At first, I didn't have any plans to review ARGO. Not ever. It's nothing personal, political thrillers just don't work for me. I'm aware that reviewing a two and a half years old movie is about the least pertinent thing a reviewer like me can do (it's not a new movie, an award-nominated one or a classic yet), but what can I say? Some movies just have a way of finding you. Not only ARGO did find me, but it also managed to make me feel stupid that I miss out on it. How has it happened exactly? Did Ben Affleck just exerted his vengeance on Hollywood by revolutionizing the most boring movie subgenre and making it cool and engaging?
It seems so.
ARGO has based on the true story of Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck), a CIA exfiltration specialist who rescued six Americans from a political crisis in Tehran, in 1979. Seems straightforward enough, but it's the way Mendez did it that was spectacular. He set up a fake production company through a special effects artist (John Goodman) he knew in Hollywood), found a script, a director, a producer and then flew to Iran in order to scout some locations and rescue his "film crew". This is one of these ideas that are so crazy that they could actually work, except that it totally did. It was an adaptation of Roger Zelazny's novel LORD OF LIGHT that was renamed for hostage rescuing purpose, and storyboarded by Jack freakin' Kirby. Everything about that movie was real, except that it didn't happen.
So, there are two poles to political thrillers, in general: patriotism and history. They're going to express one or the other. ARGO is surprisingly light in patriotism (although you can't really avoid it in big American productions), mostly because it's a lot about the complicated business of making movies. I'm not sure how close to the real thing it was (the screenplay was based on "a selection of passages" in Tony Mendez' book THE MASTER OF DISGUISE), but screenwriter Chris Terrio obviously knows when to drift and draw outside the line. He created a wonderful character in producer Lester Siegel, played energetically by Alan Arkin, proving that good lines delivered by a great actor have transcendent power.
It seems so.
ARGO has based on the true story of Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck), a CIA exfiltration specialist who rescued six Americans from a political crisis in Tehran, in 1979. Seems straightforward enough, but it's the way Mendez did it that was spectacular. He set up a fake production company through a special effects artist (John Goodman) he knew in Hollywood), found a script, a director, a producer and then flew to Iran in order to scout some locations and rescue his "film crew". This is one of these ideas that are so crazy that they could actually work, except that it totally did. It was an adaptation of Roger Zelazny's novel LORD OF LIGHT that was renamed for hostage rescuing purpose, and storyboarded by Jack freakin' Kirby. Everything about that movie was real, except that it didn't happen.
So, there are two poles to political thrillers, in general: patriotism and history. They're going to express one or the other. ARGO is surprisingly light in patriotism (although you can't really avoid it in big American productions), mostly because it's a lot about the complicated business of making movies. I'm not sure how close to the real thing it was (the screenplay was based on "a selection of passages" in Tony Mendez' book THE MASTER OF DISGUISE), but screenwriter Chris Terrio obviously knows when to drift and draw outside the line. He created a wonderful character in producer Lester Siegel, played energetically by Alan Arkin, proving that good lines delivered by a great actor have transcendent power.
"So the way it looks to me, through the cataracts I grant you, is that you can either sign here and take $10,000 for your toilet paper script, or you can go fuck yourself. With all due respect."
I couldn't help but feeling warm and fuzzy for Ben Affleck, during my viewing of ARGO. The man was handed no gift by Hollywood. He turned his career around and reinvented himself into an efficient director, in the same vein than Clint Eastwood, except maybe that his movies are a little more textured, visually and emotionally. I mean, he's not Jim Jarmusch or Nicolas Winding Refn, he doesn't have the vision these guys have, but he's one of these directors who care about a little bit more than profitability. Ben Affleck likes to make movies he can be proud of, and that extra effort and artistic cohesiveness are what put ARGO slightly ahead of the pack.
ARGO is a very good movie. It's not terrific or riveting, but it's a good time. I never thought I'd say that of a political thriller, the subgenre is usually banking on patriotism so hard that it often forgets to craft engaging character, or even tell an interesting story, but it's not the case here. ARGO's a solid, layered thriller that banks on great screenwriting, great acting and a couple of bold directing decisions (I'm thinking of a scene overlapping a reading of the script with Arabic dialogue). I would not berate you if, like me, you conveniently forgot to watch it for the next two and a half years, but you'd be missing on a decent, well-written Hollywood production and we both know that it's increasingly rare.