Green Room (Jeremy Saulnier)

[number8]

IMDB

[number8]

This is fucking awesome.

Not Blue Ruin awesome, but pretty awesome.

[Morris Schæffer]

I want to see this because of evil Patrick Stewart.

[Peng]

Well, that was one violent, visceral kick of maximum-impact tension. Not as thematically minded as Blue Ruin. And to good effect, I'd say. That one seemed like it thought up the thematic concept of protagonist first, then trying to build convincing story or situations around it second, with mixed results. This one feels fully conceived from a story and logistics standpoint, with the heartstopping situations and staging more than enough to get us to care for these innocent people.

I also continue to love the way Jeremy Saulnier tackled violence: not as shock/jump scare but as casual, grisly happenings, which makes it simutaneously more bearable to witness while it's unspooling (jump scare + extreme violence would be the death of me) but also more viscerally disturbing since it seems so real and awful to our protagonists. And the threats of violence are really, really felt throughout; my muscles still tensed walking out of the theater.

[number8]

I also continue to love the way Jeremy Saulnier tackled violence: not as shock/jump scare but as casual, grisly happenings, which makes it simutaneously more bearable to witness while it's unspooling (jump scare + extreme violence would be the death of me) but also more viscerally disturbing since it seems so real and awful to our protagonists.

The gun hand-off scene is a great example of this. [

Show Spoiler

There's a lot of build up and carefulness leading up to it, when it happens you're completely prepared for it and you never even see any of the hacking, but then you see the aftermath and the film lingers so long on Yelchin's pain.

]

[TGM]

This is fucking awesome.

Fucking awesome is right, this movie was sick! Absolutely loved it, so tightly well written, so incredibly well realized visually, this is definitely one of my favorites this year so far.

[Henry Gale]

Hol. Eeee. Fuck.

Maybe one of most sensorially arresting, deeply intense and numbingly shocking movies I've ever seen in the theatre. (Peng already used the most optimal word, "visceral", to describe it all, but it reeeeally is.) If I'd watched it at home I'm not sure I would have had the same obligation and self-control to endure it all so maximally. Not that simply pausing for a bathroom break would have likely eased the relentless tension.

So much credit needs to be given to the opening section of the movie, which creates this palette of an ethereal slice-of-life of a band on the road, scraping sideways to different lows all for the search of reaching that momentary bliss of them performing their music exactly how they want and having that connection with an audience. Such a shame it had to be that audience.

I feel like I'm saying this a lot recently, but I really do recommend going into this knowing and having seen as little as possible beforehand just as I did, especially since I think the red-band trailer I just watched gives away a lot. All that I knew beforehand was the core cast, how people were broadly but enthusiastically going on about it since TIFF, that its plot involved punks and neo-nazis, and that no one quite knew how to classify it genre-wise (which I now understand more than ever). Just know if you're in any way significantly affected by unnerving, deeply violent filmmaking, this probably isn't something for you. Luckily for the rest of us comfortably desensitized folks, it's great, and still unusually stunning in that way. It genuinely takes a lot for me to really be totally rendered speechless/breathless by stuff -- and maybe it was because I was a bit overly-caffeinated and the stress of everything in the movie only overly accentuated it -- but my jaw started to physically bother me after about the third or fourth time the movie made it drop. Just thinking about some of it makes me shudder.

It's also very funny.

[Irish]

What Peng said, and also:

My stomach was in knots for most of the runtime. It's hard to watch and even though it doesn't approach like a horror film I'd say this is one of the best horror films of the year.

Simple old plot. Nice twist in perspective (punks vs skinheads). Minimal dialogue. No bullshit. Nail biting tension.

[Dead & Messed Up]

This movie was absolutely arresting and satisfying, siege horror done about as well as it can be done, even if the film felt just a shade too insubstantial to cross over into shake-me-silly neo-classic status. I'll just have to settle for having a fantastic visceral experience, well-acted, sharply written, with real attention to the cruelty of the violence and a willingness to subvert expectations (after the hand-hacking, I figured Yelchin was the Janet Leigh of the film, since he's the most recognizable name beyond ol Patty-Stew).

[Dukefrukem]

Phenomenal. Tension was unreal.

[megladon8]

We did enjoy the heck out of this, but there's something about this kind of visceral, realistic violence and gore that has really been bothering me lately. Bone Tomahawk shook me to the bone for a good day or two, and this one really got me as well (though not as badly).

Not a slight against the movie at all, just an observation about myself. I never got enjoyment or entertainment value from torture porn flicks, but now they seem to actually bother me.

The tension here is palpable, and it's an impressive feat that they kept it so effectively tense all the way through.

A strong script and great acting all around. Loved the realistic reactions the characters had to the violence and the situations (especially appreciated Yelchin's crying through the ordeal, while not in any way being painted as cowardly).

Also had no idea until after seeing it that it's by the guy who did Murder Party - a movie I really dug. I want to see Blue Ruin even more now.

[dreamdead]

Mild yay. As others have noted, the film sustains a lot of tension once the end of the first act hits. And it's a bit surprising that some of the other bandmates get eliminated in such antiheroic ways since they appear better suited to the combat that they're asked to adopt. Yelchin has a really sweet charisma and accent here, though, and it's ultimately his show.

There are perhaps a few too many moments when Saulnier goes for aesthetic juxtapositions--dropping the hardcore music out for ambient during a band performance or slow tracks in to reveal Poots sneaking up on a Nazigoer hurting bandmates when I'd prefer that he keep things more chaotic. And Macon Blair's character begs for more dimensionality by film's end. Still, a quality thriller.

[Ezee E]

Wow.

It's taken a while for me to get to this movie. I actually even saw the first 15-20 minutes earlier on a whim, and had to stop for reasons I've already forgot.

Which makes the rest of the movie all the more intense as I had no idea what was coming. Holy cow.

It's wrenching and suspenseful for sure. There are no rules to the movie. Characters with backgrounds or themes may never get them resolved. That's a good and bad thing. It's all about the moment and true survival. One would wonder how often this happens as the Oregon group reacted like they made a small fiscal error that would just fix itself later.

In such a small time, I was really interested in the music group, the Ain't Rights, and would've been completely fine if we just saw them on the road show.

Good stuff.

[Skitch]

This is fucking awesome.

Not Blue Ruin awesome, but pretty awesome.

Agreed. What knocks it down a peg from BR is its so oppressively mean-spirited that its hard to enjoy it as entertainment. Easy thumbs up though, because the filmmaking at work is undeniably excellent, but still, DAMN.

[Grouchy]

Man, was this a great thriller or what? Agreed with those praising the skillful character development of the first half hour and the sudden brutality of the violence. These are the most convincingly scared characters I've seen in a long, long time. Also great to see Maybe from Arrested Development.