Tag: GREEN ROOM

There’s an exchange in the classic Howard Hawks western RIO BRAVO: “I told him you were one of the best,” and the other man responds with, “Well, I’ll tell you what I’m a lot better at, Mr. Wheeler, and that’s minding my own business.” If only the band in GREEN ROOM followed the lesson imparted by Colorado Ryan. I mention both of these films, along with the John Carpenter film ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13 (which was inspired by RIO BRAVO), because they all exist as siege films – a small group is barricaded in a single location and fights for their life against overwhelming obstacles. It’s an exciting subgenre that director Jeremy Saulnier centers the main conflict around, but diverts from by not having someone trained to deal with hostility like John Wayne or even Bruce Willis like in DIE HARD. Who he places on both sides of the battle is why GREEN ROOM is as hard hitting and terrifying as it is.

A punk band who struggles to get by while on tour stops at a hole in the wall dive in the middle of Oregon looking to play a gig. After they play their set, the group sees something that they shouldn’t have, which leads the owner of the club Darcy (Patrick Stewart) and his Neo-Nazi followers to take matters into their own hands. Maybe the band shouldn’t have opened their set with a cover of Dead Kennedys’ “Nazi Punks Fuck Off.”

When the violence penetrates GREEN ROOM, it cuts with the sharpest knife you can imagine. Violence isn’t glorified as much as it’s presented in a matter-of-fact manner. It’s quick and abrasive, causing you to barely catch your breath as you struggle to process what you just witnessed. GREEN ROOM isn’t just about the violence, but it might be the first thing you think about as your stomach turns leaving the theater. There’s more to chew on though than the impressive practical effects on screen.

The band of young actors led by Anton Yelchin and later joined by Imogen Poots are naturals at being kids. Sure, they aren’t the smartest guys in the room, but they aren’t making obnoxiously stupid decisions either like some might in a slasher film. The same passion and energy that drives their music are what fuels them to survive. Who is just as natural in his role is Patrick Stewart. I guess being the soft-spoken, smart, nice old man in most films got a little stale for him. So, he plays the soft-spoken, smart, evil old man. There’s a level of self-restraint that Stewart employs that might be frustrating for some. However, I found his calm but assertive delivery to be uncomfortably chilling – especially since audiences are used to seeing him on and off screen in quite a different light.

A colleague of mine informed me that some other critics he spoke to saw the lack of backstory for the main antagonist and his followers as a hindrance to the story. Saulnier has a way of immersing the audience in an experience by developing a fully realized world, coated with an authentic layer of graffiti and grime. He did this previously with BLUE RUIN. Yet, both films are about situations. He throws you into a film with characters and just enough information for you to have an emotional connection to get your blood pumping when the blood on the screen starts spurting. GREEN ROOM is a lean and mean machine that hits hard without unnecessary exposition. It’s a thriller that thrives on placing you in this nerve-racking situation. Any more superfluous information might make these helpless victims and horrific monsters feel less human and more like characters on the screen.

For me, two of the most terrifying things are the unexplainable and human beings. What horrific things people are capable of is more terrifying than any ferocious creature with fur and fangs. At its core, GREEN ROOM is a horror film. It’s a story about the evil that lives in plain sight in America that feeds off whomever they choose. They’re cannibals in a sense. Jeremy Saulnier posits that this is the type of evil that many of us turn a blind eye too because, like the “boogeyman” under the bed, if we don’t look, maybe he isn’t actually there. In this case, the boogeyman is there, and the fact that it’s a bunch of punk kids that fight back against him – the type of kids that many “good” people would snub their noses at based on appearance alone – is an ironic twist on the type of film where we see heroes defending American soil from the monsters who really want to hurt us.

Overall rating: 4.5 out of 5

GREEN ROOM is now playing in select theaters