DIE ANOTHER DAY: First 30 minutes perfect?

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Comments

  • DaltonFanDaltonFan California
    Posts: 69
    I think that the first 30 minutes of Die Another Day were very good. I especially thought than Rick Yune was very hot (even when he had The diamonds embedded in his face). But my opinion on when the movie starts to downhill? When he meets Jinx.
  • echoecho 007 in New York
    Posts: 5,921
    No. DAD smacked of desperation from frame one. James Bond should never surf.
  • RichardTheBruceRichardTheBruce I'm motivated by my Duty.
    edited December 2020 Posts: 12,916
    Well I thought that live action element played very well.

    An agent trains for a mission, and Brosnan Bond executed that and seemed pretty exercised and engaged by the time he was on shore.

    Plus those waves were "Jaws" I recall.
  • ThunderballThunderball playing Chemin de Fer in a casino, downing Vespers
    Posts: 776
    *reads question posed in the thread’s title*

    656ea2f3a7a10a60-.gif

    NO.
  • MSL49MSL49 Finland
    Posts: 395
    I think Brosnan carries this movie.
  • Posts: 6,727
    *reads question posed in the thread’s title*

    656ea2f3a7a10a60-.gif

    NO.

    +1
  • Posts: 7,500
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...
  • CraigMooreOHMSSCraigMooreOHMSS Dublin, Ireland
    Posts: 8,009
    jobo wrote: »
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...

    I wouldn't say spectacular, but confident and assured? Certainly.
  • Posts: 7,500
    jobo wrote: »
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...

    I wouldn't say spectacular, but confident and assured? Certainly.

    I would say mundane and by the numbers with some ridiculous slow mo effects ;)

    The fencing scene however is good. Probably the only highlight of the film.
  • CraigMooreOHMSSCraigMooreOHMSS Dublin, Ireland
    Posts: 8,009
    jobo wrote: »
    jobo wrote: »
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...

    I wouldn't say spectacular, but confident and assured? Certainly.

    I would say mundane and by the numbers with some ridiculous slow mo effects ;)

    The fencing scene however is good. Probably the only highlight of the film.

    I was speaking about the performance, not the film as a whole.
  • Posts: 7,500
    jobo wrote: »
    jobo wrote: »
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...

    I wouldn't say spectacular, but confident and assured? Certainly.

    I would say mundane and by the numbers with some ridiculous slow mo effects ;)

    The fencing scene however is good. Probably the only highlight of the film.

    I was speaking about the performance, not the film as a whole.

    Ah, my bad. Thought we were talking about the action :P

    Yes, Brosnan does seem more comfortable and assured in DAD than in his other films. I think some people go overboard in their praise of his performance though.
  • CraigMooreOHMSSCraigMooreOHMSS Dublin, Ireland
    Posts: 8,009
    jobo wrote: »
    jobo wrote: »
    jobo wrote: »
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...

    I wouldn't say spectacular, but confident and assured? Certainly.

    I would say mundane and by the numbers with some ridiculous slow mo effects ;)

    The fencing scene however is good. Probably the only highlight of the film.

    I was speaking about the performance, not the film as a whole.

    Ah, my bad. Thought we were talking about the action :P

    Yes, Brosnan does seem more comfortable and assured in DAD than in his other films. I think some people go overboard in their praise of his performance though.

    It likely seems better when balanced against the OTT nature of everything else in the film. He's quite low-key throughout. He almost (but not quite) manages to sell some of the more groan-worthy dialogue he's saddled with because of it. If the film was more in line with what he evidently thought it was when making it, it would have been a superior effort instead of one of the rock bottom ones for many.
  • Agent_Zero_OneAgent_Zero_One Ireland
    edited January 2021 Posts: 554
    jobo wrote: »
    jobo wrote: »
    jobo wrote: »
    It's as if the second half of the film sets the barr so low that anything adequate is deemed "perfect", generic action scenes are "memorable" and reasonable Bond performances are suddenly "spectacular"...

    I wouldn't say spectacular, but confident and assured? Certainly.

    I would say mundane and by the numbers with some ridiculous slow mo effects ;)

    The fencing scene however is good. Probably the only highlight of the film.

    I was speaking about the performance, not the film as a whole.

    Ah, my bad. Thought we were talking about the action :P

    Yes, Brosnan does seem more comfortable and assured in DAD than in his other films. I think some people go overboard in their praise of his performance though.

    It likely seems better when balanced against the OTT nature of everything else in the film. He's quite low-key throughout. He almost (but not quite) manages to sell some of the more groan-worthy dialogue he's saddled with because of it. If the film was more in line with what he evidently thought it was when making it, it would have been a superior effort instead of one of the rock bottom ones for many.
    I really do wish Pierce got the same opportunity Moore did with FYEO. I genuinely think he could've been great in a more grounded, back to basics spy thriller. (see: The Tailor of Panama).
  • SzonanaSzonana Mexico
    Posts: 1,130
    Regan wrote:
    Eeesh... I never could warm up to that song, it makes me cringe everytime that "Sigmund Freud" part comes along. :( Maybe it's just because I've never been a Madonna fan.

    Well, I don't normally enjoy her work, but I didn't mind that song. Certainly not my favorite, but enjoyable enough for what it is.

    I completely agree with you about her cameo in the movie. Bleech.


    I liked the music but not the lyrics of that song. The beginning it’s really good and the violins part it’s a great moment of the song.
    The lyrics were a little pretentious and the sigmund Freud was like WtF but song is good

  • Posts: 131
    To answer the title question of this thread, the first 30 minutes (or rather, the 25 minutes or so starting *after* the CGI surfing opener), were actually really good IMO. The scenes of Bond's capture and release, the ensuing distrust he faced from MI6 and M and his escape via Hong Kong were all done well and had plenty of promise of a tense but entertaining, and yet reasonably grounded, spy adventure. Too bad the rest of the film did not deliver on it.

    ...but I did not like the song at all. The torture montage was done well, but it could have been shown elsewhere in flashbacks to allow for a less downbeat title track.
  • Posts: 54
    I like PTS, the title song, and everything up through the infamous pajama strut through the hotel lobby.

    Beyond that scene, there are bits and pieces here and there that I appreciate (“Abandoned station… for abandoned agents.”), but the cringiness of it all just gets too be too much.
  • QBranchQBranch Always have an escape plan. Mine is watching James Bond films.
    Posts: 13,879
    Love this film, mostly nonsense but it runs with it knowingly. Embrace it all - the good and the bad. Especially when it's bad.
    With every viewing I spot a new little gag I hadn't noticed before, which only makes me appreciate it more. First, it was the couple in the hotel who comment on Bond's beard and pyjamas ("My, standards are falling") . Most recently, when the flight attendant (Deborah Moore) bends over to give Bond his martini, her butt is right in a passenger's face, and said passenger reacts to said butt.
  • Posts: 6,727
    QBranch wrote: »
    Love this film, mostly nonsense but it runs with it knowingly. Embrace it all - the good and the bad. Especially when it's bad.
    With every viewing I spot a new little gag I hadn't noticed before, which only makes me appreciate it more. First, it was the couple in the hotel who comment on Bond's beard and pyjamas ("My, standards are falling") . Most recently, when the flight attendant (Deborah Moore) bends over to give Bond his martini, her butt is right in a passenger's face, and said passenger reacts to said butt.

    Yes, DAD is indeed a lot of arse!
  • Posts: 7,500
    Mathis1 wrote: »
    QBranch wrote: »
    Love this film, mostly nonsense but it runs with it knowingly. Embrace it all - the good and the bad. Especially when it's bad.
    With every viewing I spot a new little gag I hadn't noticed before, which only makes me appreciate it more. First, it was the couple in the hotel who comment on Bond's beard and pyjamas ("My, standards are falling") . Most recently, when the flight attendant (Deborah Moore) bends over to give Bond his martini, her butt is right in a passenger's face, and said passenger reacts to said butt.

    Yes, DAD is indeed a lot of arse!

    :)) ;))
  • Posts: 503
    I'll take the campy and cliched DAD any day over the melodrama of many of Craig's installments. At least DAD feels like a Bond film, not a soap opera.
  • DAD is one of the worst films. First 30 mins probably best but I still don't like the hovercraft chase. FX are pretty ropey. Give me the Craig film anyway.
  • After my recent viewing, I’m afraid Die Another Day stops being good the minute Bond stops his heartbeat. And that’s only 10 minutes in...
  • Posts: 131
    QBranch wrote: »
    Love this film, mostly nonsense but it runs with it knowingly. Embrace it all - the good and the bad. Especially when it's bad.
    With every viewing I spot a new little gag I hadn't noticed before, which only makes me appreciate it more. First, it was the couple in the hotel who comment on Bond's beard and pyjamas ("My, standards are falling") . Most recently, when the flight attendant (Deborah Moore) bends over to give Bond his martini, her butt is right in a passenger's face, and said passenger reacts to said butt.
    I do wonder what DAD would be like sans the CGI excesses, if these funny bits were given more space to "breathe", even if it would have probably come close to the Moore Bonds in overall tone.
    Bond wrote: »
    I'll take the campy and cliched DAD any day over the melodrama of many of Craig's installments. At least DAD feels like a Bond film, not a soap opera.

    It is a close call exactly because DAD's quality drops so abruptly 30 or so minutes in, so it is hard to "average it out" for a comparison, but I know what you mean.
  • Posts: 7,500
    The PTS is not good. There is a limit to for how long firing a machine gun from a hovercraft moving in a straight line can be exciting. It is very unimaginative stuff.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 14,861
    Yeah I think there are actually plenty of decent fun ideas in DAD, but the hovercraft chase is not one of them. It’s pretty dull, fairly uneventful, very contrived, and looks really quite cheap (it looks like it’s on MOD land just near Aldershot, and probably is).

  • Draco20Draco20 USA
    Posts: 18
    The first act is not bad. The movie starts to lose altitude after Halle Berry is introduced and it goes into a tailspin and crashes and burns big time.
  • Posts: 3,273
    When I saw it at the cinema, it was officially the worst film ever made, in the history of any movie made ever, and my opinion hasn't altered ever since. If anything it has gone down in my estimation even more since that fateful day (if that is at all possible).

    It makes MR and DAF look like masterpieces in comparison.
  • NickTwentyTwoNickTwentyTwo Vancouver, BC, Canada
    edited October 2021 Posts: 7,518
    When I saw it at the cinema, it was officially the worst film ever made, in the history of any movie made ever, and my opinion hasn't altered ever since. If anything it has gone down in my estimation even more since that fateful day (if that is at all possible).

    It makes MR and DAF look like masterpieces in comparison.

    I read a comment like this, and can only think, this person has not watched very many films.

    As Vesper might have said, there are bad films, and there are bad films. ;)
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,000
    It may be an exaggeration, but when you’re watching the film there are times when you really think it can’t get any worse.

    Of course, I think it’s only the third worst Bond film.
  • NickTwentyTwoNickTwentyTwo Vancouver, BC, Canada
    Posts: 7,518
    Fair enough, and of course it’s all subjective opinion, but I think on my last watch of it I could find something to enjoy more out less throughout. Of course it’s still very low in my rankings.
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