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★★★★★
25 October 2012
This article is a review of ARGO. |
“Brace yourself, it’s like talking to the two old f*cks from THE MUPPETS,” Jack O'Donnell (Bryan Cranston) to Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck)
Who’d have guessed it? A damning indictment on regime change, smuggled out by director-star Affleck & team as an exhilarating thriller. That’s three for three, from the former Bennifer, in the helmer’s chair. Starring in PEARL HARBOUR and PAYCHECK has finally been atoned for, thanks to: GONE BABY GONE, THE TOWN and now ARGO. Those that believed that Matt Damon did all the work on GOOD WILL HUNTING are probably choking up their belligerent pie. Hell, if you could’ve dated Jennifer Lopez, wouldn’t you? Not to patronise the man, but Affleck has grown into a filmmaker that, with a couple more pictures, could be talked of in the same breath as Michael Mann. Both are concerned with: intelligence, heart and brawn – the ideal combo.
Who’d have guessed it? A damning indictment on regime change, smuggled out by director-star Affleck & team as an exhilarating thriller. That’s three for three, from the former Bennifer, in the helmer’s chair. Starring in PEARL HARBOUR and PAYCHECK has finally been atoned for, thanks to: GONE BABY GONE, THE TOWN and now ARGO. Those that believed that Matt Damon did all the work on GOOD WILL HUNTING are probably choking up their belligerent pie. Hell, if you could’ve dated Jennifer Lopez, wouldn’t you? Not to patronise the man, but Affleck has grown into a filmmaker that, with a couple more pictures, could be talked of in the same breath as Michael Mann. Both are concerned with: intelligence, heart and brawn – the ideal combo.
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Through storyboards and archive footage, the audience is efficiently shown how a coup engineered by America and Britain removed the democratic elected leader of Iran in response to his nationalising the country’s oil. In his place the tyrannical and out of tune Shah was placed. Through revolution, the hard line religious faction in turn ousted the usurper. We join the action as the capital’s citizens protest outside the US embassy in Tehran, on the 4th November 1979. The demand is for the American government to hand back the Shah, who has successfully petitioned for shelter, for trial under the new government.
At breakneck pace, which never lets up through the two-hour runtime, the building is overrun and hostages taken. However, a handful of employees working in the visa office escape and find sanctuary at the Canadian ambassador’s residence. Time is ticking before they are found out. Affleck’s elite CIA operative, Mendez, offers the “best bad idea” they have, audacious and ludicrous: pretend to be a Canadian crew location scouting a B-movie sci-fi flick, and sneak them out of the country. I don’t remember Bourne, Hunt or Bond contemplating such a strategy. I knew the ending, this shouldn’t have been tense, e.g. APOLLO 13, but ARGO is edge-of-your-seat stuff.
You maybe thinking, what’s the point? Remember the US couldn’t invade in the wake of Vietnam. Sound familiar?
The dialogue fizzles it is so cracking, like a 1930s rom-com; HIS GIRL FRIDAY by way of THE PLAYER via SPY GAME. We have an expert thrill ride with top character actors handed great lines, and they don’t fumble. Affleck plays it straight, and let’s everyone else eat up the screen: Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Scoot McNairy and of course the epitome of current screen magnetism, Cranston. But high five has to go to Mr Ben, who orchestrates with panache without intrusiveness.
“Don’t f*ck up. The whole country is watching you, they just don’t know it.”
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