box office revenues than all but one other film in North America over the weekend—and the one that beat it was also about taking a hostage.
Argo is directed by Ben Affleck and based on a book by CIA officer Tony Mendez on the rescue of six US diplomats—with help from Canada—from Tehran during the 1979 Iran hostage crisis.
Argo had box office receipts its first weekend of $20,1 million, slightly trailing Taken 2, which grossed $22.5 million. Taken 2 is a fiction film starring Liam Neeson as a former spy who is taken captive during a vacation in Istanbul.
Argo stars Affleck, Bryan Cranston, Alan Arkin and John Goodman, and was co-produced by George Clooney and Grant Heslov.
In 1979, most of the US embassy staff were taken as hostages, but six evaded capture and hid in the home of Canadian Ambassador Kenneth Taylor. The State Department then explored options for “exfiltrating” the six from Iran.
CIA staffer Tony Mendez (played by Affleck) pointed out weaknesses in all of the proposals, but was at a loss to suggest an alternative until he got an idea while watching a science-fiction movie on TV with his son: Create a cover story that the escapees are Canadian filmmakers, scouting “exotic” locations in Iran for a film.
Mendez and his supervisor contacted a Hollywood make-up artist, who had previously crafted disguises for the CIA, and a little-known film producer.
Together they set up a phony film studio and successfully established the pretense of filming a movie to be named Argo as a “science fantasy” in the style of the then-recent hit Star Wars.
Mendez entered Iran legally, acquiring documentation of his visit as a producer for Argo. He explained his plan to the six escapees, and showed them how to bluff their way through security at the airport. The six reluctantly agreed to go along with it, knowing that Mendez was risking his own life and convinced it was their only option.
Mendez was then informed by Washington that the operation had been canceled to avoid conflicting with a planned military rescue of the hostages. But the next day he unilaterally put the plan in motion.
At the airport in the film, there is tension as the escapees’ commercial flight reservations are confirmed at the last minute, a call to the supposed studio in Hollywood at first goes unanswered, and revolutionaries who had uncovered the ruse rush to stop them.
But they successfully board the plane, which takes off with revolutionary forces in pursuit.
To protect the hostages who remained in Tehran from further retaliation, all US involvement in the caper was suppressed, giving full credit to the Canadian government and its ambassador, who had fled Iran with his wife under their own credentials before the operation was uncovered.
Argo has received good reviews from many critics. Rotten Tomatoes, a website that tracks reviews, reported that 94 percent of critics gave the film positive reviews based on 140 reviews. At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received an average score of 86, considered to be “universal acclaim.”
After the film was previewed at the Toronto International Film Festival last month, criticism arose that it unfairly minimized the participation of the Canadian government, particularly that of Ambassador Taylor, who has long been a hero in Canada for his role.
One objection was to a postscript text indicating the CIA let 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.”
Mendez, now 72, was named in 1972 as one of the CIA’s top 50 officers of its first 50 years. He told Reuters that CIA classification rules forced him to change some names and delete some information about methods and techniques. “But it didn’t’ impede the telling of the story,” he said. “Not much was lost.”