Twelve Monkeys (Gilliam, 1995)
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There are so many movies I have to watch. Hundreds and hundreds of films from all around the world, released in all kind of years, that I have not seen before. And more films being released every year. This is the reason I usually do not rewatch movies. There is enough I have not seen for me to watch things I have seen.

But then, there are many movies I may have seen, but seen years before, and of which I do not remember much from it. Like, “Twelve Monkeys”. I had seen it more than a decade back and I knew I loved it and I also knew the ending, but if you put me down and asked me questions about the movie, I wouldn’t know how to answer.

Time for a revisit then. Will I still like it?

I do still like it. I have now a vast film knowledge since I saw the film as a teenager, when my knowledge of film was limited to movies shown on the local channel and films I could rent from the video store, that usually had abysmal selections.

I can now comfortably call “Twelve Monkeys” one of the best time travel films and probably Terry Gilliam’s best work. It has the special, unique, surreal Gilliam visuals that are prominent in his films, especially in “Brazil”, but at the same time, it is restrained by a great story that is almost conventional, if he doesn’t keep adding his own touch everywhere.

The second time around, I am not as impressed with Brad Pitt’s acting as I was the first time. He does seem to overplay his crazy role, and at times, he even does the crazy eye thing, but I will not directly fault Pitt. It is obviously something Gillian wanted and does fit in the crazed feel of the film, but I think still the more impressive actor here is Bruce Willis. Violent, a bit delusional, and unhinged, this is not a guy you want to visit you from the future.

Although, interestingly, Brad Pitt’s character is a bit like Tyler Durden, if mentally deranged and completely insane. Some of his dialogues are very Durdenesque .And plus, you got to love the weird coincidence of both of them being anti-mainstream revolutionaries that want to bring down the establishment and calling their army something monkey related. Space Monkeys. Twelve Monkeys. Weird.

“There's the television. It's all right there - all right there. Look, listen, kneel, pray. Commercials! We're not productive anymore. We don't make things anymore. It's all automated. What are we *for* then? We're consumers, Jim. Yeah. Okay, okay. Buy a lot of stuff, you're a good citizen. But if you don't buy a lot of stuff, if you don't, what are you then, I ask you? What? Mentally *ill*. Fact, Jim, fact - if you don't buy things - toilet paper, new cars, computerized yo-yos, electrically-operated sexual devices, stereo systems with brain-implanted headphones, screwdrivers with miniature built-in radar devices, voice-activated computers...”

4/5



Encounters at the End of the World (2007, Herzog)
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I might not yet be a Herzog fan, but I’m getting there with each movie. Because I’m starting to GET him.

He is a very visionary filmmaker. Who else would make a documentary about the Antarctica and make the ices look like the harbingers of doom for humanity? Not in an obvious, dum dum dum way, but a few subtle hints here and there, from facts, visuals, and interviewee comments, that soon the huge icebergs look like a ticking time bomb. The day these motherfuckers melt, we’re doomed. Because they are SO BIG.

And which other documentary filmmaker would interview people living in such a place, ask them questions where they spout their life philosophy in great flowery language, and then in the narrative, slightly mock them? Herzog likes eccentric people, but he is not enchanted by them.

Which brings me to this. Herzog is a funny fucker. He makes comments that make me laugh without me even knowing if he was being comical or not. He speaks to a marine ecologist, and then when the interviewee stops talking, he says that he had to keep the conversation going.

So he asks, “Dr Ainley, I read somewhere that there are gay penguins. What are your observations?”. And after he gets his answer, his next question is, “Dr Ainley, is there such thing as insanity among penguins?”

But Herzog is not Ali G. He’s not trying to be hilarious. But he is trying to do SOMETHING, I’m sure. And then a scene later, from his penguin insanity question, is a beautiful image. One penguin does not go back to the colony. Instead it walks alone, straight into the distance, step by step. The interviewee claims that once in a while a rare penguin does this, they will just go to the mountains, and die.

It just looks great.

While watching it, I was slightly bored with the film, but now that I look back on it, I realize that it was indeed a great documentary, much more than it seems to be.

“From the very first day, I just wanted to get out of this place. McMurdo has climate control housing facilities, its own radio station, a bowling alley, and abominations such as aerobic studio and yoga classes. It even has an ATM machine. For all these reasons, I wanted to get out into the field as soon as possible.”

4/5

Martin (Romero, 1977) IMDB Link "Things only seem to be magic. There is no real magic. There's no real magic ever. " With his zombie films, George Romero was able to insert a previous magical creature into a real world. Zombies did not feel like supernatural creatures, but actual, flesh and bone beings that could very well exist in our world. We just did not fully understand the how part or why part, but it felt almost REAL. Romero tries to do the same thing with the mythology of vampires in “Martin”. Currently in 2009, vampires have again become the trendiest monster, and a lot of current movies try to strip away some of the legends surrounding the vampire. In “Martin”, Romero strips away almost everything about a vampire. Martin is the vampire in the movie, a teenage looking boy that moves to a different town to stay with one of his older relatives. On the way, Martin kills a woman and drinks her blood. But there is nothing magical about that. He goes about it carefully, injecting the woman with something that makes her unconscious. Then he uses a razor to slip her wrist, drinks her blood, cleans up, and stages it to look like a suicide. In the new town, his older relative, calls him a vampire, and says that he will first save his soul and then kill him. In the meantime, he sets a few rules, hangs garlic everywhere, and allows him to stay with him, claiming that he can’t refuse him as it will shame the family. "Nosferatu. Vampire! First I will save your soul, then I will destroy you. I will show you your room. " Martin is not scared of garlic or crosses, does not get affected by sunlight (claims it makes him a bit shaky), appears in mirrors, can eat food, does not have fangs, and so on. He’s so normal, that while watching it, we can ask the question, is he EVEN a vampire or just delusional? Both he and the older man claim that Martin is 89 years old and we see flashbacks from that era, but again, it is possible that the family has claimed that Martin was a vampire since childhood, and he has gone a bit crazy. There is a reason for Romero’s vampire film not changing the genre completely the way his zombie films did. “Martin” is too psychological, too ambiguous, and there is none of the survival entertainment value the zombie films had. It is all from Martin’s perspective, as he tries to understand the world and drink people’s blood. Still, one of the most unique vampire films ever made. "Do you believe God's whole world runs by the laws of the few sciences we have been able to discover? Oh, no, Christine, there is more. But people are satisfied. They know so much, they think they know all. And that makes it easy for Nosferatu. That makes it easy for all the devils. " 4/5