Green Book Review

"Being genius is not enough, it takes courage to change people's hearts"


Green Book was directed by Peter Farrelly and stars the likes of Viggo Mortensen, Mahershala Ali, Linda Cardellini, Mike Hatton, Dimiter D. Marinov and Sebastian Maniscalco.  The film follows a working class Italian-American bouncer (Viggo Mortensen) who takes a job as a driver for an African-American classical pianist on tour of venues through the 1960s American South.

Well first thing that has to be said is congratulations to Green Book, for those who don't know Green Book won best film at this year's Oscars and a worthy winner it really is. Green Book really is a true example of great character performances and a story worth telling woven in between American racial tension and politics especially during the 1960s in which the film is set. Straight away the performances in this film are incredible, Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali give honestly some of the strongest performances in a film that I have seen in a while and play of each other as characters extremely well. The way the relationship develops over the duration of the film is heart warming not just in terms of two very different people from two very different walks of life coming together for this road trip, but also in terms of the way each character brings out the good in the other person during the duration of the trip not just enhancing their overall character arc but enhancing the overall film as well (already making itself one of the standout films of this year already). A special mention also has to be made to the directing style as well. Even though this film has some heavy hitting themes and is set against racial tension in 1960s America, the filmmakers manage to bring a light side to film, which some moments of truly good comedy, whilst this is not laugh out of your seat comedy, it's those small moments in the characters journey, little character quirks that really round out these characters, and those small moments of comedy really bring a ray of sunshine to what is a very dark and divided time in terms of racial tension.

There really wasn't anything major that I didn't enjoy about the film, if I had to nitpick here and there my only small critique would be that for me personally the editing during the first act of the film was a little too fast pace for my liking, and looking back at the film now, it seems as if the filmmakers wanted to rush the opening a little so that they could bring these two characters together as quickly as possible, so that they could focus on developing their relationship (which is where the film really sells itself), it might of been nice to have slowed down the pace of the film, so it was more of a gentle ride and gentle introduction especially to Viggo Mortensens character, but considering that the films run time is just shy over the two hours mark it does make sense that they wanted to spend as much time with these two characters together and giving Viggo Mortensens and Mahershala Ali the spotlight to truly shine.

Overall Green Book is an exceptional film and a worthy Oscar winning film with exceptional performances from both its main leads. This is a film that shouldn't be missed and one that I highly recommend.

Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars