No, its not. What was special about it. I thought it was a good film but nothing about it was incredible, as apposed to Django (incredibly well written and brilliantly acted) or Life of Pi (outstanding visuals and story). Lets be real here the only reason Argo won was due to the current political climate and tension between the two nations. Its all political.
Lol, no it's not. If anything it won because it was a love letter to Hollywood, just look at last year's winner in The Artist. Argo was fantastically well written and directed, as well as acted. Everyone involved did a fantastic job of balancing the comedy just right so it didn't distract from the fact that this was an intense drama. There were no over the top performances, and the writing was very tight.
Django was far from Tarantino's best directing work. With it he seemed much more focused on the writing than the directing, and it felt quite different. I'm hard pressed to find faults with it as, like I said, it was my favorite movie of the year, but they are there. I mean, I'm honestly surprised it won Screenplay, considering the last 30 minutes felt kind of unnecessary and the writing wasn't as tight as his other movies.
Life of Pi, proves the same thing Tree of Life did, visually stunning doesn't mean squat in the eyes of the voters. However, it was by all accounts very well acted and directed. All of the performances were strong, and, as far as adaptations go, it was great. It was my pick to win best picture, but only because I didn't think Argo had a chance.
Where Life of Pi fails is its ending which is utterly polarizing. They pulled it off well, in my opinion, but it could have been better.
In the end, with the Academy it's going to come down to what they like, and Argo gave them what they liked.
But, as an industry person myself, my bias is right there with them.