Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #11733 in DVD
• Released on: 1999-09-20
• Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Full Screen, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 124 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
Inspired by Chris Marker's acclaimed short film La Jetée, 12 Monkeys combines intricate, intelligent storytelling with the uniquely imaginative vision of director Terry Gilliam. The story opens in the wintry wasteland of the year 2035, where a virulent plague has forced humans to live in a squalid, oppressively regimented underground. Bruce Willis plays a societal outcast who is given the opportunity to erase his criminal record by "volunteering" to time-travel into the past to obtain a pure sample of the deadly virus that will help future scientists to develop a cure. But in bouncing from 1918 to the early and mid-1990s, he undergoes an ordeal that forces him to question his own perceptions of reality. Caught between the dangers of the past and the devastation of the future, he encounters a psychiatrist (Madeleine Stowe) who is initially convinced he's insane, and a wacky mental patient (Brad Pitt in a twitchy Oscar-nominated role) with links to a radical group that may have unleashed the deadly virus. Equal parts mystery, tragedy, psychological thriller, and apocalyptic drama, 12 Monkeys ranks as one of the best science fiction films of the 1990s, boosted by Gilliam's visual ingenuity and one of the finest performances of Willis's career. --Jeff Shannon

Special Features
Full Screen
1.85 Wide Screen
DVD 9
English
English
Region 2
Dolby Digital 5.1 English
Dolby Digital 5.1
The Hamster Factor And Other Tales Of The Twelve Monkeys Documentary

Synopsis
When a man enters a hospital claiming to have journeyed back in time from the year 2025 to stop a killer virus from exterminating mankind, a beautiful psychologist decides he might be more than delusional. Terry Gilliam populates this labyrinthine, apocalyptic film with twisted characters and eerie revelations. The film was shot primarily in Philadelphia; Gilliam uses the more dilapidated area of the city to the film's apocalyptic advantage. The film is based on the 1962 French short film LA JETEE. The Signature Laserdisc includes a feature on the film's making.

Customer Reviews

Monkey business
A real thriller of a film, carefully crafted and so well-thought out that I used it in a philosophy essay about time-travel at university.

The two main actors - Brad Pitt and Bruce Willis - are so unbelievably good that you can feel both James Cole's anguish and Geoffrey Goines' agitation oozing from the screen. Madeleine Stowe's attempts to rival her male colleagues fall a bit flat - she seems a bit like a jumpy Alanis Morisette in the "Ironic" video rather than the character she is supposed to be playing (it would have been better had Railly remained calmer and more composed as a foil to Cole and Goines' supposed lunacy) but gives a decent performance.

The exquisite location filming and atmospheric use of dirt and decay made me think I was in some Orwell novel - don't watch this without taking a long hot shower afterwards - but the tension between Cole's mission and longing for the "good ol' days" is poorly developed, as is the romance between Cole and Railly - perhaps there isn't supposed to be one, but the on-screen hints were sending confusing mixed messages out, and the film would not have suffered had there been less ambiguity, particularly in the final scenes.

There is an 87 minute "Hamster Factor" documentary also on the DVD but I was so exhausted by the film that to sit through almost as much again immediately afterwards was too much. More information on the cast would have been nice as well, but at the end of the day a good movie should speak for itself - and this one does so at a high volume.

Surreal Sci fi from Gilliam
Twelve Monkeys is another bizarre but brilliant sci-fi epic from Terry Gilliam. Bruce Willis plays James Cole, a man we first encounter in a futuristic, squalid, underground prison. Cole, in exchange for parole, agrees to be sent back in time to find out about the virus that forced humanity underground. Time travelling seems not to be an exact science, and he is sent back to 1990, six years before the virus breaks out. In 1990, he meets Kathryn Railly (Madeline Stowe) and tries to convince her that he is not crazy but actually is from the future (as soon as Cole starts opening his mouth in 1990, he is shipped to the local mental institution). As the movie continues, Cole takes several jumps back in time and encounters Railly again and again, until she is finally convinced that what he is saying is true. Twelve Monkeys is intercut with surreal images, and the plot seems so bizarre at times that you could leave the film thinking Cole had dreamt the whole thing, or is he having some sort of psychotic breakdown and none of what we see is actually happening. But this is the brilliance of Gilliam; when you watch a movie of his, you never quite know what has actually happened, and you can have many a heated debate as to what it all means.

Another truly great aspect of this film is the Oscar-nominated turn by Brad Pitt. He is brilliant as the insane son of a research scientist. He is essentially the comic relief of the film, although he is dressed up as the suspected villain. His performance is truly amazing and not wooden and stilted, as he can be when he takes the lead. Spinetinglers believes he is a character actor trapped in a lead actor's body, as over his career he has put in some great performances when he has not had his name above the titles (Floyd in True Romance, Mickey O'Neil in Snatch and Tyler Durden in Fight Club.)

Bring on the monkeys!
For the first part of this film you'll be entertained and midly confused.

But the pieces slot into place and you see the full scope of what is being said, this goes from being a piece-by-piece jigsaw, to being a masterpiece!

Bruce Willis plays a great part and is 100% believeable in the role.

This film is best watched twice, on the second viewing you see references you may have missed the first time round, but seem obvious in hindsight.

This is one of those films that stays with you after you've watched it, and rightly so.