbie, and Thomas Roy as a street preacher

A circular vortex made up of monkeys rotates and this is the credit sequence.

Story

Our story begins with a fragment of a memory. A flashback. A small boy watching an incident at an airport gate where something happens to a man in front of him and his family.

This segues to a prison in the year 2035 some where way below crumbling Philadelphia. James Cole is in a cage. The flashback is his. This prison is deep underground. All society lives underground. 

A computer screen a typed message.

James Cole comes out of his dream / flashback when he hears the name Cole and his number called on an address system.

Bruce Willis as James Cole

The Scientists, are using the prisoners for suicide missions to the surface.  Its the wild frontier up there, Large carnivores, i.e. bears and big cats, are roaming loose among the concrete and steel ruins of Philadelphia. Cole is chosen to explore the surface. 

There's an elaborate sequence where he slips into a latex layer that's followed by a sort of bio-hazard outer layer of clear vinyl giving the appearance of a giant condom. 

He goes through an airlock to an elevator. The elevator gets him to a semi flooded subbasement. he follows a map to a ladder that leads to a manhole at the surface. Cole pops up into to a dystopian winter cityscape.

Cole is carrying a suitcase sized apparatus to monitor the surface conditions. He's also there to collect any small life form specimens, i.e. spiders, and other insects, to keep the underground scientists occupied with various experiments to measure the livability of the surface. He's also instructed to gather what info he can on who or what caused the disaster from 1996. So Cole in effect becomes our de facto detective.

Dovetailing with these surface jaunts the scientists are also using prisoners to do various time travel experiments. Once they know the details of the cause of the apocalypse, they will try to send a time agent to the past to try to stop it. 

A lot of the early time travel experiments don't go well. At first its just like shooting in the dark trying to get dialed in to the correct specific time, and prisoners traveling to incorrect pasts have had catastrophic mental collapses. Only the prisoners with strong memories, memories that are tethered like anchors to a point in the flow of time, survive, the others go catatonic or insane.

When Cole was sent to the surface on a "finding" expedition he finds an old tin sign graffitied with a mysterious Twelve Monkeys stencil with a hand scrawled "We Did It!" A clue. 

Back in the subterranean bunker community Cole is hosed down, scrubbed with germicidal concoctions, and then injected with antibiotics before being brough before the scientists to be questioned about his report. 

In the auditorium projected on the wall is a headline from the disaster. "Too Late for Cure"

The scientists are lined up in across the room opposite Cole. They all sit behind a sort of control panel filled with computer monitoring equipment. Cole is told to sit, and as he does, wrist restraints lock him to the armrests, and the chair elevates. He is questioned in this manner, as globular monitoring device records his biometric data. 

When he tells them about the stencil of the twelve monkeys they offer him a full pardon if he'll agree to attempt a time travel to the past to investigate the Twelve Monkeys in 1996. 

Since the whole film is already in Noirsville from the get go, it goes from the Noirsville fat into the Noirsville fire when the scientists send Cole back to 1990 instead of 1996, and he finds himself in a Philadelphia lunatic asylum. 

Noirsville

Brad Pitt as Jeffrey Goines

Frank Gorshin as Dr. Fletcher

Madeleine Stowe as Dr. Kathryn Railly

Christopher Plummer as Dr. Leland Goines and David Morse as Dr. Peters

This film is heavily, a Visually Stylistic Noir and this imagery is complimented by the quality of the acting a good score, and the interesting expansion of the original story. By making it a biological disaster rather than a dystopian nuclear winter, David and Janet Peoples, were able to expand the story into a who done it mystery. 

<possible spoilers>

In the original La Jetée, Cole's character known only as "The Man" was, besides being sent to the past was also sent to the future. The mission was to find a way for the survivors to transport themselves either way. The Future people offer to give "The Man" a devise that will do just this, however upon "The Man's" return to the subterranean bunker the scientists, who no longer need their guinea pig plan to liquidate him. "The Man" is then visited by The Future people (who have long ago mastered time travel) and offer to transport him to the future. The Man who has fallen in love with the woman asks instead to be transported back to the past to be with her and thus becomes part of an eddy in the flow of time, an eternal time loop. 

A great Sci-fi Neo Noir from the 1990's Neo Noir boom. 10/10