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Oscar Bait of Yore: The Green Mile (1999)
TAGLINE
"Paul Edgecomb didn't believe in miracles. Until the day he met one."
BACKGROUND
The Green Mile originated as a Stephen King novel published in six monthly volumes beginning in March 1996. King reportedly wrote it without knowing the ending, and released it serially so readers would be unable to skip ahead.
The film version proceeded quickly, with Variety announcing in November 1997 that Hanks would star in the adaptation written and to be directed by Frank Darabont. Hanks was already committed to You've Got Mail, so Green Mile shot between July and December 1998 (running a full month over schedule). It was released a year later on December 10th, 1999, just in time for Christmas and in the heat of awards season.
PRESTIGE VALUE
Pretty high. Darabont was coming off his debut The Shawshank Redemption, which was not a box office success but got seven Oscar nominations (including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay for Darabont, winning zero). Shawshank caught on big time once it hit home video and became a small sensation, aided by countless airings on TNT.
After John Travolta turned down the lead role of death row guard Paul Edgecomb, Darabont offered it to Hanks (who wasn't yet regarded as America's Dad, but had recently won back to back Best Actor Oscars for Philadelphia and Forrest Gump). The rest of the cast filled out with one exception: the Green Mile's Christ-like inmate John Coffey. Bruce Willis recommended Michael Clarke Duncan to Darabont after working with him on Armageddon, and Coffey became Duncan's breakout role.
CRITICAL RESPONSE
Mostly positive although not overwhelming. Variety called it "intermittently powerful and meticulously crafted" but took issue with its "considerable over-length and some shopworn, simplistic notions at its center." Roger Ebert didn't mind the length in his 3 1/2 star review, saying "I appreciated the extra time, which allows us to feel the passage of prison months and years."
Critics generally liked the performances and craftsmanship but didn't go for the bizarrely dark yet simultaneously sentimental plot, and many couldn't get past the 188-minute runtime. Not to mention that the acclaimed Shawshank was a tough act to follow, a fact that hovers over Darabont's career even today.
BOX OFFICE
Until 2017's It, The Green Mile was the highest-grossing Stephen King adaptation. It made a very respectable $136 million ($286 million worldwide) off a $60 million budget.
It placed #2 at the box office its opening weekend with $18 million, just behind Hanks' own Toy Story 2 (which edged it out with $18.2 million) and ahead of the Rob Schneider comedy Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo, which grossed $12.2 million. Being an R-rated drama, The Green Mile held on and remained a strong performer over the holidays, where it faced off against the similarly adult Any Given Sunday and The Talented Mr. Ripley.
AWARDS
This is where it gets tricky. 1999 was a landmark for groundbreaking American cinema and is frequently cited among the best movie years of all time. American Beauty (which won Best Picture), Magnolia, Three Kings, Being John Malkovich, Fight Club, The Insider, Boys Don't Cry (not to mention foreign contenders like All About My Mother and Topsy Turvy)... The list goes on.
With that competition, a 3-hour Stephen King prison drama starring Tom Hanks from the director of The Shawshank Redemption seemed awfully square (though perhaps not as Oscar bait-y as the big Miramax title that year, The Cider House Rules). Although it received only one Golden Globe nomination (Best Supporting Actor for Duncan), it did nab four Oscar noms but no wins: Duncan again, best Sound, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Picture. It got practically no attention from critics groups.
IS THIS REMEMBERED TODAY?
The Green Mile certainly hasn't been forgotten, but it's rarely mentioned as a top shelf King film (it's no Misery, The Shining, Stand By Me, etc.) and is perhaps best thought of as a "what the hell were they thinking?" in regard to the Academy throwing it a bone in Best Picture. In a more conventional year, its nomination might have been a given, but when you consider the embarrassment of cinematic riches in 1999... it feels a bit tone deaf. With the Academy's current push to make its membership more diverse and inclusive, The Green Mile is just the kind of film that might not fare as well if it were released today.
HOW DOES IT HOLD UP?
Really well! The Green Mile is a solid movie that despite its VERY episodic three hours manages to hold attention with the same brand of old Hollywood grandeur that Darabont brought so memorably to Shawshank. It's moving and well crafted, with a few abrupt tonal shifts that seem more the fault of the source material than Darabont's script. As the cliche goes, this is a big budget, intimate epic "kind of film they don't make anymore" -- if The Green Mile were published today, it would probably end up an Emmy-grubbing miniseries on HBO or Netflix.
THE GOOD
- Has anyone ever gone wrong casting Tom Hanks? The character of Paul Edgecomb doesn't seem like much at first, but Hanks uses his trademark everyman charm to add shades of color to the slavishly moral, good-hearted prison guard. Does Paul Edgecomb have flaws? Not really. A rich inner life? Can't say that he does... Yet Hanks' greatest skill is being the eyes and ears of the audience, and his typically effortless presence grounds the movie and holds it together.
- Character actor mecca. David Morse. James Cromwell. Michael Jeter. Graham Greene. Sam Rockwell in one of his first major roles. Jeffrey DeMunn. Barry Pepper. Harry Dean Stanton. Bonnie Hunt. A one-scene cameo by Lieutenant Dan himself, Gary Sinise. PATRICIA CLARKSON! Veteran Hollywood player Dabbs Greer in a stunning but brief framing device as the elder Edgecomb. Nearly every performance is fine tuned to perfection and compelling to watch, even when the novelistic plot sags.
- Thomas. Fucking. Newman. My favorite composer was on a crazy roll in the mid-to-late '90s, and was Oscar-nominated the same year for his career-best score to American Beauty. (In 1998 he delivered two knockout scores for flawed prestige films, The Horse Whisperer and Meet Joe Black). His Green Mile music is no exception: it's a masterwork of understated emotion, atmospheric and dense, intriguing and mysterious, perfectly suited to the visual tone Darabont conveys onscreen. Every time his score kicks in, the film gets 15-20% better.
- Michael Clarke Duncan. While many had issues with the character of John Coffey (see below), Duncan's performance is remarkable and worth the hype. He portrays Coffey as fully human despite his supernatural (and possibly religious) abilities, and lends real dignity to Coffey's mental disability. He doesn't quite go "full" (...well, you know the line from Tropic Thunder). His Coffey is more of an innocent who's just as tortured by his gift as he is blessed with it.
THE BAD
- Yep. It's long. I didn't mind, but I can see how others would be put off by The Green Mile's lack of plot (it's a full hour before Coffey's miracle-working reveals itself). That said, the film is smoothly paced and the performances assure it never gets dull.
- The Green Mile is also WEIRD. It's like Stephen King took the straightforward prison melodrama of Shawshank and melded it with horror elements (the disturbing executions), faith-based touches, and a clever mouse named Mr. Jingles. This isn't necessarily a deterrent, but there are more than a few strange moments as Darabont navigates the off-kilter tone of King's book.
- Okay, so John Coffey is an African-American Jesus figure who's falsely accused of raping and murdering two little white girls (another creepy detail from King) but instead of exonerating himself he'd rather... cure Patricia Clarkson's brain tumor? Cultural critics including Spike Lee accused King of using the "magical negro" trope, but King denies any racial insensitivity: "When I was writing the book I said to myself, 'What can I do to make sure that this character goes to the chair even if he's innocent?' And I said, 'Well, it's 1933. If he's black, nobody's going to let him off the hook no matter what the evidence is.' So I made him a black guy." Make of that what you will! While the character isn't the most well-rounded, I found Duncan's work to be totally free of cliches, so he did King a solid there (even if the subtext is uncomfortable).
- As nicely acted as The Green Mile is, one performer stands out (and not in a great way): Doug Hutchinson as the boyish and sadistic guard Percy Wetmore, who brutalizes several inmates (intentionally botching one's execution), nearly clubs Mr. Jingles to death, and whose general presence is just sort of... icky. Maybe it's the writing (Percy has the subtlety of a sledgehammer), and Hutchinson isn't bad per se -- on the contrary, he's almost too effective. Something about him feels noticeably off, which might have been intentional, but it's safe to say Hutchinson's commitment to the detestable Percy may have cost him work (he later made tabloid headlines for marrying 16-year-old Courtney Stodden at the ripe age of 51 -- YIKES!!).
THE WTF
- It's safe to say this is the only film you'll ever see where Michael Clarke Duncan uses his magical powers to cure Tom Hanks of a UTI so he can go home and have sex with his wife, Bonnie Hunt. In a holiday blockbuster, nonetheless!
BASICALLY
The Green Mile was old school Hollywood entertainment in a year when it was more fashionable to take chances. It might seem dated in light of 1999's other offerings, but it's memorable and extremely well made. Oddly enough, this dark, brooding prison tale with hints of quirky humor and supernatural goings-on isn't that conventional at all.
UP NEXT
I seem to be unraveling with a trifecta of what Ryan Murphy calls "premium actresses": Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, and an Oscar-winning Nicole Kidman (and her prosthetic nose) in the brutally depressing literary juggernaut The Hours!