Controversial opinions about Bond films

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  • suavejmfsuavejmf Harrogate, North Yorkshire, England
    edited July 2015 Posts: 5,131
    Max von S was a better Blofeld than Charles Grey.
  • suavejmfsuavejmf Harrogate, North Yorkshire, England
    Posts: 5,131
    I saw this on the BBC....I think...did Honor Blackman narrate? The Look of Love would have fit well into any serious 60's era Bond film.
  • Posts: 14,799
    suavejmf wrote: »
    Max von S was a better Blofeld than Charles Grey.

    That was not difficult.

    Maybe not a controversial opinion, but a controversial, even shameful, feeling I had as a child when I first watched the last fifteen minutes of OHMSS: I was happy Tracy died. It meant Bond could keep on shagging Bond girls.

    What can I say, I was very young.
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy My Secret Lair
    Posts: 13,384
    All the Bond films stink, all the actors are crap and the birds aren't up to much !

    ( I don't believe any of that, just trying to be Controversial ) :D
  • Posts: 11,189
    Someone made the comment a few pages back that "the Bond series as a whole is quite mediocre". I think it might have been @doubleoego.

    The more I think about it the more I wonder whether he may have a point.
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy My Secret Lair
    Posts: 13,384
    I would have to ask, if they are so mediocre. Why so many other films
    Have copied them, in style and format ? ;)
  • BondJasonBond006BondJasonBond006 on fb and ajb
    edited August 2015 Posts: 9,020
    Controversial is my middle name... :)) ...nah, not really. I can be quite direct but always try to be diplomatic as well.

    To say DAD is the worst Bond is very controversial in my opinion. DAD is far from the worst.
    I believe it only gets that much hate because of the infamous CGI surfing scene.
    Most people even don't make an effort to watch it again to be convinced otherwise.

    There are much more worse special effects in some of the most beloved Bond movies.
    The Spy Who Loved Me may have the silliest, most ridiculous and bad special effect of all time. When the speed boat gets jettisoned from Strombergs underwater station.
    That looks like a scene from Team America it's that bad. You can clearly see it's puppets on a miniature boat. Just utterly bad, bad, bad.
    I can overlook that, it's like 5 seconds.

    Why can people not just go on and accept the CGI surfing scene in DAD?

    I guess it just needs another decade then DAD belongs to the "old" Bond movies and nobody will care anymore if there's a 5 second long bad special effect in it.
  • Posts: 11,189
    Controversial is my middle name... :)) ...nah, not really. I can be quite direct but always try to be diplomatic as well.

    To say DAD is the worst Bond is very controversial in my opinion. DAD is far from the worst.
    I believe it only gets that much hate because of the infamous CGI surfing scene.
    Most people even don't make an effort to watch it again to be convinced otherwise.



    Have a look at the scene again and tell me it's not, at the very least, cringe-inducing.
  • BondJasonBond006BondJasonBond006 on fb and ajb
    edited August 2015 Posts: 9,020
    @BAIN123

    it is awful, no doubt about it.

    I didn't say it's not awful. I just put it into perspective to other such moments in other Bond movies.
    By the way, I guess you cannot watch movies like Harry Potter 1-2 and Spider-Man 1 anymore too because they have the same horrible CGI in it and much more longer scenes and many of them too!!
  • Posts: 11,189
    I do remember the awful CG they used in Mummy Returns. Haven't watched that film in years.

    Funny that ;)
  • MajorDSmytheMajorDSmythe "I tolerate this century, but I don't enjoy it."Moderator
    Posts: 13,882
    That scene is bad (so is the QOS free fall for what it's worth), but there is still a lot to like in DAD. Mostly pre-Cuba.
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy My Secret Lair
    Posts: 13,384
    Is that an anti Craig jibe about him wearing a Cuban heel ? :))
    ( only joking) ;)
  • doubleoegodoubleoego #LightWork
    Posts: 11,139
    Lazenby's reaction to Tracy's death is overrated.
  • MayDayDiVicenzoMayDayDiVicenzo Here and there
    edited August 2015 Posts: 5,080
    Controversial is my middle name... :)) ...nah, not really. I can be quite direct but always try to be diplomatic as well.

    To say DAD is the worst Bond is very controversial in my opinion. DAD is far from the worst.
    I believe it only gets that much hate because of the infamous CGI surfing scene.
    Most people even don't make an effort to watch it again to be convinced otherwise.

    There are much more worse special effects in some of the most beloved Bond movies.
    The Spy Who Loved Me may have the silliest, most ridiculous and bad special effect of all time. When the speed boat gets jettisoned from Strombergs underwater station.
    That looks like a scene from Team America it's that bad. You can clearly see it's puppets on a miniature boat. Just utterly bad, bad, bad.
    I can overlook that, it's like 5 seconds.

    Why can people not just go on and accept the CGI surfing scene in DAD?

    I guess it just needs another decade then DAD belongs to the "old" Bond movies and nobody will care anymore if there's a 5 second long bad special effect in it.

    I'm pretty sure people have many more problems with DAD other than the surfing scene.

    The CGI surfing scene is bad not just because of it's use of poor CGI, but because it also craps on all the brilliant stunt work in prior James Bond films. Comparing it to the speed boat jettison in TSWLM doesn't really work either, because as you said yourself, it's 5 seconds at most, and we are talking about a film made in 1977.
  • BondJasonBond006BondJasonBond006 on fb and ajb
    Posts: 9,020
    @MayDayDiVicenzo

    yeah, I know the invisible car. Something I find rather amusing, both in the movie and the opinion on it by many who bash those scenes.

    It's a thread about controversy, I say DAD getting that much hate is highly controversial.
    I could say the same thing about DAF who seems to get even more hate.
  • MayDayDiVicenzoMayDayDiVicenzo Here and there
    Posts: 5,080
    @MayDayDiVicenzo

    yeah, I know the invisible car. Something I find rather amusing, both in the movie and the opinion on it by many who bash those scenes.

    It's a thread about controversy, I say DAD getting that much hate is highly controversial.
    I could say the same thing about DAF who seems to get even more hate.

    I don't understand you. You think that the majority opinion that Die Another Day is the worst Bond film is controversial?
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy My Secret Lair
    Posts: 13,384
    I never thought Jill St John was sexy in any way.
  • Creasy47Creasy47 In Cuba with Natalya.Moderator
    Posts: 40,370
    @DrGorner, neither did I. I wouldn't say that's controversial.
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy My Secret Lair
    Posts: 13,384
    But I'm head of her fan club. :D
  • Posts: 232
    BAIN123 wrote: »
    Controversial is my middle name... :)) ...nah, not really. I can be quite direct but always try to be diplomatic as well.

    To say DAD is the worst Bond is very controversial in my opinion. DAD is far from the worst.
    I believe it only gets that much hate because of the infamous CGI surfing scene.
    Most people even don't make an effort to watch it again to be convinced otherwise.



    Have a look at the scene again and tell me it's not, at the very least, cringe-inducing.

    What really sucks about it is that if they had just reconceptualized the scene, they could have accomplished it via a series of cuts that didn't scream Hanna-Barbera or seaQuest. Do some low-flying aerial over real water for his subjective plunge. Then, when you have to show a figure, do it BRAZIL style, shooting UP ata a model Bond and chute shot high-speed. You do about 100 takes and sooner or later, one of them will look okay, and you have it in-camera, or can then just add spray in the foreground.

    The notion of putting all your VFX eggs in a single CGI basket has done more harm to visual credibility and cinematic storytelling in the last 15-18 years than the misuse of digital intermediates. Up until the late 90s, it was only a rare film with more than a hundred or 150 vfx shots, now it is the rare films that has less (less than double that, probably.) Design the shot right and execute it credibly and you don't need the other seven views of the ship flying by - you really don't!
  • edited August 2015 Posts: 12,837
    I think the worst thing about the parasurfing is that it could've been cut completely and it wouldn't impact the film. Think about it

    Bond runs away
    Bond escapes in jet sled thing
    Parasurfing
    Goes back to the ice palace
    Runs away again
    Escapes in Aston Martin

    The Aston Martin chase serves a purpose because it gets Bond out of the way allowing Graves to escape, but the whole jet sled/parasurfing sequence could be cut entirely and the audience would be none the wiser, especially since Bond isn't even at all dishevelled when he goes back to the ice palace.

    In fact I think that's true of a lot in DAD, it could just be cut out. Some bad stuff would have to remain (eg- robosuit, because Bond has to kill Graves) but I bet a fan could produce a much shorter, but also better version of Die Another Day. Replace the gunbarrel with one of the other Brosnan ones, play different music over the theme song, and cut out several scenes and lines and you'd end up with a flawed, not brilliant film, but decent entertaining 90 minute action film.
  • Posts: 232
    Couldn't you do the same with other lesser Bonds that spend half their runtime with Bond being chased, like L&LD and TND?
  • trevanian wrote: »
    Couldn't you do the same with other lesser Bonds that spend half their runtime with Bond being chased, like L&LD and TND?

    I guess but at least in those films the chase scenes were entertaining and got Bond somewhere. The parasurfing is a CGI mess and then by the end of it Bond is in exactly the same position he was in before anyway (back at the ice palace with his cover blown), it's completely pointless.

    I agree that some cutting to the second half could improve TND though. The first half is brilliant but the second half is a bit bloated imo. The action is good (the tower escape, the bike chase, all great inventive setpieces with good stuntwork) but there's still too much. I'd trim the finale a bit.
  • echoecho 007 in New York
    Posts: 5,921
    Birdleson wrote: »
    I think it's a fine Bond song. I've even grown to like Madonna's DIE ANOTHER DAY. The ones that I don't think I can ever pleasurably listen to are ALL TIME HIGH and THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS (and of course NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN). Weak.

    I prefer Tomorrow Never Dies to Surrender.

  • chrisisallchrisisall Brosnan Defender Of The Realm
    Posts: 17,687
    trevanian wrote: »
    What really sucks about it is that if they had just reconceptualized the scene, they could have accomplished it via a series of cuts that didn't scream Hanna-Barbera or seaQuest.

    Oh, hahahahah, *choke* LOL :))
    OMG, biggest laff of the week!!! Thanks! :))
  • Posts: 266
    I've always wondered how the CGI surfing scene would look and how it would've been perceived if they had edited so the ice cliff breaks off and forms the wave, then you see Bond come over it and then you see him pull up onto the ice and fly off. So it lasts a couple of seconds and you don't have all the other stuff in the middle. I'm sure it would still look rubbish but it might be bearable.
  • suavejmfsuavejmf Harrogate, North Yorkshire, England
    Posts: 5,131
    The Brosnan era was mediocre....oh wait...that's not controversial!
  • DaltonCraig007DaltonCraig007 They say, "Evil prevails when good men fail to act." What they ought to say is, "Evil prevails."
    Posts: 15,686
    What shocks me the most about the CGI surfing scene is not the CGI itself, but that they put the Bond theme full-blast. I can accept bad CGI, but that bit almost killed the Bond theme for me.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    suavejmf wrote: »
    The Brosnan era was mediocre....oh wait...that's not controversial!

    If only they were mediocre...One can wish.
  • MurdockMurdock The minus world
    Posts: 16,328
    suavejmf wrote: »
    The Brosnan era was mediocre....oh wait...that's not controversial!
    Better than the Dalton era.
    Drops-Mic.jpg

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