Fierce face- off is terrifically tense
Green Room ( 18)
In a cinematic landscape full of comic book and television show adaptations, sequels, remakes and reboots, it’s pleasing that every now and then something fresh and original comes along.
Green Room falls very much into that category – where else would you see Patrick Stewart growling and snapping away playing a neo- Nazi?
The film also refuses to be pigeon- holed into one specific genre. Is it a horror? A thriller? A black comedy? Actually it’s a little bit of all three, with added drama and music thrown in for good measure.
Writer- director Jeremy Saulnier’s script sees Stewart’s gang of skinheads try to eliminate a punk band – led by Anton Yelchin’s Pat – after one of the rockers witnesses a horrific act of violence perpetrated by the thugs.
Saulnier was the brainchild behind the excellent, early Coen brothers- like, 2013 crimethriller Blue Ruin and there’s no dip in quality for his sophomore big screen effort.
Though he takes influence from grindhouse cinema and siege movies, Saulnier’s Green Room is very much its own unflinching, unrelenting animal.
Those worrying Stewart’s presence may be little more than gimmick casting to pull in the crowds – or questioning whether the Shakespearean thespian can pull off a rare villainous role – can rest easy.
This is the X- Men star’s finest performance in years and he seems to lap up the opportunity to flex his evil muscles; you’ll never look at the one- time Captain Picard quite the same way again.
His younger co- stars don’t get lost in the shuffle either. Yelchin, Alia Shawkat ( Sam) and Imogen Poots ( Amber) provide a striking mix of fear, determination to survive and bravery and Saulnier’s Blue Ruin lead Macon Blair is edginess personified as club manager/ bouncer Gabe.
With so many faces crammed into the 90- minute running time – punks, skinheads and club employees – it’s inevitable that a few get lost in the shuffle and some are so obviously just cannon fodder they may as well have it tattooed on their foreheads.
The graphic violence won’t be for everyone, with bones brutally broken, disembowelments and vicious Rottweiler attacks par for the grisly course.
But it’s befitting the incredibly tight, tense situation everyone finds themselves in as they battle either for their very survival or to stay out of jail.
No- one behaves in a manner you wouldn’t expect them to and there’s no verbal or physical grandstanding to be seen, which is a testament to the realism Saulnier wrings out of an unusual scenario.
Fresh, fierce and funny, Green Room is an intelligently directed, well- acted mosh pit of a movie.