Flick of the Day: Argo

The Tehran hostage crisis is one of the darker days of American history, indeed one of many such days in the course of American policy toward Iran before and after the fall of the Shah in 1979. For those unfamiliar, at the height of the Islamic Revolution in Iran, antipathy toward America spilled over as a group of zealous students stormed the embassy taking the staff hostage and threatening to execute them unless the hated Shah was returned to Iran to face trial. The hostage crisis lasted 444 days and directly contributed to the downfall of Jimmy Carter at the 1980 Presidential Election. That's the tale written in the history books however the lesser known story is that on the day the embassy fell six Americans escaped through a back door and sought refuge in the home of the Canadian Ambassador. Today's flick of the day is the story of how those people escaped.

Argo

The film opens with CIA operative Tony Mendez, played by Ben Affleck, being asked to review the State Department's plan for bringing their 6 diplomats out of Tehran under the noses of the Islamic regime as an expert in the area. He is so appalled at the dangerous stupidity and lack of foresight that he offers to come up with a plan at the behest of his boss played by Bryan Cranston. He quickly comes up with the idea of a fake film crew on location to scout for a new movie as a cover story to get the diplomats out. Thankfully the agency already has a contact in Hollywood in the form of John Goodman's make-up artist John Chambers. In an entertaining fashion, Goodman  takes through the ins and outs of the film business. Before long they have hired ageing producer Lester Siegel, played by the great Alan Arkin and are the road to making a film. They buy a low budget sci-fi script called Argo and set up a production company complete with business cards and an office. After a full page spread in Variety and a launch party, Mendez is on on his way to Iran to sneak the diplomats out. The tension begins to build as the full horrors of the revolution are revealed and the subterfuge begins to unravel.

Around the turn of the Noughties, Ben Affleck's career was in disarray after a string of poor films like Jersey Girl, Gigli and Paycheck. However over the last few years, he has matured into one of the most talented young actor/directors in Hollywood. Argo is his third effort as a director and builds on his previously strong work with Gone Baby Gone and The Town. From the get go, the film exudes the style and music of the era, that brief period at the end of the 1970's before the dawn of the Reagan 80's. As Tony and Chambers pass through the gates of a Hollywood studio, the Sultans of Swing by Dire Straits segues in. Everything feels of the era and there are some great stylistic flourishes which reinforce this sense of realism. The hardest part of making a period film like this is being true to the era and Affleck accomplishes this with aplomb.

Of course he is aided by a great script by Chris Terrio that is at times very funny and entertaining as it pokes fun at the fakery of the real Hollywood and at other times deadly serious as the tension mounts in Tehran. This tension is the real joy of the movie, it becomes almost unbearable as the film reaches its dramatic conclusion and I found myself on the edge of my seat at times. Affleck has created another triumph of a film.

                     In this regard, special attention must be made of the various fine performances, not least from Affleck himself. He is blessed with a male cast to die for in Arkin, Goodman and Cranston, some of the best actors working in Hollywood today. The most difficult roles are I think played by the 6 hostages to fortune stuck in Tehran as they are given little more than cursory back stories and they have to really work as actors to make us care about them.

Overall then, this is a very fine film and perhaps Affleck's best and most mature picture to date. I await his next move with interest. This is a definite contender for an Oscar in my mind if only for the near perfect rendition of an era that perhaps America would prefer to forget.

Not The Flick of The Day: Rock of Ages

Hey YOU! Do you like spandex? Do you like poodle haired soft rock from the 1980's? Do you enjoy the particular visual triumph of singing sunset strip hookers? Wanna see Alec Baldwin (now) in the denims he wore in the 80's? Do you think Tom Cruise can play whatever role he wants? Well Hollywood has the movie for you, Rock of Ages, the big screen adaptation of the boundlessly popular stage musical.

 Rock of Ages

With a plot seemingly taken from an old Guns n Roses video (I am being facetious of course, Axl Rose would never use a plot so mundane when swimming with dolphins was an alternative), a pretty young thing named Sherrie played by Julianne Hough of the recent and even more risible Footloose remake arrives in Los Angeles (On a Greyhound no less) seeking fame and fortune. Unfortunately her baggage  is robbed almost as soon as she arrives and penniless she gets a job working at a famed rock club owned by Alec Baldwin's Dennis Dupree. It is harsh doses of reality like this which give this film its best moments. Ah, I remember the time I was mugged, Alec Baldwin gave me a job too and then sang a great Foreigner tune. Anyway, Sherrie meets  an equally vacuous male companion in the form of Diego Boneta and before long the pair are an item. Of course, there is trouble in paradise in the form of right wing mayor Mike Whitmore, played by a slumming it Bryan Cranston and his batty wife Catherine Zeta Jones. Together they plan to clean the city of its undesirable elements starting with migrant workers. Oh wait, that's real life sorry, no they want to start with the poodle haired rockers. Into this veritable feast of nonsensical bullshit steps quite aptly Tom Cruise. Tom is Stacee Jaxx, a rock god of the confused variety. Cruise plays Jaxx as a kind of perma-stoned demonic messiah who exudes befuddlement and craziness in equal measure. This is Tom Cruise by the way. No irony there at all.

At one point a reporter asks Stacee what the real him is like which causes him to burst into a version of the old Bon Jovi number "Wanted Dead or Alive". This happens quite a lot in Rock of Ages. In lieu of actual plot development characters burst into another soft rock classic. Perhaps this is how modern musicals are supposed to be. Maybe somewhere in the world somebody is sitting in a theatre waiting for a musical to start and saying to their partner "Thank god there is none of that difficult plot stuff, just songs". There is nothing wrong with the musical numbers, nobody makes a fool of themselves, well not any more of a fool, but it just seems at times likes many of the songs are shoehorned in for no good reason other than: 

"Ooh, we've paid for that Journey song, better use it here. "

"But it's a scene where somebody is throwing up?"

"Yeah, a bit of Don't Stop Believing will work"

Maybe I'm just not being fair? Maybe this is exactly what the people of earth wanted to spend their 7 quid on? Maybe the world hasn't tired of Russell Brand? Maybe the world wants to see Tom Cruise singing "I want to know what love is" while face to face with a woman's rear end? That being the case, this is your film world, enjoy it.

Anyway it all comes to a climax in an orgy of Journey and Starship tunes. I know, Starship! I thought they were tied up in a basement somewhere for crimes against music. If there is a ray of light in an otherwise depressing two hours of my life, Paul Giamatti is excellently sleazy as Stacee's manager.
To finish then, rather than the usual trailer which would give this risible trash too much credit, below is Starship's We Built This City (On Rock and Roll) in full.