I have a hard time fathoming the idea of Green Book being this big awards contender that it has been framed as. Not necessarily because it’s allegedly misrepresenting one of its main characters, or the fact that it barely touches on the very subject of its title. No, it’s just that Green Room is one of those painfully inoffensive, bland, and awards-hungry prestige crowd-pleasers that feels like the kind of film that the Academy has been trying to abandon ever since they began efforts to be more inclusive in recent years.
If you didn’t already know, the film follows the true story of Tony Lip (Viggo Mortensen), an working class, Italian-American bouncer who gets offered the job of being the driver for a black classical pianist Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali). While initially reluctant, Tony ends up taking the job as Don embarks on a tour through the deep south, and they develop an unlikely friendship.
Everything that you might imagine being in a movie like this is…well, it’s all in there, and it feels about as outdated and misguided as you’d expect. Tony Lip is meant to have an arc, but it never comes across fully realized or developed, so the film ends up acting like some of his early casual racism is forgivable because, you know, at least he’s not like one of those super racists down south. And that’s another thing, while racism in the deep south, in the 1960s, was certainly extreme, it was hardly the only place where people of color experienced prejudice. The film treats the south like Mordor, as if once stepped inside, any person of color now has to be on their toes at all times, and once they leave and go back north, everything’s pretty hunky-dory. The film touches on and comments on racism and prejudice on such a basic, elementary school level that never rings true.
Plus, not only are those deep topics treated rather superficially, the film’s perspective leans heavily on the white point-of-view, through Tony’s character. We follow the story through his eyes, and as a result, Don doesn’t comes across as a fully realized character. We only get a few details, but it’s all told to us, and none of it ever serves any kind of arc. At one point he first mentions his estranged brother, and later mentions him again saying, “if he wants to get in touch, he knows how to reach me,” and these beats go absolutely nowhere. We never see his family, the film brings up his sexuality for a moment, and never brings it up again, and we just don’t get a sense of who he is whenever Tony isn’t around.
I hesitate to call the film an example of “white savior” entertainment, as some have claimed. There isn’t much saving involved on Tony’s part. If anything, the only semblance of an arc for Don is that he opens himself up a bit more, and that’s about all the film can muster up. It is, however, very misguided on how it handles race relations of that time period, and how those elements might play today. At the end of the day, though, the film is too simplistic to say anything even worth getting mad at. It avoids any nuance and tries to play the “can’t we all just get along” card without confronting the ugliness that makes it a real struggle. At one point, Don is arguing with Tony, and Tony argues that he’s more black than Don because Tony is from a working class family and enjoys black music and fried chicken while Don lives above Carnegie Hall, doesn’t listen to popular black artists, and often associates himself with high society. This, naturally, ticks off Don, and he tells him off saying, “If I’m not black enough, and I’m not white enough, then tell me what am I?” Tony doesn’t have a response to this, and that’s how the whole movie plays out. Whenever it brushes up against genuine complexity and nuance, it backs off and leans on easy going entertainment to make sure its mostly white audience doesn’t get too uncomfortable.
And as far as the titular Green Book goes, there’s less of it in this film than there was driving in the movie, Drive.
If there’s a saving grace, it is in the performances. Ali and Mortensen are super charming and engaging, they have solid chemistry, and there were moments where their banter had me laughing. I suppose it helps having notable comedy director, Peter Farrelly (who also co-wrote with Nick Vallelonga and Brian Hayes Currie), tackling a style familiar with his other films – the road trip movie – and having strong actors at his disposal. Even in the phoniest and hackneyed moments, the two were able to ground the film into something that resonated. For some, it might be all they need to have a good time, but for me, they were the only aspect of the film that made it tolerable to sit through.
While it might sound otherwise, I don’t have this intense dislike of Green Book. I just think it’s hollow and simplistic, which is hardly the worst thing a film could do, but it does make things extra cringey as the film tries to be light and playful while also trying so hard to be “about something” in timely fashion. It thankfully boasts two charming leads, who make the proceedings more easily watchable and engaging, but it’ll ultimately be up to your own patience, in terms of how much they can carry the film along. I can certainly admire what Farrelly was trying to do here, but it’s clear that he and his co-writers were in severe need of a black perspective, so they can actually have the back-and-forth between the characters actually mean something. There is an interesting story to mine in the friendship of Tony Lip and Don Shirley, but this film doesn’t do them any favors.