This March plays host to one of my favourite times of the year – the Academy Awards! March 27 marks the 94th annual Oscars, and it’s shaping up to be an exciting celebration of film with several striking performances in the running (check out Benedict Cumberbatch in The Power of the Dog and Nicole Kidman in Being the Ricardos). I’ve been an avid Oscars fan since I was a little kid, and though it’s easy to scoff at the pageantry of red carpet galas, these awards have always been inspiring for me as a filmmaker. The time and commitment alone in creating a film is a feat, and being recognized by your peers for creating an exceptional film is the ultimate honour.
Reflecting on past Best Picture Oscar wins, I was reminded of one of my favourite “Canadian Capers,” the 2012 dramatic film Argo directed by Ben Affleck. If you haven’t already seen Argo, I highly recommend this dramatic thriller; if you caught it during its past Oscar run it’s a fantastic film to rewatch.
Argo is a historical thriller inspired by the book The Master of Disguise by U.S. CIA operative Tony Mendez. The film tells the story of a CIA operation to exfiltrate six American embassy employees that avoided capture during a raid of the United States embassy in Tehran in 1979. The escaped embassy staff are sheltered in the home of Canadian ambassador Ken Taylor. In a bid to safely smuggle them from Tehran, exfiltration expert Tony Mendez creates a cover story: they are Canadian filmmakers in Iran scouting locations for their production of a sci-fi film titled Argo. Mendez enlists the help of Hollywood producer Lester Siegel who sets up a fake film production company to create a credible cover story.
Posing as a producer for Argo, Mendez enters Iran under the alias of Kevin Harkins. He meets with the escapees and provides them with Canadian passports and fake IDs. The group must convince Iranian Islamists that they are truly Canadian producers in order to board a plane to escape. Despite some historical inaccuracies, the plot is based on a real-life event dubbed “The Canadian Caper.” The film is a tense watch with a team of talented actors, and impeccable editing (Argo also won Best Editing in 2012). Fun trivia fact: the actual script that was used to aid in the ruse was a sci-fi story by writer Barry Ira Geller called Lord of Light. The film was never made but had aspirations of becoming a science fiction hit and included plans for a theme park called “Science Fiction Land,” which never came to fruition.
Check out my top list of previous Oscar-winning, or contending films below to get into the “Oscar viewing” mood.
1. Jojo Rabbit (2019)
2. Black Panther (2018)
3. Arrival (2016)
4. The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)
5. Inception (2010)
