Best Picture breakdowns: ‘Argo’

Best Picture breakdowns: ‘Argo’

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Ben Affleck in 'Argo' (Warner Bros)
Three reasons I’ll be rooting for “Argo” when Academy Awards are handed out Feb. 24:

1. “Argo” is one of only three Best Picture nominees I’ve seen, and of those three — “Lincoln” and “Beasts of the Southern Wild” are the other two — it has the happiest ending.

(Shallow cinephile? Why, yes, I am.)

2. “Argo” has a deep connection to one of the giants of the comic book world — and that’s not a reference to the girth of Affleck’s friend and inspiration, self-described “sedentary processed-foods eater” Kevin Smith.

No, it’s the central role in the movie for comic book art that, in real life, was created by Marvel and DC Comics legend Jack Kirby …

3. … Whom I interviewed on a panel at a Chicago comic book convention in the 1980s, when my hair and beard resembled Affleck’s in “Argo.”

A win for “Argo” is a win for anyone who used to look like that.

Second choice: “Beasts of the Southern Wild.”

Lincoln would have enjoyed that ending more than the ending of his movie.