The Rainmaker is a 1997 American legal drama film written and directed by Francis Ford Coppola based on John Grisham's 1995 novel of the same name.

Recent Memphis State University Law School grad Rudy Baylor (Damon) has no high-paying work prospects lined up.

Interested, Bruiser introduces Rudy to office paralegal Deck Shifflet (DeVito), a former insurance adjuster of questionable ethics who has a law degree but has failed the bar exam six times.

They file suit for middle-aged couple Dot and Buddy Black (Place and West), whose 22-year-old son, Donny Ray (Whitworth), is terminally ill with leukemia but could have been saved with a bone marrow transplant that their insurance carrier Great Benefit denied.

Rudy, having never argued a case in court before, now faces experienced lawyers led by Drummond, from the prestigious firm, Tinley Britt.

The case goes to trial, where Drummond gets the vital testimony of Rudy's key witness, Jackie Lemanczyk (Madsen), stricken from the record as it is based on a stolen manual disallowed as evidence.

Nevertheless, thanks to Rudy's determination and some clandestine reference help from now Caribbean-based fugitive Bruiser (with whom Deck is connected by intermediaries), Jackie's testimony and the Great Benefit Employee Manual are finally admitted into evidence, to Drummond's dismay.

In January 1995, prior to its publication, The Rainmaker was already attracting substantial interest due to the $6 million sale for the rights to John Grisham's A Time to Kill from the previous year.

The website's critical consensus states: "Invigorated by its talented cast and Francis Ford Coppola's strong direction, The Rainmaker is a satisfying legal drama—and arguably the best of Hollywood's many John Grisham adaptations.

[9] Roger Ebert gave The Rainmaker three stars out of four, remarking: "I have enjoyed several of the movies based on Grisham novels ... but I've usually seen the storyteller's craft rather than the novelist's art being reflected.

[11] In 2024, Francis Ford Coppola revealed during an interview with Rolling Stone that, following the release of The Rainmaker, he chose to "sort of retire" from being a professional director and instead become a student who could discover what making movies consisted by self-financing "very small, low-budget" films like Youth Without Youth (2007) and Tetro (2009), even organizing unusual rehearsals during which he learned a lot about acting.