Meet Joe Black

Updated June 26, 2020 | Infoplease Staff

What a colossal disappointment. Meet Joe Black, a remake of the 1934 Death Takes a Holiday, could have used a couple of scissor-happy editors to cut a good hour out of this painfully slow, dull film. Perhaps director Brest thought the vision of Brad Pitt onscreen would compensate for a script void of emotion and substance. Pitt plays Death, who's arrived to escort William Parrish (Hopkins) to the afterlife. But Death, too, wants a little more time on Earth so he can experience human emotion, so he gives Parrish extra time to tie up loose ends. Parrish's beautiful physician daughter, Susan (Forlani) guides Death, in the form of Joe Black, through his life as a human, as well as introduces him to the wonder of peanut butter. Forlani is wasted in the one-dimensional role, but this won't be the last we see of her.