Argo is that rare example of a story being
so odd, so fantastical, so gripping; you won’t believe it’s true. It is. Produced,
directed and starring Ben Affleck and set against the backdrop of the Iranian
Hostage Crisis in 1979, the film is is part CIA-thriller, part self referential
Hollywood satire and it is easily one of the year’s best films.
During a violent protest at the U.S.
embassy in Tehran, demonstrators and paramilitaries alike storm the building
and take its inhabitants hostage. Six embassy workers simply walk out the back
door and take refuge from the Canadian embassy. The CIA begin a clandestine
operation to “exfiltrate” the hostages. Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck), who is a
specialist in extraction, exhausts all possibilities finally landing on the
plan to pose as a Canadian film crew looking at exotic desert locations for a Star Wars rip off. He enlists the aid of
John Chambers (the real life Oscar-winning makeup designer for The Planet of the Apes, played by John
Goodman) and Hollywood producer Lester Siegel (played with gleefully acerbic
wit by Alan Arkin) to produce a fake movie titled ‘Argo’. Mendez travels to the
belly of the beast, i.e. Iran to escort the hostages out of the country where
getting caught means certain torture and public execution.
The real tension lies with Mendez and his
attachment to the hostages. Scoot McNairy (seen earlier this year in Killing them Softly) is the standout
actor amongst the hostages as the confrontational Joe Stafford. He quite
understandably is unwilling to put his life in the hands of a complete
stranger. Affleck too gives one of the better performances of his career who
has essentially carved a Phoenix-like career resurrection from tabloid fodder
(from his relationship with Jennifer Lopez) to A-list auteur. Affleck, like
George Clooney, Robert Redford, etc. has essentially written his own ticket by
developing his own stories and roles and knocking them out of the park.
Affleck does try to avoid political
commentary and focus more on the plot and characters. The film cleverly gives a
whirlwind historical lesson of Iran’s complicated history – and the US’s and
Britain’s devastating interference - in comic book animation. The prologue
essentially condenses nearly 50 years of politics and history into a 3 minute
segment but the sequence surprisingly works. Affleck does not portray the
Iranians as savage mindless murderers – but an oppressed people demanding
justice and vengeance for the US’s involvement in their country.
Argo has one of the best casts of the year.
The film is ripe with familiar faces and also familiar faces hidden by makeup
and gnarly 70s facial hair. Bryan Cranston, Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Kyle
Chandler, Titus Welliver all give superb but small roles an invaluable vibrancy
and colour.
Argo is a true story that has gone through
many treatments and is the kind of true story that really should’ve been told
by now. Clooney himself (who serves as co-producer) was tinkering with the
material for some time before Affleck took the reigns. A pedantic critic might
see the material as something any half-competent director could make electric,
but Affleck injects Argo with terrific performances, a nerve shredding tension
and a sharp emotional payoff which is surely destined for Oscar glory.
4/5
