Reasons Why “Green Book” is Problematic Enough for Best Picture 2019
an argumentative personal judgment review
Green Book, an American film based on a real occurrence directed by Peter Farrelly, portrays racial diversity in 1960s American society. This film succeeds in inspiring the audience about the message of respecting other diverse to admit human equality in a subject of friendship. The narrative follows two real-life persons, Donald Shirley (Mahersala Ali) and Tony “Lip” Vallelonga (Virgo Mortensen), as they travel the South region on a musical tour. Green Book was initiated by Tony Vallelonga’s son, Nick Vallelonga, to reminisce about their adventures. Green Book won numerous accolades for its powerful-complexity storylines, outstanding acting, and breathtaking cinematography, including the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2019. Even though this film received numerous accolades and greatly inspired the audience, several controversies are surrounding the creation of this picture that does not represent or even contradict the theme that this film conveyed, rendering this film unworthy of the accolades.
Many people think that Green Book excels in presenting the actual social and physical state of America in the 1960s as a film based on a true story of a friendship road trip between a black classical pianist and his white Italian-American chauffeur. However, in the scenario’s approach, there is some non-permissible alteration on the actual main character that affects the true worth of Don Shirley’s character without family permission. Donald’s niece and brothers, Edwin and Maurice Shirley, who is also involved in beginning the filming of this narrative, critique the character’s transformation. Maurice termed Green Book a “symphony of falsehoods” in an interview with Shadow and Act (2018) because Nick Vallelonga and the crew had excluded them from the filming process. Furthermore, Edwin Shirley told TIME (2019) that the figure depicted by Mahersala Ali in the film was not the uncle Donald he knew. An example of a change would be Don Shirley’s narration in the film, which said that he did not have a close relationship with his family. However, the real Don Shirley is a family man who is very close to his brother and other relatives. Furthermore, it was implied that Don was embarrassed about his race, although he was always proud to be a black man and never felt ashamed of his race. Nick and the crew, in my opinion, should not exclude Shirley’s family from the filming process. The families have the right to approve changes to Don’s character. By not granting such rights to the families, the process of creating this film was discriminatory since it was based only on the perspectives of white relatives while ignoring the perspectives of black relatives.
Green Book was shot with stunning cinematography and starred in a cast of A-list actors. According to Tapley of Variety (2018), overall audiences agreed that the great acting of Virgo Mortensen as the main character and the beautiful cinematography directed by Peter Farrelly support this film in serving a great moral value about racial equality, human love, friendship, and the premise of unity in diversity. However, I discovered that some cinema reviewers may disagree with it. According to Aragon (2019), there are some viewpoints from various critics that look at Virgo Mortensen and Peter Farrelly’s bad track record. Virgo Mortensen was implicated in racist concerns including racial and religious issues over their career. Furthermore, Peter Farrelly was frequently involved in a series of sexual harassment incidents. Some critics argue that both are inappropriate for this film, which addresses human race concerns. A film website The Cut (2019) discovered a 20-year-old sexual problem by Peter Farrelly while advertising Green Book, maybe in a press release, for which Peter afterward apologized for his prior genital-flashing. Furthermore, during the film’s press conference with The Guardian (2018), Virgo Mortensen used the N-word to demonstrate how norms have changed since the 1960s, but many people and critics did not accept his expressions, even though he had already apologized to Mahersala Ali as an actor who represents black people. This bad track record from the film’s main character undermines Green Book’s goal of addressing the human race issue.
Green Book’s overarching objective is to expose social facts and encourage the audience to accept other races, eliminate discrimination, and love one another unconditionally. During my screening of this movie, I discovered that the Green Book neatly relates to the history of white savior myths. In which a white character saves non-white characters from dire circumstances. It portrays white people as heroes for black people. Furthermore, there are certain sequences in the film that are biased against one race. For example, there is a scenario in which Don Shirley and Tony are stranded in the middle of a two-lane road after their car breaks down. The scene opens with them getting out of the car, followed by Tony opening the trunk machine and attempting to fix the car as Don stands beside the car door.
While waiting for Tony to restore the car, Don noticed a group of black farmers in a field wearing tattered clothes and seemed exhausted from helplessly watching him. Those groups of black farmers just observe Don’s supremacy as he is serviced by white people.
According to my perspective, it demonstrated a disparity between Don’s position and those of other black people in America. Don, being a pianist, can live independently as a free person, but the other black people are still enslaved. It also demonstrated the irony of white and black people’s differing social situations. We may claim that even if a white person is hired as a driver or a maid for black people, they are still given a fair salary and work in a safe atmosphere. While black individuals are paid very little as maids or slaves, their job is severe, and they work in a horrible atmosphere. This scene displayed a biased perspective of white people’s situation. Even though white people appeared the same as black people as employees, they still had a superior appearance.
Green Book, the Academy Award winner for Best Picture Nominees, had several aspects about it that were inversely related to their theme. They brought the concept and moral value of human equality with them. However, their filming technique, choice of the main actor, and execution in the film scene all reveal a prejudice to one of the races and do not completely depict human equality. It should serve as a lesson to all filmmakers across the world to pay more attention to the details of internal-external human rights in their films. Every character they developed for the film or tale must be based on human rights. Furthermore, if the filmmaker attempts to address a difficult topic, they should be more neutral by not favoring one side or the other.
