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Comments
I don't see the line as lazy but do agree it could potentially become a problem and if it does, we will all know where it stemmed from. Also, moments like the DB5 should not be relied upon, though I struggle to think of anything else that could make that kind of impact, so right now, I'm not worried.
It's not the line that is lazy, purely the conceit. If it wasn't there it wouldn't make the film any worse, so I can only assume it's a bit of fan-wankery on the part of Mendes. To make a comparison, I personally thought the straightening of the cuff in the PTS was a subtle, effective nod to the archetypal cinematic Bond. I thought it was quite clear the Bond of the PTS was the Bond most people know and love, who is subsequently stripped of his identity, confidence, his life. That for me is a neat character nod that plays well. Sticking in a gadget-laden DB5 just seems so incredibly overt. I can appreciate it for what it is, but I do have to ask myself, why? It's utterly superfluous. I say this as someone who values a lot of the film, if it was a bit of fluff it's forgivable, but after delivering some great material in the rest of the picture, it really irks me that Mendes stooped to this level. Much like the Fields GF nod, it's a bit of bullshit that we could without.
God Lord...
Let's look at this scene. There's quite a bit of a drag on Bond flipping the knob and revealing the button. That scene is for us, the Bond fans, who know that that button is for the ejector seat. We, us, the people who have seen every film, know what it is.
M's line "Oh, go ahead, eject me" (or whatever the hell she says, last time I watched Skyfall, my brother turned the DVD player off to watch football, I wanted to choke him with the Force) is for the people who don't know what that button is for. It's for the people who didn't see Goldfinger, who've never watched a documentary on Bond's cars, who just don't know.
Sometimes, I think we forget that there are three types of people who go to see Bond movies in the cinema. Us, the Bond fans, who digest everything Bond that we can. Casual Bond viewers, who have a knowledge of Bond, but haven't read the books, seen all the films, played the video games, read the comics. People who've never experienced Bond are the last category.
Scenes that are more subtle in nature, the glimpse of the button, are for the Bond fans. Lines like M's are for the causal Bond viewers or the people who've never experienced Bond, so that they can understand why exactly Bond is leaning a bit too close to the steering wheel (at least he looks that way to me) and keeping his thumb near this little red button that, for all they know, could activate the device that transforms the car into a freaking jet like in Men In Black.
As much as the films cater to us, the fans, they also have to provide enough information for those not in the know, as well. Many of us tend to forget that.
Or that he considers it a stand out moment. There are far greater moments than this in Skyfall. As someone who appears to know Bond so well, how he deems this a highlight I'll never know. Good but not all that in the grand scheme of things.
Typo? Either way, this is hilarious.
Exactly.
The DB5 introduction is absolutely fine. It's the fact he thought it was smart to make the ejector seat gag and have Bond use the machine guns. I want fun Bond movies as much as the next man, but it's totally bloody pointless. If Tamahori had done it, you'd all despise him. Mendes got away with it because he delivered elsewhere. The general audience will lap anything up.
It was pointless. They could have delivered a much more original take on things. Sorry, I just think it's laziness. I don't begrudge anyone liking it, I just expect more of Bond movies these days, which is perhaps my problem. The DAD chase is superb and nothing like SF. It's fantastic.
It was just a small, fairly insignificant moment...and I don't think you can really compare DAD to SF.
Not a typo it was a premature post, it's never happened to me before, i don't what happened, if your bear with me, I'll be ok next time.
The DB5 has been with us with Pierce and DC, personally I don't what the fuss is about the knob joke.
DC has had a few adventures after QoS leading up to Skyfall and the DB5 probably featured in one of those adventurers.
And harking about to old days of Bond, can we have DC's swansong film a remake of OHMSS. I think that would top and tail is tenure and I think he would have the range to pull it off - not the knob of course.
This is why I don't trust Mendes with Bond films. He revels in doing things differently, yet in the most hamfisted way. Yawn. In his latest round of interviews he's all proud of the fact that he allowed characters to age in his Bond film. Hadn't been done before he says. Again. Yawn. And also wrong (see below), but who friggin cares. This development doesn't titillate me in the slightest.
What has worked quite well for Bond is being of permanent double-0 age. ie roughly 30-45. M is M, the older boss. Q is Q etc etc. Their ages aren't that interesting. M has always been an older character. Dench was nothing new in that regard. OK fine, she was 7 films deep by this point, so I guess maybe Mendes did play with her character coming of age, even though her character was also rebooted in CR. But again, I didn't find this remotely interesting. ie the aging of M and coming to the end of the road. Or at least not half as interesting as Mendes did, to the point where he basically makes her the lead Bond-girl and number 2 character in the film. I'm a Connery purist but the SF, M saga, even made me pine for the Broz era and DAD, when M was just her usual crabby self.
Mendes allowed Bond to reflect on his age - old dog etc. But what galls is that Mendes conveniently seems to forget, or probably didn't even know, was that this was all done before in NSNA, a film which explored the concept much more convincingly, in that filmgoers all easily remembered the young Connery-Bond quite well from two decades earlier. Whatever one might think of NSNA, Connery did indeed play Bond as a near retirement 50-year-old. In fact Sean insisted that he play Bond as his own age. So we saw the brash young Bond of DN -TB era, now as an older lured-out-of-retirement Bond, and played by the same actor.
Meanwhile old-dog Craig was young-pup Craig-Bond only one film earlier. Whacko!!
God, I hope the insanity ends soon and we get back to Bond basics, ie prime-time double-0, on assignment, on mission and reveling in being Bond in his double-0 prime, minus all the tedious personal drama.
But its not going to happen with Mendes and Craig driving the bus. Not a fat chance with these two drama slaves. Don't be fooled by the SF ending. That's a hallmark of the Craig era. Film goes off reservation,but then assures that all is back to normal at the end. Yeah right. Fool me once........
Agreed. Mendes needs to quit patting himself on the back for what a great visionary he is, roll up his sleeves & start doing some darn serious graft so that he gives us the best possible BONDFILM with this next movie instead of getting all uppity about non-issues like characters reflecting on their relevance, mortality & 'ingenious' winks at the audience à la ejector seat gag (wow, Sam, did you come up with that all by yourself, then?).
He should simply be focusing on making the best possible BONDFILM - ie. a 007 adventure that is well directed, well shot, well acted & with a superior script & screenplay to it's predecessors.
That is all Mendes should be concentrating on.
100% agree. Although I think he's above that kind of thing and has taken Bond to a higher plain.
It's interesting though to hear that Mendes thinks it was great how he bought it back. I wonder if he knows that it was in GE and CR? He probably does, I'm assuming he's seen them, but then I read an interview in the production thread where he said that he cast Rory Kinnear as Tanner (when he was in QOS before), so you never know.
Ditto. It doesn't sit with well with me. Also agree on the CR usage.
Mendes' ego is little to big for his own good.
I think he should watch it and take notes. GE had a fantastic cast, great characterisation and great dialogue like SF did, but it also had some jaw dropping stunts/action scenes (there's nothing in SF that even comes close to the tank chase, the bungee jump, etc), and it felt much less pretentious, it didn't take itself as seriously (and consequently didn't seem as dumb as a result*), it just focused on being a great Bond film rather than some arty Oscar baiting flick. It also had lots of traditional Bond touches that SF was missing. There is some stuff SF does better than GE and objectively it's probably a better film, but I do think Mendes could learn a bit from watching GE.
*SF takes itself deadly seriously even though the plot was silly. GE knows that it's silly and OTT, it had self awareness.
He makes good films but he does seem a bit pretentious and up his own arse to me, from the interviews I've read. Plus he was one of the many Hollywood types who signed a petition saying Roman Polanski should be let back into the US without going to prison so I lost some respect for him there (I can't believe celebrities keep on defending that bastard, if he went to prison and got punished fair enough but he got away with rape).
I lost some respect for Brosnan when he starred in Ghost Writer for the same reason. I don't know how anyone could work with that guy after what he did. Sure he says he's sorry but if he was that sorry he'd have been a man and faced the consequences instead of running off to other countries and continuing to live as a millionaire film maker.
I agree with you about some of SF's failings, but I would prefer if Mendes was taking inspiration from FRWL, OHMSS, TSWLM, FYEO and TLD, rather than GE.
That said, I think he should have known that the DB5 has appeared more in the last 20 years than it did in the first 30. Consequently, far from being fresh and original, its inclusion was almost yawn inducing.
Surely there are people at EON whose job it is to tell the screenwriters and directors about these things - make them aware of the history, if they're not fully up to speed.
You sometimes sense that Mendes thinks he's the first person to direct a Bond movie.
But this should end it now for good in the Craig era. Let the next actor enjoy his bit of car history in yet another twist of the story, but please only once and for history's sake. If Mendes is so fond of the 70s Bond films, we may have to expect another nod to that era in his next film. I hope it's not the submarine Lotus, that would simply be over the top.