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.
An unknown and lethal virus has wiped out five billion people in 1996. Only 1% of the population has survived by the year 2035, and is forced to live underground. A convict (James Cole) reluctantly volunteers to be sent back in time to 1996 to gather information about the origin of the epidemic (who he's told was spread by a mysterious "Army of the Twelve Monkeys") and locate the virus before it mutates so that scientists can study it. Unfortunately Cole is mistakenly sent to 1990, six years earlier than expected, and is arrested and locked up in a mental institution, where he meets Dr. Kathryn Railly, a psychiatrist, and Jeffrey Goines, the insane son of a famous scientist and virus expert.
Written by Giancarlo Cairella <vertigo@imdb.com>
Director Terry Gilliam and producer Charles Roven had several arguments about how the film should end. Gilliam wanted to finish on the shot of Railly looking at young Cole while Roven preferred the scripted final scene in the parking lot outside the airport. In an attempt to dissuade Roven, Gilliam proposed an immensely complex setup involving two cranes on top of one another and a vast sea of cars in the hope that Roven would veto it as being too expensive. Roven not only okayed the shot but Gilliam so loved the result that he used it to end the film.
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Goofs
Continuity:
The television in the sanitarium announces that the featured picture is the Marx Brothers'
Monkey Business, but the clip they show is from their first film, believed to have been removed, and replaced with;
The Cocoanuts.
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Quotes
[first lines]
Title Card:
...5 billion people will die from a deadly virus in 1997... /... The survivors will abandon the surface of he planet... /... Once again the animals will rule the world... / - Excerpts from interview with clinically diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, April 12, 1990 - Baltimore County Hospital. See more »
Crazy Credits
The symbol of the 12 Monkeys provides the backdrop for the opening and closing credits.
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