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Green Book
****
Dir: Peter Farrelly
Starring: Mahershala Ali, Viggo Mortensen
(USA, 12A, 2hrs 10 mins)
The Green Book was a small publication that showed where black people were welcome to stay in the Deep South of 1960s America. Peter Farrelly’s entertaining based-on-fact story follows an unlikely duo as they head across the Jim Crow-era southern states in 1962. Viggo Mortensen plays Tony ‘Lip’, an Italian wiseguy with a racist streak who needs some work after the club he bounces for is closed for renovations.
He applies to work as a driver for black pianist Donald Shirley – a fantastic Mahershala Ali – and his trio as they embark on a tour across America that may require Lip’s certain set of skills. A sophisticated man, Shirley is nevertheless aware that the well-heeled groups he will be playing for live in deeply racist and segregated states.
As their journey continues Mortensen is forced to reassess his opinion of his passenger and Ali for his driver as they encounter racist cops, blinkered institutions and their own prejudices. Ali and Mortensen are a brilliant central duo, sparking off one another ably and creating moments of high character comedy. That their dramatic, nuanced realationship comes under the stewardship of one of the Farrelly brothers, whose previous comedies were more gross-out than engrossing – Dumb and Dumber, There’s Something About Mary, Shallow Hal etc is surprising.
It’s Driving Miss Daisy with the roles reversed and far more enjoyable. Some elements are skirted over (such as Shirley’s homosexuality), and it is all seen through a white man’s prism, but the central coupling elevate the material effortlessly.
Ali exudes stubborn dignity, Mortensen has an edginess and proves adept at comedy playing a rounded character a million miles away from Ring quests and Russian gangsters. It’s unashamedly feel-good at it’s end whilst highlighting a dark time in America’s hypocritical past, giving its central performers room to shine. A crowd-pleaser with something to say.
words Keiron Self
Out now in cinemas