Narrative Structure: Green Room

Fig 1: Theatrical Poster for Green Room (2016) 

Green Room is a 2016 horror film directed by Jeremy Saulnier, starring Anton Yelchin, Patrick Stewart and Imogen Poots. The film starts with a failing punk band who try their luck at one last gig at a popular punk venue. However things aren't as they seem when the band stumble upon a murder of a memeber of the next band to play in the dressing room and discover that the people running the venue are willing to kill them to keep the murder a secret. Without any chance of escaping alive the two bands locks themselves inside the dressing room, but they won't be safe for long.

In the first act of the film, we are given Exposition to the members of the Ain't Rights, the bassist Pat and his friends Sam, Reece and Tiger. The audience is able to see that their careers as punk musicians isn't going to well and because of one last lucky break they are able to play at one last venue out in the Oregon woods that is run by the Neo-Nazi Leader of the skinheads, Darcy Banker.

Fig 2: the Ain't Rights playing in the Neo-Nazi venue

The Inciting Incident occurs when Pat stumbles upon Emily who died from a very recent stabbing and Amber, Emily's best friend who begs him to call the police. This evokes the skinheads in the club to hold the band at gun point inside the green room and for them to be killed under Darcy's orders. The group try to negotiate to leave the room but are left with no other option then to take the bouncer Big Justin hostage and eventually murder him when their requests aren't met. Pat feels useless in the group dynamic as he is the most weak-willed and cowardly, giving up the gun that they had as soon as danger arose.

Fig 3: "This will be over soon gentlemen"

The Obstacles the group faces in the second act are how will they escape, and will they escape the club alive starting with the group trying to find a way to escape the room, only to find that the hidden room underneath is a heroin lab that is locked from the outside. Instead they decided to face the skinheads head on despite their lack of guns relying on improvising with things they found inside the room.

Running out the room into the club, the First Culmination arises when the group are attacked by an attack dog, killing Tiger, but Pat and Amber are able to get the dog to run away using the feedback from the microphones on the stage. Reece tries to jump out a window only to be stabbed to death by a skinhead waiting on the outside.

Fig 4: Tiger's Death

Deciding that retreating back to the room is their best plan, in the Mid Point of the film, the remaining three rush back to the Green Room only to be met by Emily's boyfriend Daniel, who helped the Ain't Rights with organising the show. Willing to leave his life with Darcy and the skinheads, Daniel agrees to help the remaining three escape only to be killed himself by the club's bartender. The three remaining kill the man and take his shotgun, only for Darcy's men to kill Sam and injure Amber. With just two remaining, Pat and Amber return again to the Green Room.

Fig 5: The Three attempt to escape but Darcy and his gang were waiting for them

In the room, Pat and Amber have a chance to talk, Pat reminises on a paintballing match he and his bandmates had, where the band was up against marines and how they resorted to an all out attack on them to win against the more psychically able men they were facing. This helps Pat calm down and make up a strategy to get out of the room.

In the Climax of the film, Darcy sends in two more of his neo-nazi skinheads, leaving the site with the bodies of the casualties of the film. The two survivors use the heroin lab in the bunker under the room to flank the two skinheads, killing them. As the two take the guns and ammo from the two dead skinheads, one of Darcy's right hand men, Gabe, surrenders to the two as he didn't realise how dangerous Darcy's is and calls the police. The two remaining decide not to kill him and let him go as they finally leave the club to go search for Darcy.

Fig 6: Pat waiting for the attackers in the bunker 

Leading straight into the Third Act of the film, Pat and Amber wander in the woods surrounding the club they see Darcy's and his group dumping the bodies of the Ain't Rights, staging it as a group suicide in their van. The two shoot down the hetchmen before closing in on Darcy who tries to flee. Pat and Amber shoot him down however, and just as he turns around to pull a gun on them, Pat shoots him in the head, cause Darcy to miss his target and shoot the van.

Fig 7: Darcy, shot in the head, still fires his gun

As the trauma of the night finally dawns on them, the two survivors are seen sitting down just by the van and the dead bodies of the Ain't Rights, Darcy's hetchmen and Darcy himself. One of the attack dogs plod past them as the two pick up their guns and try to shoot the dog, realising that they are out of ammo and give up, letting the dog lay down on the lap of its master. Back to sitting in the grass, Pat brings up his Desert Island Band, calling back to a previous scene in the film, only for Amber to retort with the films final line "Tell someone who gives a shit"

Fig 8: The remaining two survivors of the night, Pat and Amber

The ending of the Green Room is left partial, all the bad guys in the film are now dead, but so are the rest of the Ain't Rights and a seen that hinted at in the dning fo the film suggests that the rest of Ambers band is off on an off batch of heroin that might of lead to overdosing. The Green Room also fits into the three act structure with some ease and the film as an over arcing plotline of trying to leave the room.

Film Poster: http://cdn2-www.comingsoon.net/assets/uploads/gallery/green-room/gr_web.jpg