The Green Mile is a 1999 American drama film directed by Frank Darabont and adapted by him from the 1996 Stephen King novel of the same name. The film stars Tom Hanks as Paul Edgecomb and Michael Clarke Duncan as John Coffey.
The film is primarily about Paul and his life as a corrections officer on Death Row in the 1930s. The movie is told in flashback by the protagonist in a nursing home and follows a string of supernatural events upon the arrival of John, a man convicted, but not guilty, of murder.
The film was nominated for four Academy Awards: Best Supporting Actor, Best Picture, Best Sound, and Best Adapted Screenplay.
Plot
The Green Mile is a story told in flashback by an elderly Paul Edgecomb (Dabbs Greer, later by Tom Hanks in the younger version of the character) in a nursing home who is talking to his friend Elaine about the summer of 1935 when he was a corrections officer in charge of Death Row inmates in Louisiana's Cold Mountain Penitentiary. His domain was called the "Green Mile" because the condemned prisoners walking to their execution are said to be walking "the last mile"; here it is on a stretch of green linoleum to the electric chair.
One day, a new inmate arrives, John Coffey (Michael Clarke Duncan), a 7-foot-tall black male convicted of raping and killing two young white girls. Upon being escorted to his cell, he immediately demonstrates "gentle giant" character traits: keeping to himself, fearing darkness, and being moved to tears on occasion. Soon enough, John reveals extraordinary healing powers by curing Paul's kidney stone infection and resurrecting a mouse. Later, he would heal the terminally-ill wife of Warden Hal Moores (James Cromwell), who suffered from a large brain tumor. When John is asked to explain his power, he merely says that he "took it back."
At the same time, Percy Wetmore (Doug Hutchison), a sadistic and unpopular guard, starts work. He "knows people, big people" (he is the nephew of the governor's wife), in effect preventing Paul or anybody else from doing anything significant to curb his behavior. Percy recognizes that the other officers greatly dislike him and uses that to demand managing the next execution. After that, he promises, he will have himself transferred to an administrative post at Briar Ridge Mental Hospital and Paul will never hear from him again. An agreement is made, but Percy then deliberately sabotages the execution. Instead of wetting the sponge used to conduct electricity, he leaves it dry, causing excruciating pain to Eduard "Del" Delacroix (Michael Jeter).
Shortly before Del's execution, a violent prisoner named William "Wild Bill" Wharton (Sam Rockwell) arrives, due to be executed for multiple murders committed during a robbery. At one point he seizes John's arm and John psychically senses that Wharton is the true killer of the two girls, the crime for which John was wrongly convicted and sentenced to death. John "takes back" the sickness in Hal's wife and regurgitates it into Percy, who then shoots Wharton to death and falls into a permanent catatonic state. Percy is then housed in the Briar Ridge Mental Hospital. In the wake of these events, Paul interrogates John, who says he "punished them bad men" and offers to show Paul what he saw. John takes Paul's hand stating that he has to give Paul "a part of himself" in order to see and imparts the visions of what he saw, of what really happened to the girls.
Paul asks John what he should do, if he should open the door and let John walk away. John tells him no, he is ready to go because here there is too much pain in the world, which he can feel, and that he is "rightly tired of the pain" and is ready to rest. When John is put in the electric chair, he asks Paul not to put the traditional black mask on his face because he is afraid of the dark. Paul agrees and after Paul shakes his hand, John is executed. As the flashback ends, Paul notes that he requested a transfer to a youth detention center, where he spent the remainder of his career.
In the present, Paul's friend questions his statement that he had a fully-grown son in 1935. He explains that he was 44 years old at the time of John's execution and that he is now 108 and still in excellent health. This is apparently a side effect of John giving a "part of himself" to Paul. Mr. Jingles, Del's mouse resurrected by John, is also still alive — but Paul believes his outliving all of his relatives and friends to be a punishment from God for having John executed. Paul explains he has deep thoughts about how "we each owe a death; there are no exceptions; but, Oh God, sometimes the Green Mile seems so long."
Soundtrack
The official film soundtrack, Music from the Motion Picture The Green Mile, was released on December 14, 1999 by Warner Bros.. It contains 35 tracks, primarily instrumental tracks from the film score by Thomas Newman. It also contains four vocal tracks: "Cheek to Cheek" by Fred Astaire, "I Can't Give You Anything but Love, Baby" by Billie Holiday, "Did You Ever See a Dream Walking?" by Gene Austin, and "Charmaine" by Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians.
Reception
The film received positive reviews from critics with a 77% 'Certified Fresh' approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.[1]
Forbes commentator Dawn Mendez referred to the character of John Coffey as a "'magic Negro' figure"—a term coined by Spike Lee to describe a stereotypical fictional black person depicted in a fictional work as a "saintly, nonthreatening" person whose purpose in life is to solve a problem for or otherwise further the happiness of a white person.[2] Lee himself berated the character as one of several "super-duper, magical Negro[es]" depicting a skewed version of the black male, claiming it was due to the prominence of white decision makers in the media companies.[3]
Awards and nominations
1999 Academy Awards[4]
2000 Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy & Horror Films
2000 Broadcast Music Incorporated Film & TV Awards
2000 Black Reel Awards
2000 Blockbuster Entertainment Awards
2000 Bram Stoker Awards
2000 Broadcast Film Critics Association Awards
2000 Chicago Film Critics Association Awards
2000 Directors Guild of America
- Nominated - Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures — Frank Darabont
2000 Golden Globe Awards
2000 NAACP Image Awards
2000 MTV Movie Awards
2000 Motion Picture Sound Editors (Golden Reel Awards)
- Nominated - Best Sound Editing - Dialogue and ADR — Mark A. Mangini, Julia Evershade
- Nominated - Best Sound Editing - Effects and Foley — Mark A. Mangini, Aaron Glascock, Howell Gibbens, David E. Stone, Solange S. Schwalbe
2000 People's Choice Awards
- Won - Favorite All-Around Motion Picture
- Won - Favorite Dramatic Motion Picture
2001 Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (Nebula Award)
2000 Screen Actors Guild Awards
- Nominated - Outstanding Performance by a Cast
- Nominated - Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role — Michael Clarke Duncan
References
- ^ The Green Mile at Rotten Tomatoes
- ^ Mendez, Dawn (January 23, 2009). "The 'Magic Negro'". Forbes. http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/23/obama-magic-negro-oped-cx_dm_0123mendez.html. Retrieved October 26, 2009.
- ^ "Lee Takes Issue With Depiction of Minorities in Film". San Jose Mercury News: p. 2E. February 7, 2001.
- ^ "The 72nd Academy Awards." The New York Times - Breaking News, World News & Multimedia. <http://www.nytimes.com/library/film/oscars2000.html>.
External links
