Green Book (2018)

When "Green Book" won the Best Picture Academy Award on February 24th this year, it caught many people by surprised (in a negative way). A New York Times film critic even went so far as to headline his commentary the next morning with the title "Is 'Green Book' the worst Best Picture since 'Crash'?"! Black director Spike Lee whose film "BlacKkKlansman" was also nominated for Best Picture, reacted like a sore loser by attempting to storm out of the auditorium when the winner was announced muttering something like "... everytime somebody's driving somebody, I lose ...". Green Book eventually won 3 major Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor - Mahershala Ali, and Best Original Screenplay) out of the 5 nominations it received.

Set in the early 1960's USA, Green Book is about the unlikely friendship between a renowned African-American pianist Don Shirley and his temporary driver, an Italian-American bouncer from the Bronx, Tony Lip. Don Shirley is no ordinary black as he is a successful musician and highly educated and cultured. Tony on the other hand is the opposite and proudly boasts of his skills in telling lies to con people. The Green Book in the title refers to a motorist travel guide "Green Book" that was published for the benefit of coloured people in America that identifies places which are "colour friendly" and those which are not.

The real Tony Lip and Viggo Mortensen

Mahershala Ali and the real Don Shirley

What I liked about the movie was that it did not give a heavy preaching on racism as one would have expected given the movie's background and title. Instead I think it focus more on the relationship of the two main characters and how it grew over the course of the few weeks they were together. Both actors, Mahershala Ali and Viggo Mortensen were great and with the clever script, able to make an otherwise dull road trip into something special. I read about public uproar about the film accusing it of being told from a white man's point of view rather than from the black, and from Don Shirley's relatives denouncing the film's version of the truth. Frankly I think these people miss the point. A movie will always be based on the director and producer's interpretation of the material they are given. At the end of the day the viewer decides if he enjoys it or not and should not get politically heated up by taking sides and creating their own drama. As for taking liberty over what happened in real life or not, the movie makers here clearly stated upfront that the movie was "INSPIRED by a true friendship" rather than being "based on a real story". To me, I thought it was a wonderful story of just that .. true friendship, that just happens to take place during the ugly period in American history where racism ruled in certain parts of the world. It celebrates decency and kindness and doing the right thing, which is not something we commonly find as a theme in most movies today. For that alone, I would recommend this as a watch for those of you who haven't seen this yet.