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Comments
And that's exactly what was needed and badly.
While CR is a classic and can be referenced for all eternity to come, QOS and SF were one-offs that can't and should never be repeated.
Personally I see a lot of other Bond movies in Spectre. Some negatively call that "ticking the boxes" or "unoriginal".
I call it "give the people what they want" to quote one of my favourite villains.
Critics got that in Europe. In the US they didn't. The same goes for the audience.
In most European countries Spectre was a roaring success with the audience.
But they naysayers will deny it of course.
The USA didnt get LTK either,and that is the best revenge Bond film,and i agree @BondJasonBond006 that QOS and CR are a good pairing ,and original in their own way,to me.
I still think SP would have done better in the 'Best Scene' elimination game if that scene was the Bond vs Mr Hinx battle on the train,it wouldnt be on the verge of going out of the game as it is now...and it would have been interesting to see how close it came to the Bond vs Grant scene in FRWL,which is in the game...a pity.
Yes, the train fight in SP rivals the train fight in FRWL. Easily.
@barryt007
Timothy Dalton is my favourite Bond. He is the only one that reflected Fleming's vision imho.
I love that man and I'm grateful we got at least two films with him. And both films were even made by my favourite Bond director John Glen.
For me "SPECTRE" actually has a lot in common with the bizarre characteristics of the original S.P.E.C.T.R.E. from the 1960's.
The SPECTRE-meeting IMO reminded me a lot of the SPECTRE-meeting in "Thunderball", albeit in a more modern, cruel, darker fashion. No electrocution, but instead popping one's eyes out and then crush the victim's neck. Loved it.
Then, the entire 'bizarre' events from the train sequence in Morocco until the detruction of Blofeld's lair......had a real "Doctor No"-feeling to it:
--> A scary, vulnerable girl, holding Bond's hands very tight. Madeleine really was the modern-day Honey Rider here. If Vesper Lynd is being seen as a modern-day Tracy, then in a way Madeleine can be seen as a modern-day Honey.
--> Bond and Madeleine being picked up by a Rolls-Royce in the desert. Well, it's perhaps as bizarre as a 'dragon on wheels' picking you up to Dr. No's lair.
--> A butler sequence! Certainly an eye for the dramatic. And it reminded me of these staunch nurses guiding Bond and Honey to their rooms.
--> Blofeld's 'love affair' with his own possessions, including the Kartenhoff meteroid. We know how Dr. No was so proud of his own glass aquarium no ;-)?
--> Bond being molested twice, once by Blofeld's henchmen in the computer room, and then secondly during the torture sequence. I loved Blofeld's reasoning behind it: He was psychologically testing Bond. To an extend that it becomes a psychotic game.
Obviously, the train fight bears striking resemblance to "From Russia With Love", although I do think that the Madeleine character was at her strongest here. Her friendly but fierce interrogation of James Bond was very reminiscent of the train sequence in "Casino Royale".
Lastly, the 'funhouse' scenes in the defunct MI6-building in London in many ways reminded me of Scaramanga's funhouse in "The Man With The Golden Gun". Both very bizarre scenes, and I liked them.
I think this sums it up pretty well. Sam Mendes wanted a very atmospheric Bond film that was breathing the warm, colorful, yet mysterious, ilogical and bizarre surroundings of the Connery classics. In my opinion, Sam Mendes greatly succeeded in that.
If Sam Mendes "Skyfall" felt like an emotional heavy film that could be compared with "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" and "Casino Royale", Sam Mendes' "SPECTRE" wonderfully infuses the wonderous, illogical, ott bizarreness of Terence Young's ("Thunderball", "From Russia With Love") and Guy Hamilton's ("The Man With The Golden Gun") final Bond films.
That in itself is no easy thing to do. For me, the Brosnan films were indeed a lot of fun too. Very entertaining as well. But in many ways they felt a bit too tech driven, too 'modern'.
Dr. No-esque elements- The Blofeld HQ and Bond's journey there screams of Bond and Honey heading by armed guard to Dr. No's HQ. The dialogue Bond and Blofeld share ("I came to kill you"/"I thought you came here to die") was very reminiscent of the iconic dinner scene where Bond and Dr. No have an equally explosive confrontation ("You're nothing but a stupid policeman"). Bond and Madeleine having customized rooms inside the lair is also similar to the treatment Bond and Honey receive while under Dr. No's watch, in addition to the clothes he has ready for them while there. Each film also has a gradual disintegration of gentlemanliness between Bond and his Bond girl and the villain. In DN Bond is well received and treated nicely by Dr. No, who hopes to butter him up and get him to join SPECTRE, and in SP Blofeld's discussions with Bond and Madeleine turn from bragging into cold and brutal threats as he reveals SPECTRE's control and shares the video of White killing himself to torment Madeliene. A reversal also exists, where instead of Honey in peril at the end and in dire straits, it's Bond in SP who needs rescue.
From Russia With Love- As he does with Tania, Bond has to make Madeleine come to his side over time and accept his help. And the biggie is of course the parallels with Hinx and Grant. Both are very silent men who act instead of speak, used as a tool of SPECTRE. The train fight is an obvious and perfect modern take on the classic fight from the film as well, featuring very little score and a moment where Bond is in serious danger of death.
Goldfinger- In many ways, the GF PTS and the SP PTS are reversals of each other. In the GF PTS, Bond completes a big mission before relaxing and lowering his guard, while in SP he first seems like he's going to relax with the woman he's with, before he leaves to go on his mission. And of course the dinner jacket Bond wears on the train in SP is very reminiscent of Connery's gorgeous attire in the GF PTS.
Thunderball- Very big TB connections in SP. In both SP and TB we've got a great and tense SPECTRE briefing scene, a big visual focus on the SPECTRE rings that add mystery to the story, a woman (Domino/Lucia) in a relationship with a bad man (Largo/Sciarra) that Bond feels compelled to protect, a big moment where Bond is in great, fatal peril (Hinx fight in SP/Parade chase in TB), and I'm sure many others I haven't hit on yet.
You Only Live Twice- Both films have the debuts of Blofeld from behind the scenes, and over the course of SP Blofeld gets the scar the Blofeld in YOLT already has.
I think the biggest parallels are with DN, followed by TB. And what remains consistent in the Craig era and SP in particular is the gentlemanliness with which Bond and his villains would regard each other, despite the fact that they were bitter enemies. One thing Blofeld does in SP that no other Bond villains of the period seemed to care to do, however, is wait in the wings and watch Bond die instead of taking his eyes off him and providing a window to escape. I love how Blofeld makes his agents stall the helicopter in the sky with a view on Bond in the old MI6 HQ as the bomb ticks down, down, down. It's like Blofeld is saying, "You made my headquarters ruins, now I'll do the same to you, while you're inside it!"
There's also some parallels carrying over from SF, which makes sense with Mendes' continued directorial involvement:
The issue of whether spies are relevant still exists in SP, embodied by C. Lucia is a woman close to a dangerous man and conspiracy who warns Bond not to get too close, just as Severine warned him in SF (both also have criminally short screen time as well). The relationships between Bond and his MI6 family are also further developed, and the surviving artifacts of the Skyfall manor explosion unintentionally lead Bond to the discovery that Franz is alive and well, now the head of SPECTRE. And of course there's also all the connections made from CR and QoS to bridge the gap between all the films.