compassion | the m0vie blog

432. The Green Mile (#25)

Posted on August 23, 2025 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, this week with special guests Charlene Lydon and Cethan Leahy, The 250 is a weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users.

This week, Frank Darabont’s The Green Mile.

At the turn of the millennium, Paul Edgecomb reflects back on his time serving as chief guard overseeing death row at Cold Mountain Penitentiary during the 1930s. Paul recalls the standard operation of that section of the prison, known as “the Green Mile”, but in particular the arrival of a unique inmate, John Coffey. Neither Paul, nor anybody else on the Mile, have any idea what Coffey’s arrival will herald.

At time of recording, it was ranked 25th on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

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Filed under: The 250 | Tagged: 1990s, cethan leahy, character dynamics, charlene lydon, Christ-like figure, cinematic landscape, compassion, cultural impact, cultural significance, Death Penalty, emotional depth, emotional engagement, frank darabont, humanist message, injustice, John Coffey, michael clarke duncan, moral dilemmas, morality, narrative intricacies, podcast, race, race portrayal, societal themes, stephen king, The 250, the green mile, tom hanks, Wild Bill | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “TÁR” as a Gothic Ghost Story About Cancel Culture…

Posted on January 25, 2023 by Darren

We’re launching a new column at The Escapist, called Out of Focus. It will publish every second Wednesday, and the plan is to use it to look at some film and television that would maybe fall outside the remit of In the Frame, more marginal titles or objects of cult interest. This week, we took a look at Todd Field’s TÁR.

TÁR is an interesting film, and one that embraces an unsettling ambiguity in its exploration of its subject, classical conductor Lydia Tár. Field constructs a fascinating study of a woman literally and metaphorically haunted by the sins of her past, a movie that is very modern in its language but classical in its themes and tones. Tár is a gothic horror story for the digital age, a ghost story about cancel culture, and a nightmare about how conscience is often just the voices of the past refusing to be silenced.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: accountability culture, ambiguity, cancel culture, compassion, Darkness, empathy, ghosts, gothic horror, Guilt, haunted, listen, out of focus, Shame, tár, todd field | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How Henry Cavill Became the Internet’s Fave…

Posted on December 18, 2022 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist over the weekend. With the recent reaction to the news that Henry Cavill was no longer the DCEU’s Superman, there was public outpouring support for the actor. This is interesting, particularly given the contested nature of those films among online fandom.

It’s an interesting thing to contemplate, how Cavill has cultivated such popularity, despite never really breaking out as an actor. People seem to genuinely and unequivocally love Cavill, and the news of his departure generate a very public display of sympathy that is not always extended to creative talent in that position. So why does the internet love Henry Cavill? What is about Cavill that makes him more deserving of empathy than many of his colleagues and collaborators?

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: celebrity, compassion, empathy, Henry Cavill, internet, superman, sympathy, the escapist | Leave a comment »

Star Trek – The Empath (Review)

Posted on August 3, 2016 by Darren

This July and August, we’re celebrating the release of Star Trek Beyond by taking a look back at the third season of the original Star Trek. Check back every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for the latest update.

Like Is There in Truth No Beauty? before it, The Empath is very much “weird big ideas” version of Star Trek.

It is a simple story, as Kirk and his away team visit a planet in a star system about to go nova. It deals with fairly universal themes, like compassion and humanity. There are stakes, there are aliens, there is a test of worthiness. In many ways, The Empath is a quintessential Star Trek episode, one of those classic “humanity proves their worth to a powerful alien species” narratives in the style of Arena or Spectre of the Gun. The biggest deviation from that template is the fact that it is not humanity on trial; it is an unknown species represented by an anonymous mute.

The triumvirate triumphant.

However, The Empath works in large part due to this simplicity. There is an elegance to the story, one that distils a lot of core Star Trek ideals down to their very essence. The Empath is very much a “humans are special” story, in the vein of episodes like Lonely Among Us or The Last Outpost. However, it works better than most of these stories because it hits on a very strong core idea. The Empath suggests that what makes humanity special is not necessarily unique or intrinsic or intangible. According to The Empath, what makes humanity special is pretty basic.

As the title implies, humanity’s greatest virtue might be its empathy or its compassion.