The Mighty
USA 1998
Reviewed by Charles Taylor
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
Cincinnati. Large and lumbering adolescent Maxwell Kane has lived with his grandparents ever since his father was imprisoned for murdering his mother. Maxwell, who has troubles reading and writing, is assigned a tutor, Kevin, a classmate his own age who is afflicted with a bone-marrow disease. Kevin and his mother Gwen have just moved in next door to Max and his grandparents. Under Kevin's tutelage, Max begins reading, delighting especially in stories of knights undertaking heroic quests and selfless deeds.
Kevin asks Max to accompany him to a local fair where, perched on Max's massive shoulders, he's able to see the fireworks display. The burgeoning friendship between the boys is cemented when Max saves Kevin from the wrath of the Doghouse Boys gang by wading into a muddy lake out of the gang's reach, holding Kevin aloft. The pair begin wandering around Cincinnati in the manner of the storybook heroes they revere, looking for worthy deeds to perform. A mission to return a woman's stolen wallet brings Max face-to-face with Loretta and Iggy, old friends of his father and reminders of a life he'd rather forget. Max's father Kenny is paroled and kidnaps his son. Kevin sets out on his own quest and succeeds in rescuing his friend. Having tried to prepare Max for his eventual death, Kevin succumbs to his illness. Max honors his dead friend by setting forth their adventures in a book he calls Freak, the Mighty.
Review
Neither as magical as it aspires to be nor as sentimental as it might be, Peter Chelsom's third film continues the director's approach of putting together odds and ends that, like the dismembered body parts floating through Funny Bones, don't quite make up a working whole. So far, Chelsom's penchant for leapfrogging from genre to genre, for abrupt shifts in tone, remains more contradictory than cohesive. He resists the urge to sentimentalise the two damaged boys who are the film's heroes. But he's not above putting a melodramatic squeeze on you, for example when Kevin, entertaining some classmates at lunch in what appears to be a goofy, throwaway scene, begins choking and nearly dies, or when Max's murderer father (the scenery-chewing James Gandolfini) kidnaps the boy and holds him captive by tying him to a radiator. (Gillian Anderson does what she can to lighten this part of the movie by turning the role of Gandolfini's old barfly acquaintance into lively, trashy caricature.) And Chelsom's introduction of mythology, as in the sight of Arthurian knights journeying over a bridge in modern-day Cincinnati, lacks the obsessive burnish that a director like John Boorman or Terry Gilliam might bring it.
The Mighty is finally like an exceptionally good after-school special, but that doesn't mean it's without its pleasures. Chelsom is much better with the quotidian than he is with the extraordinary. Max and Kevin's working-class neighbourhood is rendered with scrupulous attention to lived-in detail; not a case study but a place where people are doing their honourable, unfussy best to live their lives. The Mighty works best in the scenes of simple and not-so-simple interaction between the characters, as in the moment when Gena Rowlands, as Max's grandma, gently persuades her husband (Harry Dean Stanton, whose character's name - Grim - perfectly describes his hangdog mug) to put away the rifle he's cleaning in anticipation of the arrival of Max's no-good father.
Similarly, there's the lovely moment when Sharon Stone takes out her fears and frustrations over her son's illness on a hospital vending machine. Stone's performance is one more piece of evidence that it's high time people stopped cattily commenting on her failed star vehicles and started paying attention to her as an actor. Playing a working-class mom, Stone is anything but a star trawling for credibility. The brainy flirtation that marks Gwen's relationship with her son allows Stone to indulge the quick-witted playfulness that's one of her best qualities.
The film's occasional lapses into melodrama hurt because of Chelsom's very genuine and unsentimental affection for outsiders and oddballs. He can't quite knock the well-oiled, show-biz-tyke reactions out of Kieran Culkin's Kevin. But he doesn't go soft with Elden Henson's bashful giant Max. Henson conveys the poignancy of a gentle soul housed inside a hulking body without ever asking for our sympathy. He shows a knack for maintaining a surface reticence while drawing us in with the promise of revealing Max's hidden sensitivity, bravery and smarts. It's a performance of disciplined stillness and quiet beneath which can be distinctly heard a large, beating heart.
Credits
- Producers
- Jane Startz
- Simon Fields
- Screenplay
- Charles Leavitt
- Based on the novelFreak the Mighty by Rodman Philbrick
- Director of Photography
- John de Borman
- Editor
- Martin Walsh
- Production Designer
- Caroline Hanania
- Music
- Trevor Jones
- ©Miramax Film Corp.
- Production Companies
- Miramax Films presents a Scholastic Productions/Simon Fields production
- Executive Producers
- Bob Weinstein
- Harvey Weinstein
- Julie Goldstein
- Co-executive Producer
- Chaos Productions
- Co-producer
- Don Carmody
- Line Producer
- Additional Photography:
- Jason Clark
- Production Associate
- Liz Amsden
- Production Co-ordinators
- Tammy Quinn
- Cincinnati:
- Taci M. Dunn
- Additional Photography:
- Beverly Sutton
- Co-coordinator
- Additional Photography:
- Glennis Bastien
- Production Managers
- Joseph Boccia
- Cincinnati:
- Sanford E. Hampton
- Additional Photography:
- Brian Campbell
- Location Managers
- Debra Beers
- Cincinnati:
- Deirdre Costa
- Additional Photography:
- David Banigan
- Post-production Supervisors
- Isabel Henderson
- UK:
- Stephen Law
- Assistant Directors
- David Webb
- Bruno Brynlarski
- Mary Sylwester
- Cincinnati:
- Jeff Shiffman
- Script Supervisor
- Susanna David
- Additional Photography:
- Blanche McDermaid
- Casting
- Barbara Cohen
- Mary Gail Artz
- Toronto:
- Ross Clydesdale
- Associates:
- Lynda Halligan
- Karen Meisels
- Cincinnati Local:
- D. Lynn Meyers
- ADR Voice Group:
- Loop Troop
- Additional Director of Photography
- David Dunlap
- Camera Operator
- Perry Hoffman
- Cameraman
- Cincinnati Aerial/2nd Unit:
- Michael Kelem
Digital Visual Effects- Digiscope
- Executive Producer:
- Mary Stuart-Welch
- Effects Producer:
- Lorraine 'Deedle' Silver
- Digital Artists:
- Tony Deryan
- Naomi Sato
- Digital Imaging:
- Scott Crafford
- Digital Visual Effects
- OCS/Freeze Frame/Pixel Magic
- Digital Supervisor:
- Raymond McIntyre Jr
- Digital Co-ordinator:
- Dave Fiske
- Digital Visual Effects/Animation
- C.O.R.E Digital Pictures
- Animation Directors:
- John Mariella
- Aaron Linton
- Suzanne Shortt
- Jihyung Sung
- Bradley Wilkerson
- Production Manager:
- Sara Fillmore
- Visual Effects Co-ordinator
- Additional Photography:
- Eric Allard
- Special Effects Co-ordinators
- Michael Kavanagh
- Additional Photography:
- Martin Malivoire
- Model Helicopter Operator
- Cincinnati:
- Wendell Atkins
- Associate Film Editor
- Jaqueline Carmody
- Production Designer
- Additional Photography:
- Tony Cowley
- Art Directors
- Dennis Davenport
- Additional Photography:
- Paul Austerberry
- Set Decorator
- Cal Loucks
- Scenic Artist
- Tim Murton
- Storyboard Artist
- Gary Thomas
- Costume Designer
- Marie Sylvie Deveau
- Wardrobe Mistress
- Karen Renaut
- Key Make-up Artist
- Christine Hart
- Prosthetic Appliances
- FX Smith
- On-set Dresser:
- Arline Smith
- Key Hairstylist
- Jennifer O'Halloran
- Title Designer
- Charles McDonald
- Title Camera
- Thane Berti
- Titles/Opticals
- Howard Anderson Company
- Optical Supervisor
- Mike Griffin
- Optical Line-up
- Richard Eberhardt
- Bernie Reilly
- Leilani McHugh
- Alex Cano
- Optical Camera
- Steve Mayer
- Synthesizers Performer
- Trevor Jones
- Music Performed by
- London Symphony Orchestra
- Leader:
- Gordan Nikolitch
- Additional Music Leader:
- Gavyn Wright
- Conductor:
- Geoff Alexander
- Ewi Player:
- Phil Todd
- Acoustic Guitar:
- Craig Ogden
- Piano:
- Gwen Mok
- Electric Guitar:
- Clem Clempson
- Harmonica:
- Mark Feltham
- Uillean Pipes:
- Paul Brennan
- Electric Violin:
- Dermot Crehan
- Percussion:
- Paul Clarvis
- Singers:
- Miriam Stockley
- Janet Mooney
- Lance Ellington
- Phil Nichol
- Orchestrations
- Trevor Jones
- Geoff Alexander
- Julian Kershaw
- Music Co-ordinator for CMMP
- Victoria Seale
- Supervising Music Editor
- Jim Harrison
- Music Editing
- Segue Music
- Temp Music Editor
- Paul Rabjohns
- Music Recordist/Mixer
- Simon Rhodes
- Additional Mixer
- Gareth Cousins
- Synthesizers Programmers
- Gareth Cousins
- Kipper
- Soundtrack
- "The Mighty" by Sting, Trevor Jones, performed by Sting; "Folkloric" by Alfred Kluten; "Don't Count Me Out" by K. Perry; "Strip Bar Style" by Peter Haycock; "Todo en la vida se paga" by Steven John; "Let the Good Times Roll" by Leonard Lee, Shirley Goodman, performed by B.B. King and Zucchero; "Jingle Bells" (trad), arranged by John D'Andrea, performed by Pat Boone
- Sound Mixers
- Bruce Carwardine
- Additional Photography:
- Owen Langevin
- Dub Stage Recordists
- Frank Fleming
- Brian Pierret
- Re-recording Mixers
- Patrick Cyccone
- Christian Minkler
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Paul Clay
- Dialogue Editors
- Bob Goold
- Vanessa Lapato
- Effects Editor
- Sam Gemette
- ADR
- Recordist:
- Joseph L. Bosco
- Mixer:
- Dean St. John
- Editor:
- Tally Paulos
- Foley
- Artists:
- Casey Troutman
- Jim Bailey
- Stunt Co-ordinators
- Rick Forsayeth
- Additional Photography:
- Charles Picerni
- Helicopter Pilot
- David William Paris
- Cast
- Sharon Stone
- Gwen Dillon
- Gena Rowlands
- Gram
- Harry Dean Stanton
- Grim
- Gillian Anderson
- Loretta Lee
- James Gandolfini
- Kenny Kane
- Kieran Culkin
- Kevin Dillon
- Elden Henson
- Maxwell Kane
- Meat Loaf
- Iggy
- Joe Perrino
- Blade
- Jennifer Lewis
- Mrs Addison
- Douglas Bisset
- homeless man
- Dov Tiefenbach
- Doghouse boy 1
- Michael Colton
- Doghouse boy 2
- Eve Crawford
- Mrs Donelli
- John Bourgeois
- Mr Sacker
- Bruce Tubbe
- officer
- Rudy Webb
- Mr Hampton
- Ron Nigrini
- man in diner
- Nadia Litz
- girl in diner
- Serena Pruyn
- girl in hall
- Telmo Miranda
- boy in hall
- Jordan Hughes
- Denardo
- Bryon Bully
- fat boy
- Charlaine Porter
- girl with limp
- Lisa Marie Chen
- girl in cafeteria
- Lisa Mininni
- cashier
- Ann Chiu
- nurse
- Carl Marotte
- doctor
- Nora Sheehan
- police woman
- Sophie Bennett
- little girl
- William Van Allen
- laundry worker
- Certificate
- PG
- Distributor
- Buena Vista International (UK)
- 9,029 feet
- 100 minutes 20 seconds
- Dolby stereo/SDDS
- Colour by
- DeLuxe