Argo [2012]
Directed by: Ben Affleck
Written by: Chris Terrio
Starring: Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Victor Garber, Tate Donovan, Clea DuVall, Scoot McNairy, Rory Cochrane, Christopher Denham, Kerry Bishé, Kyle Chandler, Chris Messina, Željko Ivanek, Titus Welliver, Philip Baker Hall
Is Ben Affleck a new master of suspense? I’m not heralding a second coming of Hitchcock here, but based on Argo, the moniker certainly applies for the Bostonite. Affleck shows a fantastic talent for building and maintaining tension. After Gone Baby Gone and The Town, he cements his status as one of the finest filmmakers of the new millennium.
Although I actually prefer baby brother Casey in this regard, Ben’s skills as an actor are nothing to sneer at. However, if he keeps this pace up, he’ll go down in history as a gifted writer/director who could act well, instead of the other way around.
Argo isn’t flawless. It abuses a curse “cleverly” involving the name of the movie (that gets old pretty quickly) and loses a bit of steam for a while after an explosive kickoff (literally), but with great performances across the board (Alan Arkin and John Goodman being the standouts), a great 70’s look with acute attention to detail, and a great deal of suspense that rarely lets up, this is one of the best of 2012 and another winner in Affleck’s short but very solid filmography.
Nice milestone Fernando and I still love how you cut to the chase on your reviews. I started out like this and now I find that they’re getting longer and longer as time goes on.
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Thanks, Mark! It’s lack of time, mostly! haha No but seriously, I tend to write longer reviews when they’re about films I feel very strongly about, whether it’s love or hate.
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Congrats, Fernando. It’s amazing how these come up, and an accomplishment. Well done.
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Thanks for the constant support, Michael 🙂
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Great review for a great movie; I loved Argo. Congrats on reaching 300!
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Thank you so much, Alec. Glad you enjoyed both!
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Very excited for this one. I’m going to see it tonight. Personal story: My mother said she’d heard of it from Bible study, when someone compared the rescuing of hostages to John 3:16 (“For God so loved the world….”). And I freaked out, because I had been talking about it nonstop for about a MONTH and the trailers were there every time we went to the movies within the last SIX months….guess she hears God speaking to her, not the TV or her son. 😉
Great review. I’m wondering: did you read Peter Travers’s “Argo” review a few minutes before writing the first paragraph? I remember he had written something about Ben Affleck’s great filmmaking, then clarifying that he was not calling him the next Hitchcock. 🙂
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Hahaha, good story. It’s sometimes like that with moms. Hope you guys enjoy it! Oh, and I swear I didn’t read Travers’s review! Nice coincidence there 😉
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Thanks. Oh and Congrats on the 300th! Wasn’t aware you’d written that many; I’m sort of wondering which of your reviews I have yet to read.
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Well, not all of them are reviews. If you read some of my older posts, let me know what you think 🙂
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Yeah I know not all of them are reviews. 😉
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Great review! I think Ben’s a very capable director indeed, I’l be rooting for him to get a Best Director nomination. I also prefer Casey in terms of acting, even in Good Will Hunting, you could tell that Casey’s a better actor. That’s good though each has their own niche 🙂
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Somehow, Argo was sold out tonight. Out for a month, so it’s well near impossible, especially when everyone’s going to see Twilight and Lincoln. Oh well. So a Good Samaritan refunding his Lincoln tickets offered them to us (that was sold out to), and we’re seeing that now.
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That is so weird! Great word-of-mouth and Oscar buzz right there! Enjoy Lincoln then!
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You too. Yes, you MUST see it!
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I will!
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I just looked and apparently I’d hit my 300th review without even knowing it! “A Nightmare on Elm Street”, which went up last Friday, I think! haha
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Well, congrats then!
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Nice review Fernando. As you know I loved this one and it’s one of my favorites. I didn’t mind the cursing using Argo, thought it didn’t get old 🙂
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Thanks, Nostra 😀
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Nice review man. One of my favourites of the year so far, so glad you liked it too.
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Thanks man. It was pretty good. Wasn’t blown away by it but I loved how Affleck handled suspense.
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Hey I completely agree with how you say people will look back and remember Afflecks career. Its just incredible to think he is getting all of this acclaim now after appearing in horrendous films like Gigli just a few short years ago. Great review and loving the blogathon
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Thanks a lot for dropping by and commenting, David. I appreciate it. Glad you liked my review 😉
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