Argo (2012) Review

ARGO (2012)
Director: Ben Affleck

Writer: Chris Terrio

Producers: Ben Affleck, Chris Brigham, Chay Carter, George Clooney, Tim Headington, Graham King, David Klawans, and Nina Wolarsky

Editor: William Goldenberg

Music: Alexandre Desplat

Cinematography: Rodrigo Prieto

Starring: Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, Alan Arkin, John Goodman, Tate Donavan, Victor Garber, Clea DuVull, and Christopher Denham

Runtime: 2 hours

Rating: R (language, some violent images)

Genre: Biopic, Drama, Thriller

Release Date: October 12, 2012

Before Watching the Movie: You may want to briefly read up on the Iranian Revolution and the hostage crisis beforehand, but it isn't necessary, as they explain a lot of it in the movie.

Intro: This is a movie I have wanted to see ever since I heard about it. I think I heard about it when I saw the trailer for either Prometheus, Ted, or The Dark Knight Rises. The trailer piqued my interest, and later I saw Ben Affleck on The Daily Show, which wanted to make me see it even more. Finally, when it came out in theaters, I heard the rave reviews it got, and that was the clincher for me. Finally, after waiting almost a month (my schedule has been crazy), I saw it last night, and I was not at all disappointed. Argo is a fantastic movie all around and is especially strong in directing and acting, as it is thrilling to the end and very accurately captures the mission and the time period.

Plot: In early 1979, during the Iranian Revolution, angry Iranians and supporters of Ayatollah Khomeini storm the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and capture all but 6 Americans and take them hostage. Six manage to escape out the back entrance and find refuge in the Canadian Embassy. They have no way of leaving at risk of being taken hostage and/or being publicly executed by the revolting Iranians. Back in America, the CIA is frantically thinking of ways to sneak the six out, and they call up on Tony Mendez (Affleck) and after much thinking, Tony comes up with a crazy idea to get them all out in which he would set up a fake movie production for a science fiction movie called "Argo" and then pretend to do location scouting in Iran along with his Canadian film crew, who the six trapped ambassadors have to pose as. The plan is approved since they have no better ideas and the operation is on as Tony enlists the help of a couple real Hollywood people (Arkin, Goodman). Tony must gain the ambassadors' trusts while trying to get them safely out of Iran as the government painstakingly reconstructs the shredded identifications of the missing ambassadors in hopes of capturing and killing them.

Things people may find “objectionable”: The first half of the movie has much more swearing and violence than the second, so even though there is swearing and violence, it mostly occurs in the first half. The violence stems from the shots of the Iranian revolution and the protesting, and again almost all of it is contained in the first half of the movie. There is also a lot of swearing, so if you see the movie, be prepared for that if you are uncomfortable with it.

Ratings:

     -Directing/Cinematography: 10/10. Affleck does a fantastic job with the direction. A couple things in particular caught my eye. At the end of the movie, they show pictures of the actual people involved in the operation side-by-side with shots from the movie, and it's stunning how accurate everything looked compared to how they looked in real life. The movie was also full of interesting shots and visuals. The one that stuck out to me the most was when Tony is waiting in the Iranian building in Turkey and he looks to the side and a portrait of Ayatollah Khomeini was staring down at him, as if Ayatollah were watching him. While this was far from the only great shot in the movie, this is the one that stuck out to me the most.

     -Acting: 10/10. Everyone did a great job in acting. The whole cast did a great job, though my favorite performances were from Ben Affleck, Alan Arkin, and John Goodman. Goodman and Arkin are hilarious as the two actual Hollywood people, and Affleck does a great job all around, with directing and acting.

     -Writing: 9.5/10.

          -Story: 10/10. Well, like they say, the truth is stranger than fiction, and the story is both truthful and extremely interesting.

This was the fake poster used for Argo in real life.

          -Script: 9/10. Really a great script. The lines were good and it was able to mix grave drama with witty comedy. There didn't seem to be any cheesy lines, and all the lines they had worked well with the movie.

     -Special Effects: n/a. Special effects were really not used that much in the movie. In fact, I'm not sure if they're used at all really, since there's no blood and guns are used only in two scenes. Still, the movie works extremely well without them.

     -Music/Score: 8/10. The score was very good and it added to the tension of the movie at points. While it doesn't always stand out, it definitely adds an element of tension to the movie.

     -Power/Emotion: 7/10. The movie does a pretty good job at making the audience care for the characters at least to the point where you don't want to see any of them die. You also feel especially for those from the embassy as they have to step out in public and trust a total stranger in Tony when they know they are public enemies to the Iranians.

     -Adrenaline: 10/10. The movie is very tense all the way through, as it starts off with the US Embassy being stormed. There is not a lot of action or chase scenes, but there is constant tension throughout. It will definitely have you on the edge of your seat by the end, knowing how slim the chances are of the mission succeeding and how perfectly everything needs to go in order to work and in order for all the characters not to die at the hands of the revolutionary Iranians.

     -Intelligence: 6/10. This is now the new name for the "mind-bendingness" section, as I think intelligence is a better word to describe the original intent of this section, which was to rate how much the movie makes you think and/or engages you mentally. In other words, a superficial movie like Transformers would rank low, while something mind-bending and intellectual like Inception would rank high. While the movie is smartly written and directed, it doesn't make you think as much as some movies do. The big thing that makes you think is the display of how much the U.S. is hated in this movie and the kind of things we did to Iran before Ayatollah Khomeini came to power. Still, this does not take away from the movie at all.

     -Humor: 6/10. The movie nicely blended humor and drama. There were some really funny moments and lines in the movie, especially coming from John Goodman and Alan Arkin's characters. The writer did a great job of working in good humor with such a serious story. Kudos to him.

     -Best Credit: Dorianne Pahlavan as "Airport Hysterical Wife."

     -Final Score:  Argo is one of the best movies I have seen in theaters this year. It is good all across the board and Ben Affleck is great both behind and in front of the camera. It's most likely going to take home some awards at the Oscars in February. If you can stand swearing, you should see this movie. I think it would be very hard to be disappointed.

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The Game (1997) Review

THE GAME (1997)
Director: David Fincher

Writers: John Brancato and Michael Ferris

Producers: Jonathon Mostow, Steve Golin, Ceán Chaffin, Michael Ferris, and John Brancato

Editor: James Haygood

Cinematography: Harris Savides

Music: Howard Shore

Starring: Michael Douglas, Deborah Kara Unger, Sean Penn, and James Rebhorn

Runtime: 2 hours 9 minutes

Rating: R (language, some violence and sexuality)

Genre: Mystery, Suspense, Drama

Release Date: September 12, 1997

Intro: Twas a rainy day a couple weeks ago in the Southland (Southern California for those of you who don't live here) and I had the day off school. I also had Netflix at my disposal and wanted to watch a mystery/suspense or film noir-esque movie. I chose to do a double feature of The Game and Drive. I chose the game because it's a David Fincher movie, and I am a fan of his. I also read the synopsis and it sounded really interesting. The Game is like a football team at the one-yard line on 4th down with only a few seconds left on the clock. It is about to score a crucial touchdown if only it can pull off the last play right, but somehow it ends up failing to score, despite all the options it has to do so. The Game is gripping and suspenseful to the end, but it fails to execute the ending in a manner that satisfyingly wraps up a movie with great acting, a good script, and lots of potential, thus leaving the viewer extremely frustrated.

Plot: Nicholas Van Orton (Douglas) is a wealthy banker in San Francisco without any real friends. It's his 48th birthday and this has an impact on him because that was the age his father committed suicide. After spending most of his birthday alone, his formerly troubled brother Conrad who he has not seen in years (Penn) invites him to dinner. Conrad brings him a present of a card to try out a new type of entertainment called CRS or Consumer Recreation Services, since Conrad did it and loved it. Intrigued, Nicholas goes to CRS and signs up for their real life "game."Suddenly, weird things begin happening to Nicholas that only get worse and worse as he and a girl he meets (Unger) are sure CRS is up to something. The only thing to do now is for Nicholas to find out what exactly CRS is doing by piecing together what scraps of information he can find while trying to keep his sanity.

Things people may find “objectionable”: The big thing here is swearing. The f-word is used occasionally, along with some milder ones. There is also one scene where there sexual pictures laying around a room, but it is impossible to see any nudity since they are flashed at you quickly or are too far away to make out anything.

Ratings:

     -Directing/Cinematography: 10/10. It had the stylized and interesting direction of David Fincher that I've come to like. I really like Fincher because he picks really interesting shots and adds a smooth, yet suspenseful directing style to the movie. Part of the reason I chose to watch this movie is that I knew if nothing else, it would have good directing.

     -Acting: 9/10. This was definitely a strength. Michael Douglas does a great job as Nicholas and the supporting actors all give solid performances as well. Even though he has a minor role, I liked Sean Penn as Nicholas' brother. He seems to me to play the part well.

     -Writing: 6.5.

          -Story: 6/10. The story is good and well-told for quite a while with several plot twists, albeit there are a few plot holes. The only problem is that the ending seemed underwhelming and unsatisfying, as if it almost didn't fit in with the rest of the movie. There are a million different ways the writers could've ended the movie that would've made it immensely more satisfying than the way they chose to do it. To be honest, the ending ruined the movie for me. It was confusing and extremely unsatisfying. I like the message and meaning behind the ending, but it just seemed out of place, considering the tone and general direction of the movie beforehand. It almost seemed like the screenwriters got stuck when trying to write an ending, so they just went with this one because they couldn't think of anything better. It reminds me quite a bit of the ending of Huckleberry Finn, on which Twain got stuck and settled for a lesser ending after carrying the story spectacularly up until then. Anyway, the plot was good except for the infuriating ending.

          -Script: 7/10. Pretty good script. While it wasn't the best ever written, it was definitely solid. If nothing else, it served its purpose well.

     -Special Effects: 8/10. Not used much, and when used, used subtly, but they work nicely. The best one was the guy on the TV phasing in and out telling Nicholas about his game. It was pretty subtle, but it was creepy and fitting.

Expressing my frustration with how the end of the movie
was written.

     -Music/Score: 9/10. The music is quiet, creepy, and suspenseful and accurately reflects the tone of the movie. I though the score, though it wasn't meant to stick out, did a very good job at adding that extra something to make several scenes more suspenseful.

     -Power/Emotion: 5/10. I can't really pretend that the characters have a ton of depth in this movie. They really don't. The screenwriters try to give them some, but it is fairly obvious that all the time and effort was put in to the story and not the characters (and yet they couldn't manage to come up with a good ending). Still, you manage to feel for Nicholas, especially as he begins to fall lower and lower.

     -Adrenaline: 9/10. This movie is the definition of a potboiler. It does a good job at keeping you thrilled from beginning to the bad ending. Just when you think you know where the movie is going, it pulls the rug out from under you with another plot twist and it always keeps you guessing. I think this involvement in the plot the movie creates makes the ending just more disappointing. Like I said, there are so many other ways in which the movie could have ended that would have blown the audience's minds and capitalized on the immense suspense it had been building up, but this is sadly not the case.

     -Mind-Bendingness: 8/10. The one thing I loved about this movie is how many plot twists it had, as it always kept you thinking and wondering what exactly is going on. It's almost like you're playing the game along with Nicholas, as you never know more about his situation than he does. I definitely love movies that engage you mentally, and this is one of them.

     -Humor: 1/10. Not very much humor in the movie, but the writers weren't really putting much effort into it.

     -Best Credit: Jason Kristofer as "Teen Thug."

     -Final Score: The Game is a really good mystery/suspense movie that always leaves you guessing what's next, but its ending kills all the momentum and tension the movie had been building up. If there had been a different ending of pretty much any kind, The Game would be a great, memorable, and exciting mystery/suspense, but for me, the ending ruined everything. If you don't mind getting disappointed by the ending, you should watch the movie, as it's a great ride to get there.

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Drive (2011) Review

DRIVE (2011)

Director: Nicolas Winding Refn

Writer: Hossein Amini (based on book by James Sallis)

Producers: David Lancaster, Bill Lischak, Linda McDonough, Peter Schlessel, Jeffrey Stott, and Gary Michael Walters

Editor: Mat Newman

Cinematography: Newton Thomas Sigel

Music: Cliff Martinez

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Bryan Cranston, Carey Mulligan, Albert Brooks, Oscar Isaac, and Ron Perlman

Runtime: 1 hour 40 minutes

Rating: R (bloody violence, language, some nudity)

Genre: Crime, Drama, Action

Release Date: September 16, 2011

Before Watching the Movie: Though not necessary, it might be good to familiarize yourself with the movie A Fistful of Dollars beforehand. it doesn't help or hurt your viewing, but it was interesting to me to draw parallels between the movies, since I found many.

Things people may find “objectionable”: This is definitely not a movie I'd take small children to. First of all, there is quite a bit of swearing, as the f-bomb is dropped on numerous occasions. There is also one scene that takes place in the back of a strip club where there is some nudity and BWC shots. (If you are unclear on what a "BWC shot" is, read the objectionable section from my review of Starcrash). Also, and most prevalent in the movie is the violence. The violence is intense, brutal and bloody, as well as surprising. Some of the most violent moments happen out of nowhere and can really catch you off guard. If you have a hard time handling brutal violence in movies, this one probably isn't for you.

Intro: Today was the first real rainstorm in Southern California in probably 4 months. Home alone in the morning (I had a random day off school), I decided I wanted to watch a film noir-esque movie, or one that would complement the dark and gloomy rainstorm outside. I perused Netflix and came across Drive, since I remembered it got good reviews when it came out last year. My choice ended up being a good one, especially on a rainy day. Drive is a well-made, stylized update of 60s and 70s Man with No Name classics like A Fistful of Dollars with brilliant cinematography, sometimes slow, yet relentless tension, and a very good usage of music.

Plot: A mysterious and quiet Hollywood stunt driver and garage mechanic (Gosling) one day falls for his neighbor Irene (Mulligan), who is a single mother with a young boy and a husband in prison. The Driver (Gosling's character's name is never mentioned) becomes closer to Irene and her son Benicio until one day Irene's husband, Standard (Isaac) is released from prison. After the Driver sees Standard beaten up one day, he finds out Standard owes a mobster in repayment for the protection he received in prison. This prompts Standard to ask the Driver to help with a robbery of a pawn shop so they get the money. The Driver agrees because he wants what's best for Irene and Benicio, which is their father and husband. When the robbery goes wrong and the Driver is left with a million dollars in his car, the mob starts coming after him and he soon realizes that Irene and Benicio are targets of the mob. The Driver must try to protect Irene and Benicio from the mob while not getting himself killed and controlling his rage issues.

Ratings:

     -Directing/Cinematography: 10/10. Brilliant cinematography and direction. The movie is full of interesting shots and lighting. The lighting was probably the best part. The lighting made a huge difference in the movie. Every scene is brilliantly lit and it always represents the mood of the scene. The lighting also helps create a gritty, retro feel that really helps contribute to the style of the movie. O think this would be a good movie for aspiring cinematographers to watch and learn from, since the filmmakers make it work so well on so many levels. Why did this not win an Oscar for cinematography? It wasn't even nominated!!! Why??

     -Acting: 9/10. Ryan Gosling, though he is seen by many as a heartthrob, can actually act. He really does a good job in his role as the Driver, and this will likely be the role he will be remembered for. The Driver reminds me a lot of The Man with No Name from Sergio Leone's western classics with Clint Eastwood, and Gosling seems to understand this and plays the character similarly to the way Clint Eastwood did. The rest of the cast gives solid performances as well.

     -Writing: 8/10.

          -Story: 8/10. The story was nice and twisted and dark and for the most part, well told. The only problem I had with it is that in the second half of the movie, the screenwriters seem to forget to include Irene and Benicio and the characters barely show up in the second half, even if they are trying to be protected by the Driver.

          -Script: 8/10. Pretty good script. Definitely solid, but it didn't stand out to me as much as the visuals did.

There are tons of fan-made posters for the movie, and I think many of them are better than the poster they decided to use. Here are a few that stood out to me. The middle one is my favorite of these.

     -Special Effects: 8/10. Not many special effects to speak of except the gunfire and blood. Still, the gunfire and blood look realistic.

     -Music/Score: 10/10. The music was used very well in the movie. Though some of it wasn't my favorite, the filmmakers nonetheless use it very effectively to convey the mood of different scenes.

     -Power/Emotion: 7/10. The movie definitely packed an emotional punch on me, as I can't seem to get it out of my head. In any film noir (I'm counting this as one), it can be hard to care for characters because it is usually hard to distinguish whether the character is good or bad. I went through that with the character of the Driver. I felt for him, but I couldn't confirm or deny my feelings until the end. Even while deciding if he's good or bad, I definitely had some sympathy for him, as he seems lost in life through a good portion of the movie.

     -Adrenaline: 9/10. Though the tension builds rather slowly for the first half of the movie, it almost never goes away. Afterwards in the second half of the movie, the tension ramps up and becomes unrelenting until the end. This uncertainty of the character of the Driver made the tension build and I think this was one of the main reasons I found the movie captivating.

     -Humor: 1/10. Humor is really the last you'd expect in a movie like this, and there's just about as much as you'd expect. Other than the occasional comic relief, the movie is dead serious the whole time.
     -Best Credit: John Pyper-Ferguson as "Bearded Redneck"

     -Final Score: Drive is a very style-driven movie and I think you have to tap into this to fully enjoy it. Since I am a film noir fan and a fan of Leone's Man with No Name Trilogy, I think I was able to do so. Even if you don't get or don't like the movie, it's really hard to ignore the fantastic cinematography and lighting. I'd recommend this to anyone who can take brutal violence and I'd especially recommend this to aspiring directors and cinematographers, as I think they can learn a lot from this movie. In short, this definitely was a great, gritty, rainy day movie.

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