the mask of god: 1997

James Cole (Willis) is a convicted criminal living in a grim post-apocalyptic future. In 1996–97, the Earth's surface was contaminated by a virus so deadly that it forced the surviving population to live underground. To earn a pardon, Cole allows scientists to send him on dangerous missions to the past to collect information on the virus, thought to be released by a terrorist organization known as the Army of the Twelve Monkeys. If possible, he is to obtain a pure sample of the original virus so a cure can be made. Throughout the film, Cole is troubled with recurring dreams involving a chase and a shooting in an airport.

so, maybe we are . . .

Huh?

--ok, it all started here:

One of the themes that has been strange attracting, is LA, and thus Eleleth and I watched L.A. Confidential on movie night (Tuesday). I fell asleep during the film, and wasn't really "seeing" the connections anyway.

Afterwards, "1997" began to come at me. I began seeing it eveywhere, and had no idea why . . . (I have some sense now, but still am unsure how literal I should take the metaphor).

The theme is doomsday, folks. This has been what I've been seeing . . .

Do we head to the hills and tell stories? Am I supposed to investigate my '97 more deeply to understand this theme? Is a literal plague coming, or is this a soul-sickness we caught in 1997?

. . .

"Man is a rope, tied between beast and overman—a rope over an abyss . . ."

Caesar is taken out to ‘Muir Woods’, the Giant Redwood grove, home to some of the largest living creatures on the earth, about 15 miles north of San Francisco. . . . You may have recognised the name as that of the forest in which Madeleine gets spooked in Vertigo. ("Rise of the Planet of the Apes Film Locations")

Black Dehlia

(The Fifth Element)

Like La Jetée, 12 Monkeys contains references to Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo (1958). Toward the end of the film, Cole and Railly hide in a theater showing a 24-hour Hitchcock marathon and watch a scene from Vertigo. Railly then transforms herself with a blonde wig, as Judy (Kim Novak) transformed herself into blonde Madeleine in Vertigo; James sees her emerge within a red light, as Scottie (James Stewart) saw Judy emerge within a green light.[8] Brief notes of Bernard Herrmann's film score can also be heard. Railly also wears the same coat Novak wore in the first part of Vertigo. The scene at Muir Woods National Monument, where Judy (as Madeleine) looks at the growth rings of a felled redwood and traces back events in her past life, resonates with larger themes in 12 Monkeys'.