In the American cinema discourse, there is the term "white savior", the "white savior". This character appears in numerous films when it comes to helping an African-American character from an institutional racial misery. Most of the time, she also learns something about herself.

It's a character who is aimed at a white movie crowd, she needs to calm down and straighten up: Hey, we're not ALL bad. There is this type in acclaimed racist dramas like "12 Years a Slave" as well as in "Django Unchained" and in "BlacKKKlansman". And he's also in "Green Book": Viggo Mortensen plays him as a coarse Italian-American Tony "Lip" Vallelonga. The difference to the aforementioned films is: In "Green Book" plays the "White Savior" the main role.

There's no doubt about that right from the start: in a detailed intro, Vallelonga is introduced as a cunning nightclub bouncer from the Bronx, massive, lanky and greasy like a "GoodFellas" cliché. He brings his family with hot dog food competitions, punches or ripoffs. When his wife Dolores (Linda Cardellini) hires two black craftsmen for a home repair, all of the family's available men sit in the living room, watching baseball and watching. The glasses from which the two workers have drunk lemonade throws Tony in the bin: It is 1962 in America. You are a racist.

This simple macho-Klotz is now to accompany one of the most gifted black concert pianists on a tour of the segregation laws of the southern United States - as chauffeur and bodyguard. Don "Doc" Shirley, an educated, highly talented and cultured gentleman friendly with the Kennedy family, lives in a museum-style apartment overlooking the venerable Carnegie Hall. When he receives Tony for a job interview, he sits on a throne. The as always gentle-precise Mahershala Ali ("True Detective") gives his character disarming forlornness and relentless dignity.

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"Green Book": Black drama, white belly

The dramaturgically presumably grossly exaggerated contrast of this constellation is based on a true story: Tony's son Nick Vallelonga wrote the screenplay and co-produced; it was his heart project. "Green Book" is hailed as a racism-agitator and is nominated for six Oscars (including best film): It is, however, despite some moving scenes, not a drama, but a primarily aimed at the belly buddy movie in the tradition of " Escape in Chains "," The Lucky Knights "or, in other words," Driving Miss Daisy ". Likewise, "Green Book" with its naïve premise seems to have overcome all evil in the world, as long as black and white get to know and understand each other personally over societal hurdles.

And of course that's exactly what happens in this surprise-less movie by dodgy director Peter Farrelly ("Stupid and Dumber"): The more the emerald-colored Cadillac moves away from liberal New York with Tony and Doc Shirley, the more the relationship between the two men gets set in motion : From the back, Shirley tries to teach manners to his proletarian driver, he smokes the chain and pushes a whole, rolled-up pizza into the big mouth for dinner. Shirley plays popular music for the white high society in the evenings, but soon he gets to feel that he does not belong to: Led by the equally real "Green Book", the eponymous travel booklet with secure contact points for African Americans, the descents for the celebrated star shabby and dirtier - until the guest of honor is not even allowed to use the toilet at the place of performance.

Green Book
USA 2018
Director: Peter Farrelly
Screenplay: Nick Vallelonga, Peter Farrelly, Brian Hayes Currie
Performers: Viggo Mortensen, Mahershala Ali, Linda Cardellini, Dimiter D. Marinov, Mike Hatton
Production: Participant Media, DreamWorks, Amblin Partners, Innisfree Pictures, Wessler Ent.
Rental: Fox
Length: 130 minutes
FSK: from 6 years
Start: January 31, 2019

Here, in Louisiana and Alabama, the hour of the "White Savior" Tony, who considers himself blacker than Shirley, and familiarizes his distinguished boss with his "own" culture - fried chicken and R & B. He rescues the homosexual, defiant musician from all sorts of threatening situations - not only because he knows it as a white man and his job is, but because he befriended him over all resentments and gaps. Hach.

The existential drama of Don Shirley, which he desperately reveals in a scene ("Not white enough, not black enough, not man enough: what am I ?!") remains unresolved in "Green Book"; The film rushes to the next episode, when looking into the abyss of structural racism and individual alienation might become shocking.

In the video: The trailer for "Green Book"

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ddp / INTERTOPICS / LMKMEDIA

Nevertheless, "Green Book" is not an inedible concoction, but touches and captivates. This is thanks to Farrelly for his talent for comedy, kitsch and timing, but above all Viggo Mortensen and Mahershala Ali: The one who overpowers, the other balances with fine nuances and gestures masterfully. But this dynamic, between two men of different skin color and culture, who harmonize and excite in their acting here in spite of banal omens, is inspiring.