Film Review: The Green Book

Sexuality/Nudity Mature
Violence Mature
Vulgarity Mature
Anti-Catholic Philosophy Mature

One of the things that I hope happens when I see a movie is that I encounter the sense of being transported.  Sometimes the spell is so complete that it is almost a shock to return to reality when the credits role.  But at the very least I hope to be taken to some time or some place that is other.  And The Green Book felt like an immersive time warp back to the early 1960's.

The story centers around Tony Lip (Viggo Mortensen), a scamming, middle-aged bouncer who never had a corner he couldn't cut.  When the club where he works is shut down for a while, Tony has to find work to keep supporting his wife Dolores (Linda Cardellini) and their kids.  He finds it by being hired to drive Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali).  Shirley is a piano virtuoso who is embarking on a concert tour of the country, including parts of the segregated deep south, which could lead to trouble for Dr. Shirly who is black.  To help them, Tony uses a guide called "The Green Book" which is a triptik for safe places for minorities below the Mason-Dixon line.  Tony and Don could not be more opposite.  The result is a story of great humor, heart, and drama.

I have to give director Peter Farrelly an inormous amount of credit for his work as director.  If you had told me that the one who made the gross-out films of There's Something About Mary and Dumb and Dumber could make a movie this serious and subtle, I would have been very sceptical.  But Farrelly injects a lot of wholesome beauty into this picture.  There is a stylish simplicity to the entire aesthetic of the film.  Even in the rougher sections of the country, Farrelly captures something beautiful about it.  When Dr. Shirley is denied entrance to certain places, Farrelly does not take the easy path of making these dens of segregation look seedy and unwelcome.  Instead, Farrelly films most of them with bright, welcoming lighting and lets the injustice of segregation sink in through the performances of the actors.  Farrelly also uses a good deal more restraint than I would have expexted.  All scenes dealing with sexuality are presented in an non-exploitative way that get across the deep secret feelings of the characters.

A movie like this also works based on the chemistry of the two characters.  If one is obviously the hero and the other is obvisously the one who needs to be "enlightened," then the relationship is not nearly as interesting.  But both Don and Tony have opposing flaws and opposing virtues.  This movie could easily have been about Don civilizing the racist Tony.  But Tony is not that simple.   He is flawed and lacks a great deal of compassion.  But he has a code and has genuine street smarts.  Don has sophistication, but he does not come off as too stuffy.  He learns from Tony and Tony learns from him.  We see in their story the basis of every good friendship: each friend makes the other a better person.

But what really kicked the movie into high gear for me was the moment I began to partly see it in terms of analogy:  this is a Barack Obama/ Donald Trump road trip movie.

I am not here to make any political statements.  But if you take the broad brush with which the media has painted these two presidents, you cannot help but see the parrallels.  Obama is portrayed as a sophisticated intellectual who is a bit lofty and out of touch.  Trump is portrayed as an unsophisticated hustler who is there to get the job done.  See the movie through this lens made it fascinating and amusing.  It made me think that perhaps if we could all see our polticical adversaries in these human terms, much of our strife would be lessened.

Issues of homosexuality are raised, but they are treated with care.  The purpose of those scenes are not so much to promote a lifestyle, but to show us a characters insecurity and vulnerability.  The only comment on the issues is Tony saying, "Life... it's complicated."  A simple as that statement was, it allows the audience to simply watch these characters and draw their own moral conclusions.

Ali is fantastic as Don Shirley.  You can see the smooth control he has on the character that comes from a practiced politeness.  But he is able to show you so much with a simple look.  One scene in particular comes to mind.  Don is sitting comfortably in his car while Tony fixes it.  On the side of the road are black farm laborers looking at his luxury.  This makes Don incredibly introspective and uncomfortable.  No words are said, but Ali lets us see all of the conflicting emotions at play.  Mortensen captures the essense of Tony's character, but I cannot help to say I was distracted by his accent.  DeNiro or Pesci sound completely natural with their New York accents.  But while Mortensen hit every cadence correctly, it still felt artificial and not natural.  Cardellini does a very good job and you will wish that she had more screen time.

One of the things I loved about the film was that it was very focused on moral courage.  How do you change the world when so much of the world hates you.  I remember a time I spoke to my father, who is an immigrant, about if he ever experienced any racism from Americans.  He shrugged his shoulders and said yes.  When I asked him how he handled it, he said, "I was the best at my job and it forced them to respect me."  I can see a lot of this in Don Shirley's journey.  He enters into these racist territories and is excellent in their presence.  Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't.  But he doesn't give up and he helps show Tony what this kind of strength means.

The other moral foot of the movie is about connection to your fellow man.  Don Shirley may be a humanitarian, but he has trouble connecting to people.  Tony helps him with this and Don helps Tony see past his own prejudices.  The movie also does a good job of not stereotyping any of the races, even after bad encounters with our main character.  The question the movie asks often is: where do I belong.

And the answer it gives is that as long as you are loved, your are where you belong.

image by Yasir72.multan