Green Room

Writer/director Jeremy Saulnier follows his mesmerising revenge tale Blue Ruin with another pulsating and riveting thriller. Here, young punk band the Ain't Rights (led by Star Trek's Anton Yelchin) end up in the wrong place at the wrong time when they play a gig in the backwoods of Oregon. The fact the audience is made up of snarling neo-Nazi skinheads barely registers with these rockers, who proceed to provoke with gusto (Dead Kennedys fans will know how). However, when they return to the green room and find a dead body, the quartet and local girl Amber (Imogen Poots) are soon besieged by vicious thugs with no qualms about using dogs and knives to eliminate the unwanted witnesses. After all, merciless head Nazi Patrick Stewart (all mellifluous menace) wants no proof of gunplay, just victims of canine attack. Cue lashings of savage violence as the frantic five try to escape the secluded club. However, like the vagrant avenger of Blue Ruin, the heroes prove just as amateurish and shambolic in their attempts to survive. The contrast between the pastoral setting and shocking blood-letting generates lots of breathless tension, putting Green Room in good company with down-and-dirty siege flicks like Assault on Precinct 13 and especially Straw Dogs.