Product Description

Settle in. Take a deep breath. Hold tight. The best screen version yet of a novel by John Grisham (The Firm, The Pelican Brief) delivers all-out, moment-by-moment suspense! Headliners Susan Sarandon and Tommy Lee Jones join newcomer Brad Renfro in The Client, a whirlwind thriller that "starts like a house afire and keeps on blazing" (Chicago Tribune). Renfro plays Mark Sway, an 11-year-old torn between what he knows and what he can never tell. A hitman will snuff him in half a heartbeat if Mark reveals what he learned about a Mob murder. An ambitious federal prosecutor (Jones) will keep the pressure on until Mark tells all. Suddenly, Mark isn't a boy playing air guitar anymore. He's a pawn in a deadly game. And his only ally is a courageous but unseasoned attorney (Sarandon) who risks her career for him...but never imagines she'll also risk her life.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3641 in DVD
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 1997-12-17
• Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, Full Screen, HiFi Sound, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English, Spanish, French
• Dubbed in: Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 119 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
The exceptionally fine cast--Susan Sarandon, Tommy Lee Jones, J.T. Walsh, Mary-Louise Parker, Anthony Edwards, William H. Macy, Anthony LaPaglia, Ossie Davis, and Brad Renfro--goes a long way toward making The Client one of the more solidly enjoyable screen adaptations of a John Grisham southern gothic legal thriller. Teen-hearthrob Renfro is a natural, playing a kid whose life is in jeopardy after he witnesses the death of a Mob lawyer. Susan Sarandon is the attorney who decides to look after the boy; nobody can match her when it comes to playing strong and protective maternal figures (Thelma and Louise, Lorenzo's Oil, Dead Man Walking). Sarandon won her fourth Oscar nomination as best actress for this role, before finally winning the following year for Dead Man Walking. Author Grisham was so impressed with former window dresser/fashion designer/screenwriter-turned-director Joel Schumacher's work on this movie that he later asked him to direct A Time to Kill. --Jim Emerson

From The New Yorker
Joel Schumacher's thriller, based on a John Grisham best-seller, has a familiar chase-picture plot: innocent citizen stumbles on some incriminating information about the Mob, and runs like hell. The reluctant witness here is an eleven-year-old Memphis boy, Mark Sway (Brad Renfro), whose lawyer, Reggie Love (Susan Sarandon), acts as a sort of surrogate mother. Her legal duel with the steely prosecutor Roy Foltrigg (Tommy Lee Jones), who wants Mark to testify, plays like a desperate, drawn-out custody battle. Sarandon and Renfro work so beautifully together that Jones-who's superb-doesn't steal the movie. This is safe-as-houses entertainment, directed with no particular finesse, but it's refreshingly straightforward and unpretentious. It's the first Grisham-based thriller that actually lowers itself to provide a thrill or two. Also with Mary-Louise Parker, Anthony LaPaglia, and J. T. Walsh. Screenplay by Akiva Goldsman and Robert Getchell. -Terrence Rafferty
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

THE CLIENT
A sterling cast headed by Oscar - nominated Susan Sarandon makes this slick thriller the adaptation of a John Grisham bestseller. Mark Sway (Brad Renfro) witnesses the suicide of a Mafia lawyer, who confesses that the mob was behind the murder of a U.S. senator. Mark's brother is traumatized into a coma by the incident; gangster Barry Muldano (Anthony LaPaglia) is soon on Mark's trail, and in desperation, he arrives at the office of recovering alcoholic lawyer Reggie Love (Sarandon). With the mob after them, and a ruthless federal attorney Roy Foltrig (Tommy Lee Jones) trying to force Mark to reveal what he knows, Love battles to guarantee the safety of her client and his family. The relationship between Reggie Love and Mark Sway is the center of the film, adding considerable character development to plot's routine elements. Director Joel Schumacher helmed another Grisham adaptation, A Time To Kill, in 1996.

Reggie to the Rescue.
You gotta hand it to John Grisham: Nobody has the various lawyer cliches down pat as well as him - in fact, it almost seems as if he invented or at least, reinvented many of them. As in most of his thrillers, we get a whole handful in "The Client": the slimy mafia lawyer, the power-hungry politician-to-be, the self-aggrandizing ambulance-chaser, the grandfatherly judge and, of course, the motherly family law practitioner who turned to legal practice after overcoming a few troubles of her own. I think that leaves only the greedy corporate attorney, his cousin the corrupt judge and their perpetual antagonists, the starving public interest lawyer and the inquisitive student prodigy unrepresented here; but still, not a bad collection for a single thriller, even by Grisham. (And that doesn't even include the count of dumb and/or malicious cops, slick tabloid journalists and ruthless mobsters running around in this story.) But never mind: "The Client" is one of John Grisham's best-ever novels, and this movie surpasses many another big-screen adaptation of his books by several leagues. For Grisham at the top of his game is also an excellent storyteller, and in the hands of director Joel Schumacher his tale of beleaguered eleven-year-old Mark Sway who gets in trouble by becoming the reluctant last confidant of suicidal defense attorney Jerome "Romey" Clifford comes to life in spot-on and truly gripping fashion.

Although not even a teenager yet, Mark (Brad Renfro) is as tough as they come - a Memphis trailer park kid who gets most of his education on life's really important aspects from TV, has already helped his mom (Mary-Louise Parker) get rid of the wife-beating guy he now calls his "ex-father," and since then has been the man in the house, taking care of his eight-year-old brother Ricky whenever their mother is at work (i.e., most of the time). So Mark doesn't scare easily; and even if he really is afraid, he'd rather drop dead than admit it. But with both the mob *and* the feds on his trail - the former out to kill him before he can share the dirty little secret they suspect Romey has spilled before blowing out his brains, the latter hell-bent on making him share that very secret - even Mark has to face the fact that he is in way over his head ... and yes, he's scared, too; and not just a little. Worse, his brother is out cold, in hospital being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder because watching Romey's suicide was more than his delicate eight-year-old soul could take, and their mother is in hospital with Ricky on the doctor's orders because Ricky might need her when he wakes up. (Consequently she's also out of a job, because her sweat-shop employer doesn't take kindly to this sort of family emergency). Reluctantly, Mark therefore concludes that he needs an attorney. And in short order, he lands on the doorstep of Regina "Reggie" Love (Susan Sarandon), middle-aged but only a few years out of law school, through which she put herself after her husband left her for a younger woman, not without depriving her of their children's custody and branding her an unfit mother. But what starts as a hesitant relationship at best on Mark's side soon turns out his one stroke of luck, because Reggie is probably the only lawyer in town not afraid to take on even powerful U.S. Attorney "Reverend" Roy Foltrigg (Tommy Lee Jones) and the FBI, and ultimately willing to put her own job at risk for her client.

While condensing some of its elements, the movie's screenplay follows Grisham's novel fairly closely, taking part of its dialogue straight from the book. Yet, "The Client" lives not only from John Grisham's gripping story but also - and primarily - from its characters and outstanding cast, including the ever-reliable J.T. Walsh (FBI Agent McThune), William H. Macy (Ricky's doctor), Anthony Edwards (Reggie's assistant Clint), Ossie Davis (Judge Roosevelt) and Walter Olkewicz ("Romey" Clifford). Unquestioningly most memorable, however, is the quintet at the movie's center. Brad Renfro was selected by Schumacher for his first-ever screen appearance as Mark because he had a somewhat similar background as the story's hero and thus, an intuitive understanding that, along with his innate toughness, ultimately proved more convincing than the acting skills of more experienced child actors; and indeed, he so compellingly carries his part that he deservedly garnered a 1995 Young Artists Award. Susan Sarandon earned another Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Reggie, who actually listens to her clients and makes sure even those of their desires that may seem trivial to others are taken care of; such as Dianne Sway's wish for a walk-in closet. (Sarandon's Academy-Award nomination was her fourth after "Atlantic City," "Thelma & Louise" and "Lorenzo's Oil;" but although she had to wait yet another year to finally score an Oscar with "Dead Man Walking," "The Client" at least won her a BAFTA Award). Tommy Lee Jones plays the bible-quoting Foltrigg with his tongue firmly planted in his cheek and thus, although occasionally terrifying, makes him a more complete and almost even likeable character; much more so than he is in Grisham's novel. Mary-Louise Parker's Dianne Sway truly brings to life the young besieged trailer park mom desperately trying to get a grip on her life, and Anthony LaPaglia finally is simultaneously frightening and unintentionally funny as the slick but not overly bright mob killer Barry "The Blade" Muldanno, the source of Clifford's (and consequently everybody else's) problems.

So, watch this for the outstanding performances of the five central characters as well as the fine ensemble cast, for one of John Grisham's most gripping yarns, and for Joel Schumacher's excellent editing and sense of place. This may not be a major milestone in movie history (except regarding Brad Renfro's career of course), but it's without question one of the best thrillers of the past 15 years and easily recommended on that basis alone.

Also recommended:
The Client
The Firm
The Pelican Brief
A Time to Kill
Dead Man Walking
The Fugitive / U.S. Marshals (1998)

Excellent Movie From a Terrible Book
"The Client" is a movie that profiled the American Justice system drenched with beaurocracy, and the particular story of a young child and his family caught up in it. An 11 year old backwoods punk kid named Mark Sway (Newly introduced Brad Renfro), is a witness to the suicide of a lawyer involved in a high profile Mafia case. Being the only witness, he is now pressured by the US Attorney's office to talk...and by the Mob not to. US Attorney Roy Fortrigg is played flawlessly as always by award winning actor Tommy Lee Jones, who battles Mark's dedicated lawyer (Susan Sarandon) to make the boy tell all and vault himself to Governor of Louisianna. If I was making this movie, I would think that it would fall apart on the child's role...but it didnt. Brad Renfro was as good as they come, playing a stubborn punk kid who refused to be intimidated by Fortrigg, and tried not to let the Mob get to him either. Another stellar performance was played by Kim Coates, one of the big Mob boss's henchmen. After seeing "The Client" I checked out a few other of his roles...needless to say they were mostly the "bad guy" parts. The movie was gripping in every sense with suspense, action and hardball legal dialogue that trully capture the reality of a high-profile criminal justice case. From start to finish I enjoyed the movie very much and cant turn it off to this day if I flip by it on television. I think "The Client" is a great purchase idea...and again I dont recommend the book.