I don’t recall that as the purpose, but I readily admit I could be mistaken (just don’t tell Ms. D_Odds). It’s been awhile since I’ve seen the movie, and I never watched it on DVD with commentaries.
You recall incorrectly. The security guard is told to be careful with the samples and the “evil man” is notably worried he’s going to piss on his operation by dropping or opening one of the containers.
RE 12 Monkeys
Does no one read my posts?
[spoiler]
He does indeed open one of the vials in the airport. He explains that they are biological samples and opens one while saying “Not even an odor.”
Cole’s mission is never to prevent the plague from happening. The scientists who send him are not interested in altering their past. They only want a pure sample of the virus so that they can create a vaccine and emerge from the underground civilization to retake the surface world. Remember Cole’s first mission in his own time? He walks around a Philadelphia in ruins, inhabited only by animals? With a vaccine, he and the other survivors can kick the bears and pigeons out of Strawbride And Clothier.[/spoiler]
I don’t have much to add. I just want to say that this thread REALLY filled some holes that had always had me puzzled about 12 Monkeys. I have read whole threads related to 12 Monkeys and never come across…
The significance of the “insurance” lady. It probably should have been obvious, but it totally whooshed me. And that scene always annoyed me, because I knew it meant something more than I was getting…
There is just one more thing that confuses me. Why did she think Bruce Willis “looked” familiar? If anything he should think SHE looked familiar. Was it the WWI photo?
I need to watch this thing again!
I know it’s a book and not a movie, but in Isaac Asimov’s *Foundation * Series:
[Spoiler]Everything the heroes of the First Foundation do is ultimately meaningless because Hari Seldon’s psychohistorical plan is driving events
-and-
Everything the Second Foundationers do is also meaningless in the end because the collective consciousness of the planet Gaia is the true caretaker of Seldon’s plan
-and-
Everything Gaia does really doesn’t mean anything because Daneel Olivaw is actually behind it all![/Spoiler]
Frank Bigelow in the 1950 film noir classic D.O.A.
He goes to San Francisco to have some fun and cheat on his girlfriend a little, is dosed with a irreversibly fatal luminous toxin, rushes around California for the next 24 hours to try to track down his killer, and then…dies.
Bigelow: I want to report a murder.
Homicide Captain: Sit down. Where was this murder committed?
Bigelow: San Francisco, last night.
Homicide Captain: Who was murdered?
Bigelow: I was.
I would second The Dude from The Big Lebowski. Classic.
I would also add virtually all of the semi-heroic characters from Mystery Men… ineffectuality at its most ridiculously sublime. “We have a blind date with Destiny… and she just ordered the lobster.”
Zim wouldn’t have caught the Brain if
Rico hadn’t shown up in the nick of time, carrying the nuke. The nuke frightened the Brain, which fled in terror, running into Zim and his squad, who subsequently captured it. Plus they called in the Brain’s location and direction of travel after they located it.
While Rico and his squad weren’t the main heroes, they were cogs in the hero machine. Teamwork.
Michael York’s character in Zeppelin.
[spoiler]As a double-agent, he’s barely able to tell London that the Zeppelin is going…somewhere. On the ground—after helping the Germans find the target—he manages a vague warning to London that results in reinforcements arriving after the Germans’ mission has already failed. (They couldn’t blow the vault door completely, so they have to settle for tossing some grenades in. This after slaughtering, as far as I can tell, the entire British garrison at the target)
Of course, with the alarm now raised, the Brits are able to intercept the Zeppelin with fighters, which results in the crew either being killed in the air or dying in the crash.
Which, I guess, makes it a great WWI movie—nothing actually got accomplished, but a lot of people got killed needlessly.[/spoiler]
And…how do we rate “designated hero” movies? You know, ones where the heroes unironically actually CAUSE more problems/suffering than they help, but we’re still supposed to think of them as “good”?
(Never heard of it? sigh Yeah, I figured as much.)
Except that they did become effectual right at the end, as they got in touch with their powers in time to thwart Casanova Frankenstein. Even Mr Furious came good.
How about Frodo? He heroically walks a long way to throw the ring into the mountain, but can’t finish the job. Thankfully, Gollum bites off his finger, and the ring falls into the lava.
If you identify with the side of Law and Order:
Mr Orange in Reservoir Dogs.
If you identify with the Honourable Outlaw archetype:
Mr White in Reservoir Dogs.
If you identify with the Clever Devious Coward archetype:
Mr Pink in Reservoir Dogs.
Of course, they all helped to cancel each other out because they couldn’t trust each other(not that they had much reason to).
Though Orange gets points for ridding the world of Mr. Blonde.
Re Mystery Men
Yeah, once they’re trained by the Sphinx and armed by Dr Heller they’re not ineffectual anymore.
Re Frodo
I’m not sure I need a spoiler considering that the movies came out a few years ago, and the books a few decades ago but what the hey
In Tolkien’s world, none of the heroes would have been able to destroy the ring. At the final moment, they would all fail. Only through a gift of divine grace (In this case manifested through Gollum biting of a finger) can Frodo complete his task. Frodo did perform quite heroically in carrying the ring for so long before succumbing. Boromir just spends a few weeks near Frodo before the ring gets him. Isildur carries the ring for just a few minutes before he cracks. Gandalf, being wise, is afraid to even touch the ring.
Kaiser Soze or Dean Keaton in The Usual Suspects (depending on if you consider either one of them to be heroic):
Dean and the others go on the final mission to save their loved ones and get the $90 million but they all die and at least Dean’s girlfriend is found later to be murdered; they do accomplish the real goal of getting Kaiser Soze in to murder the Argentinian who can identify him. But one of the Hungarians survives to describe Soze to the police. Granted Soze walks away from the police station before the connection is made, they still have his mugshot and fingerprints, presumably and can identify him.