Green Book

Tony Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen) is a New York night club bouncer and tough guy who finds himself out of work for a couple of months and in need of a temporary job.  Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali) is a jazz pianist embarking on a tour that will take him across the deep southern states of the US.  He needs a driver, preferably one who can offer him some protection, so he signs up Vallelonga, and off they go.  Shirley is cultured, multilingual, hugely talented and very particular in his manners.  His relationship with the rough and ready Italian gets off to a bad start and it takes time for each of them to fully appreciate the qualities of the other, and to learn a bit about life from the experience.  That they will end up as friends, of a sort, is never in doubt.

It would be all too easy to dismiss Green Book as just another buddy-buddy road movie that ticks the boxes.  Mismatched couple forced to spend a lot of time with one another?  Check.  'Hilarious' cross-cultural misunderstandings?  Gradual dawning of friendship and respect?  Check.  Personal epiphanies to ensure a happy ending?  Check.   It's all there, and in one sense this is a film where you know exactly what you're getting.

Two elements save it from banality.  Firstly the outstanding performances of the leading duo which avoid any dangers of caricature and remain believable throughout.  Ali gives Shirley a surface strength and deeper vulnerability that combine into fun when he gets the chance to play some rock 'n roll.  Mortensen's hard man has a brash surface, low cunning and a brutal way with people who cross him.  But his growing affection for his new boss feels natural and human without becoming sentimental.

The second element is context.  This is 1962, Shirley is black, his driver white (hailing from a bullishly racist community), and the southern states have scant regard for the rights of negroes, no matter how much of a star they might be.  Vallelonga has plenty of opportunity to show off his abilities in protecting his passenger, and have his eyes opened when he sees the treatment being meted out by society to the brave pianist.  That this was based on real events makes the events portrayed all the harder to accept.  And that title?  The Green Book was a list of hotels in the USA which would accept 'coloreds' staying the night....

Like, say, Philadelphia before it, this film takes a standard Hollywood drama format and uses it to bring across the evils and horrors of bigotry and discrimination.  Any movie which brings those issues to mainstream cinema audiences, and manages to be very thouroughlyentertaining in the process, gets my backing.