Argo

Ben Affleck has struck gold. Producing, directing, and starring in this thriller that, last weekend, four weeks out, was the highest grossing movie of the past weekend. And for good reason.

We were among the many who went to see Argo last weekend. The movie is true edge of your seat fare. The challenge of a historical movie, one in which we know the ending, is to create real drama. After all we know as we watch the movie that the plane carrying those being rescued will get in the air, they will evade the Iranians, and the plan to get them out will work.

Still, with these challenges, Affleck makes it work and work beyond compare.

The movie tells the story of six American embassy workers who escape from the takeover of the embassy by the Iranian protestors. Hidden by the Canadian embassy for a time what becomes clear is that they need to be brought out of the country before the Iranians discover their presence. Affleck as CIA agent Tony Mendez comes up with a plan, a crazy plan, to create a fake movie to provide cover for getting those embassy workers out of the country.

Casting in the movie is brilliant. Alan Arkin and John Goodman play the Hollywood types brought in to help create the supposed movie. Arkin is perfect in his role but truly needing to be recognized is Goodman. Is there anyone acting today that is better at these character rolls than John Goodman. Familiar faces abound in the movie, most however are not those one can put a name to but we know that we know them. Kyle Chandler of Friday Night Lights fame makes an appearance as Hodding Carter.

The movie in all respects however is all about Affleck. He dominates this movie and it is a good thing. His character is an agent who takes his job seriously and has a sense of responsibility toward each and every person he is to help.

As we watch a movie we often wonder about how it will age, this is a movie that could easily become a classic. A fantastic movie.

The In Laws

We watched this movie the other day, this movie being the original starring Peter Falk and Alan Arkin. I love this movie, I think Peter Falk is a great actor, always someone to remember. Some actors just ooze personality and Falk is one of them.

A simple story, a CIA agent and a dentist. The agent caught up in some kind of currency manipulation scheme by South American dictators robs the U S Mint. Alan Arkin, as the New York City dentist, who gets caught up in it keeps saying he just does not want to be shot at.

Still as the story progresses he admits he finds his future in law crazy but with something lovable about him. And no one will ever forget the serpentine scene.

Comedies are hard for me. This is a great one.

The Heart is a Lonely Hunter

I have heard much about this book so was intrigued when I saw the movie was on TMC. I watched this and still am not sure what I think of it.

One thing I will say is that I was shocked by the ending. I guess I should have read the book, I did not foresee that ending.

The movie featured two separate plots that were only connected by the main characters relationship to both. A man named Singer, a deaf mute, played by Alan Arkin. It must be a challenge to play a role such as that and transmit feeling and emotion but Arkin does.

Cicely Tyson plays a unlikeable character in the movie and Percy Rodriguez her father an African American doctor torn between doing what he feels is right and what might be needed.

Stacy Keach has a memorable role which makes us remember that he was a fine actor before the Mickey Spillane stereotype he played on television.

Stealing the movie however in her movie debut was Sandra Locke later of Clint Eastwood movie fame. She plays a teenage girl whose room is rented out to Singer as her family struggles financially. Her struggles and angst and relationship with Singer are the centerpiece of the movie. She is remarkable in the role.

A good movie, an unsettling movie. Worth watching.