← Back to Reviews
in
Green Book
A prejudiced Italian American bouncer/driver is tasked with driving a brilliant African American piano player across south for a concert tour. The tour takes place during segregation down south and in the months leading up-to Christmas.
I think the north star for diving into reviewing this movie is the director. That's not often the case with movies but it is for this movie. Its directed by Peter Farrelly. That tells us many things. The script would have to be passed on by lot of more established directors for it to land in his hands. These types of scripts usually come with possibility of an outrage. Movies that touch of sensitive topics often times are hot button issues. This movie has 2 leads , one is black and other is white. It is okay if its directed by black filmmaker but when its white the outrage starts. So going into awards season with a movie like this makes the whole landscape full of land mines.There are even problems associated with the director. He is a comedic director trying to make a serious movie. So there is certain amount of trepidation associated with that. Rather than judging by the movie on its own they bring in all their prejudices. It almost feels like they want to punish him on his current movie because he made comedies before. No one can call out critics on that.
As for the movie, It was uncomfortable at times. The movie gets the period feel right. You can feel the 60s. There is a lot of positivity in the movie. You get this warm feeling through out the movie. It is not unflinching. Movies about racism often times have those racist white characters that have an additional set of rules that jump into action if someone is trying to cross those rules. So you are always waiting for that racism aspect or use of n-word. This movie has those but since its dealing with segregation period its much more mellow and subtle. If i wanna look at positives of tackling subtle racism in a movie then this movie does it well. It gets the uncomfortable,sad and disturbing situation of Don Shirley right. But from what I see with the reactions of critics who didn't like the movie , most of them expecting it to be this hard hitting racism movie that ends with a downer where everyone is sad and miserable that racism existed. But the movie is not going for that. It is going for something more different. However I can't call it uncompromising.
As for the oscar bait accusation against the movie I completely disagree. Its a movie that is taking enormous risks. Its slow, smooth and patient. Subtle character reactions and actions make up for the drama in the movie. Nothing unrealistic happens in the movie. The movie is not trying to make racism a shock value tool. Most movies do that. They dramatize racist elements to get a reaction from audience. But not this. Even towards the end the movie deals with a very complicated psychological hurdles people have towards giving up their inherent racism. A scene where a host of a musical performance by Don Shirley try to negotiate a deal with Vigo Mortensen's character where he treats Don Shirley as an animal in a zoo that will dance for money. All these are uncomfortable. In the end the movie deals with racism but more importantly it deals with how do we overcome it. Dwelling on the racism is not going to change anything. If you want to dwell on it then go and watch tons of other movies that do that for you. But this is about how do we move on.
A prejudiced Italian American bouncer/driver is tasked with driving a brilliant African American piano player across south for a concert tour. The tour takes place during segregation down south and in the months leading up-to Christmas.
I think the north star for diving into reviewing this movie is the director. That's not often the case with movies but it is for this movie. Its directed by Peter Farrelly. That tells us many things. The script would have to be passed on by lot of more established directors for it to land in his hands. These types of scripts usually come with possibility of an outrage. Movies that touch of sensitive topics often times are hot button issues. This movie has 2 leads , one is black and other is white. It is okay if its directed by black filmmaker but when its white the outrage starts. So going into awards season with a movie like this makes the whole landscape full of land mines.There are even problems associated with the director. He is a comedic director trying to make a serious movie. So there is certain amount of trepidation associated with that. Rather than judging by the movie on its own they bring in all their prejudices. It almost feels like they want to punish him on his current movie because he made comedies before. No one can call out critics on that.
As for the movie, It was uncomfortable at times. The movie gets the period feel right. You can feel the 60s. There is a lot of positivity in the movie. You get this warm feeling through out the movie. It is not unflinching. Movies about racism often times have those racist white characters that have an additional set of rules that jump into action if someone is trying to cross those rules. So you are always waiting for that racism aspect or use of n-word. This movie has those but since its dealing with segregation period its much more mellow and subtle. If i wanna look at positives of tackling subtle racism in a movie then this movie does it well. It gets the uncomfortable,sad and disturbing situation of Don Shirley right. But from what I see with the reactions of critics who didn't like the movie , most of them expecting it to be this hard hitting racism movie that ends with a downer where everyone is sad and miserable that racism existed. But the movie is not going for that. It is going for something more different. However I can't call it uncompromising.
As for the oscar bait accusation against the movie I completely disagree. Its a movie that is taking enormous risks. Its slow, smooth and patient. Subtle character reactions and actions make up for the drama in the movie. Nothing unrealistic happens in the movie. The movie is not trying to make racism a shock value tool. Most movies do that. They dramatize racist elements to get a reaction from audience. But not this. Even towards the end the movie deals with a very complicated psychological hurdles people have towards giving up their inherent racism. A scene where a host of a musical performance by Don Shirley try to negotiate a deal with Vigo Mortensen's character where he treats Don Shirley as an animal in a zoo that will dance for money. All these are uncomfortable. In the end the movie deals with racism but more importantly it deals with how do we overcome it. Dwelling on the racism is not going to change anything. If you want to dwell on it then go and watch tons of other movies that do that for you. But this is about how do we move on.