Millions of Americans have seen the film “Argo†and enjoyed it. Not Barry Rosen. With this movie, Mr. Rosen could not possibly be like millions of Americans. When he saw “Argo†a few weeks ago, he inevitably brought to it a critical eye that only a few dozen others could share.
“I'm not saying it's not a good adventure movie,†he said, “but it's not serious to my mind.â€
“For me,†he said, “it was very much an escapist film,†while reality as he knew it was “much more compelling and more dangerous.†On this, you must take him unquestioningly at his word.
Mr. Rosen is the lone New Yorker remaining from among the 52 American men and women held hostage for 14 months by Iranian militants who had overrun the United States Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979. During those months â€" 444 days in all - a transfixed America felt as if the entire country had been taken prisoner.
That moment in histo ry is the backdrop for “Argo.†The focus, though, is not on the hostages but, rather, on six American diplomats who slipped out of their compound, made their way to the Canadian Embassy and, eventually, flew out of Iran through a delicious subterfuge cooked up by an alliance of the C.I.A. and Hollywood.
The luckless hostages are shown fleetingly, as in a moment when their captors line them up for mock executions by a firing squad. Terrifying as that scene was, it landed wide of the mark, said Mr. Rosen, who was the embassy's press attaché. Now, at age 68, he is in charge of public and external affairs at the Borough of Manhattan Community College.
“There was no firing squad,†he said. “There were mock executions in our cells. They took place in the middle of the night. Total darkness. They were dressed up in black outfits. It was their charade. They were the same people guarding us during the day. They'd open up our cell, throw all that we had on the floor - it wasn't much: photos, letters - throw us up against the wall, point the gun against our head, and just laugh and walk out.â€
“It was an attempt at intimidating us and making us feel like we were totally without any power,†he said. Clearly, the tactic worked. “We were powerless,†he said.
Whether or not former hostages like “Argo,†it has performed at least one important service for them: It has, for now anyway, retrieved their crisis from the deep recesses of the American consciousness, and shined some welcome light on it.
Of the 52 who were finally released on Jan. 20, 1981, 13 have died, the most recent death being that of Phillip R. Ward, an intelligence officer at the embassy. He took his own life last month â€" as fate would have it, just as “Argo†was opening. “Ward came home but never returned,†V. Thomas Lankford Jr., a lawyer for the hostages, wrote in Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper. “He was never the same.â€
In his own way, neither was Mr. Rosen. He suffers from recurring bouts of deep anxiety and sleeplessness. “For 33 years, it's been a constant,†he said. “I went through an emotional disconnect while I was there. This has followed me through these decades.â€
He and the other survivors still have unfinished business with Iran. They want to be compensated for their ordeal.
They tried for years to accomplish that with lawsuits, but hit a brick wall in the courts. American administrations repeatedly opposed them, citing an agreement with Iran in 1981 that had cleared the way for the hostages to be freed. That arrangement permitted companies to recover billions in Iranian government funds that the United States had frozen. But the hostages themselves were barred from seeking damages.
A deal is a deal, the State Department insisted, and it must be honored.
A deal reached in effect at gunpoint is no deal at all, the former captives countered. That argument did not prevail.
Now the hostages' best hope rests with a House bill that would compensate them with money obtained from two principal sources: any Iranian assets that may remain frozen and fines imposed on companies found to be trading illegally with Iran. Whether this bill becomes law is an open question.
“This is not a money grab,†Mr. Rosen said. As he sees it, basic standards of fairness were turned on their head when his own government agreed that it was fine for huge corporations to recover money from Iran but not those who had endured long torment.
He recalled a moment in 1981 soon after being freed. He and his wife, Barbara, had a much-needed getaway in Jamaica with their two children. An American who ran “a construction company with interests in Iran†recognized him and came over.
“He says to me, ‘How did you make out?'†Mr. Rosen said. “I said: ‘We didn't get a dime. We are what we are.' He s ays, ‘We made out like a bandit.'â€
“Now that has to hurt me,†he said. “And it hurts everybody else who was held hostage.â€
E-mail Clyde Haberman: haberman@nytimes.com
