Jump to content

The Jacket

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Degree9 (talk | contribs) at 02:54, 31 January 2010. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

For the 1915 Jack London novel, published as "The Jacket" in England, see The Star Rover.
For the Seinfeld episode, see The Jacket (Seinfeld).
The Jacket
Film poster
Directed byJohn Maybury
Written byMassy Tadjedin
Produced byGeorge Clooney
Peter Guber
Steven Soderbergh
StarringAdrien Brody
Keira Knightley
Kris Kristofferson
Jennifer Jason Leigh
Kelly Lynch
Brad Renfro
and Daniel Craig
CinematographyPeter Deming
Edited byEmma E. Hickox
Music byRoger Eno
Distributed byWarner Independent Pictures
Release date
March 4, 2005
Running time
103 minutes
CountryTemplate:Film US
LanguageEnglish
Budget$28,500,000
Box office$21,126,225 (worldwide)

The Jacket is a 2005 psychological thriller, directed by John Maybury partly based on the Jack London novel, The Star Rover.[1] Massy Tadjedin wrote the screenplay based on a story by Tom Bleecker and Marc Rocco. The original music score is composed by Roger Eno and the cinematography is by Peter Deming.

Plot

After miraculously recovering from a bullet wound to the head, Gulf War veteran Jack Starks (Adrien Brody) returns to Vermont in 1992, suffering from amnesia. Accused of murdering a police officer, he is found not guilty by reason of insanity, and is incarcerated in a mental institution. Starks becomes subject to the experiments of Dr. Thomas Becker (Kris Kristofferson), a psychiatrist. Starks is injected with an experimental drug and put into a straitjacket; he is then locked in a morgue drawer. While in this condition, Jack's mind sends him into the future of late December 2007, where he discovers, amongst other things, that he is destined to die in four days from his first incarceration in the drawer in 1992. While in the future, Starks meets Jackie Price (Keira Knightley), whom he helped in 1992 returning from Vermont. At first, Jackie does not believe Jack's story, but on subsequent trips to the drawer (and the future) she helps him learn how he is to die, in the process becoming attached to him. Jackie learns that Jack dies from head trauma, but visiting the mental institution no one there is able or willing to explain how it happened. With his time running out, Jack writes a letter explaining Jackie's bleak future and gives it to Jackie's mother (who died by burns when she fell unconscious with a cigarette.) On the return trip to the hospital, Jack slips on the ice and hits his head; bleeding profusely, he convinces the hospital workers to put him in the jacket one last time. Jack returns to 2007, where Jackie's mother is still alive and she has a better life. The screen fades to white, and Jackie says "How much time do we have?" and the credits start to roll.

Cast

Basis

The Jacket shares its title, and the idea of a person experiencing extra-corporeal time-travel while in an intolerably tight straitjacket, with a 1915 novel by Jack London. The novel was published in the United Kingdom as The Jacket and in the United States of America as The Star Rover. Director Maybury has said that the film is "loosely based on a true story that became a Jack London story."[1] (The true story is that of Ed Morrell, who told London about San Quentin prison's inhumane use of tight straitjackets).

Reception

The Jacket opened on March 4, 2005, and grossed $2,723,682 on opening weekend, with a peak release of 1,331 theaters in the United States. The film went on to gross $6,303,762 domestically, for a total of $14,822,463 worldwide.[2]

The Jacket garnered mixed reviews on release; the film has a 44% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes,[3] and a 44% average critic rating on the aggregate reviews site Metacritic.[4]

References

  1. ^ a b Clarke, Donald (May 13, 2005). "Full Mental Jacket". The Irish Times. Archived from the original on December 20, 2009. Retrieved December 20, 2009. Quotes director Maybury: "'I know you think it is a load of Hollywood nonsense,' he says amiably, 'but it is in fact loosely based a true story that became a Jack London story.'"
  2. ^ "The Jacket (2005)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved December 20, 2009.
  3. ^ "The Jacket (2005)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved December 20, 2009.
  4. ^ "The Jacket Reviews". Metacritic. Retrieved December 20, 2009.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=The_Jacket&oldid=341018224"