Anything Goes : "Argo" Film Review by Sean Patrick Burke

“Argo” My Rating: 8.5 out of 10 Friday night and I decided to venture to an evening with the recently directed Ben Affleck film titled “Argo”. My colleague, Adam Hobbs, and I are going to be critiquing films and are in the process of beginning a website. We both felt this was the perfect first film to release to the public and we both thoroughly enjoyed ourselves through this incredibly true political drama. This is Affleck’s third film directing and I went into the film thinking he is going to have his work cut out for him after delivering “Gone Baby Gone” and “The Town” which were both magnificent. Well, I am happy to announce that Affleck delivered once again and is three for three in my book for films he has directed. This film is set in 1981 during an Iranian revolution as it revolves around 6 US citizens who go missing from the United States Embassy. Affleck (who also starred in the film as Tony Mendez), is a specialist in exfiltration, which helps people escape from hostile environments such as this. The film follows Mendez as he comes up with a ridiculous plan revolving a fake Hollywood movie titled “Argo”. The film is suspenseful and extremely well shot. The acting was spot on and there was a perfect amount of comedic relief fostered by actors Alan Arkin and George Goodman. Bryan Cranston also plays a role in the film and although it was a bit of a smaller role, he delivered perfectly per usual. One of my favorite Directors of Photography took the helm on this picture. That man is Rodrigo Prieto (Brokeback Mountain, 21 Grams, and Amores Perros). Throughout the entire film, even during extremely suspenseful scenes, Prieto did an amazing job keeping the camera steady, but moving in an artistic way. I also really enjoyed the overall writing of the project. Great dialogue and all the scenes were well crafted, but there is a few over the top scenes which was expected to some capacity since this still is Hollywood. Anytime films deal with different time periods, wardrobe and set decoration can be a sore spot, but “Argo” delivered here once again. The overall art department did a fantastic job re-creating this part of history and when the film credits role, you will see exactly what I mean when they show “Argo” film stills alongside actual photos from the incident. Speaking of re-creating, the casting of this film was superb. Once again, sit through the credits and see the actors pictures in the movies side by side with the actual people involved in this incident. If there was one weakness of the film, it had to be the original score done by Alexandre Desplat (The King’s Speech, Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows: Part 1). Desplat, who has done some magnificent work in the past, just couldn’t immerse the music into the scenes. When the music was traditional Middle Eastern music, it was amazing, but the remainder was far from that. Overall, I was quite impressed with this film. Affleck is currently making a great name for himself in the director world and I am sure this film will be nominated for a few Academy Awards. Definitely a must see film in theaters and I can assure you, you will not be disappointed. *Rated R, 120 minute Run-time, English Language with parts in Farsi with English Subtitles.