Twelve Months

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Twelve Months
Poster
Directed by	Kimio Yabuki
Written by	Samuil Yakovlevich Marshak (story)
Music by	Vladimir Ivanovich Krivtsov
Release date(s)	March 15, 1980 (Japan)
Running time	65 min
Country	Japan/USSR
IMDb profile

For the 1956 animated film, see The Twelve Months.

Twelve Months (Japanese: 世界名作童話森は生きている Sekai Meisaku Douwa, Russian: Двена́дцать ме́сяцев, Dvenadtsat Mesyatsev) is a 1980 animated feature film directed by Kimio Yabuki, produced by Toei Animation from Japan in partnership with Soyuzmultfilm from the Soviet Union. It was based on the fairy tale of the same name written by Samuil Yakovlevich Marshak (Самуил Яковлевич Маршак). The music was composed by Vladimir Ivanovich Krivtsov (Владимир Иванович Кривцов) and performed by the National Leningrad Philharmonic under the direction of A. S. Dmitriev.

[edit] Plot

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Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Twelve Months is the story of a Sweet little orphaned Girl called Anya.

When a spoiled little Princess, that is also orphaned, sees the picture of a galanthus she immediately wants one but that flower only booms at spring, in April. But it was New Year's Eve and there is no way such flower can be found in the middle of the winter. So she offers a basket of gold to anyone who can bring her a bag of galanthus.

Anya lives in a cabin in a northern kingdom with her cruel stepmother who dotes on her own daughter while making Anya do all the work. When the greedy mother and daughter listen to the big award on the galanthus, they force Anya to bring them a basket full of galanthus and throw Her out of their house in the coldest and stormiest night of the year, New Year's Eve.

Anya tries to accomplish this impossible task but the night was so cold and the storm was so big that She would certainly die of freezing but She was saved by the spirits of the Twelve Months.

After thanking them for letting her get warm next to their magical fire Anya tries to leave in order to find galanthus but the Twelve Months tell Her there is no way She can find galanthus in the middle of the winter. So, because Anya Is Such A Sweet And Kind Girl, they give Her the gift of spring for one hour , altering the weather and the season and making a local spring, so that She can gather the flowers She needs. Anya very happy, inside the local spring, pickes up all the galanthus She needs and Her basket was now full with them. Anya changed the year with the Twelve Months while picking the flowers but then Anya realises that the local spring was ending and beyond that it was still winter. It was January 1. Anya realises that She should go home now. Anya thanks them once again and tells them that She will never forget them and April, the month that Anya liked the most, gives Anya a magical ring and tells Anya that if She ever wants to see them again, She has to throw the ring and say the magical phrase he tells Her and they will come for Her. Anya tells April that She will never remove it from Her hand and April tells Anya that if She ever loses that ring, She will never be able to see them again. January also tells Anya that at the changing of the year She was lucky and found them and they helped Her because She is just a Good Girl, but She must never reveal that secret to anyone and She must never tell anyone that She met them. Anya promises that She will never tell anyone about them and She leaves very happy, hoping to see Her Friends again.

The real adventure begins after that. When Anya gets home the mother and her daughter were asleep so Anya leaves the basket full of galanthus on the table and wents to sleep. But when Anya wakes up She realises that Her ring was stolen.... If Anya doesn't find Her ring She will not be able to see Her Friends again....

At first, Anya thinks maybe everything was a dream, since the basket with the flowers was also missing but then Anya realises that She memorizes the magical phrase April told Her and it was so real, it couldn't be a dream.

Meanwhile the mother and her daughter went to the Queen with the basket of galanthus in order to take the basket of gold. At First, the Queen was really happy that She finally gets a galanthus but when She asked the two women where they found these flowers in the middle of the winter, they started talking confused and they didn't know what to say so they started lying about finding them in a big circle lake which wasn't frozen from the winter and that every kind of flower was blooming there. So the Queen wanted to go there but then they told Her that the lake and every flower has disappeared and the Queen started to believe that they were lying and She still wanted to go there in order to get one galanthus herself. If they didn't show Her the place, She would imprison them. Frightened by that, they started telling the truth, that they didn't really go to find any galanthus, but sent a "stupid girl" to find them. The capricious Queen demanded that they show her the place or she would still imprison the two women.

When the two women get back home they go directly to Anya and tried to be nice to Her. Especially Her stepmother which told Anya that she is her child. But then Anya tells her that she never treated like her child, accuses them for sTealing Her ring and begs them to give it back to Her. The two women deny taking the ring but when they tell Anya that She has to tell them where She found the galanthus and Anya denies saying anything (since She promised to the Twelve Months never to tell anyone) the daughter says that she actually "borrowed" the ring, only for a while, but the Queen saw it and took it from her and will only give it to Her if Anya takes them to the place She found the flowers. Anya totally denies taking anyone there but She offers to go alone and gets more galanthus for the Queen in hope that She will give Anya Her ring back. The daughter wanted to go with Her but Anya totally denies it and her mother tell her not to go with Anya - She will be fine on Her own. But when Anya leaves, she tells her daughter to follow Anya so that they will find out the place. The daughter also would leave signals on the trees, just so her mother with the Queen and her men know which way to go.

The Queen and her men start in order to find the place and the mother goes with them. Meanwhile, a heavy pack of snow hit the daughter and Anya realises She's been followed. She tells the daughter to go immediately back or She won't go but the daughter tells Anya that it doesn't matter since the Queen will soon find the way, showing Anya the signals. Anya starts crying, saying that she is stupid, because the place was near there and they would soon find it... And the daughter says that Anya may be stupid but she is not and starts laughing...

Meanwhile, the Queen has to continue on foot because the path is not clear. The daughter, after scouting the area for a while, runs to Anya and tells Her that it is really unbelievable that what she told the Queen to lie about was really true. She has found the circle lake. But of course it was frozen. One of the Queen's men finds them and tells them that the Queen is searching for a circle lake but that lake does not seem to exist. The daughter tells him that it exists and she knows it because she saw it. The man goes to get the Queen and soon they are all in the lake.

The Queen then sees Anya and tells Her that she must be the "stupid girl" the mother and her daughter were talking about. And she laughs saying that she really is stupid because Anya found the galanthus, then She is the one that should have taken the gold. The Queen offers to give Anya one basket full of gold but Anya says that she doesn't want it and all Anya really wants is the ring the Queen took from Her. The Queen quite shocked at this, says that she didn't take any ring and that she didn't know what She was talking about. Anya then realises that the daughter lied to Her and She asked the daughter if she really did lie to Her. The Queen, quite angry, wants to know the truth so orders her sergeant to threaten the two women to death if they don't tell the truth immediately. Frightened, the daughter says that she "accidentally found it in her pocket" and shows the ring. Anya tells her to give it back, but the Queen says that she is the Queen and wants to see the ring so she should give it to her. After she gives the Queen the ring, the Queen was really amazed by the beauty of the ring, saying that she doesn't have anything like that. She offers to give Anya her ring back but on one condition. She will tell her where She found the galanthus. Anya says that She is really sorry, but She promised never to tell anyone, ever. The Queen persists but so does Anya and so the Queen threatens to throw the ring on the frozen lake if Anya doesn't tell her. Anya, crying, tells her to throw the ring as She will never tell her.... And the Queen saying "fine, it's too late now!" throws it into the lake....

Anya remembered the magical phrase and says it while the ring jumps on the ice of the lake. Suddenly a storm rises and Anya says that She knows that it's Her Friends the Twelve Months ! One of them appear and takes Anya with him, but noone else sees him due to the heavy storm.

When the storm calms down, Anya was missing, but the Winter was missing also ! The weather was Spring even though it was Winter. The mother and her daughter find out galanthus and tells the Queen immediately to go there and see them but the galanthus vanished immediately. A minute after it gets so hot, like a really hot Summer. Everyone takes their coat off since it was so hot, but this lasts only for a minute since it soon started to rain, just like an Autumn Rain. The rain takes place just for a while as well since it suddenly stops and it starts feeling like Winter again. Suddenly another heavy storm comes out of nowhere and takes away everyone's coats. Finally a heavy snow starts to fall once again making the weather the way it should be because after all it was still January 1, Winter.

It gets really cold with all the snow but everyone's coat was missing since the heavy storm took them all away. All except one that was stuck in a tree. The mother and her daughter ran to it and soon started to fight for it and a second after they became dogs ! Like the bitches they really were... The others said that they deserved that.

Then the Twelve Months and a sledge appeared. Anya was sitting asleep in the sledge and April, gently, wakes Her up. Anya was really happy to see Her Friends and realised that She was wearing Her ring and She was also wearing a really beautiful and warm white coat. December tells Her that it was a present from him, for keeping Her promise never telling anyone about them. The sledge was also a present. Anya says that all these are too much for a Girl like Her....

Then the Queen arrives in the spot, demanding that she is the Queen and that she immediately wants to go to her palace with that sledge. December claims that this sledge belongs to Anya so she should ask Anya about that. The Queen furius says that who does Anya believe to be ?!

The two dogs then go to Anya and Anya welcomes them. The Queen tells them they really were her stepmother and her daughter. Anya, shocked at hearing this, asks the Twelve Months if they will become humans again and December tells Her that in 3 years if they are good dogs She should take them to the Twelve Months at the New Year's Eve and they will make them humans again. Anya promises the dogs that they will have a nice home. The Queen wonders how could se be so nice with just some useless dogs and December says that the reason Anya is so good and kind-hearted was the reason She met them and was given the galanthus as a present. Anya was not stupid after all, She never was, Such A Sweet And Kind Girl ! ....

The Queen was shocked at hearing that, realising that being capricious and cocky is not representing what you really are after all, a person with a kind heart like Anya is worth much more than a cocky Queen. And when Anya offers the freezing Queen and the sledge to get home the Queen realises how mean she was towards Anya and Her ring and apologises to Anya. But Anya tells her not to worry about - She didn't lose the ring, She is wearing it. The two Girls finally become Friends and the Queen accepts the offer of Anya to take her to her palace.

The two Girls get inside the sledge along with the Queen's men and Teacher. Everyone says goodbye to the Twelve Months. Anya says goodbye and thank you for everything.... And they leave.... just a moment after.... the Twelve Months disappear as well as the Circle Lake....

At the end of the film Anya is seen in her sledge with her new friend and they both seem really happy.