Perry Kate Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Inmechon The movie's only flaw is also a virtue: It's jammed with characters, stories, warmth and laughs.

Jenna Walter The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Jonah Abbott There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Paul J. Nemecek The first questions I ask in reviewing a film are "was it a story worth telling", and "was it a story well told." Given the artists involved in making the Rainmaker, it should come as no surprise that this film gets a solid yes on both counts. John Grisham (author of A Time to Kill, The Firm, the Client, etc.) is one of the hottest novelists writing today, and Francis Ford Coppola (Godfathers I & II, Apocalypse Now, The Outsiders) is one of the great directors of the last twenty years. I knew Grisham had crafted a story worth telling when I read his novel. Fortunately, Coppola handles the material well and turns out one of the best adaptations of a Grisham novel yet.As is the case in many of Grisham's novels, the hero is a young struggling lawyer just out of law school. But in the Rainmaker, young Rudy Baylor (Matt Damon) is stuck with a law firm that specializes in ambulance-chasing and haunting the halls of hospitals in search of potential clients. When the head of the firm runs afoul of the law, Rudy joins forces with self-described "para-lawyer" Deck Shifflet (Danny DeVito), and the pair strike out on their own.Their only real client is Dot Black (Mary Kay Place) whose son, Donny Ray, is dying from leukemia. Donny Ray needs a blood transfusion, but the insurance company has refused to cover it. This sets the stage for a real David v. Goliath showdown, with Danny DeVito almost stealing the show as the "sling-carrier" for our 20th century David. John Voight plays Leo F. Drummond, the insurance company's attorney, and does an excellent job of making it easy for us to dislike him and the company he represents. Claire Danes plays a battered wife-and eventual love interest for young Rudy-in a subplot that seems a bit hurried and underdeveloped at points.One of the things that makes this movie so enjoyable is its smallness. In an era of star vehicles and special effects thrillers, it's a welcome change to watch a film that is simply a good story well-told. There is no over-the-top super performance, and there are no dazzling special effects, but the film is chock-full of solid performances by excellent actors (including Danny Glover, Teresa Wright, Randy Travis, and Roy Scheider). Coppola is known as the director who turns unknowns into stars. He seems to have continued the trend with rising star Matt Damon in the lead role. The Rainmaker is an engaging story with a timely theme, and in Coppola's hands becomes a story well-told.

secondtake 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!

jc-osms It seemed in the 90's that Hollywood was on a mission to film every book from the prolific pen of best-selling writer John Grisham. I've never read one of his books but having watched a few of the movie adaptations of his novels, I almost feel I could write one. All you need is an idealistic central lawyer, confront them with a big moral dilemma, close with a big courtroom scene and simmer but never quite bring to the boil.Matt Damon is the youthful unsullied hero here who belies his poor-boy background to try become a solicitor but who has to compromise his moral standards in starting up with a crooked ambulance-chasing litigation practice barely one step ahead of the law. There he's paired chalk and cheese-style with seen-it-all para-legal Danny De Vito and gets involved in not one but two cases which stretch his honesty and integrity to the max, one involving a law-suit against a mega-rich private medical insurance company denying a dying leukaemia victim his due pay-out and the other a cuddly old rich granny trying to stop her grasping kinfolk from getting her money when she expires. Along the way he also somehow manages to get romantically involved with a young battered wife.To be truthful, there's not much to get excited about here, the drama fails to grip as a thriller and the supposed feel-good sentimental climax underwhelms too.Damon and DeVito are okay in their stereotyped parts and Jon Voight gets to roll his eyes and chew the scenery as Mr Big Bad Corporate Lawyer. The only surprising thing about the whole movie in fact is the dull TV-movie type direction it gets from none other than Francis Ford Coppola. Either he was under strict instructions to film the book as written or he really has lost it since his 70's hey-day. This is not his finest hour by any manner of means.

SnoopyStyle Rudy Baylor (Matt Damon) is fresh out of law school. He has no family, or any connections. He starts to work for notorious lawyer Bruiser Stone (Mickey Rourke), and with street smart Deck Shifflet (Danny DeVito) who can't pass the bar. They take on a case against a health insurance company who refuses a claim from a seriously sick boy. Meanwhile, he falls for Kelly Riker (Claire Danes) who is in constant fear of her abusive husband.This is a simple David vs Galioth story from the pen of John Grisham and the directing skills of Francis Ford Coppola. There are big time talents involve in this. Matt Damon is superb in the boyish charm department. Danny DeVito likewise is superb. The acting in this movie is top notch. However the Claire Danes battered wife storyline is too simple and too separate. It doesn't really connect with the rest of the movie. The romance seems to be sidelined in importance and short shrifted. It needs more attention. On the other hand, the courtroom drama has good fun and good tension.