Argo

So what's the big deal about Argo?  Aside from the fact that it sounds like something a pirate might say, I mean.  Argo is one of those movies that wears its "based on a true story" claim as a badge of honor.  There are two types of movies that push claims like that: movies that want to be capital "I" Important and movies that are so unbelievable that they have to legitimize themselves by pointing out that the unbelievable sometimes actually happens.  Which is Argo?  A little from column A, a little from column B.

When the American embassy in Iran was invaded in 1979, there were six embassy employees that managed to sneak out and avoid being part of the Iran hostage crisis.  They weren't able to leave the country, though.  Every Westerner (or, I guess, anybody looking American) was closely monitored and security in and out of the country was multiplied.  The six escapees managed to find shelter with the Canadian ambassador (Victor Garber), but they couldn't go anywhere or do anything, or else they would risk becoming hostages and probably being executed.  To make matters worse, circumstances (or the plot) dictate that the escapees have to leave soon or not at all.  That's where Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck) comes in.  When all other half-baked, dumb-ass ideas for getting those people out of Iran appear doomed for failure, Tony comes up with something ambitious and outlandish --- although it is still a pretty awful idea.

These are the faces of men smelling shitty ideas

Tony wants to pass these six people off as part of a film crew, because everyone knows that Hollywood is full of complete jackasses who eat up stupid ideas, like filming a movie in we-have-American-hostages-era Iran.  Like all cover stories and identities, this needs to be able to pass the sniff test in case anybody doubts their claims.  That means that Tony needs to create a fake movie.

"Should we make a Reindeer Games or Gigli joke?"

To do that, he needs help from some Hollywood types (John Goodman and Alan Arkin) to convince Hollywood that a terrible science fiction movie called "Argo" (that should be filmed in Iran) is actually in production.  If they can convince Hollywood, they should be able to convince Iranian militants, right?  Once all that is done, all they have to do is confidently sneak six Americans out of the country while lying their asses off.  Piece of cake.

"Hello, do you have any unmonitored or under-guarded ways out of this lovely country?"

Argo is definitely the work of an ensemble cast.  Ben Affleck is on all the posters and gets the majority of the acclaim for this movie, thanks to his direction, but there are no star roles here.  Ben Affleck is good and understated as a CIA operative that specializes in getting people out of bad places.  While he is the main character, the star of this movie is the plot, so all of the actors are basically playing character roles.  This is probably my favorite Bryan Cranston movie role to date, if only because he had multiple dimensions.  John Goodman was clearly having fun lampooning Hollywood, but the best supporting actor in this cast was definitely Alan Arkin, who...well, I guess he did more or less the same thing as Goodman, but crankier.  They were both fun to watch and helped balance out the rest of the film, especially with their "Argo fuck yourself" bit.  The rest of the cast was made up of recognizable actors in uncomplicated or tiny roles.  Victor Garber, Tate Donovan, Clea DuVall, Kyle Chandler, Rory Cochrane, Christopher Denham, Kerry Bishé, and Zeljko Ivanek all lent their presence to this movie more than any particular acting skills.

Look at this crap.  They haven't even memorized their lines!

It is nice to see Chandler getting work in high-profile movies, but he (and Bryan Cranston) needs meatier roles to show off his talent.  Of the six not-hostages, Scoot McNairy was the only one that actually developed as the movie progressed.  Of course, that was because he was the obstinate jerk character, but I still thought McNairy was pretty good.

Argo is the third movie directed by Ben Affleck, and the first one set outside of Boston.  This is also his first attempt at something that isn't a crime story.  Affleck's biggest impact on Argo is the sense of urgency.  The pacing in this movie is excellent, especially in the second half.  That is remarkable, considering that this is, at its core, a movie about people waiting to go to the airport.

THRILLS ABOUND!

It's hard to gauge how well Affleck directs the actors, since this movie is so plot-driven.  I guess he was fine in that regard, since everyone played their parts decently.  The other aspect of the film that I was impressed with was the production design.  Granted, it can't be that hard to re-create 1979 in Hollywood, but the side-by-side comparisons between the real-life people and places and the stuff in the movie was eerily accurate.  Attention to detail is important in all movies, but realizing just how much effort went into duplicating every single thing on the screen made me wonder what little things I took for granted in this film.

The actual magazine ad for "Argo" in the Hollywood Reporter

Argo is a tense, funny, and generally entertaining film that has a little more gravitas because it is based on true events.  How accurate is this movie?  With a few minutes of research, I would say "fairly," with most of the liberties being taken for pacing reasons.   I've seen and heard a few comments about the subject matter of Argo (with the least nutty objection coming from Daniel Tosh), and I see their point.  Why make a movie about the six people who were not held hostage and tortured?  Probably because the US and Canada didn't team up to fake a goofy movie as a means to sneak out the 50-odd hostages.  Argo is a good movie, and is one of the better true-life adaptations I have seen in a while.  It is missing performances that will draw me back to it, but I am now fully on board with Ben Affleck (the director). 

If you're interested in the back story on this script, it appears that comic book legend Jack Kirby did a number of concept drawings for the movie-that-never-was.  Cool stuff.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Every so often, I watch a movie that reminds me of the decade in which I came of age: the 90s.  While not as sleazy as the 70s, and not as absolutely stupid as the 80s, American pop culture in the 90s was still fairly ridiculous.  I don't often watch movies that are defined by their decade, but I made an exception for Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

"Ridiculous"how?  Two words: Butterfly Vagina

Before I continue, I have to admit that I am a fan of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer television show.  I'm not much of a TV fan, but I have been sucked into that teen melodrama and found it surprisingly entertaining.  I am not going to compare the two, though; I believe that serial storytelling is vastly different than filmmaking.  I just want to acknowledge ahead of time that I might have a soft spot in my heart for Joss Whedon, who created the TV show and wrote the screenplay to the film.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer is the story of (not surprisingly) Buffy (Kristy Swanson), your average, run-of-the-mill Valley Girl stereotype, circa-1992.  Basically, she cares about fashion, shopping, boys, and using "like" at least three times in every sentence.  Like, gag me with a cliche.  Buffy's life would be normal, if not for the intervention of Merrick (a slumming --- even by his low standards --- Donald Sutherland).

Sutherland, contemplating seppuku

Merrick finds and trains the Chosen One in each generation (he's old) to battle the vampire master, Lothos (Rutger Hauer).  The Chosen One is always a teenage girl, and she always loses to Lothos; this time, it's Buffy's turn.  On a side note, though, Merrick has a worse losing record than my beloved Chicago Cubs; if this were professional sports, he would have been fired at least a hundred years ago.  Anyway, in a bit of plot convenience, Lothos likes to treat his only viable opposition as sport, so he and his vampire minions set up shop in Buffy's hometown of Los Angeles.  Can Buffy defeat the dastardly vampire leader?  What effect will Merrick have on this Valley Girl?  What the hell is an Oscar winner doing in this movie?  All this, and more, can be answered by watching this movie. 

But who would want to do that?  Buffy the Vampire Slayer is not, by any imaginable definition, a good movie.  You can blame many people for that, but I think the first targets should be the actors.  Kristy Swanson is, quite simply, not much of an actress.  Unfortunately, her character goes through a pretty typical story arc, so her performance seems even more bland and predictable than usual.  Donald Sutherland is pretty decent as a creepy old man, but he does make me wonder exactly what his acting standards are; does he look for choice roles, decent money, or just someone who will offer to buy him Funyuns?  Rutger Hauer had swelled to his current size by this point, so he wasn't as physically intimidating as Blade Runner-era Rutger would have been.  Hauer is only a little subpar in this role, primarily because his character is stupid (he deliberately allows his enemy to get stronger) and his costumes and makeup were occasionally laughably bad. 

Smirkingly bad, at the very least

Surprisingly, the supporting cast is pretty solid.  Luke Perry played Buffy's love interest, and he managed to have some reasonable reactions --- when weird stuff starts happening, he tries to leave town --- as well as some of the better lines in the movie.  David Arquette has a small role, but the banter between him and Perry was one of the better aspects of the film.  Paul Reubens doesn't make for a very fearsome vampire, but his comic timing provides some of the movie's best jokes, particularly with his death scene.  You might also recognize Stephen Root and Hilary Swank in fairly boring character roles, as well as Ben Affleck, Ricki Lake, and Thomas Jane in bit parts.  None of them are particularly interesting to watch here, but it can be fun to spot them before they were famous.

Vampire or extra from Wayne's World?

This is the only feature film directed by Fran Rubel Kuzui and I think I know why.  Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a story that, probably, shouldn't work.  The premise alone guarantees a fairly cheesy movie experience.  Kuzui doesn't go much further with the idea than that; in fact, I believe that the Wisconsin-ish levels of cheesiness present in the movie are due to Kuzui making lazy choices and settling for stereotypes and easy jokes.

Thankfully, no stakes-for-dildos jokes

I suppose you can blame a lot of that on Joss Whedon's script, too.  This is an odd script, though; while there are a lot of lame jokes and gags, there are also a few genuinely funny and clever moments.  For every Valley Girl-ism, there's a line like, "He ruined my new jacket...!  Kill him a lot."  I hesitate to say that the filmmakers butchered his script, but...this screenplay draft is a lot cooler than what ended up on-screen.

For example, Luke Perry's friend didn't look or sound like an Arquette

That's not to say that the movie is awful...it's just not very good.  There are some clever lines and it managed to blend comedy and horror together --- unfortunately, it was neither scary or funny enough to truly work.  Still, it's kind of cute for what it is: a stupid comedy-horror hybrid.

The Town

The Town begins with the line, "There are over 300 bank robberies in Boston every year. Most of these professionals live in a 1-square-mile neighborhood called Charlestown."  The promotional posters claim that Boston is the "bank robbery capital of America."  Here's a shocker for you: that's not exactly true.  According to the FBI, Ohio had almost three times as many bank robberies as Massachusetts in the first quarter of last year, and all of Massachusetts might not reach 300 for the year.  According to an FBI spokesperson, they do not collect data by neighborhood, and Boston wasn't even in the top five cities for bank robberies in the US.  Does any of that matter?  Not really, I just like to research interesting claims made in movies.

Doug (Ben Affleck) is a second-generation Bostonian career criminal.  He commits armed robberies with his lifelong buddies, Jem (Jeremy Renner), Gloansy (Slaine), and Dez (Owen Burke).  Doug is the brains of the group, at least in part because he has stopped drinking and doing drugs, while all his friends care about are "coke and XBox."  The group lets Doug plan things out so nobody gets hurt and they all make it home safely.  The film opens with the team robbing a bank, wearing Rastafarian-inspired Skeletor masks and armed with automatic weapons.  The robbery goes more or less as planned, except for Jem beating an unarmed bank employee (Victor Garber) to a pulp and taking the bank manager, Claire (Rebecca Hall), hostage.  During their escape, Doug calms everyone down and Claire is released, unharmed.  Still, Gloansy and Dez are a little put off by Jem's recklessness.  Bad news, guys: it's gonna get worse.  Jem took Claire's driver's license as a scare tactic to keep her from talking; she lives in their neighborhood, which is bad news for criminals trying to avoid being identified.  Jem offers to "take care of" Claire, but Doug opts to handle the mission himself; he "accidentally" meets her, just to see if she has any way to identify the group (she does).  But instead of doing the hard-boiled criminal thing and killing her or threatening her, Doug genuinely likes Claire and the two start dating.  As the story continues, Doug and Claire get more serious and Doug starts contemplating a life beyond Boston.  Meanwhile, the boys keep getting jobs from the local crime boss, Fergie the Florist (Pete Postlethwaite), and the Florist doesn't take "no" for an answer.  Making things even worse, Jem is getting more and more reckless.  On top of all that, FBI Special Agent Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) has the group in his sights, has some circumstantial evidence to tie them to past robberies, and is now actively trying to get evidence to nail Doug and his buddies.  Isn't that just the way things work?  Whenever you want to get off the carousel, it just seems to get faster and faster.

This is Ben Affleck's second directorial effort and third co-writing credit, and he did another good job.  The supporting cast gave pretty good performances, with Renner as the clear stand-out in the cast, and Affleck handled the lead role well.  The robbery scenes were handled quickly and efficiently, which added to the impression of their team as a group of professionals.  The whole movie felt busy.  A lot happens; aside from the three armed robberies, there is the love story, Affleck and Renner's crumbling bromance, the FBI's case, and some father-son time between Affleck and Chris Cooper.  I don't know what else they might have added to the Extended Cut, which is twenty-eight minutes longer than the standard version I watched, but the pace of the film is brisk and everything clicks together nicely.

I'm not a huge fan of Ben Affleck's acting --- I think the last movie I enjoyed him in was Shakespeare in Love ---but he did a decent job here.  I don't think he played that remarkable of a character, but he was likable enough for me.  Jeremy Renner gave the film's best performace, bar none.  As the increasingly psychotic Jem, he made the movie.  You know how Joe Pesci made Goodfellas so much more entertaining with his surprising violence?  That is the rough equivalent of Renner in The Town.  Jon Hamm is pretty good as the FBI agent, but he was stuck between being a total jerk and a smart guy, but not enough of either to really impress me.  He did swear a lot, though, in a script peppered with profanity.  Rebecca Hall handled the more dramatic moments for her character well, but I was pretty indifferent to her overall.  Chris Cooper was good in his small role.  Blake Lively was only in a couple minutes of the film, so I have no idea why she is on the movie poster.  When you break this movie down to look at each actor's performance, it becomes apparent that this is really more of an ensemble cast than a star vehicle.  Somehow, though, Renner manages to draw all the attention his way.

After finishing the film, I joked to my wife that this was like Heat, but without the great expectations.  That's actually not a bad description at all.  Good job, self!  The Town shows us several well-executed and daring robberies, and looks good doing it.  It starts to do something different, with Doug's desire to leave crime behind him, but aside from the truly regrettable The Notebook-styled final shot of the movie, Affleck never follows through on that promise.  Yes, the inevitable shootout scenes were pretty well-done, even if nobody seemed to get shot, even at close range.  But this movie hinted at something a little different than the typical "one last heist" you see in so many crime movies.  The Town is a pretty good movie that, had it followed through on what made it different, could have been great.