Promising and moving at times, but with a muddled message

Rating: Null/10 (13 December 1999)

"The Green Mile" could have been a great movie, but its overlength, awkward present-past-present flashback device and ambiguous spiritual message relegate it to only good-movie status, definitely worth the price of admission, but still lacking greatness.
The gentle behemoth John Coffey is the central figure in this tale about unexplainable goings-on in a Southern prison's death row. Michael Duncan is excellent as the child-like Coffey, convicted of raping and murdering two young white girls. Tom Hanks turns in a very good performance as the guard in charge of the prison's "Green Mile."
The scene near the end when Coffey's time is up is gut-wrenching and, I'll admit, elicited more than a few tears from me. But the three-hour film suffers from a very poor ending that borders on absurdity.

The movie seems to be always getting somewhere but never quite arrives. What message are we to take from it? The viewer is left wondering. We have tears in our eyes but we're not exactly sure why.
"The Green Mile" is worth a look, but not worthy of the Oscar hype surrounding it.