The Green Mile was released byWarner Bros. in the United States on December 10, 1999, to positive reviews from critics, who praised Darabont's direction and writing, emotional weight, and performances (particularly for Hanks and Duncan), although its length received some criticism. It was a commercial success, grossing $286.8 million from its $60 million budget, and was nominated for fourAcademy Awards:Best Picture,Best Supporting Actor for Duncan,Best Sound, andBest Adapted Screenplay.
Plot
In 1935, corrections officer Paul Edgecomb oversees "The Green Mile", the death row section of Cold Mountain Penitentiary, alongside officers Brutus Howell, Dean Stanton, Harry Terwilliger, and the sadistic and despised Percy Wetmore, whose connections to the state governor shield him from repercussions. The guards supervise three prisoners: Eduard "Del" Delacroix, who is frequently tormented by Percy; the violent and erratic William Wharton; and John Coffey, a hulking yet gentle and simple-minded African-American man convicted of raping and murdering two white girls after being found distraught while cradling their bodies. John asserts that he tried to "take it back", but could not.
Paul grows doubtful that John committed the crimes and soon discovers he possesses miraculous healing abilities. John cures Paul's crippling bladder infection by absorbing it into himself before expelling it as flies, explaining that he "took it back". After Percy crushes Del's pet mouse, Mr. Jingles, John urgently requests the body and resurrects it, further convincing the guards of his powers.
Fed up with Percy's behavior, the officers let him officiate an execution on the condition that he take a job at Briar Ridge insane asylum afterward. At Del's execution, Percy deliberately neglects to wet the sponge meant to conduct electricity, causing Del an agonizing death. John senses and is overwhelmed by Del's pain, causing him to inadvertently transfer some of his power into Mr. Jingles, who scurries away.
Paul convinces the guards (excluding Percy) to take John out of prison to heal warden Hal's terminally ill wife, Melinda. They confine Percy to apadded cell as punishment for torturing Del before sneaking John to the warden's home. John absorbs Melinda's illness, but experiences severe pain from containing it within him. The guards return John to his cell and release Percy, but John grabs him and expels flies into Percy's mouth. In a possessed state, Percy shoots Wharton dead before the flies leave his body. Paul demands answers, and John shows him Wharton's memories, revealing he was responsible for the crimes of which John was convicted. John was attempting to resurrect the girls. Percy is left catatonic and later committed to Briar Ridge.
Though convinced of John's innocence, Paul cannot prove it or stop the execution. He offers John a chance to escape, believing it unacceptable to destroy what he considers to be a true miracle. John, however, exhausted by the constant pain he endures from sensing the suffering and ugliness that people inflict on each other, chooses to die. His last request is to watch a movie, never having seen one before, so he, Paul, and the other officers watchTop Hat (1935).
When John is taken to be executed, he tells the guards of his recent dream, in which he and the two girls are safe and happy. John is saddened by the hatred he feels from those in attendance, who still believe him to be guilty, but Brutus encourages him to focus on the guards, who do not hate him. John requests not to wear a hood, because he is afraid of the dark. Paul briefly takes John's hand before the tearful officers reluctantly carry out the execution.
In 1999, Paul, now 108 years old, watchesTop Hat and, reminded of the events, recounts John's story to his friend Elaine, revealing it was the last execution he and Brutus performed before transferring to juvenile corrections. Elaine is stunned when Paul reveals that Mr. Jingles is still alive. She calls Paul's longevity a miracle, but he sees having outlived all his loved ones as a divine punishment for allowing John to die. Sometime later, after Elaine dies, Paul wonders how much longer he will live if a mouse's life could be so significantly extended, lamenting, "Sometimes, the Green Mile seems so long."
Frank Darabont said that John Coffey "represents those extraordinary, visionary souls that come along in human history from time to time, that the rest of us feel compelled to exterminate. I've always found it extraordinary that we just can't seem to accept the message of peace and love. It's not such a crackpot notion. But whenever somebody comes along who embodies that notion, we have to nail him to a cross, we have to shoot him, we have to kill him."
Michael Clarke Duncan said, "John Coffey stands for everything that is right in the world. If you see an old lady crossing the street, and you go over to help her, to me, that's John Coffey. John Coffey stands for everything that is good about the earth."
James Cromwell said, "We continue, which is what John Coffey says, 'They kill each other with their love.' We continue to kill each other because we fail to recognize that all of us have the demon, and that the only way to deal with that demon is with love, and with compassion, and with understanding."
Production
Development
Frank Darabont adapted Stephen King's novel,The Green Mile, into a screenplay in under eight weeks.[5]
The film was shot atWarner Hollywood Studios,West Hollywood, California; and on location inShelbyville, Tennessee;Blowing Rock, North Carolina;[6] and the oldTennessee State Prison.[7] The interior sets were custom built by production designerTerence Marsh. "We tried to give our set a sense of space. A sense of history. And a sense of mystery, in a way. We chose the elongated cathedral-like windows because there is a very mystical element in this movie, a supernatural element [...] It presented us with lots of opportunities", he said.[8] Theelectric chair was also a bespoke design, and was inspired by real prisons which have the device.[8]
The film title refers to the stretch of green floor in the hallway that the inmates walk down before they are to be executed by electric chair.[9]
Casting
Tom Hanks and Darabont met at anAcademy Award luncheon in 1994.Stephen King stated he envisioned Hanks in the role and was happy when Darabont mentioned his name.[5] Hanks was originally supposed to play elderly Paul Edgecomb as well, but the makeup tests did not make him look credible enough to be an elderly man.[10] Because of this, Dabbs Greer was hired to play the older Edgecomb, his final film role.
Michael Clarke Duncan credited his casting toBruce Willis, with whom he had worked on the filmArmageddon one year earlier. According to Duncan, Willis introduced him to Darabont after hearing of theopen call for John Coffey.[11] Basketball playerShaquille O'Neal has stated he turned down the role of John Coffey.[12]Josh Brolin was considered for the role of William "Wild Bill" Wharton.[10]
David Morse had not heard about the script until he was offered the role. He stated he was in tears by the end of it.[5] Darabont wanted James Cromwell from the start, and after he read the script, Cromwell was moved and agreed.[5]
In the United Kingdom, the film's distributors wished forThe Green Mile to receive a 15 certificate from theBritish Board of Film Classification (BBFC), but they instead gave it an18 rating, their strictest mainstream certificate,[13] citing the film's "strong horror".[14] After the distributors asked the BBFC to reconsider, the Board's presidential team viewed the film but again agreed that 18 was the appropriate certificate for the film; BBFC directorRobin Duval said: "We can't give in. If we did, we would not be seen as independent. We would lose our credibility."[13]
Box office
In the United States and Canada,The Green Mile opened on December 10, 1999, in 2,875 theaters and grossed $18 million in its opening weekend, placing second at the box office, just behindToy Story 2 with $18.2 million, although Warner Bros. insisted thatThe Green Mile was the number one film.[15] However, it did finish first for the week with $23.9 million compared toToy Story 2's $22.1 million.[16][17] It remained at number two in its second weekend and in the top 10 for 10 weeks but never reached number one for the weekend.[18] It went on to gross $136.8 million in the United States and Canada and $150 million in other territories, bringing a worldwide total of $286.8 million, against its production budget of $60 million.[18] It was the second highest-grosser in Japan for the year with a gross of $55.3 million.[19]
Reception
Critical response
OnRotten TomatoesThe Green Mile holds an approval rating of 79% based on 136 reviews with an average rating of 6.80/10. The website's critics consensus states, "ThoughThe Green Mile is long, critics say it's an absorbing, emotionally powerful experience."[20] AtMetacritic the film has a weighted average score of 61 out of 100, based on 36 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[21] Audiences polled byCinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.[22]
Film criticRoger Ebert gave the film three and a half out of four stars, writing, "The film is a shade over three hours long. I appreciated the extra time, which allows us to feel the passage of prison months and years ... it tells a story with beginning, middle, end, vivid characters, humor, outrage and emotional release".[23] Writing forEntertainment Weekly,Lisa Schwarzbaum also took note of the film's length, but praised Tom Hanks' "superior" performance and Darabont's direction. "Darabont's style of picture making is well matched to King-sizeyarn spinning. The director isn't afraid to let big emotions and grand gestures linger", she said.[24]
San Francisco Chronicle's Edward Guthmann thought the cinematography was "handsome", and the music was "florid and melodramatic". He added, "Darabont is such a committed filmmaker, and believes so earnestly and intensely in the stories he puts onscreen".[25]Desson Thomson ofThe Washington Post called the storytelling "brilliant", and said "From its deceptively easygoing beginning to the heart-wrenching finale,The Green Mile keeps you wonderfully high above the cynical ground."[26]
Some critics had a less positive response. Kirk Honeycutt ofThe Hollywood Reporter opined, "By inflating the simple story with a languorous pace, pregnant pauses, long reaction shots and an infinitely slow metabolism, Darabont has burdened his movie version with more self-importance than it can possibly sustain."[27] While complimenting theproduction design and soundtrack, the critic fromTimeout magazine thought some scenes were tiresome and the film "suffers from a surfeit of plot threads and characters".[28]
Writing for theBBC, Clark Collis criticized the film's length and pacing.[29]David Ansen ofNewsweek thoughtThe Green Mile was weaker than Darabont's previous film,The Shawshank Redemption (1994). He stated,The Green Mile is a "lumbering, self-important three-hour melodrama that defies credibility at every turn".[30]
Stephen King praised the film adaptation, although he felt the film was a little "soft" in some ways. He added, "I like to joke with Frank that his movie was really the first R-rated Hallmark Hall of Fame production. For a story that is set on death row, it has a really feel-good, praise-the-human condition sentiment to it. I certainly don’t have a problem with that because I am a sentimentalist at heart."[31]
The depiction of Coffey was considered among some in the African American community to be "somewhat of an embarrassment", even among those who enjoyed the film. Such viewers saw Coffey to be too complacent in being seen as "one more" black rapist and as having a shallow backstory.[32]
The film was released onVHS andDVD on June 13, 2000, byWarner Home Video.[47][48] The film earned $17.45 million in combined DVD and VHS rental revenue by June 18, 2000.[47]
TheBlu-ray was released on December 1, 2009. A remastered 4K UHD Blu-ray was released on February 22, 2022.
Notes
^Universal Pictures International (formerlyPolyGram Filmed Entertainment) distributedThe Green Mile in eleven international territories under a deal PolyGram had made with Castle Rock.[1] Elsewhere, Warner Bros., which also distributed in the United States and Canada, distributed excluding territories where it did not directly operate; Universal sold distribution rights in such territories to independent distributors.[2]
^"Green Mile, The".www.goldenglobes.com.Archived from the original on June 6, 2020. RetrievedJune 6, 2020.
^Ikard, David; Sharpley-Whiting, T. Denean (2017).Lovable racists, magical Negroes, and White messiahs. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. p. 61.ISBN978-0-226-49246-9.OCLC971130590.
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