A newly-qualified wet-behind-the-ears lawyer Rudy Baylor (Matt Damon) and his partner Deck Shifflet (Danny DeVito)are tasked with taking on insurance giant Great Benefit after they fail to pay out on a claim which could potentially save the life of their mutual client Donny Ray Black (Johnny Whitworth).The Rainmaker shares a bit in common with Pelican Brief (another Grisham novel). In both cases, an underdog fights against the big boys in their pursuit of justice - although to be honest I preferred this John Grisham adaptation to the Pelican Brief.It begins slowly, perhaps a little too slowly, but once it gets going it is a very good film. I think part of the problem with this film is that it sometimes lacks focus; the interesting part of the film is the main plot involving Baylor and Shifflet trying to take down Great Benefit, but the film has a sub-plot involving Baylor trying to protect Kelly Riker (Claire Danes) whom is a victim of domestic abuse. Whilst the sub-plot is quite touching and does help to endear us towards Rudy it ultimately feels unnecessary and seems like it's been tagged on just to create a love interest for Rudy. The very fact that it is completely unrelated to the rest of the story only reinforces this point, and at times it means that the film lacks focus and feels longer than necessary. The oddities in this film continue when we're introduced to Bruiser (Micky Rourke whom it took me a while to recognise to be honest). He's introduced early on and seems important to the story, but then disappears from the film with very little explanation??? Hmm... just seemed a bit strange to me.That being said, once we get to the meat of the film (the courtroom drama aspect) then it does become very enjoyable and this is the side of the film that makes it worth seeing. The performances from the main cast are all excellent; Damon is very convincing as a wet-behind-the ears laywer (he's actually almost too convincing). DeVito is OK, but Voight and Glover are both excellent - Glover in particular looks like he is having a lot of fun here.The Rainmaker is a bit of a plodder in its early stages and there are certainly aspects of it that don't really work, but the courtroom scenes in the second half of the film more than compensate for the shortcomings of the first half and the strong second half makes it worth the effort.

The Rainmaker (1997)Stolid and solid, steady to the point of functional, and extremely mainstream. That is, here we have a somewhat sensational do-gooder kind of plot, taken from the Grisham novel, and a series of complications and good guys and bad guys fill it out. It's painfully predictable, and yet you are cheering for the underdog lawyers fighting the mean insurance industry and want to see how it ends. Even though it ends the way it has to.I love director Francis Ford Coppola's best movies. A lot. And I also wonder what goes on in his worst ones, where a personal indulgence gets in the way. Here I feel another thing kick in—mediocrity. Or fulfilling a contract. The filming is good of course, the mechanics of editing and acting are top notch. The music is a bit forced, however, and the pace is slower than necessary for the limited range of events that are shown. Matt Damon, years before his Jason Bourne stereotyping, is a recent law school grad who is instilled (according to a plain voice-over) with left-wing idealism. He falls into a shoe-string law firm with an oversized case. Classic David and Goliath. And of course he has setbacks and shows his naiveté, but perseveres, more or less, to the end (though the end itself you need to see for itself). Damon is very good. Jon Voight as the evil opposing attorney is even better, though with a more 2-dimensional role. What really pulls this movie into the mainstream in a kind of disappointing way is the way it is all told. It is what it is—well done but nothing more. It seems that the goal is to be convincing and entertaining. And so it is. Routinely. A simple comparison is "Anatomy of a Murder" which I guarantee Coppola saw before shooting this. The scenario is roughly similar—underdog lawyer against overpaid big shots, with a sidekick who does all the last minute investigative work. But Preminger (in this earlier film) had a whole bunch of things going for him that Coppola somehow skipped. First is an amazing rather than a decent leading actor (Jimmy Stewart). Second is a great score. Third is a plot that threw some real twists at you, including a defendant you didn't know whether to trust or not. Fourth you set it someplace really interesting, filled with quirks. And so on.So this movie, as solid (and stolid) as it is, just comes up short again and again. Enjoyable? Yes. As such!

Lets start at the beginning; any film based on a John Grisham book has a head start in terms of plot. This is no exception. The Rainmaker is a very good story about a newly qualified lawyer who takes on a multi-billion insurance company for the family of a young man dying of leukaemia. Exciting stuff with a pleasing if slightly simplified end, but a entertaining law-procedural plot. Enter, the amazing acting talent of Matt Damon. He was excellent in this film, measured, quietly strong and believable up against the arrogance of his opposite number Jon Voight for the Insurance Company. Also, Danny DeVito was good, and he and Damon seemed to work well together. Some of the make up special effects were a little poor. Aside from the main characters, some of the acting wasn't deep or developed enough but were generally good but the actual production of the film was lacking something. The sound quality was bad, there seems to be pauses in the action, and some continuity and pacing issues. The film feels amateurish and low budget. Coppola, who directed, clearly wanted a grim and grey feel to the film, which I think he achieved but it didn't make it look that good. However, it is Damon and DeVito and the story that carries this film and that is what you are invested in with a John Grisham film. Definitely highly entertaining.

With everyone today using buzz words to talk about health care legislation, this is a novel about a health insurance company scamming policyholders by refusing claims that is adapted to a screenplay for a movie that was written and filmed years before reform was on the horizon. It is extremely forward thinking for its time.The Rainmaker, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, wasn't a beautifully shot movie but it was executed well. This film holds up as it does not feel dated like many movies released around the same time. There are some movies you can tell when they came out and this is one of those films that ages very well as are not many outdated styles shown and the film was shot in a way that doesn't feel dated. By that, I mean that some movies released around that time had the same feel to them and this one felt much more like it was being played through a storyteller's eyes. There wasn't much flair involved in the filming but it didn't need that. Nothing was creative about the way it was shot but it worked.The casting of this film was great as each player delivers a fantastic performance top to bottom. A perfect example of this is that Dean Stockwell is only in this film for a short period of time and he delivers quite a performance given the limited amount of time on screen. Matt Damon works as the do-good attorney in a sea of snakes. Danny DeVito is about as good as he gets in this film. Coppola could have done a bit more with the framing of the film to work with DeVito's size but that is the only problem with the performance.The movie isn't perfect because there are quite a few issues with certain lines and regardless of how good DeVito and Voight are, there are some cheesy and predictable lines that they are forced to deliver that drag the movie down a little. The film could have done more with the given novel it had to work with but there is only so much that can be done to adapt a novel into a film. It will never be a perfect interpretation of the novel unless this film was done in the same way as The Stand or The Hobbit. You cannot please everyone and I think The Rainmaker did a good job with this story.