Green Book
This review is a part of the Best Picture Project: a review of every single Academy Award winner for the Best Picture category. Green Book is the ninety first Best Picture winner at the 2018 Academy Awards.
Near the tail end of a decade where the Academy expressed as much courage in selecting their winners as they once did in the ‘70s, Green Book won. The Academy didn’t want to award a Netflix picture, let alone a foreign film (Roma), and it would have gotten even more flack for selecting the next daring film (The Favourite) or another mainstream picture (Bohemian Rhapsody). Somehow, a popular and well made picture like BlackKklansman just wasn’t in the cards. So, for the first time in ages, the Academy went stupidly safe. Green Book is an okay film that has some laughs, some heart, but an overall struggle with its pedestrian approach to race relations in the United States. It is the “thoughts and prayers” of societal commentary in cinema: an easy approach with a bigger focus on pleasing crowds and appearing just, than an effort to get down to the bottom of such a discussion.
It’s a road film (this can usually be a bad sign for surface level entertainment) based on real people: Musician Dr. Don Shirley is to be chauffeured across the southern states by bodyguard (and eventual actor) Tony Lip. The two bond over Lip’s bumbling bigotry (but that’s okay… he means well, right?) and Shirley’s class (an untouchable character). The audience has some fun. The actors get a stage to perform (despite my reservations on this film, Mahershala Ali is phenomenal, and VIggo Mortensen is also a major delight). That’s it. You have some slight drama for a bit, but nothing threatening enough to make you worry about the outcome of this feel-good hit of the awards season. Green Book won the audience vote at TIFF, and its Oscar race thus began (and, obiously, never let up).
Tony Lip and Don Shirley getting to know one another via Lip’s letter-writing to his wife back home.
Is Green Book the worst film ever? No. There is a lot of heart here, even if the film is incredibly misguided; its intentions are always true (like the lead character Tony Lip). Other than that, it’s a par film. Its acting is strong. Its sets and costumes are detailed. On those fronts, it is a great film. As a story and a discussion, it is far too protective and laid back, thus being subpar. It’s a film that coasts just down the middle of the road at a reasonable speed (which, honestly, is the plot for most of the flick). It’s an okay journey for all, but an overwhelmingly passive film for 2019, when we could have used a more meaningful discussion than what we got: “Two guys of different cultures experience a white-saviour complex narrative and some knee slapping jokes. Will anything substantial happen? Find out soon, because the answer is no”.
Andreas Babiolakis has a Masters degree in Film and Photography Preservation and Collections Management from Ryerson University, as well as a Bachelors degree in Cinema Studies from York University. His favourite times of year are the Criterion Collection flash sales and the annual Toronto International Film Festival.