The green mile

The green mile BY ajW0215 The Green Mile In the year 1999, Director Frank Darabont released The Green Mile, written by Stephen King (Novel) and Frank Darabont (Screenplay). The main characters include Paul Edgecomb (Tom Hanks and Dabbs Greer), Brutus ‘Brutal’ Howell (David Morse), Percy Wetmore (Doug Hutchison), and John Coffey (Michael Clarke Duncan). The movie starts out with the protagonist (Old Paul Edgecomb) recalling his memory of his time as a prison guard in theGreat Depression(Green Mile).

He recalls the year 1935 as he year his bladder infection was the worst it had ever been (Green Mile). He then talks of the first day that he had met John Coffey ” Just like the drink only not spelled the same,” (Green Mile). He then proceeds to talk about the amazing things that started happening in and around Death Row Block ” E” like his bladder infection getting cured, a mouse coming back to life, a cure for a tumor, and finally the ” insanity” punishment that one of the guards and a certain inmate so rightly deserved (Green Mile).

Once he is done with his story, it is found that he is one undred and eight years old and still has many, many more years to go thanks to John Coffey, a very gifted man who was executed in 1935 for the rape and killing of two innocent little girls (Green Mile). He was found to be innocent during the story but only the viewer gets to know that part (Green Mile). The Story artfully tiesnursinghome life of an old prison guard to that of an inmate on death row. The Green Mile talks about segregation and ” open and shut” cases. The movie also touches on the historic lack of delay before an execution, particularly in those involving an African

American. In the nursing home, Paul is confined to the premises by walls and rules, both of which he habitually breaks. Rules he breaks by eating white bread every day while the ” rules” dictate he should be eating healthy. He ” breaks” the walls by taking long walks every day, even though it is dictated that he needs to stay within the confines of the building. The staff is concerned, but tends to turn a blind eye. This is a direct contrast to his life as a guard on death row, where he was surrounded by alleged law breakers who were forced to stay within the confines of their cells until he day they were to die.

It is allegorical in that he is also confined to this life until the day he is to die. Segregation was illustrated by how everyone took one look at John and declared him guilty Just because he was black and they could easily compare him to a dog gone rogue; they never stopped to listen to his side of the story. In this film, we can assume that if it had been a white man who was found at the scene of the murder, then they would have listened to whatever he had to say and he may have gotten a very different ruling.

The illiteracy of blacks comes in when Paul is surprised to hear that John can spell his name, he then asks for John to spell his name and proceeds to interrupt him in the middle of the first name. When the townspeople find John with the two raped and dead girls, they immediately put him to trial and prosecute him. This went to show how officials werent doing a full police investigation if they could present enough evidence that someone could easily find their person guilty, not to mention that if nobody wanted to look at all of the evidence hey didn’t nave to.

The entire time period tor the memory in this tilm is only a tew weeks between John getting convicted and John getting executed; whereas in today’s legal system in the United States, a minimum often years transpires before an execution can happen. Assuming the defendant is convicted in a state that still allowscapital punishment; the defendant has many appeals before various or sometimes the same courts to determine if they truly are guilty, if a life sentence is better, or if the decision can be overturned.