Maniac Magee (film)
| Maniac Magee | |
|---|---|
| Based on |
Maniac Magee by Jerry Spinelli |
| Written by |
Jerry Spinelli Michael Nolin Jack Zurla Mark Zaslove |
| Directed by | Bob Clark |
| Starring |
Michael Angarano Orlando Brown Kyla Pratt Jada Pinkett Smith Rolonda Watts |
| Theme music composer | Alyssa Brown |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) |
Michael Nolin Jack Zurla Mark Zaslove |
| Cinematography | Marshall Adams |
| Running time | 68 minutes |
| Distributor | Nickelodeon |
| Budget | N/A |
| Release | |
| Original release | February 23, 2003 |
Maniac Magee is a television film made for the Nickelodeon network, based on the novel of the same name by Jerry Spinelli. The story follows twelve-year-old Jeffrey Lionel "Maniac" Magee, an orphaned runaway with many extraordinary and athletic talents, who arrives in a town divided with racial conflict. The film was broadcast on Nickelodeon on February 23, 2003.
The film appears to be set in the early 1980s. The book was released in 1990. The teleplay was a finalist for a Humanitas Award in the Children's Live Action program category in 2003, though the award was ultimately won by A Ring of Endless Light.
In the present, an adult female character (played by Jada Pinkett Smith) arrives at a public park in Two Mills, Pennsylvania where she goes to watch some kids jumping rope together at a park. She is also the narrator of the movie and goes to tell the story of Maniac Magee who changed the town of Two Mills forever.
Two decades earlier, the parents of twelve-year-old Jeffrey Lionel Magee (Michael Angarano) are killed by a drunk driver just after his father told him that he would show him his infamous "stopball." After his parents' funeral, a police officer and a woman named Dottie Freeze (Melissa Bickerton) who runs an orphanage approaches Jeffrey and tells him to "come with them." They both appear to be lunatics, scaring Jeffrey who decides to make a run for it out of the town and across the country. All of the running seems to develop into supernatural-like qualities allowing him to run at a very fast speed. After nearly a year of running, he arrives in the town of Two Mills, where racial tensions are extremely strong. Hector Street, the main street located in the middle of the town, divides Two Mills by race: blacks on East End, whites on West End. Jeffrey is confused by racial biases; to him, the people are simply people - heterogeneous, but with much in common, such as both kindness and cruelty.
Jeffrey first crosses over on the East End where the black people there stare at him. He is amazed by a giant ball of rope of twine located outside of a pizza place called "Cobble's Corner" owned by an elderly black man, Mr. Cobble, (Garret Morris). Anyone who can untie it wins a year supply of free pizza from his place. Mr. Cobble comes out and tells Jeffrey to go back to his own side. Jeffrey does so and comes across a kid's baseball game where he comes across a white teenager, Big John McNab (Adam Hendershott), who is a pitcher and is known for striking out many kids with his fast throw. His younger brothers, Russell and Piper McNab (Brandon de Paul and Isaiah Griffin), cheer him on from behind the gate. His good pitching still isn't enough to please his father, George McNab (Rip Torn), who urges him to do better. Jeffrey skips a line of kids waiting to bat to take on Big John. He manages to strike the ball so fast it disintegrates in the air. Big John takes Piper's pet frog to use as a bat to throw at Jeffrey next who hits it lightly. Big John has a hard time catching it as it's hopping around. When he does, he tells his friends to go after Jeffrey proclaiming him as a "maniac". Jeffrey makes a run for it back across the East End of Hector Street. The white boys are trapped on their end, but urges Jeffrey not to come back over.
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