Meet Joe Black

For how terribly acted, for how long it runs, for the multiple and obvious goofs, for Brad Pitt's horrendous hair, for all these things - it's still a decent script.

There should be a remake soon. Less on the sap, more on the death, I bet. This plot is the same type of philosophical question we all have about the elements out of our control: nature (Anti-Christ), our obsessions (Little Children), mutants (X-Men), degrees of separation (Babel), beliefs (Angels and Demons), consciousness (The Matrix), and death (Meet Joe Black).

[I can't believe "dervish" came out of Anthony Hopkins' mouth. Like I can't believe "suborn" came out of Brad Pitt's.]



Bill: There's not an ounce of excitement, not a... whisper of a thrill. And this relationship has all the passion of a pair of titmice. I want you to get swept away out there. I want you to levitate. I want you to... sing with rapture and dance like a dervish. Be deliriously happy, or at least leave yourself open to be.

Love is passion, obsession, someone you can't live without. If you don't start with that, what are you going to end up with? Fall head over heels. I say find someone you can love like crazy and who'll love you the same way back. And how do you find him? Forget your head and listen to your heart. I'm not hearing any heart. Run the risk, if you get hurt, you'll come back. Because, the truth is there is no sense living your life without this. To make the journey and not fall deeply in love - well, you haven't lived a life at all. You have to try. Because if you haven't tried, you haven't lived.




Bill: You know, I got to thinking. With you here and seemingly occupied, how's your work going, I mean, elsewhere?

Joe: While you were shaving this morning, you weren't just shaving.

Bill: What do you mean?

Joe: You were hatching ideas, making plans, arriving at decisions, right?

Bill: Yeah, I guess so.

Joe: So you understand the concept. While part of you is busy doing one thing, another part of you is doing another, perhaps even attending to the problems of your work. Correct?

Bill: Of course.

Joe: So you understand the idea. Congratulations, Bill. Now multiply that by infinity, take that to the depths of forever, and you still will barely have a glimpse of what I'm talking about.




Joe: You're the poison, Drew. You've operated behind the scenes
to suborn the trust of a man... who has stamped you with his imprimatur of class, elegance and stature. I've had the opportunity to be witness to every kind and degree of deception. But Bill Parrish has been on the receiving end of machinations so Machiavellian... that it has rarely been my experience to encounter. And yet, he has combatted them stoically and selflessly, without revealing my identity. Had he violated the vow of secrecy he took, his task would have been far easier. He could have turned defeat into victory. But he is too honorable a man to have done that. Because of me, he has lost his work, his company, his reputation. So now, given these losses, I'm compelled to end the need for secrecy. The time has come to tell you who I am.