Green Book

Grade: B+

It has been interesting to see the progress of the Farrelly brothers over the years. They are notorious for writing and directing Dumb and Dumber, Kingpin, and There’s Something About Mary in the 90s. Then in 1999, they tried their hand at growing up a bit, with Outside Providence. Though they didn’t direct, Peter and Bobby Farrelly co-wrote and co-produced it. It wanted to be an epic coming of age tale, and took itself very seriously, but had too short a running time for all the plot it tried to cram in, and the terrific assembly of classic rock songs on the soundtrack came off as a flimsy pretentious smoke screen. 19 years later, Peter Farrelly has co-written and directed Green Book – now nominated for a handful of Oscars, including Best Picture. In many ways, it follows through on the promise that Outside Providence showed.

The setting is New York in 1962. Tony “Lip” works at the Copacabana, but when it closes for the holidays, he is finding himself in need of work. He ends up taking a job as a chauffeur for Dr. Don Shirley, an African-American classical pianist and part of a trio on a tour of rich white country clubs in and around the Bible belt. The gig lasts about 8 weeks, going right up until Christmas Eve. Yes, this is a Farrelly-directed road trip mismatched buddy comedy. You could call it Driving Mr. Doc. It’s a “wunza” movie (“One’s a slob, one’s very proper. Together, they will…”). It even delves into My Fair Lady territory, with Doc, who is quite proper and well-spoken, giving the foul-mouthed Italian lessons on grammar and letter-writing.

What makes the material work so well are the wonderful performances of the two leads, played by Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali (from Moonlight) – both nominated for their work here. Mortensen plays what would have been the Robert de Niro role 30-40 years ago, and in Ali’s first few scenes, I thought he would be wooden and one-note, but he finds many dimensions and brings a lot of texture to his character as events unfold. Green Book does feel like a Farrelly is doing his best to play grown-up. It takes itself awfully seriously, and near the end, it does its best forced Frank Capra impression, trying to forcibly tug at the heartstrings, and all but scream “please give me an Oscar.” If you’ve never seen a movie in your life, all this will be new to you, and you will fall for it. If you’ve been around the block a few times and seen your share and grown tired of the common film conventions and cliches, somehow, there will still be a surprising amount to love in Green Book.

Grade: B+