Argo (Ben Affleck, 2012)

[Anhedionisiac]

Not that I know of, but you can always email him (or tweet at him) and see if he will.

I followed your advice, hearthesilence, and tweeted him. He was gracious enough to answer that he'd rather not write about Argo since he's only seen the first 10-15 minutes and, in his own words, has no reason to see the rest. Fair enough.

[hearthesilence]

Wow, no kidding? Well, if he hated the first 15 that much, I can't see how he would've enjoyed the rest of the film, that's for sure.

[Black Hat]

Being Iranian American I had avoided this film out of fear for my head exploding, but I finally said what the hell Iran's been shat on and misrepresented for 30+ years Argo can't possibly make its reputation any worse than it already is and handed over my 14 bucks. Felt it handled the sensitive politics of it very well, in every way Zero Dark Thirty did not and to boot was a terrific film. Yes, Ben Affleck's tough to take as an actor, Mr. Master of Disguise he most certainly is not, however as a director I thought he employed a deft hand. Particularly enjoyed and give him credit for the self deprecating John Goodman line about what you need to know to be a director. Yes, the final scenes were too cartoonish for my liking, but I really enjoyed the story. I suppose a case could be made that not every Iranian is a fan or a member of the revolutionary guard even in 1979 or for more exposition rather than the foaming at the mouth anger almost every time an Iranian was on screen, but personally I didn't feel it was necessary, nor troubling. And lets be real this could have easily been a million times worse. Did find it interesting that a lot of the Farsi spoken wasn't subtitled as there was some exposition there in the Bazaar scene that would have added something. I also don't know where they found these Farsi speakers, probably 'Tehrangeles', those were some bloody awful accents. Oh and does anybody whether or not the story of Sahar is true? And if so what became of her?

[Black Hat]

There were also myriad opportunities to get maudlin, melodramatic, jingoistic (or conversely cynical), or mired in the Iranian side of things...but each and every one of these pitfalls was avoided.

Did you walk out ten minutes early or something? Goodness me! There won't be stronger vomit-in-the-mouth shot all year than that one with Affleck and his wife having a cuddle in front of the American flag a minute or two before the end.

Wait, what? This really happened??? Hilarious! I completely tuned out from the time the guardsmen started banging on the Swiss Air glass door. That's what I hate about these mainstream Hollywood flicks, for my own sanity I've trained myself to check out whenever I sense the the stupidity cheese scale is about to go off the charts and on occasion miss out on great bits of unintentional comedy.

[Andre Jurieu]

I also don't know where they found these Farsi speakers, probably 'Tehrangeles', those were some bloody awful accents.

Affleck has mentioned in a few different interviews that the production attempted to cast actual Iranian actors from overseas for the Farsi-speaking roles, but they were thwarted by bureaucracy, budget, and a limited pool of actors. He then decided to cast these roles using the Farsi-speaking community within Los Angeles.

["membrillo"]

Not that I know of, but you can always email him (or tweet at him) and see if he will.

I followed your advice, hearthesilence, and tweeted him. He was gracious enough to answer that he'd rather not write about Argo since he's only seen the first 10-15 minutes and, in his own words, has no reason to see the rest. Fair enough.

Am I alone in finding that disconcerting? I don't understand how he can call it the worst film of 2012 if he has only seen 10 to 15 minutes of it.

[Jeff]

[quote=""membrillo""]Am I alone in finding that disconcerting? I don't understand how [Jonathan Rosenbaum] can call it the worst film of 2012 if he has only seen 10 to 15 minutes of it.[/quote]
He can't. At least he can't expect people give any sort of credence to that opinion. I can absolutely understand people who have seen the entire film finding it overrated or having problems with its tone or politics. Referring to it as the worst film of the year is pretty damned stupid though, especially when he hasn't, you know, seen it. I thought Nothing was the only one who pulled that sort of stunt.

[TheDudeAbides]

There were also myriad opportunities to get maudlin, melodramatic, jingoistic (or conversely cynical), or mired in the Iranian side of things...but each and every one of these pitfalls was avoided.

Did you walk out ten minutes early or something? Goodness me! There won't be stronger vomit-in-the-mouth shot all year than that one with Affleck and his wife having a cuddle in front of the American flag a minute or two before the end.

Wait, what? This really happened??? Hilarious! I completely tuned out from the time the guardsmen started banging on the Swiss Air glass door. That's what I hate about these mainstream Hollywood flicks, for my own sanity I've trained myself to check out whenever I sense the the stupidity cheese scale is about to go off the charts and on occasion miss out on great bits of unintentional comedy.

Ugh there was some major cheese at the end of this film. The Swiss Air door scene I didn't mind so much as it created tension and really led to the whole escape scene being more dramatic and nerve racking; yes it was super cheesy but narratively it had a purpose.

For me the vomit-inducing moment was the "WE DID IT!!!" sequence; it was so incredibly lame and overly sentimental. When they cut to a close up of Brian Cranston with tears in his eyes I actually laughed in disgust while choking back my vomit caused by the excessive amount of fromage I just induced. That said I still enjoyed the film, although that partially ruined it for me.

I've found that as a general trend in all of Affleck's directed films; I've rather enjoyed most of his movies until the endings when they get so overly sentimental and cheesy that I get nauseous.

I didn't find this to be one of the best films of the year, but its definitely got that kind of touch that the Oscar voters love; I'm sure it will take best picture and honestly if it does, I won't be really pissed off. Not nearly as pissed as I will be if that Spielberg American-masturbatory picture wins, which I think has a really good chance at winning solely because America loves yanking its chain to its own 'greatness' (I don't hate America nor Americans btw, just an observation)

[mfunk9786]

That's some observation!

[HistoryProf]

Jealous much Canuck?

[mfunk9786]

I guess we should all be ashamed of the guy who decided to get off his ass and pull the strings necessary to abolish slavery. What a movie that'd be.

[Murdoch]

Everybody knows Bill and Ted did him best

[Grand Illusion]

I'm sure it will take best picture and honestly if it does, I won't be really pissed off. Not nearly as pissed as I will be if that Spielberg American-masturbatory picture wins, which I think has a really good chance at winning solely because America loves yanking its chain to its own 'greatness' (I don't hate America nor Americans btw, just an observation)

Isn't the point that half of America was abhorrent, and it took an extreme amount of effort from a certain individual to stop us from treating each other like animals? Hardly "rah rah America" stuff.

[MichaelB]

I can't imagine how anyone could get the impression that Lincoln's message is "rah rah America". Unless they'd made up their mind about it before seeing it.

[mfunk9786]

Or their screen name and avatar suggests that they're 16 years old and just saw The Big Lebowski for the first time a few weeks ago

[Brian C]

Rosenbaum elaborates, kind of, on his reaction to Argo.

[knives]

It's frustrating that I can't really disagree with that since I liked both films.

[Murdoch]

The swipe at Cousins at the end sticks out as strange to me since he goes from basically saying "hey, here's someone who agree with me!" to "he doesn't get it either."

[knives]

Totally, but it wouldn't be Rosenbaum without some irrational crankiness.

[Highway 61]

Has this been posted yet? Robert Fisk enjoyed the movie, despite acknowledging its historical inaccuracies. "While Argo deviates from the facts of the diplomats’ escape, it does – chillingly and with enormous veracity – capture the mood of suspicion and savage vengeance in post-revolutionary Tehran."

[hearthesilence]

Argo doesn't deserve the Oscar

I’m less concerned with the veracity of individual details than with the fact that “Argo” uses its basis in history and its mode of detailed realism to create something that is entirely mythological... Affleck and Terrio are spinning a fanciful tale designed to make us feel better about the decrepit, xenophobic and belligerent Cold War America of 1980 as it toppled toward the abyss of Reaganism, and that’s a more outrageous lie than any of the contested historical points in “Lincoln” or “Zero Dark Thirty.” It’s almost hilarious that the grim and ambiguous portrayal of torture in Kathryn Bigelow’s film – torture that absolutely happened, however one judges it and whatever information it did or didn’t produce – was widely decried as propagandistic by well-meaning liberals who never noticed or didn’t care about Affleck and Terrio’s wholesale fictionalization.

[Mr Sausage]

Read that paragraph again. His main thesis is that the film makes us feel better about America. Now ask yourself: what's the "lie" he accuses Argo of? Of making people feel better about America, an America he apparently feels is beneath contempt as a totality. That is literally a matter of opinion. How much someone vaguely likes a country as a whole is not a factual matter. You can't lie by indirectly making people feel good about their country by making them feel good about its handling of a particular crisis. Nevermind a somewhat complex reaction where someone can dislike America for its Cold War idiocies and like it at the same time for, say, its handling of the events shown in Argo; nevermind that a single unvarying opinion on something as vast, as mutable, and as contradictory as an entire country is lazy, silly, and absolutist; nevermind all that. There is only one way you're allowed to feel about America, and Andrew O'Hehir knows exactly what that is, and you're a liar and worse if you deviate from that even slightly. You can't have any other opinion or you're a liar. He knows the truth, and by god you'd better agree. There is no debate.

[matrixschmatrix]

I think it's perfectly true that an exercise in rah rah populism featuring a (the?) positive event in Reaganism, CIA adventurism, and US foreign policy is absolutely inherently propagandistic regardless of how factual the material is, in the same way that Potemkin is inherently propagandistic- selecting that particular story to highlight and tell has a specific intention and effect, particularly when a lot (though not all) of the context for that story is outside the scope of the film. To call that form of propaganda a 'lie' seems foolish- it may be deceptive, but it's the kind of deception that's inherent to any narrativization of history, in varying degrees. I think it's somewhat insulting to dismiss as 'hilarious' the concerns over Zero Dark Thirty in light of that kind of propaganda, as Bigelow's film awakens a very specific and narrow concern about one of the most shameful things in recent American history, as opposed to a broad and common-to-Hollywood feelgoodishness about things that are on the whole pretty horrible, which is what I'd accuse Argo of. But I think it's fair to critique the movie for what it is, and for what it chooses to be, and I think that's what O'Hehir's getting at.

[cdnchris]

I'm still trying to get the whole "rah rah" criticism that everyone is accusing the film of. I haven't seen it since opening weekend, but I recall an opening that was somewhat critical of how the West interfered with Iran, laying out the basis as to why the revolution occurred in the first place. The rest of the film presents Americans trying to get other Americans out of the country. What the hell else are they supposed to do? Leave them there where there was a good chance they would be killed? I don't recall anything stating that Reganism was awesome or that the U.S. was in the right for what was going on there. All I recall is that people were trapped in the country and they had to get them out.

[mfunk9786]

I found it to be an interesting and uplifting story - but I didn't leave galvanized about America in any way that I wasn't going in... in fact, it sort of made America come off as a big lumbering obstacle in the way of Affleck's CIA agent character's and Canada's ability to try to rescue these people as quickly as possible. This reminds me of accusations of, say, misogyny in a film that doesn't contain it that tend to reveal something more about the accuser than the film being accused. Just because you see this rah rah patriotism in Argo doesn't mean it's definitively there, and that even if it is, it hits everyone in the same spots.