Good and Evil Meet on Death Row

Rating: 9/10 (5 May 2007)

Mel produced THE PASSION and was hated by many in may quarters for it; King wrote the same story to general acclaim.
Green Mile is narrated by Paul Edgecomb (Tom Hanks) recalling his days as a prison guard on death row escorting the condemned down the last mile. in Edgecomb's facility this is called the Green Mile. there are three prisoners awaiting the hot seat, a psychotic killer who delights in impish, sadistic maliciousness as he weaves in and out of catatonia, the confused Cajun and John Coffey. Coffey is a convicted killer with extraordinary powers complimented by childlike gentleness, despite his imposing size and physical strength. He is described by his captors as a wonder of nature and a gift of God.
Though impressed with Coffey's demonstrated talents, Edgecomb and the crew decide that Coffey must walk the mile, simply because they can't figure out anything else to do with him. Coffey is too childlike to escape.
The movie version of Green Mile though it attains near perfection in story telling, fails to grasp only one aspect of the King novel on which it is based: the erratic and occasionally contradictory flow of Edgecomb's (played in twilight years by Dabbs Greer) recollection. The movie ends on a more positive note than the book and avoids King's speculation on re-incarnation.