The movie adaptation of Stephen King’s The Green Mile hints that narrator Paul Edgecomb lives to be significantly older than the average human. Paul, played by Tom Hanks, is established to be 108-years-old in 1999 when the movie comes to an end. This fact serves to explain how Paul’s son was already an adult when Paul worked as a prison officer in Cold Mountain Penitentiary back in 1935, putting Paul at 44 years of age in the flashback. The end of the movie also establishes that Mr. Jingles, a garden mouse that used to roam the prison in 1935, is still alive and well in 1999, something that could not be true in any normal circumstance.

The underlying similarity between Paul and Mr. Jingles is the fact that both were healed by death row inmate John Coffey (Michael Clarke Duncan) in 1935. Coffey used his healing powers, the nature of which were never explained, to cure Paul’s bladder infection, which he appeared to have been suffering from for quite some time when he met Coffey. Further, Coffey brought Mr. Jingles back to life after Percy Wetmore (Doug Hutchinson), one of Paul’s junior officers, crushed him with his boot. This magic extends the lives of both Paul and Mr. Jingles, but for how long exactly?

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When The Green Mile introduces Mr. Jingles, there is no indication of how long he's already lived before Coffey resurrects him. Although, the fact that he has lived 64 years from 1935 to 1999 suggests that he has lived a minimum of 20 times longer than the average garden mouse (who typically live to a maximum of 3), even if one assumes that he was a newborn when Coffey's fellow inmate found him. In the movie, Mr. Jingles lives right up until the credits roll, but in Stephen King's The Green Mile book, he breathes his dying breath only moments after Paul introduces him to his friend Eileen. It is important to point out here that, despite the brown-to-gray hair transformation and being significantly slower than his days at Cold Mountain, Mr. Jingles is just as lively right up until the end. This provides the reader with a definite endpoint to the results of Coffey's miracle.

Paul Edgecomb and John Coffey in The Green Mile

In applying this formula to Paul, it is key to consider that he was born in 1891, when the average lifespan was 42-43 for an average American male. However, by 1935, it was expected that a white American male aged around 40 would live for another 30 years (via InfoPlease), and that's before Coffey healed him. The additional 30 years, when multiplied by 20 (the same amount that Mr. Jingles' life was extended by), gives Paul 600 years left to live from 1935, or 536 years left when viewers depart from him at the end of The Green Mile, meaning he'd be around 644 when he eventually dies. However, another aspect of the story suggests that Paul's life expectancy is even longer, although the exact amount is unknown.

Coffey altered the course of Paul and Mr. Jingles's lives differently, which could impact the way that his healing added years onto their lifespans. While Paul's infection has the potential to become life-threatening, it only causes him pain at the point when Coffey interjects. In comparison, Mr. Jingles has already passed over to death by the time Coffey heals the mouse. Between the two miracles, the power required to bring a creature back to life would presumably be more substantial than that to cure an infection, which suggests that Mr. Jingles would surpass his life expectancy more than Paul would his. Moreover, Mr. Jingles is significantly smaller than Paul, making the ratio of healing powers to the size of the being skewed in favor of the mouse as well.

However, Coffey gives his own healing powers to Paul after compelling Percy Wetmore to kill Wild Bill (Sam Rockwell), who committed the murders that Coffey was charged with. This is a more direct and deliberate transfer of power, and in theory would alter the way that the magic impacts Paul's lifespan, suggesting that 600+ years is just the tip of the iceberg and he could really live for much, much longer from the end of The Green Mile.

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