Green Room

Movie Name: Green Room

Year of Release: 2015

Director: Jeremy Saulnier

Stars: Anton Yelchin, Imogen Poots, Patrick Stewart, Alia Shawkat, Mark Webber, Macon Blair, Joe Cole, Callum Turner, David W. Thompson, Eric Edelstein, Brent Werzner, Samuel Summer, Kai Lennox

Genre: Crime, Horror, Thriller

Score out of ten (whole numbers only): 7
Watch it on Amazon

Synopsis & Review:

Director Jeremy Saulnier is back, following the celebrated "Blue Ruin" which premiered in 2013. "Green Room" follows the story of a punk rock band who is touring the US barely scraping by with the measly dollars they manage to make. After a small debacle, they find themselves in Oregon, playing in a neo-Nazi skinhead club, much to their surprise. Following the show and getting paid, as they're about to leave the premises, one of the band members realizes they forgot their cell phone. When he goes back to retrieve it, he notices a group of people in the green room, surrounding a young woman who has been fatally stabbed. The club organizers bring everyone into the room, where they keep the band under surveillance and unable to leave. Once the owner of the club arrives, things escalate to a whole different level, where they suddenly become the target for this menacing group who wants to erase all evidence they were there.
Jeremy Saulnier has created with "Green Room" a film that is anguishing, and filled with tension. The film successfully builds momentum, and captures the band dynamics between the young individuals, while also displaying their shock and surprise to be caught in such a disturbing and dangerous situation. There's a great balance between a specific aesthetic and style, with a more gruesome and definitely graphic way in which the violence is displayed. The group of actors assembled to bring this story to life is uniformly good, from the eternally underrated Anton Yelchin, to the always great Imogen Poots and of course the fantastic Patrick Stewart, who oozes menace in a role that is quite different from his latest screen incarnations. The cinematography from Sean Porter is stunning. A very good film worth watching.