Finally saw 12 Monkeys
I've actually never seen the Terry Gilliam movie 12 Monkeys before! I absolutely should have, though, because it's got my favorite aesthetic: the late nineties/early 2000s greebled-up, neon, visually-clashing, occasionally faux-3D-modeled kind of look that vanished in the mid 2000s.
I'm talking about the look shared by movies like Spy Kids, Josie and the Pussycats, Mystery Men, But I'm A Cheerleader, and Babe: Pig in the City. I also see shows like Beakman and Teletubbies sharing this look. It's absolutely my favorite visual style, and I'm genuinely sad that nobody makes anything quite like it anymore - though I understand why they don't. It is fun partially because it's such a particular product of its time.
As computer graphics became more common in movies, some sci-fi and kids' entertainment moviemakers also kept using incredibly good physical sets and props. It became a lot more practical to collage physical props with weird early 3D animation and digital effects. A lot of these movies heavily use very visually unusual physical props and miniatures - to the point where I wonder if the props were designed to look almost 3D-modeled in real life. It's clear that we're seeing costumes and props influenced by the sudden surge in low-fidelity, 90s-style 3D art and animation. The absolutely unique cartoon look in Spy Kids was the peak of this, and is definitely my favorite example of the style. When I started first trying to describe this aesthetic to my husband, he suggested calling it "the Maya 1.0 aesthetic," which definitely fits that movie in particular.
12 Monkeys has some cartoonish visuals, but most of it is on the grimier, more adult end of the aesthetic. A lot of these movies have insanely cluttered, visually overwhelming sets, garish costuming, and a philosophy toward grime that makes them feel completely oppressive. They assault the audience with detail, and a lot of the details are alarming, even when they're cartoonish. It's the kitchen-sink aesthetic also shared by early CD-ROM PC games. The 90s and early 2000s had their own sense of excess which was very clearly guided by the tech of the moment. I recommend reading some of Misty De Meo's writing about CD-ROM art and this blog post by Bolerosoft on itch.io - the more of this 90s multimedia stuff you see, the more clearly you can percieve the connection between it and all these cartoonish, collage-y films. My particular introduction to the visual style probably came in the form of this diabetes educational CD game.
Babe: Pig in the City has a scene where the camera roams through a mashup of every major global city, crammed with people wearing almost Halloween-store-esque costumes, roaming around like cartoon characters or action figures. I love that moment so much - it's the type of excess that I find extremely funny. When we showed that movie to my nephew - he was five years old - it meant absolutely nothing to him. The tech context that made this shit mindboggling to me as a school-aged kid just doesn't exist anymore.
12 Monkeys has just been a jumping off point for me to rant about how much I love the aesthetic, but really: that was my favorite part of the movie. I had no idea I was watching a La Jetée adaptation until halfway through, when it became instantly clear to me. I was impressed at how completely they'd transformed it into a feature-length story, but I wasn't overly gripped by a lot of the plot, and I think it easily could have been cut down without losing much impact. And Willis does a fantastic job too! But to me, the most precious thing about it is Gilliam's sensibility and visual style, particularly in the scenes where Willis meets the scientists. It's a snapshot of a lost moment and a lost philosophy toward tech.
I don't think the excess and exuberance of this uniquely turn-of-the-century visual style is innocent or nostalgic, really. I think it was kind of crazy and weird. Excess is always weird. Excess tells you a lot about what people value! And it's fun to see cartoonish, multimedia-CD-flavored excess and grime in something darker, sometimes. I can only rewatch Spy Kids about once every three or four years without losing my mind!!