Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, and John Goodman in ‘Argo’

Winning Academy Awards for best picture, best writing, and best achievement in film editing, the film Argo (2012) tells a story based on actual events depicted in a book written by a CIA operative and a 2007 Wired magazine article. The underlying events of the story traced back to a three year hostage crisis in Iran that began in 1979. Based on the fact that the end result was something I knew walking in, I found the movie better than it had to be.

(From left, Bryan Cranston as Jack O’Donnell and Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez in Argo).

Argo stars director Ben Affleck as American intelligence officer Tony Mendez, Bryan Cranston as Jack O’Donnell, Alan Arkin as Lester Siegel, and John Goodman as John Chambers. Mendez, O’Donnell, Siegel and Chambers were key members of the American effort to get six members of the American embassy in Tehran in the aftermath of the Iranian Revolution of 1978-1979. The film took pains to provide the historical context of the time, along with the series of bad ideas to get six Americans to safety.

(From left, John Goodman as John Chambers and Alan Arkin as Lester Siegel in Argo).

The six Americans holed up in the Canadian embassy in Tehran were Kathy Stafford as played by Kerry Bishé, Joe Stafford as played by Scoot McNairy, Mark Lijek as played by Christopher Denham, Bob Anders as played by Tate Donovan, Lee Schatz as played by Rory Cochrane, and Cora Lijek as played by Clea DuVall. Mark and Cora Lijek were a couple.

(From left, Kerry Bishé as Kathy Stafford, Scoot McNairy as Joe Stafford, Christopher Denham as Mark Lijek, Tate Donovan as Bob Anders, Rory Cochrane as Lee Schatz, and Clea DuVall as Cora Lijek in Argo).

Argo as a film was praised for its cinematic experience, as well as the acting in particular of Alan Arkin and John Goodman as film producers that helped bring the fiction of a film within Argo called the same thing. Historical complaints of note for the film included that the Canadian embassy’s part in the rescue was larger than portrayed, that British and New Zealand embassies had turned the Americans away,  and that the actual danger for the six American captives, Mendez, and Ken Taylor (as played by Victor Garber) may have been less than portrayed.

(From left, Victor Garber as Ken Taylor and Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez in Argo).

The story of the “exfiltration” of six Americans from Tehran, Iran in the midst of a political revolution in the late 1970s during the presidential administration of Jimmy Carter made for good cinema. I appreciated the movie at the time of its release, and I enjoyed it again upon watching the film just recently. My recommendation is that you watch the film. I offer the movie Argo 4.5-stars on a scale of one-to-five.

Matt – Saturday, June 13, 2020

Ben Affleck, Jeremy Renner and the film ‘The Town’

There were the towns of Charlestown and Boston in Massachusetts, serving as characters just as distinctly as the people in the movie The Town (2010). There was the notion of burglary, armored trucks, banks, and Fenway Park serving as places just as distinctly as there were funny notions of love and loyalty. Finally, there was the resolution of criminals fighting the notion of getting pinched, all tracing back to the source story for The Town, based on the book Prince of Thieves by Chuck Hogan.

(Slaine as Albert ‘Gloansy’ Magloan, Ben Affleck as Doug MacRay, Jeremy Renner as James Coughlin, and Owen Burke as Desmond Elden in The Town).

Ben Affleck plays Doug MacRay and Jeremy Renner plays James Coughlin, two members of a four member burglary set with Albert ‘Gloansy’ Magloan and Desmond Elden who rob banks and armored vehicles for money as a relatively practiced and efficient burglary ring having grown up in Charlestown. There is definite history among the group, which is revealed with suggested emotional depth through the film that at times is undersold by through the film. Renner is especially convincing in his role as Thomas Coughlin.

(Jon Hamm as FBI S.A. Adam Frawley, left, and Rebecca Hall as Claire Keesey in The Town).

After a burglary that includes the taking of a hostage, Doug MacRay takes a love interest in Claire Keesey, as played by Rebecca Hall. Seeing connections between this robbery and the organization run out of the flower business of a notorious criminal run by Fergus ‘Fergie’ Colm, FBI S.A. Adam Frawley and Dino Ciampa land pursue the criminals.

(Pete Postlethwaite as Fergus ‘Fergie’ Colm, top, and Dennis McLaughlin as Rusty in The Town).

Jon Hamm plays FBI S.A. Adam Frawley while Pete Postlethwaite plays Fergus ‘Fergie’ Colm. Rusty aids Colm in the delivery of messages as appropriate in service of the larger enterprise, which eventually turns to the large heist that The Town is leading towards. The backdrop of their illegal enterprise is the store front of the flower shop run by Colm.

(Left to right: Chris Cooper as Doug MacRay’s father Stephen MacRay, Blake Lively as James Coughlin’s sister and Doug MacRay’s baby mother Krista Coughlin, and Titus Welliver as Dino Ciampa, who grew up in Charlestown and serves as assistant to Adam Frawley in The Town).

Besides the tension of the burglary, pressure to pull another heist, and the pull of family for James and Krista Coughlin, Doug and Stephen MacRay, and the added love angle with varying degrees of loyalty, time spent in jail, and the depths that some have gone and will go for these different constructs, that the past as well as place pull on each of these run deep. Even FBI man Dino Ciampa bears baggage in this tale, and the resonance is there and communicated well. That many of these culminate in a crowning jewel to these points in the story of Boston, and specifically Fenway Park, reinforces the larger pathos of many of these points in the story.

(Ben Affleck as Doug MacRay and Jeremy Renner as James Coughlin outside Fenway Park in The Town).

The emotion and the questions underpinning this story are winners governing the telling of this story. The hardest part for me in giving the telling of this story through the cinematic telling of The Town is that I never believed Ben Affleck as Doug MacRay. It simply feels to me like Affleck wanted this role along with the telling of this story too much. The emotion of the character, as I felt, never really rang true for me. For a movie that I very much wanted to rate higher, I give The Town 3.50-stars on a scale of one-to-five.

Matt – Monday, December 16, 2019