Better Late Than Never on "12 Monkeys"

I just watched the movie "12 Monkeys" for the first time. Let’s discuss.

I have heard about this movie for years but never got around to it. I know why I didn't see it when it first came out. The preview made me scared. I had issues with movies that were post apocalyptic when I was a kid. It felt too real and too close to me back then. I couldn't handle it. But, I don't have any real issues with movies like that now. I actually seek these types of movies out. I have also had two of my brothers, RD and Seth, who have been in my ears for years about this movie. But I never got around to it, until this past Tuesday. This is also my first time seeing a Terry Gilliam movie. I have always heard about him, but never watched any of his movies. That's going to change after seeing "12 Monkeys".

I loved every single second of this movie. For people who have not seen it, the movie takes place in the past, present and future. Bruce Willis plays a criminal from the future who is sent back in time to try and stop this disease from being released in 1996 that is going to wipe out 99 percent of the human population.

Bruce Willis is exceptional. A performance like this makes me so sad that he has to deal with what he is currently dealing with. He and his family do not deserve this at all. He is so good in this movie. They let him be himself to an extent, but he also had to act like a crazy person at certain points, then shift on a dime and act like he was just giving in. It felt like he had given up at certain points in the movie. He portrayed all of this very well. I especially liked the scene when he was beating up someone who accosted his friend, and he took his own teeth out afterward. It was such a good performance of someone who could just flip on a dime at any given moment.

I also really liked all of the stuff in the asylum. This is where we meet Brad Pitt, an Oscar nomination worthy performance. Pitt is the best part of this whole movie. He plays the leader of the 12 Monkeys crew that everyone thinks is the cause of the spread of disease. Pitt plays this asylum patient and real world person perfectly. He is twitchy and talkative. He goes on these rants and raves where he will make sense in one sentence, then go off the rails during the next. He was so fun to watch.

Madeleine Stowe plays a psychiatrist who works with Willis. She thinks he is losing his grip on reality at first. But after a while she starts to understand and see his side of things. She realizes he is actually from the future and wants to help him. Christopher Plummer has a minor role, but he is memorable and I thoroughly enjoyed his southern accent. There are a bunch of other people in this movie and they all lend some good stuff to this movie that makes you feel wacky while you watch.

I loved everything about this movie. The look and estechic were so much cooler than a bunch of similar movies being made today. Gilliam made this movie look surreal, especially in the asylum, and you could really see it on the screen. I also like that the writers throw you in so many directions before revealing everything in the final act. I loved all the twists and turns. This movie's plot had me on the edge of my seat. But what I think I enjoyed most was the way it all wrapped up. Most movies give you hope. Most movies will show you something that makes you think it will all be okay. Most movies want you to leave in a good mood. Not "12 Monkeys". This movie ends very sadly. Spoiler alert, but everything you see leading up to the final act, it is going to happen. That is how the movie ends. You watch all of this stuff happen, and when there's a chance to stop it, that doesn't happen. I like when directors take a swing like that. And land said swing.

"12 Monkeys" is a very, very good post apocalyptic sci-fi movie. I shouldn't have waited this long to watch it. I'm glad I remedied that this week. I recommend you do the same if you haven't watched it, or are looking for a rewatch. "12 Monkeys" rules. 

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast.

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The News About Bruce Willis Sucks

Yesterday I was scrolling through social media and I saw that Bruce Willis announced he was retiring from acting.

I was kind of stunned. I had no idea why. I wanted to know why he was doing this. I am a fan, more on that later, and it really bummed me out. I do truly like a good amount of movies I have seen that Willis has starred in. I love "Die Hard". It is a great movie and he is electric in it. I really love his performance in "Pulp Fiction". He is my favorite part in fact. I enjoy his storyline the most in that movie. He is tremendous in "The Sixth Sense". That was my first drama experience with him. I love "Unbreakable". I actually think that is the best Shyamalan movie personally. I truly do love "The Fifth Element". This is not me being a hipster, I genuinely like that movie. A lot. He showed up in "Between 2 Ferns: The Movie", and it was great. "Glass" isn't a great movie, but it brings back his "Unbreakable" character, which is nice. He voices himself in "The Lego Movie". He's solid in "Sin City". "Looper" is my modern day "Blade Runner", and he is the best person in that movie. I loved him in "Moonrise Kingdom". It was cool to see him in a Wes Anderson movie. "RED" is a great, underrated movie. If it never got an undeserved sequel, that movie would be a cult classic. "Cop Out" is not a good movie, but I loved seeing him and, my favorite actor, Tracy Morgan play off one another. "16 Blocks" is a very cool, solid movie. "The Whole Nine Yards" is dope. He voiced a bad guy in "The Beavis and Butthead Movie". "12 Monkeys" is a trip in all the right ways. I just recently saw "Death Becomes Her" for the first time, and I enjoyed the whole movie, especially Willis' performance. "The Last Boy Scout" was the first hyper violent movie I ever watched, and it opened my eyes to wild movies. And, as a child, of course I watched "Look Who's Talking" all the time. The last decade his movie choices have not been great, but he was still steadily working. Needless to say, I am a fan of his.

I also like how he has lived a relatively scandalous free life outside Hollywood. Sure, his marriage to Demi Moore did not last, but they have been incredible co-parents and continue to be friends. He has helped other actors land big time roles. He is widely known as the best tipper in Hollywood. He seems as down to Earth as someone as famous as he is nowadays. So to hear he was retiring, it was out of left field.

Then I did a little digging to see why. I assumed he just wanted to step away, or that he has done what he has wanted to do. He does not need to act, I just think he truly likes it. But that was not the case. Upon further research I saw that he was diagnosed with aphasia. That is not a disease anyone should hope to get diagnosed with. From what I know, aphasia "typically occurs after a stroke or head wound". It could also occur "from a slow growing brain tumor". It will cause "progressive permanent damage". Willis' family has not disclosed how he got it, and they shouldn't have to. Digging a little deeper, aphasia sounds dreadful. I have read that this disease will cause the patient to "speak in short or incomplete sentences, speak in sentences that do not make sense, substitute words for other words, speak unrecognizable words, not understand what others are speaking about or write sentences that do not make sense". This all sounds so very brutal. It sounds like Alzheimer's, except that maybe your brain doesn't fully go away, you just find it hard to communicate. What a blow. I hope Willis finds some great doctors to help him ease into this horrific situation. He is still relatively young, at 67. I hope he has another 20 plus years, and that this disease doesn't paralyze him.

This news stinks. It bums me out. I hope he gets the help he needs. What a drag. Another great actor, and seemingly decent person, stricken with a disease that just sounds horrendous. Fight the fight Bruce Willis. You seem strong enough to give it real hell.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast.

Come and support Ty and the podcast on Patreon.

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SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

Ty wants director Neill Blomkamp to get off the M. Night Shyamalan path

The first step to directing. Keep the film in the can.

I finally got around to seeing the movie "Chappie" this week, and while it wasn't awful, it wasn't that good either.

Dev Patel and Sharlto Copley are serviceable enough in the movie. Copley as the robot Chappie is quite good actually. He does the whole motion capture thing really well and makes Chappie seem life like. I think Copley is a very good actor in fact. I like him in all his roles. Patel is decent as the scientist that created the robotic police force, and while I enjoyed his performance, it was nothing special. It was just okay. My two biggest problems with the movie were Hugh Jackman's performance as the bad guy and the Johannesburg rap duo, Die Antwoord's performance. Jackman, whom I love as an actor the dude plays Wolverine, my all time favorite superhero, does not make a good bad guy. He's too nice of a guy, and for those of you out there saying, Wolverine is kind of a dick, Wolverine is still a good guy in the end. It wasn't for lack of trying on Jackman's part either, that's on the writers and director, he's just too nice of a person in real life, that I don't buy him as the bad guy. It doesn't fit. Die Antwoord's performance was just confusing. I don't know if they're playing themselves in this futuristic world, or if their characters are just big fans of Die Antwoord's music. For example, they each go by their rap names in the movie, and there's, at least two that I can remember seeing, times that Ninja(that's the guy in Die Antwoord) is wearing his own band's merchandise as his wardrobe. I was confused by the whole thing. The two of them aren't very good actors either, which didn't help their case. The movie was very formulaic and you could tell how the movie would end very early in the plot. It was another disappointment from Neill Blomkamp, who I really liked after seeing his first movie, "District 9".

This brings me to my main point and question of my blog today, is Neil Blomkamp the new M Night Shyamalan? Let's start by comparing each director's first movie. Shyamalan came out of the gate and crushed a grand slam with the brilliant, innovative, and probably biggest shock in a movie in my lifetime with "The Sixth Sense". Talk about a great debut. This movie was well written, well acted and perfectly directed. People talked about the ending for years, and "I see dead people" has become as big as "My wife!" or "I knew it was you, you broke my heart"(if you don't know those references, you need to get up to speed people!). Blomkamp's debut was just as unique as Shyamalan's and maybe even more innovative. I'm of course talking about the brilliant "District 9". I remember seeing posters at movie theaters a year before this movie came out that just had a shadow picture of an alien, and the saying, "Humans not allowed". I was immediately intrigued by this and found out any and all information I could about this upcoming alien movie. As more previews and clips came out, I got more and more excited. I saw the movie on opening night, and it not only live up to my expectations, but it exceeded them.

"District 9" takes place in Johannesburg and there's a race of aliens, known as "prawns" living in the slums. They're treated as second class citizens, and in his film debut, Sharlto Copley plays a wet behind the ears, yet eager police officer. He goes into the "prawns" area to extract and arrest some that are stealing from the humans. He gets poisoned by an alien and slowly starts to turn into one. It is so awesome to watch his character's transformation into an alien and the movie has a great secondary story about how higher class people treat people they feel are below them. If you haven't seen "District 9" stop reading this, watch it, and then come back and finish reading this, That movie is so great.

Unforunately, at least in Blomkamp's case, the same can't be said for his second movie, "Elysium". Another good premise about the upper and lower classes in society, but this movie just didn't work for me. Matt Damon was miscast as a working class, former bad boy trying to turn his life around. Jodie Foster plays the leader of the higher class people living on the rich planet Elysium, and she's your typical, bitchy rich lady that only cares about the high society folks and can do without the poor people. She also sports a terrible South African accent. It's so bad. I mean, it's terrible. The only person I enjoyed in this movie was Copley. He plays a bad ass assassin for Foster's character and he's awesome. He's a great bad guy and he kicks total ass. But, he cannot save this movie. It's just not a good movie.

Shyamalan's second movie, "Unbreakable", I personally like more than "The Sixth Sense". It's a cool, pseudo superhero movie that I feel is criminally underrated. Bruce Willis is on a train that has a brutal crash and he's the only survivor. He actually comes out unscathed. Samuel L Jackson plays a big comic book guy and he's very intrigued by Willis' character and the fact that he did not even get a scratch in the train wreck. They team up and do some cool, super hero type stuff. It's a really good movie and I highly recommend watching it.

I've already mentioned Blomkamp's third, and most recent movie, "Chappie". You all know how I feel about that. After the success of "The Sixth Sense" and the high of making "Unbreakable", Shyamalan's star was going up, and it was never going to come down. Or so we thought. He followed "Unbreakable" with the god awful, Joaquin Phoenix and Mel Gibson bomb of a movie "Signs". That movie sucks, but hey, you can't hit a home run every time. Certainly his next movie would be better, it had to be. Once again, nope, he made "The Village" and that movie is worse than "Signs". I think it's Nicolas Cage's version of "The Wicker Man" bad. That movie is confusing and awful. He followed that up with "Lady in the Water". You know that movie about a mermaid, or some bull shit, that a guy finds in his pool and she of course has special powers. So, three stinkers in a row. Was this a sign of things to come, or was he just in a slump? His next movie would determine his fate in my opinion. He had the great un fortune of deciding to put out "The Happening". You know this movie, the one were plants come to life and make people kill themselves and Mark Wahlberg plays a scientist and calls himself a douchebag at one point. This movie was so bad that I convinced a group of about eight people to walk out. A movie we all paid for, and we didn't stay for the whole thing. I'd never done that before, but that's how bad that movie is. His next two movies did nothing to prove me wrong, that he was past his prime. He released the horrendous "Last Airbender" and the stupid and contrite "After Earth". Both these movies are just plain awful. "The Last Airbender" is so bad that fans of the anime won't even acknowledge the movie as part of the series. That's pretty telling. Shymalan is now dabbling in television with the mini series "Wayward Pines", and while it started interesting, I didn't finish it because it was way to boring and falling into Shymalan's routine of posing way too many questions that there's no way they could all be answered in ten, one hour episodes.

While I feel that Shymalan's fate is sealed as a director(he peaked early and is now no good), I think there's still hope for Blomkamp. He's only made three movies. "District 9" is, by a wide margin, his best movie, but while I didn't like either "Chappie" or "Elysium", at least "Chappie" was a bit more interesting and a touch better than "Elysium". I hope for his sake he's not turning into Shymalan, but the way it's going now, that's what I unfortunately see happening.

Time will tell I suppose.

Ty 

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for SeedSing and co-host of the X Millennial Man podcast. In the upcoming movie about SeedSing, Ty will have to wear Die Antwoord gear. Follow him on twitter @tykulik