While the Oscars on Sunday evening were full of heartfelt moments and crowd-pleasing wins, not all left Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre with a smile.
Even though he was fresh off his first Oscar win for adapting the screenplay for his film BlackKklansman, Spike Lee was outraged when Julia Roberts announced the controversial Green Book as the Best Picture of 2018. He was about to storm out of the theater when Jordan Peele, a producer on BlackKklansman, stopped Lee from walking out the doors. Instead, Lee decided to protest by pitting his back to the stage as the Green Book team gave their acceptance speech.
Green Book certainly did not move throughout awards season without its share of difficulty. There was the incident of star Viggo Mortensen employing a racial slur during a press interview, as well as the family of Don Shirley (portrayed by two-time Academy Award winner Mahershala Ali), not being happy with the overall film. Yet, it has always been viewed as a favorite for the prestigious final award, and Lee’s BlackKklansman was never highly predicted to win out over it. To read even more about Green Book’s controversy, click here.
Though this event is certainly sour, there is some humor to be had with it. At the Academy Awards honoring the movies of 1989, the film Driving Miss Daisy won the top prize. That film, starring Morgan Freeman and Jessica Tandy, has many parallels to Green Book. Lee certainly made this and his bitter attitude obvious in subsequent press interviews. When asked what he thought about Green Book’s win, he stated “every time someone’s driving somebody, we lose – they just changed the seating arrangement this time.”
—
In my opinion, Green Book deserved to win Best Picture. It was one of my favorite films of 2018, and was an impressive dramatic debut for director Peter Farrelly. I certainly can see the argument for Green Book being a safe choice. I also can see that the film’s message can be seen as rather simplistic. But, I believe that this was the kind of movie America needed in today’s day and age. Lee tackles similar racial issues in BlackKklansman, but that film’s tone is a gut punch compared to Green Book’s light tap. Green Book also exists to serve as a “feel-good” movie – one that audiences can walk away from with their heads held high. With the current politic climate, I believe that we deserve a movie that can make us feel good about ourselves and our country. It’s just a shame that we can’t all feel that way.
John's Blog 