Green Room (film)

D.C. punk band the Ain't Rights—Pat, Sam, Reece, and Tiger—are travelling the Pacific Northwest, low on funds. After their gig is cancelled, a radio host arranges a new show in a rural area outside Portland through his cousin, Daniel. Arriving at the venue, they realize it is a neo-Nazi skinhead bar and they are opening for an NSBM band, Cowcatcher. They go ahead with the show anyway. During their set, Pat notes two young women, Emily and Amber, looking disturbed and being shepherded out of sight.

As the band is about to leave, Pat returns to the bar's green room to retrieve Sam's cell phone, where he stumbles upon Amber and the members of Cowcatcher standing over the body of Emily, who's been stabbed to death by Werm. Pat calls the police as he flees, but he is caught, and bar employees Gabe and Big Justin capture the rest of the band and confine them in the green room with Amber. Gabe pays one young skinhead to stab another to create a cover story for the police who respond to Pat's call. He consults with the bar's owner, skinhead leader Darcy, who decides all witnesses need to be eliminated. He arranges for Cowcatcher to be given poisoned heroin, while more skinheads assemble at the bar, waiting until nightfall to kill the band and Amber.

The band overpowers Big Justin and holds him hostage, taking his pistol and a boxcutter from his pocket. They negotiate through the door with Darcy, who asks them to surrender the pistol. Pat agrees, on the condition that they keep the bullets, but when he opens the door, the men attempt to force their way in while slashing at his arm. They manage to close the door, but Pat loses the gun and is seriously injured. Big Justin attempts to break free, leading Reece to choke him unconscious. Amber slashes Big Justin's stomach open with the boxcutter.

The band tears up the floorboards and discovers a drug lab under the bar, but the only exit is locked from the outside. Arming themselves with improvised weapons, they attempt to fight their way out. Neo-Nazi Clark unleashes a fighting dog which kills Tiger. Amber and Pat drive the dog away with microphone feedback. Reece escapes through a window, only to be stabbed to death by Alan. Pat, Amber, and Sam retreat to the green room.

Daniel arrives, and Darcy sends him in to kill the remaining survivors, claiming they murdered Emily, his girlfriend. However, he instead talks to them, and Amber explains that Werm murdered Emily after discovering she and Daniel were planning to leave the skinhead life. Darcy grows suspicious of Daniel and searches the trunk of his car, where he finds Daniel and Emily's belongings, indicating that they were planning to escape. He also discovers a baseball bat that Darcy had used to murder someone in the past and realizes that Daniel had intended to blackmail Darcy to let them go by threatening to give it to the police. In the green room, Daniel agrees to help the band escape, but as they venture back out into the bar he is shot dead by the bartender. Pat kills the bartender, and the group takes his shotgun, only to find themselves confronted by the full skinhead force. Sam mortally wounds Clark's dog with the shotgun before it kills her, and Amber is shot as she and Pat once again retreat to the green room.

With the sun rising soon, Darcy has most of the skinheads disperse, taking Clark and Alan with him to stage the band's deaths to make it look as if they were killed while trespassing on his property. Gabe prepares to clean up the bar, while Jonathan and Kyle are dispatched with another dog to finish off Pat and Amber, who formulate a plan for a last stand. They again use microphone feedback to scare off the dog before Pat lures Jonathan into the drug lab. As Kyle stands watch in the green room, Amber emerges from under the cushions of the couch and cuts his throat with the boxcutter. Pat and Jonathan fight, and Amber sneaks up and shoots Jonathan in the head. Gabe enters the green room to find his companions dead and surrenders to Pat and Amber.

Holding Gabe at gunpoint, they trek through the woods. As they near Darcy's house, Pat and Amber decide to go after him while Gabe goes to a nearby farm to call the authorities. Pat and Amber confront Darcy, killing Clark and Alan. Fleeing, Darcy draws Big Justin's pistol but is shot dead. Their ammunition gone, Pat and Amber sit on the side of the road. Alarmed at the return of Clark's dog, they watch it lay beside his body mournfully and leave it alone. Energy spent, they wait for the police.

• Anton Yelchin as Pat, the bassist of the Ain't Rights
• Imogen Poots as Amber, Emily's friend
• Alia Shawkat as Sam, the guitarist of the Ain't Rights
• Joe Cole as Reece, the drummer of the Ain't Rights
• Callum Turner as Tiger, the singer of the Ain't Rights
• Patrick Stewart as Darcy Banker, the leader of the skinheads
• Mark Webber as Daniel, a skinhead and Tad's cousin in a relationship with Emily
• Eric Edelstein as Big Justin, a skinhead bouncer
• Macon Blair as Gabe, a skinhead and club employee
• Kai Lennox as Clark, a skinhead and dogfight breeder
• David W. Thompson as Tad, a radio host and promoter
• Brent Werzner as Werm, a member of Cowcatcher
• Taylor Tunes as Emily, a female skinhead and Amber's friend
• Samuel Summer as Jonathan, a skinhead
• Mason Knight as Kyle, a skinhead
• Colton Ruscheinsky as Alan, a skinhead
• Jacob Kasch as the bartender

The film came from Saulnier's desire to create a thriller set in a green room, calling the idea "an obsession".[10] Saulnier created a short film set in one as part of a 48-hour film challenge in 2007 which involved the supernatural and according to Saulnier was "Really kind of fun and hammy." However, he still wanted a chance to do his green room movie "the right way".[10] Although the film features a large amount of violence and what Saulnier calls "full frontal gore", he has gone on record as stating that it is not "sadistic", and that every act of violence apart from the initiating incident is done with a reason.[11] As such Saulnier made sure that there were no "gratuitous close ups" of recently deceased characters.[11]

On May 22, 2014, it was announced that Broad Green Pictures would finance and produce the film directed and written by Jeremy Saulnier, with Film Science.[12] Anish Savjani, Neil Kopp and Victor Moyers would produce the film.[12] On October 16, Anton Yelchin and Imogen Poots joined the lead cast of the film, along with Alia Shawkat, Callum Turner, Joe Cole, Macon Blair and Mark Webber.[13] On October 21, Patrick Stewart was added to the cast to play Darcy Banker, the leader of a violent white supremacist group,[14] while other cast includes Kai Lennox, Eric Edelstein and Taylor Tunes.[14]

Music

Saulnier, who used to play in a hardcore punk band called "No Turn on Fred,"[19] wanted the film to "stand the test of real musicians scrutinizing every frame."[20] He enlisted Hutch Harris of American indie rock band The Thermals to teach the actors the musical parts that they would be performing onscreen.[21] The film's soundtrack is largely populated by heavy metal artists like Midnight rather than white nationalist bands. Saulnier says that he wanted the club to have more of a Motörhead-like atmosphere, and that he had no intention of financially supporting white nationalist artists.[22]

In addition to the songs appearing on the soundtrack, Green Room features several other punk and metal tracks, including Fear's "Legalize Drugs" (1995), Napalm Death's "Suffer the Children" (1990), Obituary's "Paralyzed with Fear" (2014), Poison Idea's "Taken By Surprise" (1990), Slayer's "War Ensemble" (1990), and Bad Brains' "Right Brigade" (1982).[23]

Green Room (Original Soundtrack Album)
Soundtrack album by various artists
Released	April 15, 2016 (2016-04-15)
Genre	Punk rock
Length	59:47
Label	Milan Records

Green Room (Original Soundtrack Album)[24]

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Artist(s)	Length
1.	"Weapons Ready"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	2:17
2.	"What Have I Become?"	Benjamin Macensky Ezra Mihalcin Matt Mihalcin	The Ain't Rights	2:19
3.	"Corpus Rottus"	Corpus Rottus	Corpus Rottus	3:02
4.	"Oregon Coast"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	0:50
5.	"Balefire"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	0:51
6.	"Prowling Leather"	Jamie Walters	Midnight	3:38
7.	"Nazi Punks Fuck Off"	Darren Henley Eric Boucher Geoffrey Lyall Raymond Pepperell	The Ain't Rights	1:07
8.	"Red Laces"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	2:00
9.	"Pour A Floor"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	2:38
10.	"Blades And Fangs"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	3:15
11.	"Coronary"	Sam Jones	The Ain't Rights	3:03
12.	"Inevitable Failure"	Hochstedder	Hochstedder	3:13
13.	"Mosh Pit"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	0:55
14.	"Mopping Up"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	2:18
15.	"Let's Pretend"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	3:10
16.	"Savage Pressure"	Battletorn	Battletorn	1:04
17.	"Takin' Out The Trash"	Christian Blunda Patsy Gelb	Patsy's Rats	3:17
18.	"Melted"	Christian Blunda Patsy Gelb	Patsy's Rats	2:44
19.	"Odin Himself"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	6:10
20.	"Fresh Air"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	1:38
21.	"The Residence"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	3:10
22.	"We Need The Police"	Brooke Blair Will Blair	Brooke Blair and Will Blair	1:46
23.	"Sinister Purpose"	John Cameron Fogerty	Creedence Clearwater Revival	3:20
24.	"Toxic Evolution"	Sam Jones	The Ain't Rights	2:02
Total length:				59:47

Actor Anton Yelchin at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival premiere of Green Room

On October 29, 2014, WestEnd Films acquired the international rights to the film.[25] The film had its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival on May 17, 2015.[26] Shortly after, it was announced A24 had acquired distribution rights to the film.[27] The film screened on opening night of the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival, on September 10, 2015.[28]

The film was originally to open in a limited release on April 1, 2016, before opening in a wide release on April 15, 2016.[29] However, it was moved to April 15, in limited release, and May 13 wide.[9]

Wikiquote has quotations related to Green Room (film).

• Official website
• Green Room at IMDb
• Green Room at Box Office Mojo
• Green Room at Rotten Tomatoes
• Green Room at Metacritic