MEET JOE BLACK
Interview Brad Pitt in Film Review (February Issue)
.... He pauses before continuing to make his point by explaining the influence on him from Anthony Hopkins as they worked together on Meet Joe Black. "It'll be decades before I understand were Tony's coming from. He's an enigma to me. This guy, I mean, he's a very complex man. He's a very giving man and yet he's also haunted in the sense that most people have something to wrestle with. He's not afraid to show any of it and how he balances the good and the bad of the human in his characters is - he's just way beyond me".
Film Review (January Issue):
A fascinating premise, this story reunites Anthony Hopkins and Brad Pitt who starred in the very different "Legend of the Falls". A less epic, but surely more universal story, it is the tale of Death who inhabits of the body of his latest victim - played by Pitt - and visits an ageing tycoon in a bid to understand why humans are so scared of him.
Film Review (February Issue)
Meet Joe Black aka Death. You're going to be spending the next three hours with him. Lucky then, particularly for female viewers, that he's played by Brad Pitt. Recreating the role originated by Frederic March in the 1934 "Death Takes a Holiday" (itself adapted from Alberto Casella's play), Pitt brings an endearing innocence to the most reviled of screen characters. Interpreted in human terms, Death (stripped of his hood and scythe) is as vulnerable out of his depth as anyone - or entity. In this handsome, self-indulged and, yes, sluggish, supernatural romance Death finds himself confronted for the first time by not only the sheer joy of life but the overwhelming intoxication of love. I mean, what's a Grim Reaper to do? Shortly before his 65th birthday celebrations (meticulously marshalled by his eldest daughter), media tycoon William Parrish (Anthony Hopkins) starts hearing voices. At first, simple echoes of his own voice whispering "yes" wake him up from his slumbers. Then more complex sentences intrude on his sanity until, just before dinner, a handsome young stranger turns up in his library. Haunted by the pain in his chest and the voices in his head, Parrish can't do anything but accept the stranger's world that he is who he says he is. However, the handsome visitor is willing for Parrish to stay alive until his upcoming birthday party, so long as he keeps Death's identity a secret. Like the "Horse Whisperer" "Meet Joe Black" shows signs of a wonderful, shorter movie struggling to get out. Had thirty minutes of incidental fat been cut from its narrative bones, the emotional payoff would hit just as hard, but also the audience would still be awake. As it is, the film trudges along at the velocity of a glacier, basking in the icy blue eyes of Brad Pitt, the ethereal lovelines of Claire Forlani (as Parrish' daughter) and some magnificent pauses from Sir Anthony Hopkins. There is much wrong with "Meet Joe Black", but there is a lot right, too. From the astute, touching music by Thomas Newman (who also scored the Pitt/Hopkins vehicle "Legend of the Fall) to the sumptuous sets designed by Dante Ferretti, the film is a visual treat. And then there's Pitt and Forlani.....
(James Cameron-Wilson)
Cast:
Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, Claire Forlani, Jake Weber, Marcia Gay Harden, Jeffrey Tambor
Director: Martin Brest, Screenplay: Ron Osborn and Jeff Reno
Soundtrack:
Meet Joe Black is a 21-tracker where the brief silences between each of the misty-eyed tunes are as important as the piano-tickling and the string-picking. Thomas Newman sets his stall out with a slow, sorrowful mood that has a flighty, ethereal quality. From "Everywhere Freesia" and "Whisper of a Thrill to Mr. Bad News" and "That Next Place", Newman's stony mood-setting leaves imprint of romantic ooze. Like the three-hour movie it underpins, the "Meet Joe Black" soundtrack reels languidly from track to track, lounging lazily, often rising slightly to rouse the feelings with an uptempo theme.
Article Total Film:
What's the story? Susan, the daughter of media tycoon William Parrish (Anthony Hopkins) meets a young man in a coffee shop and falls in love at first sight. Unknown to her, he's later knocked down by a car and killed. Meanwhile Death arrives on earth to claim Parrish, but offers the mogul a stay of execution if he'll be his guide to human life. The Grim Reaper then appears in the form of the man at the coffee shop, using the name Joe Black (Brad Pitt). Things become complicated when Joe Black and Susan (Claire Forlani) fall for each other......
Director Martin Brest took his inspiration for "Meet Joe Black" from the 1934 film "Death Takes a Holiday". That was a comedy, but Brest needed a story that touched on something deeper. Hence, what was originally touted as a rom-com unfolds as much more sincere drama. Before its release, "Meet Joe Black" had already been condemned as the most expensive romance ever made (costing $ 100 million) and that's for a movie with few special effects. Death may well be a very ordinary character with no obvious special powers. But Parrish, on the other hand, is a millionaire with a millionaire's lifestyle, wardrobe and lavish birthday party to attend. Every detail of his life is perfectly realised on screen (specially designed furniture, ornaments, clothes, etc.) and to create a millionaire's lifestyle you evidently have to spend a millionaire's budget. The money, however, isn't the issue: no one minds how much is spent if the end product is fantastic. The issue here is the running time. "Meet Joe Black" is not bad, it's superbly acted by the three leads, while the relationship between Anthony Hopkins (struggling to deal with the knowledge of his death) and Claire Forlani (who gradually begins to suspect the stranger's motive), is particularly well handled. It looks sumptuous too, bathed in autumn colours as light and life creep into Death's existence. And, to top it off, this morbid love story also has a compelling central storyline, as well as a subplot about the fate of Parrish's media empire. But what it has more than anything else is a bum-numbing three-hour running time. With its epic nature, "Titanic" got away with it. "Meet Joe Black" does not. At the beginning Parrish delivers a long speech about the nature of life and love. His distracted daughter looks at him and says: "Give it to me again, but the short version". Someone should have said that to Brest. He could have cut a few speeches. He could have lost a very uncomfortable sex scene between Joe Black and Susan (would they make Death-babies?). He should certainly have sliced out some uneven playing from the support, who seem to think they're in a different kind of movie to the central protagonists. These elements wouldn't have been missed. We could also have gone without Pitt's astonishing Jamaican accent, used for dramatic effect when a Carribean woman recognises Joe Black for what he is. Not to mention the very unconvincing explanation of how, although he's in one place, he can still kill people all over the world. The audience would have survived. The best bits of "Meet Joe Black" are contained in the first half-hour and the last, and are worthwile. The beginning is intriguing, the end is tearful, especially as Susan wordlessly begins to realise the fate of her father. To those who have lost a relative recently, these scenes in particular are teary and painful. But they would have had so much more impact without a thumb-twiddling, seat-shifting middle-section.
(Emma Cochrane)
Meet Joe Black Special (with interview) Veronica (Dutch TV Wednesday 20 January 1999)
Interview wit Rene Mioch of "Films en Sterren"
RM (A question about Brad Pitt his acting)
AH: It's inteachable. He's a good actor, he doesn't need to be taught anything! He's a fine actor.
RM: Do you talk a lot about acting?
AH: No, never. Boring. Never talk about acting. If you can act, you can act and you don't have to talk about it.
RM: It seems so down to earth. Have you always thought that?
AH: That is what I do. It just happened that my work is seen in a public way but it's seen like anything else, like being a camera man, like being a plumber, cap driver, whatever, a baker, a tailor, it's a job.
RM: Do you think we make to much fuzz about it?
AH: Far too much. Too much mystery, too much talk, too many lies, too much publicity.
RM (A question about his private life) Your job takes a lot of your time!
AH: I don't have many needs. I have a life of my own, but I spend a lot of time
free on the movie. Sometimes I take a week off, sometimes 10 days free, so I do what I
want to do. I don't have any friend I want to talk to. I'm not a very sociable person. I
go back to my hotel, or go for a walk around Central Park, I read, play piano, I do my
things. So, I keep my life simple.
RM: Is it a very individual life then, for you
as an actor? Are you very much on you own, as an actor?
AH: I don't socialise with actors. I don't have any friends with actors.
* I saw the movie and I really loved every minute. So, whatever the critics say, if they would have cut out an hour, the story would have been less comprehensable. It's essential to the story to explain every possible feeling or event! And then of course, I could enjoy Tony longer now!!!!!!
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Soundstudio: Tony Waves different movies
April 2001