Many Iranian-Americans are concerned over a perceived negative portrayal of Iranians as a nationality. Canadians were miffed that the original version of the film dismissed Canada’s major role in the rescue—although director/star Ben Affleck changed the movie to respond to that complaint.
The movie is “Argo,” which was the CIA codename for the 1980 effort to sneak out of Iran six US embassy staffers who had not been captured when the embassy was seized November 4, 1979. They walked out of the consular section and were given shelter by the Canadian ambassador and his wife. The successful “exfiltration,” in CIA jargon, was later labeled “The Canadian Caper” in the media. It came just before the unsuccessful military effort to rescue the 52 hostages being held in the captured embassy.
The film was released October 12 and has ranked in the top three films for box office receipts ever since then, placing first on just over half of those days.
“Argo” has received mostly ecstatic reviews and is widely touted as a likely nominee for the Oscar for best film.
That said, there are complaints.
Some in the United States have been irritated by the opening narration that sets the stage. That narration is what some see as standard Hollywood anti-Americanism; it lays out the theme that the United States had long shafted Iran and that what happened with the embassy seizure was an understandable payback.
The narration also states that the United States launched the 1953 overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh in retaliation for his nationalizing of US oil interests. There were no US oil interests in Iran then; Britain had the monopoly. The Eisenhower Administration decided to topple Mossadegh because they feared Iran was about to be taken over by the communist Tudeh party.
That narration also paints the Shah in the darkest tones. It describes him as a cruel monarch who lived in “opulence and excess” while “the people starved.”
The film was first shown several weeks ago at the Toronto Film Festival, where Canadians were upset by a printed postscript in the closing minute of the film.
The text indicated the CIA let Canadian Ambassador Kenneth Taylor take the credit for political purposes, implying that he did not deserve the accolades he received. Affleck responded by changing the postscript text to read, “The involvement of the CIA complemented efforts of the Canadian embassy to free the six held in Tehran. To this day the story stands as an enduring model of international co-operation between governments.”
Many Iranian-Americans are concerned at the depiction of Iranians in the film. For example, Pouya Alimagham, a doctoral candidate in history at the University of Michigan, calls that portrayal “unbalanced” in the Huffington Post.
He writes: “‘Argo’ presents a country of more than 35 million people in 1979 exclusively through the lens of terrorism and hostage-taking, public executions, bearded men shouting so hysterically that spit flies out of their mouths, one seemingly untrustworthy lonely servile housekeeper and more. Through such an unbalanced depiction, viewers risk foregoing the basic humanity that Iranians share with the rest of the world.”
The “untrustworthy lonely servile housekeeper” he cites is the heroine of the film, as she refuses to help the revolutionaries who are hunting for six Americans they failed to capture at the US embassy. (See accompanying article below.)
Alimagham’s main concern is that the film may lay the foundation for a US war on Iran. “By focusing exclusively on events such as the Hostage Crisis, movies like ‘Argo’ dehumanize Iran and Iranians, indirectly aiding the efforts of political hawks with an ‘ax to grind’ with the Persian Gulf country. The first step toward war is denying the humanity of other people. ‘Argo’ is an unwitting part of that effort,” he writes.
Indeed, there are very few “nice” Iranians in the film except for the woman dismissed by Alimogham as “untrustworthy” and “servile.” The vast majority of the Iranians depicted in the movie are revolutionary enthusiasts in beards or chadors.
At least one Iranian-American chortled at how they are portrayed. Sohrab Ahmari, an assistant books editor at The Wall Street Journal, wrote in that newspaper: “The Iranian actors who play the Revolutionary Guards are particularly effective. Anyone who has ever encountered their real-life counterparts—bearded fanatics boiling with class resentment, paranoia and hatred of women—will find their portrayal in the film accurate and chilling.”
The Pasdaran are almost uniformly depicted as crude and hate-filled, almost subhuman. But other Iranian officials—the deputy minister of culture, a consular official in Turkey, the airport immigration officers, culture officials assigned to help a supposed Canadian film crew—are shown as rational and professional, not crazed beasts.
In Tehran, official coverage of the film is uniformly negative and took the line that the filmmakers hate Iranians. Meysam Karimi wrote in Moviemag, “’Argo’ makes the people of Iran look like they have no self-determination and indisputably support violence. For me, as an Iranian,… this makes ‘Argo’ much less believable.”
The Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), the state news agency, labeled “Argo” as “Hollywood’s latest failed attempt to confront the Islamic revolution,” ignoring the fact that the opening sequence justifies the revolution.
The Fars news agency tabbed the movie as “anti-Iranian” and dismissed it as a box office flop. It acknowledged that “Argo” came in second at the box office its first weekend in theaters, but said that was because the people behind the film (George Clooney is the producer) artificially boosted sales by buying up tickets en masse and handing them out for free.
Fars reported that the film was “unable to become a box office hit in spite of considerable advertising. The filmmakers tried very hard and used a variety of methods to increase ticket sales, but they were unsuccessful…. Even though ‘Taken 2’ was in its second week, ‘Argo’ still couldn’t beat it to first place at the box office … due to a lack of interest among its audience” in North America.
“Argo” came in second in box office receipts to “Taken 2” in its first weekend out, second in its second weekend to “Paranormal Activity 4” and first in its third weekend, this immediate past weekend.
The Moviemag review was more sober. “If I were to set aside issues [of how Iranians are portrayed], I must admit that ‘Argo’ is one of this year’s best movies,” reviewer Karimi wrote. “Without a doubt, a non-Iranian viewer will highly enjoy seeing ‘Argo’ because the story is strong and keeps the viewer’s attention through to the end. But for an Iranian who counts the topic of the film as part of our country’s history, the view may be a bit different.”
Almost all of the coverage of the film in Iran made a point of noting that “Argo” premiered in Canada the very same day, September 7, that Canada closed its embassy in Tehran and ordered Iran’s embassy in Ottawa shuttered. That juxtaposition, Karimi wrote, “somewhat undermines the theory that this [embassy closure] happened by accident.”
Looking at the film as a whole, one might say “Argo” is anti almost everything. Apart from the housekeeper Sahar, the Iranians seen in the film are not nice people. But the CIA is depicted as a mass of confused and often bumbling jerks—except for Ben Affleck, who is both the star and the film’s director, not to mention an absolutely brilliant CIA operative (Anthony Mendez in the real world) who must spend much of his time battling the ignoramuses who are his bosses.
Hollywood plays a major role in the film and provides some hilarious comic relief. To make the caper work in Tehran, Affleck’s character recruits help from two old Hollywood hands (played by Alan Arkin and John Goodman) who set up a fake film company, stage a press conference about the film and even provide a real script for an unmade movie, “Argo.” They spend most of their time dishing out one-liners about how dishonest and untrustworthy everyone in Hollywood is.
By film’s end, Hollywood, the CIA and the Pasdaran look like they were all poured from the same mould.