12 Monkeys (1995)
Rated R
Directed by Terry Gilliam
Who has also done Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, Life of Brian
Written by David & Janet Peoples
Who have also done Blade Runner, Unforgiven
Cast
James Cole
Kathryn Railly
Jeffrey Goines
Jose
Bruce Willis
Madeline Stowe
Brad Pitt
Jon Seda
Introduction
Tagline: The future is history.
In a future world devastated by disease, a convict is sent back in time to gather information about the
man-made virus that wiped out most of the human population on the planet.
http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0114746/
Awards
Nominated for various awards in the following categories: Best Actor in a Supporting Role (x2),
Costume Design, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, Writing, Best Dramatic Presentation,
Won Best Science Fiction Film, Best Supporting Actor (x4), Best Costumes, Best Director, Best
Actress.
Nominated for Oscars in Costume Design and Best Supporting Actor.
Nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the Awards of the Japanese Academy in 1997.
Nominated for the Golden Berlin Bear at the 1996 Berlin International Film Festival.
Won a Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture.
Reviews
12 Monkeys
by Roger Ebert
August 2, 2002
www.rogerebert.suntimes.com
In this [film’s] world, everything is rusty, subterranean, and leaks. The movie uses its future world as
a home base and launching pad for the central story, which is set in 1990 and 1996, and is about a
time traveler trying to save the world from a deadly plague.
Much of the interest comes from the nature of the Cole character. He is simple, confused, badly
informed, exhausted and shot through with feelings of betrayal. Nothing is as it seems - not in his
future world, not in 1990 and not in 1996.
There are relatively few shots in this movie that would look normal in any other film; everything is
skewed to express the vision.
Gilliam's "Brazil" was praised by a lot of critics, but I didn't get it, even after repeated viewings. "12
Monkeys" is easier to follow, with a plot that holds together and a solid relationship between Cole
and Railly. But even here, Gilliam allows the anarchic flywheel of madness to spin: The Brad Pitt
character, spewing compulsive visions of paranoia and dread, is a powerful influence, suggesting
that logic cannot solve the movie's problems. And other characters - those in charge of the
subterranean future world, as well as the conspirators around the Plummer character - behave like
villains pumped in from an H.G. Wells science-fiction fantasy. Wild overacting takes place on
bizarre sets that are photographed with tilt shots and wideangle lenses, and we begin to share the
confusion and exhaustion of Cole. Like him, we're wrenched back and forth through time, and
dumped on the concrete floor of reality.
I've seen "12 Monkeys" described as a comedy. Any laughs that it inspires will be very hollow. It's
more of a celebration of madness and doom, with a hero who tries to prevail against the chaos of his
condition, and is inadequate. This vision is a cold, dark, damp one, and even the romance between
Willis and Stowe feels desperate rather than joyous. All of this is done very well, and the more you
know about movies (especially the technical side), the more you're likely to admire it. But a comedy
it's not. And as an entertainment, it appeals more to the mind than to the senses. 
12 Monkeys
by Peter Travers
January 25, 1996
www.rollingstone.com
Even when Terry Gilliam's latest leap into the wild blue of futuristic fantasy is at its most
confounding, you leap along with him. Such is the seductive power of his twisted imagination.
Gilliam, along with the gifted cinematographer Roger Pratt and production designer Jeffrey
Beecroft, fashions a disturbing and dazzling lost world.
Credit is also due to screenwriters David Peoples (Unforgiven, Blade Runner) and his wife, Janet,
who took Chris Marker's evocative 1962 short film La JetTe and enriched it with their own stirring
vision of a future haunted by the past.
Cole is haunted by a recurring dream of a young boy at an airport. The boy stands transfixed as a
man with a suitcase rushes past him, followed by a blond woman who weeps by the man's side after
the police gun him down. The tenderness of the woman as she kisses the dying man's bloody hand
deeply affects Cole and the boy.
This dream is the soul of the film. Gilliam returns to it three times, adding more details until the
dream links all the pieces in the puzzle, which includes the remarkable David Morse as a researcher
with more than a passing interest in Kathryn. Cole's confusing of illusion and reality suggests Alfred
Hitchcock's masterwork Vertigo, in which a mentally unbalanced James Stewart tries to turn Kim
Novak into a reincarnation of the woman he loves, who has died. Cole and Kathryn hide in a movierevival house showing Vertigo. The 1958 film, now yellowed with age, shows Novak in the Muir
Woods using her finger to trace the small space on the rings of a cut redwood that encompasses the
years of her life. Bernard Herrmann's haunting Vertigo score plays over the dialogue between Cole
and Kathryn as they leave the theater in an attempt to carve out their own small space in life. Rarely
has one film referenced another with such poetic grace. Like Vertigo, 12 Monkeys rewards multiple
viewings. You might say it even demands them. For all the fun, fright and hypnotic romance that
Gilliam delivers, he digs deepest into fatalistic themes that usually scare away the crowds at the box
office. Go with Gilliam anyway. Solving the riddle of 12 Monkeys is an exhilarating challenge. 
Allusions, References and Noteable Notes
Source: 12 Monkeys was inspired by the French short film La Jetée.
La jetée (English: The Jetty and The Pier) (1962) is a 28-minute black and white science fiction
film by Chris Marker. Constructed almost entirely from still photos, it tells the story of a postnuclear war experiment in time travel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Jet%C3%A9e
Vertigo:
Cole and the woman hide out in a movie theater playing Hitchcock's "Vertigo," and later, in their
own lives, replay the movie's key scene, with the same music on the soundtrack. What is Gilliam
doing here? He's not simply providing a movie in-joke. The point, I think, is that Cole's own life is
caught between rewind and fast-forward, and he finds himself repeating in the past what he learned
in the future, and vice versa.
www.rogerebert.suntimes.com
Excerpt of Vertigo synopsis from www.imdb.com/title/tt0052357/synopsis
The film begins with the close-up of a woman's face, giving way to a kaleidoscope of credits, to Bernard
Hermann's haunting score…
Later, at Big Basin Redwoods State Park, Scottie and Madeleine admire the ancient redwoods. As they
view a cross-section of a huge tree with the approximate dates of historical events indicated by its rings.
Madeleine appears to go into a trance, seemingly becoming Carlotta, recounting the dates of her birth
and death. Madeleine wanders deeper into the woods, and Scottie follows her. He confronts her about
the jump, and tries to bring Madeleine back. By the shore, Madeleine begins to reveal fragments of her
vague memories: an empty grave with no name, waiting for her; an empty room in which she sits alone;
and finally a tower, bell, and garden in Spain. Madeleine declares that she is not crazy, she does not
want to die. They kiss as the waves crash onto the rocks. Scottie promises he will never leave her.
The next day, Madeleine returns to Scottie's house, where she tells him of an awful dream, with a tower,
a bell, and a village. As she describes the location in detail, Scottie finishes her descriptions. "You've
been there!" he exclaims. Scottie is talking about the San Juan Bautista, a mission that has been
converted into a museum. They drive to the mission.
When they arrive at the mission, they kiss. Madeleine explains she must do something. She asks him if
he believes she loves him. He replies, "yes". She says, "And if you lose me, then you'll know I, I loved
you. And I wanted to go on loving you". When she goes into the chapel, Scottie realizes she is going to
the bell tower. He follows her, but as he looks down, his acrophobia sets in: he gets vertigo. He cannot
follow her up to the top of the bell tower. He watches, helpless, in fear and horror as Madeleine's body
plunges to the tile roof below. Scottie staggers out of the mission, sun blinding his eyes, stricken.
Scottie's sleep is troubled. Midge arrives to care for Scottie in a psychiatric ward. She tries to comfort
him: "Mother's here". Scottie does not speak. The doctor believes that Scottie will be incapacitated for a
year due to stress and anxiety from his depression and guilt.. . 
Prophecy: There is a recurring motif in the film regarding the depiction of time travelers as prophets.
During Railly's lecture on "Madness and Apocalyptic Visions", she recounts the Cassandra myth, and
speaks of medieval and war-time predictions of an apocalypse in the year 1996. Later in the movie, we
encounter a medieval evangelist who tells Cole "You're one of us" and Railly's photograph reveals that
the soldier from 1917 was actually Cole's friend Jose.
In Greek mythology, Cassandra (Greek: Κασσάνδρα "she who entangles men") was the daughter of
King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy. Her beauty caused Apollo to grant her the gift of prophecy.
However, when she did not return his love, Apollo placed a curse on her so that no one would ever
believe her predictions.
Furthermore, religious studies academics have authored essays claiming that the lead character James
Cole (initials J.C.) fits the cinematic character type of a
Christ-figures
Christ-figure, a savior sent to sacrifice himself in order to
appear
save humanity.
thoughout pop
A Christ figure is a literary technique that authors use to
culture as a way
draw allusions between their characters and the biblical
to identify a
Jesus Christ. More loosely, the Christ Figure is a spiritual
selfless hero.
or prophetic character who parallels Jesus, or other spiritual
In Superman
or prophetic figures.
Returns, for
In general, a character should display more than one
example, the
correspondence with the story of Jesus Christ as depicted in
protagonist is
the Bible.
repeatedly used
For instance, the character might display one or more of the
as a Christ“They can be a great
following traits: performance of miracles, manifestation of
figure in the way people, Kal-E l, they wish
to be. They only lack the
divine qualities, healing others, display loving kindness and
he is shot, and
light to show the way. For
forgiveness, fight for justice, being guided by the spirit of
this reason above all,
the ideas or
their capacity for good, I
the character's father, die and rise again. Christ figures are
values placed
have sent them you... my
often martyrs, sacrificing themselves for causes larger than
only son”
around him.
themselves. In postmodern literature, the resurrection
theme is often abandoned, leaving us with the image of a martyr sacrificing himself for a greater good. It
is common to see Christ figures displayed in a manner suggestive of crucifixion as well; this technique
is more noticeable in films than in literature.
www.en.wikipedia.org
“Yesterday This Day's Madness did prepare;
To-morrow's Silence, Triumph, or Despair:
Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why:
Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where.”
from The Rubaiyat (a form of Persian poetry)
By Omar Khayyam
Written 1120 A.C.E.
Discussion Questions
Film as Technique
 Bookend shots; significance; similarities/differences?
 Use of music and repeat of music (dischordant music from opening credits, nostalgic music etc.)
 Light and color associated with time/place
 Canted camera // Cole’s confusion
Film as Story
 Subjective nature of memories and their effect upon perceptions of reality
 Parallels between Cole’s present and the past
 Symbolism of birth/rebirth
 Prison motif (freedom v. entrapment); animals/zoos to parallel this motif
 Shift in interpretation based on shift in perspective (paintings, zoom outs/ins, change understanding
with more information)
 Contrast between “crazy” and “sane”
 TV programs // plot
 Religious underpinnings (Father/Son, belief, faith etc.)
Key Quotes/Selections
Quote
Scene
Significance/Relevance