STARRING TOM HANKS, DABBS GREER, MICHAEL CLARKE DUNCAN, DAVID MORSE, BARRY PEPPER, JEFFREY DEMUNN, HARRY DEAN STANTON, SAM ROCKWELL, JAMES CROMWELL, BONNIE HUNT, PATRICIA CLARKSON AND DOUG HUTCHISON.
REVIEW BY SANDRA HARRIS. ©
This is a phenomenal film, three hours and nine minutes of sheer brilliance, although people often have trouble with its length. Not me, though. I loved every second of this intensely emotional and multi-award-winning movie. It was perfect viewing for Christmas Night this year, when we really wanted something to take our minds off the bad COVID news…!
Tom Hanks is absolutely fantastic as prison officer Paul Edgecomb, who, in 1935- during the Great Depression- is in charge of Death Row in America’s Cold Mountain Penitentiary. He runs a tight ship, but with kindness and compassion as his watchwords rather than cruelty and harsh discipline.
Agitated men are likely to riot, he maintains, but treating condemned men with calm dignity goes a long way towards keeping things serene in the sad and lonely part of the prison they call ‘the Green Mile,’ due to the colour of the floor covering…
Paul is helped in his work by Brutus Howell, Dean Stanton and Harry Terwillinger, all of whom are really good, decent men who share Paul’s ideas around keeping the men calm and feeling as good and positive as they can feel, given where they are…
The one bad apple on Paul’s staff is Percy Wetmore, who, because of his connections at the prison, seems to get away with the worst behaviour possible towards the inmates, whom he loves to taunt, bully, torment and openly remind about their destination, the electric chair, as if they needed reminding.
You’ll be rooting for a suitable come-uppance for Percy all the way through the movie, as his actions towards the inmates become ever more despicable. You will not be disappointed, but I’ll say no more. No spoilers here, lol.
The biggest thing happening on Paul’s Green Mile during this particular year is the arrival of the physically enormous but quiet and child-like black man known as John Coffey, ‘like the drink, but not spelt the same.’
Played magnificently by the sadly deceased Michael Clarke Duncan, John Coffey has been accused of the worst crime a black man can commit, the rape and murder of two pretty little white sisters. There seems to be no doubt as to his guilt, as he’s been caught red-handed with the bodies, so to speak.
After John Coffey ‘heals’ Paul of the worst darned urinary infection he’s ever had in his life, simply by laying hands on the affected area- much to Paul’s surprise!- Paul and his staff come to realize that there’s something extraordinary about this gentle giant.
When he brings Mr. Jingles, a very special player in this eye-opening drama, back to life after a particularly disgusting act of violence by the power-crazed Percy Wetmore, there seems to be no doubt at all about John Coffey’s healing powers.
Paul and his men start to wonder if the big man mightn’t be able to do something for the prison governor’s wife Melinda, who is dying an especially horrible death from cancer. Dare they chance it…? It’s all to play for, folks.
In the case of Death Row inmate Edouard ‘Del’ Delacroix, Percy Wetmore’s sadistic act of omitting to wet the sponge that goes on the head during electrocution shows us two things clearly. One, Percy Wetmore is the worst kind of lowlife, and the poorest decision the otherwise sound Paul Edgecomb makes in the whole film is to let Wetmore have a hand in Del’s execution.
Secondly, a method of execution that can cause a man to burn to death in agonising pain if someone neglects, deliberately or otherwise, to wet the sponge that goes on the head, is barbaric and needs to be changed. The electric chair, aka ‘Old Sparky,’ was probably one of the most brutal ways to take a man’s life by order of ‘a judge of good standing.’
I’d personally prefer to see the death penalty abolished worldwide, but, if it must take place, then something painless, something that allows the person just to slip away quietly without knowing that it’s happening, is what’s needed.
The penalty, after all, is to deprive the prisoner of his life for what he’s done, and not to have him endure the physical torments of hell while that life is being taken away from him. Right? Okay, lecture from a bleeding heart liberal over, lol, but there’s a lot of food for thought there.
Except just to say that the recently deceased Harry Dean Stanton plays a prison trusty in the film called Toot-Toot, who is happy to lend his living body to Paul and his men when they need to do a practice run on Old Sparky.
It says a lot about them that they take the job so seriously, and don’t want to make an inmate’s experience of electrocution any worse or more painful than it needs to be because of any mistakes or slip-ups of theirs. Too late for poor Del, though, unfortunately.
The film is book-ended by two modern day pieces in which Dabbs Greer- the Reverend Alden from LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE- plays an elderly Paul Edgecomb, relating the story of John Coffey’s miracles to a lady friend in a nursing home.
The film also has a bit of a supernatural twist to it involving the wonderful Mr. Jingles, truly the bestest mouse performer in a film ever. If only Mouseville were a real place! Mr. Jingles would be celebrated every day like the little rodent superstar he is, and dine nightly on the finest cornbread till it was coming out his mousie ears.
THE GREEN MILE is one of Stephen King’s best ever movie adaptations. I’d waste no more time in watching it if I were you, that’s if you haven’t already. Enjoy it, but keep a box of tissues handy. (No, not for that, you perverts!) Trust me, it’s a weepie to rival even TITANIC. Happy Christmas, anyway, and a happy and prosperous New Year to you and yours. And God bless you, Mr. Jingles, wherever you are.
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY OF SANDRA HARRIS.
Sandra Harris is a Dublin-based novelist, poet, short story writer and film and book blogger. She has studied Creative Writing and Vampirology. She has published a number of e-books on the following topics: horror film reviews, multi-genre film reviews, women’s fiction, erotic fiction, erotic horror fiction and erotic poetry. Several new books are currently in the pipeline. You can browse or buy any of Sandra’s books by following the link below straight to her Amazon Author Page:
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B015GDE5RO
Her debut romantic fiction novel, ‘THIRTEEN STOPS,’ is out now from Poolbeg Books:
https://www.amazon.com/Thirteen-Stops-Sandra-Harris-ebook/dp/B089DJMH64
The sequel, ‘THIRTEEN STOPS LATER,’ is out now from Poolbeg Books:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1781994234
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