Taglines: He’s Expecting You.
Meet Joe Black movie storyline. Bill Parrish, media tycoon, loving father and still a human being, is about to celebrate his 65th birthday. One morning, he is contacted by the Inevitable – by hallucination, as he thinks. Later, Death itself enters his home and his life, personified in a man’s body: Joe Black has arrived. His intention was to take Bill with him, but accidentally, Joe’s former host and Bills beautiful daughter Susan have already met. Joe begins to develop certain interest in life on earth as well as in Susan, who has no clue who she’s flirting with.
Meet Joe Black is a 1998 American romantic fantasy film directed and produced by Martin Brest, and starring Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins and Claire Forlani. The screenplay by Bo Goldman, Kevin Wade, Ron Osborn and Jeff Reno is loosely based on the 1934 film Death Takes a Holiday. It was the second pairing of Hopkins and Pitt after their 1994 film Legends of the Fall. The film received mixed reviews from critics and was a box office success, grossing $143 million worldwide.
Most of William Parrish’s country mansion scenes were shot at the Aldrich Mansion in Rhode Island. The penthouse interiors and Parrish Communications offices were sets built at the Teaneck Armory in New Jersey. The place where Susan and the Young Man from the Coffee Shop first meet is Broadway Restaurant, at 2664 Broadway and West 101st Street, Manhattan.
Meet Joe Black opened on November 13, 1998, and grossed $15,017,995 domestically upon its opening weekend at #3, behind The Waterboy’s second weekend and the opening of I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. While the film had a disappointing domestic box office return of $44,619,100, it fared much better overseas. Taking in an additional $98,321,000, the movie grossed a worldwide total of $142,940,100.
As Meet Joe Black was one of the few films showing the first trailer for Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, it was reported that droves of Star Wars fans bought tickets for the film, only to leave after the trailer showed.
About the Story
Billionaire media mogul Bill Parrish is considering a merger between his company and another media giant, and is about to celebrate his 65th birthday with an elaborate party planned by his eldest daughter, Allison. He begins to hear mysterious voices, which he tries with increasing difficulty to ignore.
His youngest daughter, Susan, a resident in internal medicine, is in a relationship with one of Bill’s board members, Drew. She is considering marriage, but Bill can tell she’s not passionately in love. When she asks for the short version of his impassioned speech, he simply says, “Stay open. Who knows? Lightning could strike!”
Susan meets a vibrant young man at a coffee shop. She is instantly enamored but fails to even get his name. Minutes after their encounter (but unbeknownst to her), the man is struck by multiple cars in what appears to be a fatal motor vehicle accident. Death arrives at Bill’s home in the uninjured body of the young man, explaining that Bill’s impassioned speech has piqued his interest. Given Bill’s “competence, experience, and wisdom”, Death says that for as long as Bill will be his guide on Earth, Bill will not have to die. Making up a name on the spot, Death is introduced to the family as “Joe Black”.
Bill’s best efforts to navigate the next few days, knowing them now to be his last, fail to keep events from going rapidly out of his control. Drew is secretly conspiring with a man bidding for Parrish Communications. He capitalizes on Bill’s strange behavior and unexplained reliance on Joe to convince the board of directors to vote Bill out as Chairman, using information given to him inadvertently by Bill’s son-in-law, Quince, to push through approval for the merger which Bill had decided to oppose. Quince is devastated.
Susan is confused by the appearance of Joe, believing him to be the young man from the coffee shop, but eventually falls deeply in love with him. Joe is now under the influence of human desires and becomes attracted to her as well. After they make love, Joe asks Susan, “What do we do now?” She replies, “It’ll come to us.” Bill angrily confronts him about his relationship with his daughter, but Joe declares his intention to take Susan with him for his own.
As his last birthday arrives, Bill appeals to Joe to recognize the meaning of true love and all it encompasses, especially honesty and sacrifice. Joe comes to understand that he must set aside his own desire and allow Susan to live her life. He also helps Bill regain control of his company, exposing Drew’s underhanded business dealings to the board by claiming to be an agent of the Internal Revenue Service and threatening to put Drew in jail. The party is in full swing, with jazz music, cake and speech by Bill. He makes his peace with his daughters. Susan tells Joe that she has loved him ever since that day in the coffee shop.
Meet Joe Black (1998)
Directed by: Martin Brest
Starring: Brad Pitt, Anthony Hopkins, Claire Forlani, Jake Weber, Marcia Gay Harden, Jeffrey Tambor, David S. Howard, Lois Kelly-Miller, Marylouise Burke, June Squibb
Screenplay by: Bo Goldman, Kevin Wade, Ron Osborn, Jeff Reno
Production Design by: Dante Ferretti
Cinematography by: Emmanuel Lubezki
Film Editing by: Joe Hutshing, Michael Tronick
Costume Design by: Aude Bronson-Howard, David C. Robinson
Set Decoration by: Leslie Bloom
Art Direction by: Robert Guerra
Music by: Thomas Newman
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for an accident scene, some sexuality and brief strong language.
Distributed by: Universal Pictures
Release Date: November 13, 1998
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