Punk music is brisk and brutal. It’s the sound of energy, the emotion of release. It doesn’t linger, refuses to blink, and won’t pull back in the face of disgust. Green Room isn’t a movie about punk music. But it’s one that lives by the same moral creed. Jeremy Saulnier’s follow-up to the 2013 indie darling Blue Ruin takes his unforgiving eye for realist violence and imbues it with a thrashing pace. The end result is bleak, angry and impossible to ignore.

Set deep in the Oregon woods, Green Room follows a punk-rock band that takes a last-second gig at a dive bar inhabited by local skinheads. After the show, they become witness to a murder and are trapped in the green room as the club’s owner (Patrick Stewart) attempts to scrub clean all evidence. As they make a push to survive until morning, the band is forced into increasingly dark territory. The inevitable confrontation is a gore-loaded affair, where the cinematic hopes of our heroes often meet the crushing blows of reality. The script is solid, dotting a simple premise with memorable dialogue and chilling takes on gang warfare.
At 94 minutes, the film moves along at a steady clip. There’s not quite enough time given for the tension of the situation to feel real, or for the honest terror of these characters to come across in the room. The story feels lacking, with characters that never quite get enough definition. The fast pace is exciting to witness, but doesn’t do the script enough justice.
Saulnier’s view on the Northwest backwoods is appropriately muted, painting rural landscapes with cold grey-blues and a smattering of green that sinks into the dark night. Inside the club, fluorescent lights and sparse window light illuminate a space that lives in shadow. This is a dark film in both tone and palate, occasionally to the point of distraction. There’s an honesty to how everything appears on screen, but that isn’t always conducive to great storytelling. Some key moments are overly concealed by the night, subtracting from their impact.
But worry not, as there is plenty of violence left to see in Green Room. The film boasts a classic sensibility to bloodshed, entirely practical and filmed in full. The edits never shy away from the grit and gore, but Green Room never feels excessive or exploitative. Rather, it feels precisely as messy and intolerable as the reality represented. There’s a grounded perspective to every shot, letting the audience feel the tension of what may lurk around every corner. No drama is added to the moment a bullet is fired or a knife pierces flesh. By ripping away many of the comforts that modern cinema uses to shield us from violence, Green Room goes a step beyond.
Like a good punk song, Green Room is harsh, energetic, and over before you know what hit you. But like the genre itself, the aesthetics and overall style might get in the way of really conveying a message.
Green Room will be released in Portland and Seattle on April 22 before expanding nationally on the April 29.
Follow Chris Berg on Twitter @ChrisBerg25