12 MONKEYS
A film review by Meera Srinivasan
Copyright 1996 Meera Srinivasan
This movie is a disappoinment. I will give it a pass. Go see it as matinee or when it comes out on video.
I will admit time-travel movies are difficult to do. It is tough to balance disrupted time sequence with coherent story line. This movie does a fair job of it. Yet it is a strange movie with a lot of overacting. Bruce Willis is a disappointment as always (if only someone can wipe the smirk of his face). Madaline Stowe is the neurotic psychiatrist who jumps from caring behavior to thrashing about in fury. She plays your typical Hollywood professional woman in distress. Pitt, of course, is original but againg very overdone. The kid is clearly a lunatic. What's with the facial tics and gestures.
The psychiatric hospital, portrayed in the film, would put the entire health care system to shame.
Many of the scenes are very predictable. The convict suspected of being a Schizo is sent in time.Bruce Willis is this chose guy. The system abuses him and you know you can't trust anyone. The whole city looks blue in the entire movie with gothic style architecture. The movie does not keep you in the hot seat. It is difficult to say whether this is an action movie as there are many fighting scenes or a thriller. The only statement in the movie that was creative and original was when Stowe as psychiatrist says in frustration, "that psychiatry is like any religion. People in it decide who is insane and who is not" (paraphrased).
Maybe if the director had chosen some other actors or if the characters in the movie were not so caricatured it would be little better than pass.
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