tom cruise 12 monkeys

The Untold Truth Of 12 Monkeys

Take a pinch of time travel, add a shake of a global pandemic, mix in a subtle flavor of ecological crisis, put in the oven, bake until golden and you have Terry Gilliam's "12 Monkeys." Released in 1996, the movie was an insightful and no-holds-barred view of what humanity's future would look like. Much like "Blade Runner" — which was also scripted by "12 Monkeys" co-writer David Peoples — the future in this movie isn't pretty or Utopian. It's bleak, accusing, and claustrophobic. Both a box office smash and a hit with the critics , "12 Monkeys" refuses to follow formulas or let the viewer off the hook with a happy ending.

With Hollywood heavyweights Bruce Willis and Madeleine Stowe on board, and rapidly rising star Brad Pitt in support, Terry Gilliam was given more freedom by the producers to follow his trademark vision of what a film could be. The collapse of civilization, the Cassandra Syndrome , and questions about preconceived notions of sanity and the paradoxes of time travel are all themes that force the audience to sit up and pay attention. So take a breath, gather your wits and let's take a deep dive into the murk, mist, and mayhem of "12 Monkeys."

It's based on a short French film that Terry Gilliam refused to watch

Before there was "12 Monkeys," there was a short science fiction French film called "La Jetee" (via Films Lie ). Directed by Chris Marker in 1962 and composed mainly of still shots, "La Jetee" is a study on the illusion of cinema and the false perception of time that all film conspires to create. The film's plot revolves around a soldier in a post-apocalyptic Paris who is used as a test subject for a series of experiments in time travel. Through clever editing and voice-over commentary, "La Jetee" manages to create a multi-layered 28-minute film about the unreliability of memory, the whimsical nature of time, and how it traps us all in its never-ending labyrinth. It's easy to see the similarities with "12 Monkeys."

David and Janet Peoples were the scriptwriters in charge of adapting "12 Monkeys" from "La Jetee," and, according to Cinephilia and Beyond , both felt it was the perfect film and had initial reservations about its remake. In an interview, Terry Gilliam described "La Jetee" as "technically brilliant." He also equated the film to music or poetry because of the editing, which he coined, "the most extraordinary I have ever seen." Although quick to sing the praises of "La Jetee," Gilliam admitted in an interview with Film Scouts , that prior to, and during the filming of "12 Monkeys" he refused to watch the film. Gilliam explained, "I've never seen "La Jetee." If I do something based on something else I make it a principle not to read or see the original. I'll be intimidated by it or I'll feel an awful sense of responsibility."

Terry Gilliam initially thought 12 Monkeys was too complex to make

When the script for "12 Monkeys" landed on Terry Gilliam's lap, he loved the story that David and Janet Peoples had created. It wore its inspirations unashamedly but it was very much its own beast and blazed its own trail. There was, however, one big problem. In an interview with Den of Geek , Gilliam explained that he felt the movie about time travel, underground civilizations, and deadly viruses that kill all but one percent of the world's population was far too complex to make. Yet fortune favors the brave. With the realization that the studio had already invested a million dollars in the script and wanted to see a tangible return on their money, he threw caution to the wind and picked up the directorial reins.

Gilliam explained, "My job was basically to find a cast to make it work. Once Bruce Willis was on, we were off running, and Brad Pitt was the icing on the cake. And then we made the film." Although Gilliam felt the film's success proved there was an audience for films that engaged the intellect as well as the emotions, he recalled meeting with studio executives who had a different explanation for the film's popularity: Brad Pitt. Gilliam added, "Their reductionist theory of its success was very simple. I was saying, 'Wait!' But of course, that's the way it works." Gilliam explained that post "12 Monkeys," Pitt appeared in a string of failures such as "The Mexican" and "Meet Joe Black." Gilliam elaborated it eventually turned out well for Pitt but insisted that studios should concentrate more on the quality of the film and less on big-name stars and overblown promotion campaigns.

Terry Gilliam was concerned that Bruce Willis's Hollywood tough guy persona was wrong for 12 Monkeys

Although in the mid-nineties, Bruce Willis was riding the crest of a wave and a huge box-office draw, Terry Gilliam initially felt that the Hollywood "tough guy" was the wrong fit for a damaged, vulnerable and confused character such as James Cole. Willis had built his reputation playing wisecracking alpha males such as John McClane in the "Die Hard" franchise, and Gilliam revealed to Inverse that although he liked him as a person he wasn't a fan of Willis as an actor. The director confessed that Nicolas Cage and Tom Cruise were also in the running to play Cole. With pressure to attach a big-name movie star to the production, Gilliam decided to take a punt on Willis because he was smart and funny, and Willis, who was looking to try out more challenging roles, agreed to a pay cut.

Adamant that the superstar meet certain conditions to play the part, Gilliam explained he told Willis how much he hated that, "Pursed-lip expression he does in his films when he gets a little nervous. It's a Trumpian mouth. For a moment it goes all Trumpian. Rectal. It's like I'm looking at somebody's a**hole." Spotlight reported that Gilliam also recalled saying to Willis, "You've got to come here basically naked; you can't come with all the entourage, the trappings of the superstar. This character is basically alone, that's his nature." Gilliam admitted that, to his credit, Willis, "Worked his a**off" because the actor "was desperately feeling he wanted to escape the trap of success."

Brad Pitt worked with a psychiatrist to perfect the role of Jeffery Goines

Playing the part of a neurotic and hyperactive individual whose mouth can barely keep up with his quicksilver thoughts was an opportunity for Brad Pitt to show the world he had serious acting skills to match his good looks. "12 Monkeys" casting director Magery Simkin told Inverse , "With Brad at the time, it was a failure of people's imagination about him. And also the curse of the pretty boy, that people don't believe God gives with both hands or something." Simkin added that the films presented both Pitt and Bruce Willis with an ideal opportunity to push people's perceptions of what they could do as actors. Producer Charles Roven revealed that Pitt was so committed to the role of Jeffery Goines that he spent some time in a ward for people with mental health conditions to gain a fuller understanding of the character.

The New York Times reported that psychiatrists are often dismayed about the reckless and inaccurate way mental disorders are depicted in movies. To avoid falling into that trap, Pitt worked closely with Dr. Laszlo Gyulai, who explained that too often in film, people suffering from mental health difficulties are made to "look like lunatics, but many patients who are mentally ill are not crazy at all, particularly if they have depression or mood disorders." Terry Gilliam revealed he initially thought, Pitt, who won a Golden Globe for the role, might not be able to capture up the mercurial intensity of Goines. He explained, "I was actually scared sh**less that Brad might not be able to do the character because up to then we'd never seen him as a motormouth."

Terry Gilliam stumbled upon 12 Monkeys' haunting musical score by accident

Everything about the "12 Monkeys" — from the set to the dialogue to the direction to the plot and the performances — has a haunting quality that is both unsettling and captivating. The musical score is no different. Suite Punta Del Este composed by Astor Piazzolla has an unrelenting quality like a snake consuming its tail or time collapsing in upon itself. As such it's perfect for a film such as "12 Monkeys." Suite Punta Del Este is played over the main titles and repeated occasionally throughout the film until it becomes like an earworm working its way into the fabric of your soul.

In an interview with Wide Angle/Closeup , Terry Gilliam revealed that his musician friend Ray Cooper recommended he listen to some Argentinian tangos by Carlos Gardel. Gilliam couldn't get his hands on any of the traditional styles of tangos that Gardel was renowned for. Instead, he stumbled across a CD by a guy called Piazzolla. The music stayed with Gilliam and he explained, "I was convinced they were right for the film and I wanted to use them." Yet when he attempted to use them as a soundtrack to certain scenes in the film, such as when Cole and Reilly were in the car, "It just felt like driving music; it didn't work. And I put it somewhere else and I was getting frustrated." And then out of the blue, Gilliam had a eureka moment. "It just hit me — it's the '12 Monkeys' theme."

12 Monkeys features a lot of televisions to express Terry Gilliams' hatred of their stupefying effect

Viewers who pay close attention to "12 Monkeys" will notice that there are a lot of scenes that feature televisions broadcasting everything from news bulletins to cartoons and advertisements. Terry Gilliam is not a big fan of TV and wanted the television sets churning out a steady diet of nonsense to symbolize their narcotic effect. In an interview with Film Scouts , the director explained that television is "ubiquitous in 12 Monkeys" because, "I think television is this awful mirror that we look into every day, but it distorts the reflection and I hate it. It trivializes life. Rather than really enlightening us, it ends up just dragging us down to the lowest, into the boring and the tedious."

The unrelenting wave of television trivia in "12 Monkeys" perfectly encapsulates the insidious and perpetual way that TV slowly bends reality to its will and creates an almost bullet-proof presentation of the way the world was, is, and forever shall be. Gilliam added that he included a big dose of what The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy once called "The Drug of a Nation" in "12 Monkeys" because no matter how hard you try to resist the hypnotic qualities of TV, it eventually lures you into thinking the world works the way the little screen in the room tells you.

The set design was inspired by deconstructionist architecture

As is only fitting for a film that in part deals with the apocalyptic outcome of humanity's hubris, many of the locations in "12 Monkeys" were what Terry Gilliam branded as "cathedrals of technological progress" (via Film Scouts ). Disused power stations, factories, and even nuclear plants were scouted out and used for locations in a film that Gilliam described as being about nostalgia and decay. Gilliam said, "These great spaces were considered to be providing the solution, yet now they're just wasted, lying there, rotting." In an interview with Wide Angle/Closeup , production designer Jeffrey Beecroft explained that a lot of the set design on "12 Monkeys" was heavily influenced by deconstructionist architecture.

A book on the architecture of Labbeus Wood proved instrumental in setting the stage for the unique look and atmosphere of "12 Monkeys." Beecroft explained, "He's an artist that no one's ever built anything he's drawn because it doesn't stand up. So I built it! And it doesn't make sense, but it works." Beecroft explained that Gilliam would often say, "Make this Labbeus-looking!" Yet the production designer points out, "To make Labbeus-looking things is very hard, so we used the language of tin, and things we could find that were not real expensive and had really good metal workers, and we just started forming stuff." Art News reported that upon seeing the chair attached to the wall on which Bruce Willis's character is interrogated by the scientists on, Wood saw red and sued Universal. The late conceptual architecture visionary claimed the set was a copyright infringement on his 1987 design Neomechanical Tower (Upper) Chamber. An agreement between Universal and Labbeus was settled out of court.

Al Capone's prison was the location for 12 Monkeys' psychiatric asylum

The psychiatric asylum in "12 Monkeys" where James Cole meets Jeffrey Goines for the first time has a sinister and imitating presence. And that's because the scenes were filmed in America's most historic prison:  Eastern State Penitentiary (ESP). Located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the prison opened its doors in 1829 before finally closing in 1971. The ESP is a National Historic Landmark in the U.S. and was famous for housing criminal luminaries such as Al Capone. Solitary Watch reported that in 1842, Charles Dickens was given a tour of ESP and was horrified by the solitary confinement the prisoners had to endure.

In "American Notes for General Circulation," Dickens wrote that prisoners were separated from the living world and buried alive. He believed "very few men are capable of estimating the immense amount of torture and agony which this dreadful punishment, prolonged for years, inflicts upon the sufferers." It was an unusual place to shoot a film and as location manager, Scott Elias pointed out to  Inverse , "It (ESP) was supposedly haunted, which I wouldn't doubt. They had a central rotunda and then various cell blocks pin-wheeled out from that center. The whole idea was that the guards could be in the center and could see everything that was going on." In addition to appearing in "12 Monkeys," ESP also features in "Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen" and "Return to Paradise."

Universal gave Terry Gilliam the final cut of 12 Monkeys

Terry Gilliam has always had a reputation as a director who works outside of the Hollywood system and is not afraid to go toe to toe with bigshot studio executives to fight for his vision. Although "12 Monkeys" was more mainstream than anything the director had filmed previously, the studio still considered it a financial risk. To compound matters, Gilliam already had a track record of locking horns with Universal. 10 years earlier, the studio had initially refused to distribute what is widely hailed as Gilliam's masterpiece, "Brazil" (via Ringer ). Universal was adamant that unless drastic cuts were made and a happy ending put in place, it would never see the light of day. Gilliam held his ground and eventually Universal agreed to release a slightly shorter version when it was awarded best film, director, and screenplay by the Los Angeles Film Critics Association which had been given secret screenings of "Brazil."

Gilliam feared a similar merry-go-round with "12 Monkeys," particularly when executives began to ponder post-filming if it was perhaps too artistic for a mass audience. Things took a turn for the worse when the feedback of two National Research Group screenings was largely negative. Yet this time the angels were on Gilliam's side in the shape of the movie's big-name stars who backed the director's version of "12 Monkeys." Gilliam explained he always makes allowances "for the big battle at the end" of any film and was pleased to see Brad Pitt, Madeleine Stowe, and Bruce Willis had his back "in the foxhole." He added, "They all stuck together with me, and the studio just couldn't do anything about it."

12 Monkeys launched a spin-off TV series

20 years after it was released, "12 Monkeys" was resurrected for a spin-off TV series that proved a lot more straightforward and conventional than Terry Gilliam's ode to the eternal riddle of time and the finite nature of human perception. The TV show is still set in the future when a virus has decimated humanity and a time traveler called James Cole (Aaron Stanford) buddies up with a doctor to put things right (via The Verge ). Yet unlike Bruce Willis's version of Cole which is haunted, ragged, and frayed, the made-for-TV version has superhuman healing and fighting abilities, but little in way of a personality. Emily Hampshire steps gamely into the shoes of Brad Pitt, but compared with Gilliam's strange and sinister original, it all felt a little flat. Yet it still had enough in the tank to run four seasons until it took its final bow in 2018.

Upon hearing the news of the "12 Monkeys" TV spinoff, Gilliam told ScreenDaily that he thought the whole notion was ridiculous and that no one from the show had been in touch with him to discuss any details. He explained, "It's a very dumb idea. That's what I think. If it was going to be any good it would have to be written by David and Janet Peoples, who wrote the film, otherwise, it would be just another version of 'Time Bandits.'"

12 Monkeys made some uncanny predictions

Much like the passing of time, there's beautiful and elusive chaos about "12 Monkeys." As Willis' character James Cole said toward the film's end, "This is the present. This is not the past. This is not the future. This is right now." Yet, little did Terry Gilliam realize way back in 1995, that the world-destroying virus that serves as a backdrop to events in the movie would eventually take on the tone of a prophecy. In 2002, film critic Elvis Mitchell wrote in the New York Times that the biblical floods, plagues, landslides, and heatwaves that were ravaging modern times were like the world catching up with "the lyric paranoid streaks" of Gilliam's imagination. In 2020, the warnings inherent in "12 Monkeys" became even more apparent when Covid-19 broke.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, Terry Gilliam revealed to  Film Scouts that one of "12 Monkeys" themes was, "People putting layer upon layer to protect themselves from a potential infection, end up in a sense isolating themselves from one another." It sounds like a grim prediction of the worldwide lockdowns that followed in Covid's wake. "12 Monkeys" producer Charles Roven told The Ringer , that during the first half of 2020, the film "had a whole new life" as audiences began re-watching a film where life was seemingly imitating art.

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Terry Gilliam Refused Tom Cruise for ’12 Monkeys’ and Was Concerned by Bruce Willis’ ‘Rectal’ Mouth

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Terry Gilliam ‘s “ 12 Monkeys ” is currently celebrating its 25th anniversary since it was released nationwide January 5, 1996. Inverse marked the occasion with an oral history that features Gilliam, screenwriters David Peoples and Janet Peoples, producer Charles Roven, and casting director Margery Simkin. It comes as no surprise that Gilliam makes a few hilarious off-the-cuff remarks while reflecting on his time travel movie, which was inspired by Chris Marker’s 1962 short film “La Jetée.”

“12 Monkeys” stars Bruce Willis as James Cole, a prisoner selected to take part in a time travel experiment in which he travels back and forth through history in an attempt to find a cure to a virus that wiped out mankind. Madeleine Stowe and Brad Pitt also star in “12 Monkeys,” but it was the casting of James Cole that proved most important for Gilliam.

“The pressure was to get a movie star in,” Gilliam said. “That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me. So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise , Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me.”

Gilliam refused to consider the likes of Tom Cruise, but Bruce Willis wasn’t an instantly attractive choice for him, either. Gilliam admits to Inverse that Willis was never his favorite actor, particularly because of the look of the actor’s mouth.

“I had never been a great fan of Bruce’s before, but I liked talking to him, and I thought, ‘OK, this guy’s smart; he’s funny,'” the director said. “I explained to him my concerns about him as an actor. I hated the Trumpian mouth he does in films. Rectal. It’s like I’m looking at somebody’s asshole.”

Gilliam liked Willis enough after their meeting to cast him, but it turns out Pitt also wanted the role of James Cole. Pitt was instead cast as motor-mouthed mental patient Jeffrey Goines.

“Brad [Pitt] came to London, and we had dinner because he was keen to get on board to play the part that I had already given to Bruce,” Gilliam said. “I was actually scared shitless that Brad might not be able to do the character because up to then we’d never seen him as a motormouth.”

Head over to Inverse’s website to read the “12 Monkeys” oral history in its entirety.

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Terry Gilliam's ambitious "12 Monkeys" was co-authored by David Peoples , who wrote " Blade Runner ," and it has the same view of the near future as a grunge pit - a view it shares with Gilliam's own " Brazil ." In this 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.

The traveler is Cole ( Bruce Willis ), who in the opening shots lives with a handful of other human survivors in an underground shelter put together out of scrap parts and a lot of wire mesh. The surface of the planet has been reclaimed by animals, after the death of 5 billion people during a plague in 1996.

Cole is plucked from his cage and sent on a surface expedition by the rulers of this domain, who hope to learn enough about the plague virus to defeat it. Later, he is picked for a more crucial mission: He will travel back in time and gather information about the virus before it mutated. (The movie holds out no hope that he can "stop" it before it starts; from his point of view, the plague has already happened, and so the future society is seeking treatment, not prevention.) Cole lands in 1990, bruised, bleeding, and dripping sweat and mucus from every pore (a large percentage of Bruce Willis' film career has been spent in this condition). He's thrown in jail, and assigned a psychiatrist, Dr. Kathryn Railly ( Madeleine Stowe ), who believes he's delusional when he says he's a visitor from the future ("You won't think I'm crazy when people start dying next month"). He pulls off an inexplicable jail break and reappears in her life in 1996, kidnapping her because he needs help in finding 12 monkeys in Philadelphia that have the virus in its "pure" form before it mutated, later that year, into a killer of humans.

Cole discovers that a mental patient named Jeffrey Goines ( Brad Pitt ), whom he met in 1990, is an animal rights activist with a father ( Christopher Plummer ) whose laboratory may be harboring the deadly virus. Does Jeffrey want to unleash the virus, returning the earth to the animals? Or does his father, or another member of the team . . .

All of this is just the plumbing of the plot. What the movie is really about is its vision. The decor looks cobbled together from the debris of the 20th century. Cities are either scabby Skid Rows or towering skyscrapers. Scientists still work in laboratories that look like old postcards of Thomas Edison inventing. Bizarre killers and villains are hurled at Cole and Railly, and there are many bloody fights. Gradually the psychiatrist comes to believe, after Cole makes a series of accurate predictions, that he may be from the future after all.

The movie is not, however, a straightforward action thriller.

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. And there is another factor, one hinted at in the opening shot of the movie and confirmed in the closing: He may have already witnessed the end of the story.

The plot of "12 Monkeys," if you follow it closely, involves a time travel paradox. Almost all time travel movies do. But who cares? What's good about the film is the way Gilliam, his actors and his craftsmen create a universe that is contained within 130 minutes.

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.

One of the most intriguing sequences is completely arbitrary.

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.

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.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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Film credits.

12 Monkeys (1996)

Rated R For Violence and Language

130 minutes

Brad Pitt as Jeffrey Goines

Madeleine Stowe as Kathryn Railly

Bruce Willis as James Cole

Christopher Plummer as Dr. Leland Goines

Screenplay by

• David Peoples
• Janet Peoples

Directed by

• Terry Gilliam

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12 Monkeys Director Reveals The Studio Wanted Another A-List Star In The Lead

Terry Gilliam is one of the most famously outspoken directors in the industry, and he knows full well the impact it had on his career. If he’d simply smiled and nodded like many other filmmakers do, then he would have ended up tackling a number of high profile blockbusters having turned down Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Forrest Gump , both of which experienced major success with Robert Zemeckis at the helm.

He also knocked back an Alien sequel and eventual Best Picture winner Braveheart , tried twice to drag Watchmen out of development hell, found himself on the shortlist for The Truman Show and was J.K. Rowling’s number one choice for adapting Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone . The author’s preferred candidate was shot down by Warner Bros., but Gilliam remembered and then rejected the opportunity to enter talks for sixth installment Half-Blood Prince .

That leaves 1995 sci-fi 12 Monkeys as the biggest commercial hit of his career by far, after it raked in close to $170 million at the box office. It also happens to feature a couple of A-list movie stars in cast, with Brad Pitt scoring an Academy Award nomination for his performance, while Bruce Willis also does some of his best work as time traveler James Cole.

Gilliam may have recently admitted that he didn’t want to cast Willis in the first place because the actor’s mouth reminded him of a butthole , but he also revealed that Universal were trying to force a couple of even bigger names upon him.

“The pressure was to get a movie star in. That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me. So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise, Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me.”

Tom Cruise would have been far too flashy for the existential 12 Monkeys , while Cage is arguably too manic for the stoic James Cole. For one of the last times, then, Gilliam was able to overrule the studio, get his own way and keep Willis on board.

'12 Monkeys' Ending Explained: How That Time-Travel Twist Worked

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Terry Gilliam 's 12 Monkeys remains one of the director's most compelling films, packed to the gills with bizarre scenery, narrative switchbacks, and fascinating performances. One of the more perplexing elements of the film is its ending, which provides a fair share of ambiguity even to viewers paying careful attention. For those confounded by the sudden delivery of the gun or the role of the scientist on the plane, let this article serve as an explanation of the time travel in 12 Monkeys and its role in this film's gripping conclusion.

What Is 12 Monkeys About?

One of the reasons that 12 Monkeys is interesting to revisit with a modern lens is its post-apocalyptic future. The film begins with James Cole ( Bruce Willis ) imprisoned in a bleak looking cell within an underground prison in the year 2035. James is forced into "volunteer duty," which requires him to brave the planet's surface. After the outbreak of a virus in 1996, living above ground is no longer safe for humankind, though it is apparently quite hospitable for fearsome creatures like bears and lions, both of which James encounters on his visit to the surface. Because of his reliability, James is chosen by a bizarre group of scientists for a special mission: he will travel back in time to the year 1996 and locate a group known as The Army of the 12 Monkeys, who are believed to be responsible for releasing the virus. The scientists' overall goal is to pinpoint the location of the virus in its purest form so that they can study a sample and thereby devise a cure for the people of 2035.

RELATED: '12 Monkeys' Gets 4K Ultra HD SteelBook Release

Unfortunately for Cole the time travel device that the scientists use is a bit imprecise, resulting in him occasionally being sent to the wrong year. At one point he even finds himself in the middle of a World War I battlefield, thereby ensuring his place in history books as an example of what psychiatrist Dr. Kathryn Railly ( Madeleine Stowe ) dubs "Cassandra syndrome," a reference to the Trojan priestess of Greek myth whose doomsaying was never taken seriously. Cole also has the habit of suddenly disappearing whenever the scientists of the future decide that he needs to return, bewildering the people of the past in the process. Cole is drugged and flung across time and space, often reducing him to a drooling, erratic mess. It should be unsurprising that, like Cole, many viewers of 12 Monkeys have struggled to keep track of what exactly happened, which events (if any) were pre-destined, and how many of these misadventures were figments of Cole's imagination.

Understanding How 12 Monkeys Ends Is All About Remembering How it Begins

In order to understand the ending of 12 Monkeys, it is important to keep Cole's dream from the beginning of the movie in mind. While asleep in his prison cell in 2035, Cole dreams of a scene at an airport in the 1990s. The dream begins with the sound of a gunshot. A young boy watches a bloodied long-haired man fall to the ground. A woman shouts, "No!" and charges toward the long-haired man, cradling him. The film cuts from a shot of the boy watching the shooting to Bruce Willis's adult Cole asleep in his cell, implying that Cole was the child in the dream and that the dream is based on his memories. Thanks to the time travel complexity in 12 Monkeys , it turns out that Cole is both the child watching the shooting at the airport and the long-haired man gunned down by airport security. In attempting to elope with Dr. Railly, his newfound lover and former psychiatrist / kidnapping victim, Cole dons a wig and Hawaiian shirt, thereby disguising himself from the police as well as the viewers, who might have otherwise recognized him in the dream at the movie's beginning. Dr. Railly is likewise wearing a blonde wig in the dream, her face only shown briefly before being partially blocked by Cole's hand. In this way Gilliam cleverly foreshadows the film's ending in a way that prevents the audience from understanding its full impact.

Even though the film forms a bit of a narrative ouroboros, there are clues that in spite of adult Cole's demise, there is still hope for ending the virus's reign of terror in the future. One of those clues comes in the form of the Astrophysicist ( Carol Florence ), one of the scientists from 2035 who appears on the plane next to the villainous Dr. Peters ( David Morse ), the virologist responsible for releasing the deadly plague. The Astrophysicist introduces herself as Jones and says that her business is "insurance." Her lack of animosity toward the man who doomed the world suggests that her presence was meant as insurance for the virus to be released. After all, the scientists' goal is not to prevent the release of the deadly virus but simply to locate a sample of its purest form so that a cure can be made for the people of the future. Though their motivation for wanting to ensure the pandemic rather than prevent it is never explained, the Astrophysicist's final scene confirms that this is indeed their goal.

When Cole and Dr. Railly arrive at the airport, their plan is to slip away together and enjoy a new romantic life. This changes when Dr. Railly spots Dr. Peters at the airport, recognizing him as both a creepy attendant of the Cassandra syndrome lecture she gave and a prominent virologist featured on the cover of a nearby USA Today newspaper. She determines that Dr. Peters is the person planning to release the deadly virus, and so she rushes to find Cole and tell him. Meanwhile, Cole has been contacted by a friend of his from the prison in 2035, Jose ( Jon Seda ), who tells Cole that the scientists want him to follow orders and outfits Cole with a handgun. Though Cole is mystified by who exactly the scientists want him to shoot, the scientists' plot becomes a bit clearer once Cole charges through airport security with a gun in his hand.

Dr. Peters makes a break for his boarding gate and Cole runs after him, aiming to kill him. Dr. Railly shouts, "No!", giving Cole pause. When he turns to look at her, he is immediately gunned down by airport security and falls bloodied to the floor while another airport visitor, young Cole, watches, thereby creating the exact situation from the dream at the beginning. If the viewer takes this sequence of events into consideration along with the Astrophysicist's mention of "insurance," it seems likely that the scientists gave Cole a gun so that Cole would be treated as a threat by security, thereby ensuring that the virus would be released worldwide. Again, the movie never explains why the scientists prefer this outcome to potentially preventing the pandemic altogether, but it makes things abundantly clear that given the choice between preventing the virus or releasing it, they desire the latter outcome at any cost.

Was the Ending of 12 Monkeys an Inescapable Fate?

Some interpretations of 12 Monkeys suggest that the events at the end of the movie were inescapable, that they were set in stone by fate and that the movie's characters could never have prevented the release of the virus. If one takes into account the Astrophysicist's mention of insurance and the fact that the scientists gave Cole the gun, one may arrive at an alternate conclusion. Had Cole and Reilly merely been fulfilling their destiny, acting as helpless pawns doomed to repeat a vicious cycle of violence and disease, the scientists never would have needed to intervene in the airport. Though it could be argued that the scientists themselves are at the mercy of fate and had no agency of their own in these matters, the fact that the Astrophysicist says she works in "insurance" suggests the exact opposite: her presence on the plane was to ensure that the virus was released worldwide whether by Dr. Peters or herself.

When Cole and Dr. Reilly decide to run away together, Cole removes some of his teeth, having been told previously that the scientists use his teeth to track him. This is confirmed when Jose appears at the airport to deliver the gun to Cole. Jose chastises Cole for removing his teeth, suggesting that the scientists had difficulty finding Cole as a result of that decision. The scientists were only able to find Cole because he called them and left a voicemail before entering airport security, a mistake that allowed them to send Jose through time to his location and outfit Cole with the weapon that would lead to Cole's death. It is evident from their behavior that the scientists believe that changing the past is possible. The unpredictability of Cole's behavior made them worry that history might be rewritten. If deviation from history was impossible, the scientists never would have needed to send anyone to ensure the virus's release, let alone send the Astrophysicist as "insurance."

In 12 Monkeys, How Does Changing the Past Impact the Future?

What is unclear in 12 Monkeys (among other things) is whether changing the past would have a direct result on the future inhabited by the scientists, i.e., following Back to the Future rules, or instead if changing the past would create a new, distinct timeline in a potentially infinite sea of parallel universes with various differentiating outcomes. As much of this movie's charm is its assortment of mysteries, misdirects, and red herrings (like the titular 12 Monkeys themselves, who turn out to be nothing more than a slapdash animal rights brigade hellbent on releasing zoo animals), it is unlikely that Gilliam wanted to make such things explicit. What is clear is that 12 Monkeys depicts a time travel cycle in which it may be possible to change the past but that the scientists are continually conspiring to ensure that things play out exactly as they wish, likely for their own benefit. That being said, if the scientists were at least honest about their end goals, it is possible that they might use their newfound knowledge to concoct a cure and save the underground people of 2035. The same cannot be said for James Cole, who is apparently doomed to be a sacrifice, at least so long as the will of the scientists is fulfilled.

• Movie Features
• 12 Monkeys (1995)

The oral history of 12 Monkeys , Terry Gilliam's time travel masterpiece

Inverse speaks with director Terry Gilliam and nine other people involved in the making of this 1996 sci-fi cult classic.

A quarter of a century after its release, Terry Gilliam still can’t believe anyone let him make 12 Monkeys . “You have your moment when you’re a golden boy and they listen to you,” the director tells Inverse .

The 1996 sci-fi classic about time travel, death, and madness was Gilliam’s sixth project as a solo director (following 1975’s Monty Python and the Holy Grail and his 1985 dystopian cult classic, Brazil ) and is regarded as one of his finest pieces of work. Though such a complex and ambitious film was fraught with drama — from asbestos to a knife-wielding prostitute — a number of stars aligned to ensure its commercial and critical success is remembered fondly 25 years on.

The opaque tagline, “the future is history,” is as much of an absurd paradox as the story within. A dense and destabilizing film, 12 Monkeys was unusual in being unapologetically weird while starring two of Hollywood's hottest names, Bruce Willis and Brad Pitt, in lead roles.

Given that Willis was synonymous with Die Hard in the mid-’90s, it came as a surprise when one of his next movies was a Gilliam mind-bender based on a dystopian black-and-white French arthouse film , but casting John McClane as a confused time traveler turned out to be sci-fi cinema’s best idea until Keanu Reeves said “ whoa ” three years later . (Though the casting what-ifs will make you wish you could travel back in time and change Gilliam’s mind.)

“I had never been a great fan of Bruce's before,” Gilliam says, revealing that he passed on Nicolas Cage and Tom Cruise before coming around to Willis.

As James Cole, Willis travels back and forth through time in an attempt to prevent the release of a virus he believes to have killed almost everyone on the planet. Dr. Kathryn Railly (Madeleine Stowe) diagnoses him as mentally ill, sending Cole to a mental institution where he meets Jeffrey Goines (Brad Pitt). But after encountering him again and again, Railly comes to realize Cole may be sane after all.

Confusing, amusing, and a Gilliam film through and through, 12 Monkeys is the definition of a movie that rewards repeat viewing. Twenty-five years after its January 5 wide release (following a limited premiere in late December of '95), Inverse spoke to 10 of the film's key players to piece together how such an ambitious project came to be.

The beginning

"We had an image of a city with no people and just animals roaming around, totally out of place."

Charles Roven (producer): I was given the short film La Jetée by Chris Marker by a gentleman by the name of Robert Kosberg. I then gave that to Dave and Jan [Peoples].

David Peoples (screenwriter): We had missed seeing La Jetée in the ‘60s when we should have seen it. They sent us a terrible video of it, but in spite of the fact that it was an awful video, it really was such a wonderful movie. We said, “We'll spend a weekend on it and see if there's anything we can come up with that would be interesting.” It did come to us that people hadn't been doing a lot of stuff with the threat of germs – man-made germs or germs from nature. We had an image of a city with no people and just animals roaming around, totally out of place. Chris [Marker] hadn't said it was OK to make a movie out of his movie. He hated all Hollywood movies except Vertigo .

Janet Peoples (screenwriter): We bumped into a friend of ours from Berkeley: Tom Luddy. Tom laughed and said, “Oh, I know Chris. You know, Chris loves Francis Coppola. And Francis is in town.” So we all met at a Chinese restaurant – writers and a couple of directors; no producers, no suits – and Chris Marker at one end of the table and Francis at the other. Francis looks up and says, “Chris!?” and Chris says, “Yes, Francis?” and Francis says, “Jan and Dave want to make this movie. They're good people; I think you oughta let them do it.” And Chris says, “Oh, OK, Francis.”

“I will die to make this film.”

Mick Audsley (editor): About two years before Terry [Gilliam] contacted me, Dave and Jan sent me a very early draft of Monkeys . I thought, I will die to make this film. If I have to lose my arm or sell my children, I want to make this film. They said, “Is it comprehensible in any way?” to which I replied, “Not at all, which is why I want to do it.”

Charles Roven: We were talking about directors to give it to. We all agreed that Terry would be a great choice.

David Peoples: Terry read it and liked it a lot, but he was totally devoted to a long-time project to make A Tale of Two Cities for Warner Brothers. So he had to say no to 12 Monkeys, at which point Chuck [Charles Roven] had us do another rewrite which he thought would make it appealing to other people. In the meantime, something went wrong with A Tale of Two Cities and suddenly Terry's available again. So we gave him the rewrite we'd done for Chuck and he said, “How come you ruined the script?”

Terry Gilliam (director): I was told by Chuck that it had been read by many different directors and nobody knew what to do with it. That's what excited me about it. The complexity was one thing that was intriguing. Who is the mad person in here? Is it Madeleine [Stowe]'s character or is it Bruce [Willis]'s character?

Janet Peoples: Both David and I worked in state hospital mental institutions when we were really very young.

David Peoples: We both remembered instances of sitting in staff meetings with the doctors all there and the patient not in yet, and one doctor would say something like, “Oh, by the way, what's the date today?” Then when the patient came in and they started asking him, “Do you know what the date today is?” it would be a big deal if they knew that stuff. That's what Terry likes, because Terry has this sense of absurdity that is just wonderful.

Terry Gilliam: The pressure was to get a movie star in. That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me. So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise, Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me.

Margery Simkin (casting director): Terry called. Whatever he does, I will always be willing and able to come play. After all these years he trusts me a lot. It's like, I imagine when you're dealing at a restaurant and people are developing dishes. You're looking for various flavorings that will spice something up and make it special.

Terry Gilliam: I had never been a great fan of Bruce's before, but I liked talking to him, and I thought, OK, this guy's smart; he's funny. I explained to him my concerns about him as an actor. I hated that moue [pursed-lip expression] he does in his films when he gets a bit nervous. I thought, 'God, that's horrible.' He does a moue with his mouth; it's a Trumpian mouth. For a moment it goes all Trumpian. Rectal. It's like I'm looking at somebody's asshole."

Margery Simkin: Bruce was perfectly willing to leave the entourage behind.

“It's like I’m looking at somebody's asshole .”

Terry Gilliam: Brad [Pitt] came to London, and we had dinner because he was keen to get on board to play the part that I had already given to Bruce. I was actually scared shitless that Brad might not be able to do the character because up to then we'd never seen him as a motormouth.

Charles Roven: We were lucky that the actors fell in love with it and that they were willing to do the movie for not their established prices.

Margery Simkin: It seemed that they both wanted to be involved because it was an opportunity for both of them to stretch.

Terry Gilliam: I put [Brad] together with Stephen Bridgewater, who had worked with Jeff Bridges on The Fisher King . Stephen's first meetings with Brad — he liked pot too much, he had a lazy tongue. But he worked his ass off; he really did.

Charles Roven: To prepare for the movie, he checked himself into a mental ward. And he spent a few days there, just to get the feel of it.

Margery Simkin: With Brad at the time, it was a failure of people's imagination about him. And also the curse of the pretty boy, that people don't believe God gives with both hands or something.

Jon Seda (Jose): Once I got the script, I had to read it probably at least five times in a week, and I was still lost. I was trying so hard to make sense of it.

Terry Gilliam on the set of 12 Monkeys .

Scott Elias (location manager): I had just returned from doing something or other and had been away for quite some time and really didn't want to do another project right away. But then I got a call from Lloyd Phillips, who was a really interesting guy; he was the co-producer of the film. The moment he said, “Terry Gilliam,” I said, “Gee, I think I'm in, no matter what.” He said, “We need you here right away; we're on the verge of losing a location that Terry wants very badly.” I dropped everything and just ran over to Philadelphia.

Margery Simkin: Their downtown hadn't been torn down and rebuilt like many other American cities, so it still had all of these amazingly stunning old buildings downtown. There was something about that energy – of this beautiful, slightly crumbling place that was being energized.

Charles Roven: There were these amazing old 19th-century generator plants, which served as the locations for the subterranean areas where Cole was in the future.

Terry Gilliam: Having used Croydon power station for Brazil , I was obsessed with power stations and the technology within them.

“I learned more about asbestos abatement than I ever thought I would have to know.”

Scott Elias: Terry was enamored very much with a closed power plant on a Delaware river. It was maybe the biggest building in all of Philadelphia. We were maybe 30 feet inside this place and a huge chunk of the ceiling fell directly in front of me. Honest to God, had it hit me, it would have been the end of me. I looked up and in the distance on the ceiling it was just crumbling; all this concrete barely hanging there. I remember driving to the office, and I met with Lloyd Phillips and Chuck Roven. I said, “I can't take two people in there, let alone 200.” It took a pretty solid three months to make it safe.

Anthony Simonaitis (special effects on-set supervisor): The thing that we would do CG now, we wouldn't shoot in a power plant. We'd shoot on a stage and they would do CG set extensions, do blue screens. We'd be on a stage with a heater; it wouldn't be 15 degrees in there with 100 years of toxic residue and mold and asbestos and bird poop and all the other stuff that's in a 100-year-old industrial building.

Anna M. Elias (assistant location manager) : I learned more about asbestos abatement than I ever thought I would have to know. One of the things that was unique to these power plants was they were freezing inside, and we were filming in the winter in Philly. They had their own weather patterns. And we had Bruce Willis in next to nothing, so we had a tent for him that we'd have to haul up these steps.

"We used a penitentiary for the psychiatric asylum, which was the first real penitentiary in the world."

Scott Elias: We did shoot one scene in Camden, New Jersey. At the time it was really rough and tumble. I looked everywhere for a motel. It was a freezing cold day and I'm taking photographs of this motel, and a knife suddenly comes across my throat from behind. It was a hooker. It turns out that this was a hooker motel and she thought I was some kind of a policeman. And she actually stole my video camera, and she took my money as well.

Anna M. Elias: In the movie, we depict a World War I trench that we had to create from scratch in this quarry-type place in Chase, Maryland. Our art department had to go in and build World War I trenches. At some point, this wind arrived — like a tornado. It was strong enough to lift the tents out of the ground. I just remember lunging and grabbing the side of the tent and hanging on for dear life.

Jon Seda: I remember I could barely keep my eyes open because of all the stuff from the bombs going off and the dirt was flying down from the sky. They had to keep plucking pieces of rocks and sticks out of my eyes so we could get the take.

Scott Elias: We used a penitentiary for the psychiatric asylum, which was the first real penitentiary in the world. I think Charles Dickens even toured the place when it first opened, and Al Capone was housed there for a while. It was supposedly haunted, which I wouldn't doubt. They had a central rotunda and then various cell blocks pin-wheeled out from that center. The whole idea was that the guards could be in that center and could see everything that was going on.

The... issues

Charles Roven: Terry and I had a very interesting give-and-take relationship. We had some pretty nice arguments, but we also had some pretty nice times where we really agreed.

Anthony Simonaitis: It's the one movie I point to where the grey started to show up in my beard.

Margery Simkin: It wasn't easy, and Chuck really produced the film. He wrestled that film into being.

Anthony Simonaitis: I remember some pretty contentious budget meetings about the snow and some stand-offs on the set. There's a technique where we use a soap solution and compressed air and water. You aerate this material and you create a foam. You spray it on the ground, you spray it through hoses; you can cover large areas quickly, and it creates this white, soft blanket of snow. But at first, it looks like shaving cream. Terry was not happy with it when we first put it out.

Terry Gilliam: Bruce was trying incredibly hard to just be an actor at work, but he had been spoiled by success for so long. So he was in many ways like a kid who was pushing the limits constantly and then coming up with stupid excuses for being late on the set. There was one point he had something that looked like a note from his mother. We let Bruce go away for a long weekend and he came back and suddenly he was Bruce Willis Superstar again.

“There was one point he had something that looked like a note from his mother .”

Mick Audsley: He became the Die Hard man with his pouty mouth. Then we decided to see if we could rescue our Bruce, which we couldn't. He got re-molded back to the character.

Charles Roven: I would say that those were tense conversations, but ultimately it all worked out, clearly.

Terry Gilliam: Stephen Bridgewater was working with Brad daily. He was like a coach. And I think at a certain point, he decided that day he didn't need Stephen. It was a terrible day because Brad was not getting it right, and he knew it, which made it worse. Bruce became fantastic; he was like a father figure to Brad. I said, “Brad, you've got to call the studio and ask for another day.”

Anna M. Elias: Brad had just been Sexiest Man of the Universe.

Terry Gilliam: Legends of the Fall did it. It just changed everything. Girls were threatening to throw themselves off Philadelphian bridges.

Anna M. Elias: That penitentiary… I don't know how she did it, but somehow a girl got in and hid overnight. The next day, when we showed up to continue filming, she came out in the middle of things and wanted Brad.

Scott Elias: Sasha the Siberian tiger was a particular favorite because we housed her at the armory where our office was located. It had huge walls everywhere. And don't you know, a couple of teenage gang members decided that that was a good night to climb over the walls with ladders. So they crept up to this fancy-looking trailer that housed Sasha and they broke into it. And they were stealing a radio out of the cab of the truck, and the window was open between the cab of the truck and the trailer. I get a call from the security people, saying, “You need to come down to the armory, there's been a break-in.” So I just throw on some clothes and run down there as fast as I can to find these two 15/16-year-old kids literally weeping, one having wet himself – no kidding. What I discovered was, as they were breaking into the cab and they were stealing this radio, Sasha's paw comes through and she growls at them, and it scared them out of their wits.

The focus groups

Terry Gilliam: People don't understand the test screening aspect of filmmaking, which is possibly the most critical. You've made the film, you've done the work, and now you're surrounded by all these studio executives who are shitting themselves with nerves, worrying that they might have their name on a failure of a movie.

Mick Audsley: It was Georgetown. It was an educated audience. You felt this sparkle, and we thought, “Wow, they're loving it as much as I do,” only to get comments like, “I can't rate it, I'm too confused.” The one that I shall never forget: A man stood up and said, “This film is predictable.”

David Peoples: We did go to a screening where we were sitting in the back of the theatre. And some guy in the back of the theatre, as everybody was filing out, said, “They oughta shoot the writer!” We were a little panicked that people weren't being that entertained by the movie, but Mick and Terry are tough as nails. They just refused to make stupid changes.

Jon Seda: At the wrap party, Bruce was DJing the party. I went over and I joked, “Hey, where's the Latin music?” And he joked back, “You're the only Puerto Rican here.” Then he put on some salsa music.

The premiere

Bruce Willis at the premiere of 12 Monkeys .

Terry Gilliam: Getting to the premiere was a nightmare. It took place in New York in December and there was a huge blizzard. The whole thing was apocalyptic.

Jon Seda: I was so excited and eager to see it, and when I saw it the first time, I was blown away. Terry knew the story so well. He was the captain of the ship.

Anna M. Elias: He achieved a vision that probably none of us saw going in.

Terry Gilliam: I thought a [limited] release date of December 27 was a stupid idea, but it turned out to be brilliant. Boom, we went to number one.

Charles Roven: I had done some well-reviewed movies and had some commercial success, but this was by far my biggest hit. For a $30 million movie to do $180 million [$168.8 million] in worldwide box office at that time, that was quite significant.

Mick Audsley: People were going to see the film more than once. There were things to reveal on a second viewing, which for cinema was quite unusual.

Margery Simkin: I saw it again a couple of years ago. And I gotta say, there were a few things I didn't understand to begin with in the script and that were not illuminated on reviewing it.

Janet Peoples: We were lucky because it did well in our hometown and it didn't embarrass our children. We enjoyed it. We thought that Terry did a fantastic job.

Jon Seda: Sometimes we don't realize the significant moments in our lives as they're happening. It's years later when we look back and go, “Wow, I was a part of that. ” This was one of those. If someone else brings it up and says, “Hey man, you were in 12 Monkeys ,” I stop and I go, “You know what? Yeah! I was in 12 Monkeys !”

Update 1/11/2021: At Terry Gilliam's request, we've added the full version of his quote about a certain Bruce Willis facial expression to provide additional context.

This article was originally published on Jan. 5, 2021

• Science Fiction

• Cast & crew
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Minority Report

John works with the PreCrime police which stop crimes before they take place, with the help of three 'PreCogs' who can foresee crimes. Events ensue when John finds himself framed for a futur... Read all John works with the PreCrime police which stop crimes before they take place, with the help of three 'PreCogs' who can foresee crimes. Events ensue when John finds himself framed for a future murder. John works with the PreCrime police which stop crimes before they take place, with the help of three 'PreCogs' who can foresee crimes. Events ensue when John finds himself framed for a future murder.

• Steven Spielberg
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• Trivia (at around 1h 2 mins) The scene where Lois Smith (Dr Iris Hineman) kisses Tom Cruise was not scripted. Tom's reaction is of genuine surprise.
• Goofs (at around 1h 24 mins) Given that Anderton is a man on the run it would make sense to revoke his access rights to PreCrime. However in the movie he is able to access sensitive areas using his old eyes. His ex-wife does the same later in the movie (at around 2h 5 mins) to access the prison. However, the system might not have worked in an optimal and complex way, and being a chased man might not have affected access rights.

John Anderton : Why'd you catch that?

Danny Witwer : Because it was going to fall.

John Anderton : You're certain?

Danny Witwer : Yeah.

John Anderton : But it didn't fall. You caught it. The fact that you prevented it from happening doesnt change the fact that it was *going* to happen.

• Crazy credits The DreamWorks and 20th Century Fox logos appear underwater, which ties into the opening shot of Agatha in the tank.
• Alternate versions Spencer Treat Clark was credited as "Sean at Nine" in release prints of the film, because he appeared in a scene that was deleted so close to the film's release that the credits had already been finalized and couldn't be changed. Clark played a grown-up version of Anderton's young son Sean, in a fantasy dream scene that took place after Anderton has been put in containment toward the end of the film. The entire scene was removed from the film just before release.
• Connections Featured in Siskel & Ebert: Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood/Ivans XTC/Undercover Brother/Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner/Bad Company (2002)
• Soundtracks Symphony No. 8 in B minor D. 759 'Unfinished' I. Allegro moderato Written by Franz Schubert Conducted by Carlos Kleiber Performed by Wiener Philharmoniker Courtesy of Deutsche Grammophon GmbH, Hamburg Under license from Universal Music Enterprises

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• Given that John Anderton admits that he thought of finding and killing the person who had taken his son every day, how does he not realize it is this hypothetical murder that his brown ball indicating premeditation must refer to?
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• Jun 23, 2002
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Terry Gilliam was hesitant to cast Bruce Willis in 12 Monkeys because of his ‘rectal’-looking mouth: ‘It’s like I’m looking at somebody’s a**hole’

‘i had never been a great fan of bruce’s before,' said the director, article bookmarked.

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Terry Gilliam has revealed that he initially did not want to cast Bruce Willis in 12 Monkeys , stating that he was particularly concerned by the actor’s “rectal”-looking mouth.

Gilliam’s acclaimed 1995 sci-fi thriller stars Willis as James Cole, a man sent back in time to stop the world’s population from being wiped out by a virus.

In a new interview with Inverse , the director admitted that he had been hesitant to cast Willis in the main role and that he had “never been a great fan” of the actor’s.

“I had never been a great fan of Bruce’s before, but I liked talking to him and I thought, ‘Ok, this guy’s smart, he’s funny,’” he said.

Gilliam continued to reveal that one of his biggest “concerns” in casting Willis was the appearance of his mouth, which he called “Trumpian” and “rectal”.

The 80-year-old said: “I explained to [Willis] my concerns about him as an actor. I hated the Trumpian mouth he does in films. 

“Rectal. It’s like I’m looking at somebody’s a**hole.”

Discussing the casting process for his cult classic, Gilliam spoke about how “the pressure was to get a movie star in” and revealed that he had turned away Tom Cruise and Nicolas Cage .  

“That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me,” he said. “So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise, Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me.”

The Monty Python star divulged that Willis’s co-star Brad Pitt had also wanted to play the part of James Cole, however, was instead cast as the film’s antagonist, Jeffrey Goines.

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Last year, the outspoken director made a series of provocative statements during an interview with The Independent in which he elaborated on why he thinks #MeToo is a “witch hunt” and declared that he was “tired of white men being blamed for everything wrong with the world”.

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“I just kept saying no”: Tom Cruise Nearly Landed $168M Bruce Willis Movie For A Role That Was Also Sought By Brad Pitt

No matter if they are targeted toward award-winning filmmaking or creating a commercial blockbuster in the industry, no one can go wrong with choosing Tom Cruise as the face of their projects in the film business. His prowess to deliver on the promise and hopes placed on him is the biggest reason why the star is such a revered individual in Hollywood.

The aforementioned traits of the star are the reason why he is so highly sought after by many filmmakers and producers from the industry. But that constant demand of the star doesn’t necessarily mean that he wants or gets those roles in the end. In fact, he almost became part of an iconic sci-fi film, but lost the role at the end.

Tom Cruise Lost A Significant Role In 12 Monkeys

Being part of some of the most iconic films and franchises in the world like the Mission: Impossible  series along with films from almost every genre takes a toll on a star, but when you’re Tom Cruise , there aren’t many things that can or will stop you form going the extra mile.

Popular for choosing roles that challenge him in a new and exciting way, the star might’ve felt the thrill if he had been part of Terry Gilliam’s 1995 sci-fi masterpiece, 12 Monkeys.  Alas, the role that he was being recommended for didn’t seem to fit the director’s vision.

You may also like: Tom Cruise’s Aerial Epic ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ Gave Samuel L. Jackson the Encouragement To Ask For a Sequel To His Prized 27-Year-Old Classic

In a past interview with Inverse , the director along with members of the crew were talking about the entire journey of bringing the classic film to life. Here, Gilliam also talked about the casting process that went into the film and how Bruce Willis was selected to play the role of the lead protagonist.

They talked about how when the film was in the pre-production stage, people were recommending names to Gilliam left and right, which involved individuals like the  Top Gun  star as well as Nicolas Cage, but the director didn’t feel they were right for him. He said:

“The pressure was to get a movie star in. That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me. So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise, Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me.”

Therefore, along with Willis, the second lead for the film was offered to none other than Brad Pitt , who played the role of the mentally ill Jeffery Goines, a long departure from his pretty boy image.

You may also like: “He had been spoiled by success for so long”: Bruce Willis’ Extreme Fame Landed Him in Trouble That Forced Director to Take One Extreme Step

What Was 12 Monkeys About?

Considered to be one of the best iterations of the time travel sci-fi genre in cinema history, 12 Monkeys tells the tale of a convict named James Cole, who volunteers for an assignment to travel back in time. Due to a viral breakthrough that happened in the past, the year 2030 has witnessed the borderline extinction of the human race, and Cole seeks to save the world from that future.

But when he arrives in the 1990s, he’s instantly captured by the authorities and put in a mental asylum for claiming to be from the future. There, he meets Jeffery Goines, who takes an interest in Cole. Slowly, as he spends more time with him, Cole begins to suspect that Goines might be the key to stopping the mass extinction of the future.

You may also like: “I don’t know how she did it”: Brad Pitt’s Greek God Looks Became Troubling After a Female Fan Sneaked Into Set While Filming ’12 Monkeys’

12 Monkeys,  streaming on Starz.

Source: Inverse

Brad Pitt Bruce Willis Tom Cruise

Written by Deepak Bisht

Deepak Bisht is a writer at FandomWire who has vast expertise in films of many genres, a hardcore anime nerd along with two years of writing experience. After completing his Bachelor's in Business Administration, he became part of the company in hopes of providing accurate, informative, and exciting articles to the world.

Apart from his contributions to FandomWire, the rest of his time is spent either reading quality works of literature, listening to vintage music, or playing any video games he can get his hands on.

Copyright © 2024 FandomWire, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Terry Gilliam's mind-scrambling sci-fi thriller 12 Monkeys celebrates its 25th anniversary this coming December. Starring Bruce Willis and Brad Pitt, the story imagines a disease-ridden future dystopia in which a convicted criminal is sent back in time to find answers regarding the man-made plague that has annihilated much of Earth's population.

RELATED: Top Rated Movies Directed By Terry Gilliam, According To IMDB

12 Monkeys premiered theatrically on December 27, 1995, costing roughly $29 million to produce before going on to gross more than $168 million worldwide. The film also earned star Brad Pitt his first Oscar nomination and Golden Globe win, cementing it as one of the best sci-fi movies not just of the '90s but of modern cinema. Ahead of its 25th birthday, here are ten behind-the-scenes facts about the making of 12 Monkeys  fans need to know.

Terry Gilliam Had Final Cut

Given the rocky relationship he had with Universal while making Brazil in 1985, director Terry Gilliam only agreed to make 12 Monkeys if he retained control over the final cut.

Much to his surprise, the studio agreed under two conditions. One, the budget had to remain relatively small. Secondly, Bruce Willis (a big star at the time) had to be cast in the lead role of James Cole in order to ensure opening-weekend success at the box-office. Gilliam agreed and was given final say over the finished film.

It's A Remake Of A Short French Movie

Despite Terry Gilliam's claims of never seeing it before making the film, 12 Monkeys is directly adapted from the 1962 award-winning short French film La Jatee , directed by Chris Marker.

Told exclusively through still images, La Jetée follows a troubled man who is forced to traverse time and space in order to find answers to global devastation in the wake of World War III. Several recurring themes and concepts are shared in both films, which Gilliam credits Marker within the opening credits.

Bruce Willis Wasn't The Director's First Choice

Terry Gilliam's first choice to play the role of James Cole was Jeff Bridges ( Brazil  star  Robert De Niro was also considered), whom he worked with on The Fisher King a few years earlier. Universal wanted a bigger movie star to play the part, so Willis was cast instead. Ironically, Willis also auditioned for the role Bridges played in The Fisher King .

RELATED: Bruce Willis' 10 Best Movies (According To Metacritic)

Once he was cast, Gilliam gave Willis a list of "Bruce Willis Acting Clichés" to avoid. Willis took this advice to heart, as seen in his tortured performance that garnered serious critical acclaim. Moreover, Willis took a drastic pay cut just to work with Terry Gilliam, and he was only paid well after the movie was released. Needless to say, Willis' casting proved beneficial to  12 Monkeys.

The Hamster Factor

Gilliam fostered such a reputation for being a perfectionist on the set of 12 Monkeys that, after one specific instance, his crew dubbed his perfectionism The Hamster Factor.

During the scene in which James Cole ( Willis ) draws blood from himself, the shadow of a hamster running on its wheel is seen in the foreground. This innocuous detail would normally require little time to film, but Gilliam spent the entire day to get the scene just right. As such, the nickname was given, which was included in the 1996 making-of documentary, The Hamster Factor and Other Tales of 12 Monkeys .

Brad Pitt Was Deprived Of Cigarettes To Get In Character

For the iconic scene in which Brad Pitt manically spouts nervous, rapid-fire dialogue in the asylum, Terry Gilliam was deeply concerned that the then-novice actor would not be able to credibly pull off the speech. As a result, Gilliam resorted to sensory deprivation to elicit Pitt's award-nominated performance.

RELATED: The 10 Funniest Brad Pitt Performances

Gilliam sent Pitt to work with a speech coach to prepare for the speech in question. But in the end, Gilliam simply took away Pitt's cigarettes as a means of getting him in the proper headspace to deliver the speech as written.

The TV Ball Was Impossible To Work With

One of the most lasting images featured in 12 Monkeys is the large, spherical "TV Ball" that simulcasts various video imagery of the futuristic dystopia. Believe it or not, the prop almost didn't make it into the movie.

The Ball Prop was so difficult to work with on the set that it became infamous among crewmembers. The electronics constantly failed to work, as did the hydraulics that allowed the prop to move up and down. The entire apparatus broke nearly every time it was used during a take.

The Logo Was Inspired By An Old Puzzle

The recurring logo designs and that of the title sequence of 12 Monkeys , which feature thirteen monkeys atop a revolving globe, are directly lifted from a 19th-century puzzle.

Created by Sam Lloyd in 1898, the "Get Off the Earth" puzzle features thirteen characters atop two round dials. When the dials are turned, one of the characters disappears from the frame entirely. The titular puzzle-piece used in the film reinforces the underlying plot and theme of the story.

Terry Gilliam Had A Near-Fatal Accident

In the middle of production on 12 Monkeys , Terry Gilliam suffered a near-fatal accident after being thrown off a horse. He returned to the set covered with fresh wounds and bruises.

When he returned to work to finish filming, Gilliam was less concerned about his physical injuries and more worried about how the accident would affect his creative vision. Despite having zero sound stages at their disposal, Gilliam ultimately delivered the film on time and under budget.

There Are Subtle M. Night Shymalan Connections

Although nobody could have known at the time, 12 Monkeys features an eerie amount of connections to the work of M. Night Shymalan . For instance, both 12 Monkeys and Shymalan's The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable take place in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and both star Bruce Willis.

Furthermore, at one point James Cole mentions in that "all I see are dead people," which is very similar to the most famous line of Shymalan's Sixth Sense, also starring Bruce Willis. Also, Franklin Field in Philadelphia is featured in both this film and Unbreakable .

The Movie's Ending Was A Sarcastic Suggestion

Gilliam originally wanted to bookend the film with close-up images of young James Cole's eyes. He continually bickered with producer Charles Roven, who preferred the scripted ending in the airport parking lot.

Stuck at loggerheads, Gilliam suggested an expensive and extremely elaborate compromise which called for two cranes, a huge collection of cars, and an entire parking lot to achieve. Hoping Roven would reject the idea and let him film the ending he intended (a close-up of the boy's eyes), Roven instead loved the idea and approved it. Gilliam shot the sequence and loved it so much that he agreed to use it in the final cut.

NEXT: 12 Monkeys: 10 Films To Watch Liked Terry Gilliam's Surreal Time Travel Movie

• 12 Monkeys (1995)

12 Monkeys Director Was Hesitant to Work With Bruce Willis Because of His 'Rectal' Mouth

"It's like I'm looking at somebody's a-hole," says Terry Gilliam, as the filmmaker also spilled on some tension on set.

"12 Monkeys" director Terry Gilliam turned down Tom Cruise and Nicolas Cage to headline the sci-fi film -- and had some strong reservations about casting eventual star Bruce Willis , too.

In a new interview with Inverse celebrating the film's 25th anniversary, Gilliam revealed the totally insane reason why he had hesitations about having Willis appear in the film at the height of his "Die Hard" success.

Demi Moore Throws Bruce Willis Under the Bus Defending Her Carpeted Bathroom

"The pressure was to get a movie star in. That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me," he recalled. "So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise, Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me."

"I had never been a great fan of Bruce's before, but I liked talking to him, and I thought, 'OK, this guy's smart; he's funny,'" he said of Willis. "I explained to him my concerns about him as an actor. I hated the Trumpian mouth he does in films. Rectal. It's like I'm looking at somebody's asshole."

Sadly, we have no idea how Willis reacted to that feedback, but Bruce did go on to star in the film alongside Brad Pitt . Gilliam said Pitt itinitially hoped to land the part of James Cole, which went to Willis.

"We had dinner because he was keen to get on board to play the part that I had already given to Bruce," said the director. "I was actually scared shitless that Brad might not be able to do the character because up to then we'd never seen him as a motormouth."

Saying Pitt "liked pot too much" and had a "lazy tongue" at the time, Gilliam explained that the actor worked with acting coach Stephen Bridgewater to nail the role of Jeffrey Goines. "[Pitt] worked his ass off; he really did."

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The director also said there was some tension on set, as Willis allegedly got a big head during production.

"Bruce was trying incredibly hard to just be an actor at work, but he had been spoiled by success for so long. So he was in many ways like a kid who was pushing the limits constantly and then coming up with stupid excuses for being late on the set," said Gilliam. "There was one point he had something that looked like a note from his mother. We let Bruce go away for a long weekend and he came back and suddenly he was Bruce Willis Superstar again."

Added editor Mick Audsley, "He became the 'Die Hard' man with his pouty mouth. Then we decided to see if we could rescue our Bruce, which we couldn't. He got re-molded back to the character."

"Ultimately it all worked out, clearly," added Charles Roven.

The movie went on to become a critical and financial success, with Pitt nabbing an Oscar nomination and winning the Golden Globe for Supporting Actor. "12 Monkeys" also spawned a TV spinoff of the same name, which aired from 2015-2018 on SyFy.

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Film Details

Brief synopsis, cast & crew, terry gilliam, kevin thigpen, charles techman, vernon campbell, john d kretschmer, technical specs.

The year is 2035 and humankind subsists in a desolate netherworld following the eradication of 99% of the Earth's population, a holocaust that makes the planet's surface uninhabitable, and mankind's destiny uncertain. A desperate group of scientists secure a reluctant volunteer, Cole, to embark on a dangerous mission back to the year 1996, where they hope he can help unravel this apocalyptic nightmare before it completely erases humanity from the planet. When Cole arrives in 1996, he meets Jeffrey Goines, the unstable son of a renowned scientist, and Dr. Kathryn Railly, a psychiatrist and author whose initial alarm over his prophetic warnings of the world's fate soon turns to conviction, and she comes to believe that mankind may indeed be doomed. While also questioning his own sanity, Cole struggles with Railly to unravel the mystery with his only two clues: a haunting childhood memory and a series of puzzling symbols from a group known only as The Army of the Twelve Monkeys.

Simon Jones

Michael chance, herbert c hauls, charley scalies, drucie mcdaniel, louis lippa, harry o'toole, frank gorshin, janet zappala, joliet harris, jack dougherty, annie golden, christopher meloni, johnnie hobbs, paul meshejian.

Madeleine Stowe

Bruce Willis

H michael walls, joseph melito, stephen w bridgewater, joann s dawson, michael ryan segal.

Christopher Plummer

Franklin huffman, bill raymond, nell johnson, karle warren, jeff tanner, bruce kirkpatrick, ernest abuba, robert o'neill, arthur fennell, lisa talerico, anthony brienza, lisa gay hamilton, lenny daniels, irma st. paule, john blaisse, barry price, joseph mckenna, chuck jeffreys, rozwill young, joey perillo, david morse, aaron michael lacey, carol florence, carolyn walker.

Carl Catanese

Fred strother, faith potts, wilfred williams, rick warner, john panzerella, david acord, g. a. aguilar, sandy alexander, bill anagnos, monica anderson, alex applefeld, kathleen ash, ron ashmore, mick audsley, marilyn bailey, richard bain, howard baral, valerie bartlett, kate bartoldus, christina bartolucci, david beach, jeffrey beecroft, elizabeth bell, andrew bernstein, christina beveridge, rhett bloomquiet, sally boccella, martin body, mick boggis, thomas boguski, victoria boydell, shelly brett, paul buckmaster, hermione byrt, jan carroll, phillip v caruso, penny causer, robert cavallo, david cecil, nick church, robin clarke, melissa "stanley" cohen, trevor collins, andrew conner, joseph t conway, john copeman, catherine councill, simon cozens, john craigmile, ted criswell, douglas crosby, richard d curry, steve cutmore, lucy darwin, deborah dasher, f dale davis, chad doherty, richard doy, liz dykhouse, stephen j eads, mark egerton, dr. burr s eichelman, scott elias, dodson elliot, jennie evans, steve ewing, robert farr, graham farrow, bill fielder, george figgs, chuck finch, michael finnegan, doug forrest, glen foster, lisbeth fouse, carole french, rodney g french, keith fulton, timothy galvin, vincent gerardo, william gerardo, kack gerbes, marissa giunta, alan g. glazer, ben goldberg, emily goodman, jim goodman, wes goodwin, chad graves, diane greaves, thomas grecco, kevin greene, isobel griffiths, dr. laszlo gyulai, craig haagensen, celia haining, solita hanna, russell hardee, douglas harlocker, damien harrer, joseph hawkins, james healy, mikie heilbrun, william f hennessy, ellen hillers, robert holtzman, kent houston, russell hurlburt, kevin ishioka, terry jackson, ronald jaynes, casey jirgal, ernie karpeles, ian c kelly, mark kendig, peggy khoury, yvonne king, william kohout, suzanne koneful, robert kosberg, thomas f lappin, bob laprell, bob lapress, reg larkman, gary levinsohn, craig heston ligget, steve litecky, thomas lockey, david lomax, danny longhurst, ted lubonvich, scott maginnis, paul maiello, marina marit, chris marker, theresa l marsh, steve e martin, peter maxwell, matt mcanany, emily mcgovern, patrick mcgrath, jay meagher, joe mercurio, anna mewbourne, charles miller, erin miller, matt miller, michael wayne miller, paul minitello, larry misselhorn, shirley montefusco, vincent montefusco, terry morse, elena moscatt, cynthia neilson, phil neilson, norm nelson, elizabeth j nevin, peter norman, thomas j. o'connell, charles olins, terri ostrow, chris panton, philip a patterson, clive pendry, david peoples, janet peoples, lloyd phillips, sharon pickenson, award nominations, best costume design, best supporting actor, miscellaneous notes.

Released in United States Winter December 27, 1995

Wide Release in United States January 5, 1996

Released in United States on Video July 9, 1996

Released in United States January 1996

Released in United States February 1996

Shown at Berlin International Film Festival (in competition) February 15-26, 1996.

Inspired by Chris Marker's classic short "La Jetee" (France/1962).

Completed shooting May 6, 1995.

Began shooting February 8, 1995.

"Twelve Monkeys" marks the first feature collaboration for husband and wife co-scripters, David and Janet Peoples; David's most well-known works include "Blade Runner" (1982/USA), "Leviathan" (1989/USA), and "Unforgiven" (1992/USA).

Released in United States Winter December 27, 1995 (NY)

Released in United States January 1996 (Shown in New York City (American Museum of the Moving Image) as part of program "Fairy Tales For Adults: A Terry Gilliam Retrospective" January 6-21, 1996.)

Released in United States February 1996 (Shown at Berlin International Film Festival (in competition) February 15-26, 1996.)

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Terry Gilliam Refused Tom Cruise for ’12 Monkeys’ and Was Concerned by Bruce Willis’ ‘Rectal’ Mouth

• Oops! Something went wrong. Please try again later. More content below

Terry Gilliam ’s “ 12 Monkeys ” is currently celebrating its 25th anniversary since it was released nationwide January 5, 1996. Inverse marked the occasion with an oral history that features Gilliam, screenwriters David Peoples and Janet Peoples, producer Charles Roven, and casting director Margery Simkin. It comes as no surprise that Gilliam makes a few hilarious off-the-cuff remarks while reflecting on his time travel movie, which was inspired by Chris Marker’s 1962 short film “La Jetée.”

“12 Monkeys” stars Bruce Willis as James Cole, a prisoner selected to take part in a time travel experiment in which he travels back and forth through history in an attempt to find a cure to a virus that wiped out mankind. Madeleine Stowe and Brad Pitt also star in “12 Monkeys,” but it was the casting of James Cole that proved most important for Gilliam.

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“The pressure was to get a movie star in,” Gilliam said. “That was at a time when I was still a hot director, so people wanted to come near me and touch me. So they were coming up with all these names. And I just kept saying no. Tom Cruise , Nic Cage, they were all being thrown at me.”

Gilliam refused to consider the likes of Tom Cruise, but Bruce Willis wasn’t an instantly attractive choice for him, either. Gilliam admits to Inverse that Willis was never his favorite actor, particularly because of the look of the actor’s mouth.

“I had never been a great fan of Bruce’s before, but I liked talking to him, and I thought, ‘OK, this guy’s smart; he’s funny,'” the director said. “I explained to him my concerns about him as an actor. I hated the Trumpian mouth he does in films. Rectal. It’s like I’m looking at somebody’s asshole.”

Gilliam liked Willis enough after their meeting to cast him, but it turns out Pitt also wanted the role of James Cole. Pitt was instead cast as motor-mouthed mental patient Jeffrey Goines.

“Brad [Pitt] came to London, and we had dinner because he was keen to get on board to play the part that I had already given to Bruce,” Gilliam said. “I was actually scared shitless that Brad might not be able to do the character because up to then we’d never seen him as a motormouth.”

Head over to Inverse’s website to read the “12 Monkeys” oral history in its entirety.

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Based on the 1995 Terry Gilliam film, 12 Monkeys is a high-stakes race against the clock that follows the journey of a time traveler (Aaron Stanford) from the post-apocalyptic future who appears in the present day on a mission to locate and eradicate the source of a deadly plague that will eventually decimate the human race.

Aaron Stanford, Amanda Schull, Noah Bean, Kirk Acevedo

S1E1 ∙ Drama ∙ English

Mentally divergent, s1e2 ∙ drama ∙ english, cassandra complex, s1e3 ∙ drama ∙ english, s1e4 ∙ drama ∙ english, the night room, s1e5 ∙ drama ∙ english, the red forest, s1e6 ∙ drama ∙ english, s1e7 ∙ drama ∙ english, s1e8 ∙ drama ∙ english, s1e9 ∙ drama ∙ english, divine move, s1e10 ∙ drama ∙ english.