Star rating: 1 out of 5

Rating: 2/10 (1 February 2003)

Meet Joe Black tries very hard to be a Significant Movie, but fails miserably. It certainly has many of the constituent parts of a classic film including a three-hour running time, a respected senior actor teamed with Hollywood heartthrobs, and an orchestral score. Unfortunately the music is also intrusive and overly sentimental, the film is at least an hour too long, and Claire Forlani irritatingly spends most of it in tears (although Brad Pitt and Anthony Hopkins are adequate in their roles).

Hopkins plays Bill Parrish, a media mogul squillionaire whom everybody loves. We are expected to believe this without question, despite the fact that he is irritable, insensitive and patronisingly patriarchal towards his daughters. The hands of fate have decreed that it is Bill's time to die, but over the millennia Death has become curious about the ways of people and offers Bill a bargain. In return for a guided tour of the thing we know as life, Bill will be allowed to continue living for an unspecified length of time. Of course Bill has a beautiful daughter (so Death can fall in love), a Machiavellian business partner (so Death can prove that he is really a good guy), and assorted family crises which provide the fodder for seemingly endless poignant glances.
Perhaps the only thing that the film gets right is the sensual undressing sequence, with Pitt and Forlani proving that incredibly slow is also incredibly sexy. That however, is the one bright point in a movie that waffles along towards its drawn out and saccharine conclusion. And as far as conclusions go, it's pretty lame. Don't watch this - you've got better things to do with your life.