Shows far more originality than 99% of films.

Rating: 8/10 (28 February 2005)

Bruce Willis plays James Cole, a man from a future where the world has been devastated by a deadly virus, who is chosen to go back in time and try to find out how this came about.
Directed by Terry Gilliam, Twelve Monkeys bears many similarities with his earlier film Brazil, but somehow feels more complete. Brazil was a weird, and at times brilliant futuristic parable, with crazy characters offset against grim cityscapes. However it failed to mesh into a coherent whole, and had a plot that amounted to little more than a dash from one mad sketch to another.
Twelve Monkeys largely succeeds in improving on the things that didn't work in Brazil. Gilliam has reined in some of his more bizarre ideas, and paid more attention to keeping the plot moving, making this a far more balanced work. Even so, Gilliam remains true to his own uniquely quirky style, making Twelve Monkeys strikingly different from the average science fiction film.
Bruce Willis plays a character far removed from his usual action movie stereotype. As a man set adrift in a strange world, he demonstrates that he can do more than just blow up buildings. Brad Pitt also gives a terrific performance as a mental patient, although it does become a tad irritating after a while.
Being a time travel film, there are many plot holes in Twelve Monkeys, but this is unavoidable in any film on this theme, since whatever approach is taken to the possibilities of time travel you are bound to create inconsistencies. For example, this film's notion is that the time in which Cole lives is the present, and everything up until this point has already happened, so it is impossible to change the past. However, surely every action that Cole takes in the past must impact on events in some small way, through the very fact of his presence.
Twelve Monkeys is an ambitious and impressive film. Of course many of its ideas are derivative, but it shows far more originality than 99% of films. It succeeds in being simultaneously entertaining and thought provoking, and deserves to be regarded as one of the best science fiction films of the 90's.