Meet Joe Black

Have you ever wondered what it would be like if death took control of a human being and then fell in love with your daughter? Well, if you have, Meet Joe Black is just the movie for you, almost. Two and half hours into the movie Anthony Hopkin’s character dares to ask “How are we on time?” I don’t know if he was asking the audience or Brad Pitt, but I felt the urge to reply back “not so good Anthony, not so good.” Meet Joe Black, for all of its strengths, fails to just end. The last half hour was filled with me saying things like “ok, really now, this is the end, it has to be” and finally, “just end it already!”

Despite its length Meet Joe Black actually had a good idea to start out with. Anthony Hopkins is the well respected CEO William Parrish whose time on earth has come to an end. But “Death” has another plan, he wants a break from the day to day killing and decides to take a vacation asking Bill to show him a good time, or else. He temporarily kills off an unsuspecting lover boy (Brad Pitt) and takes over his body (not really his life). By coincidence Bill’s daughter Susan (Claire Forlani) just met that very same guy before his unfortunate accident. I’m sure you can imagine her surprise when he turns up at her father’s house.

This is really where things go astray. Meet Joe Black decides to take it upon itself to run into as many clichés as humanly possible. Here is one example. Before lover boy (due to a lack of a better name he has to be called this) meets his maker he decides to take one too many “look backs.” You know, where two people begin walking in opposite directions and then each separately look back to see if the other is doing the same. Well, this happens not once, not twice, but three times. On that third and final time, lover boy is struck by a car! Just like the clichés killed lover boy, they also kill the film.

Then there is the promiscuous little fart named Drew (played by Jake Weber). He’s un-thoughtfully scripted and it shows early on. The problem with characters like Drew is that they are written so you hate them. I started paying attention to him early on to see if I could find any shred of dignity or kindness. I found neither and, in my opinion, both must be present in a character, even for villains. Take Daniel Plainview from There Will Be Blood as an example. He exhibits very little kindness, but even he manages to have some sort of soul, and most importantly, a sense of right and wrong (even if he chooses to ignore those truths). I guess what I’m saying is, if you can make Daniel Plainview look like an angel, you’re character has its fair share of flaws.

Like I said, Meet Joe Black was in a poised position to be an enjoyable film. The length is really what made me dislike it more than anything. For every good plot point or interesting character development there are twenty minutes of wasted jibber jabber. It has its moments but director Martin Brest just doesn’t know when to quit.