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That's the view I thought about her character when I watched SF last weekend.
Exactly...they need to do similar now with Mallory,and not waste the talents of an actor like Ralph Fiennes,even just a mission briefing in his office.
Bernard Lee was only in the films briefly,at the beginning,a great treat if we got to see him in the middle,and sometimes at the end,the same needs to be with Fiennes M,no more than that.
SF is the biggest moment for any M ,and they need to go back now to how it was.
Bernard Lee is 99% of people's favourite M.....less is Moore,er more.
Good conclusion, my friend!
I did genuinely think until recently I preferred it to FRWL previous no. 4 and SWLM previous no. 5 but SF has moved down to five while the others go up a place.
While I have issues with it, yes the plot hole of Silva supposedly having planned everything years before highlighted by Wishaw's Q's dialogue. I do like him in SF but this moment irks me and as much as I dispise SP he all around comes across better, one of the only plus points of that travesty.
Also I do love the end of the film in Scotland and the whole Apocalypse now tribute that some seem to hate but the origins of Bond skims too close to Batman and you can see the writers were trying to replicate that vibe with Bond.
In hindsight I would have preferred it not, digging into Bond's and M's past I liked but they dug a little too far, P&W & Logan with Mendes being a little under the spell of Nolan's Bat trilogy and the whole Batman back story.
Ditto.
Sure, its about her (M). And James, and Silva. As they spell out, as blatantly as they could get away with.
But it's really about the Bond movie franchise.
Apologies if this is well-covered elsewhere, as I suspect. I haven't seen as much; if so please tell me where. If not, please continue.
SF is, above all things, a meta-story about the relevance of our fave pop culture intellectual property, Bond. Bond, the franchise, not exactly Bond, the character (though he is the lynchpin).
It essentially covers a middle-aging Barb's fears and struggles regarding viability, survival, relevance.
How does Bond /Bond fail? When his "handler" (M representing the relevant Broccoli/Wilson) loses faith and breaks with expectation and "bets wrong" (as someone earlier in this thread said) by not betting on Bond. So let's take a shot (of romantic tragedy, of lower-budget martial arts slapstick, of sci-fi, of self-parody, of Bourne's shakiness) and knock Bond off the train, to his apparent demise. Oof. That didn't quite work out (perhaps financially, perhaps critically).
How does Bond recover? When Bond returns to "the old ways." Tradition. Even if explicating tradition via unusual backstory is, by definition, not the old way but a disturbing/challenging new way...it still is the reclamation and penance path needed.
Bond (via Bond) might wallow too much, and certainly frustrates his handlers upon return, and might not always shoot straight. But...as Tennyson explicitly tells us, "That which we are, we are." Bond's not very comfortable now, is it? But whether we are going to complain the whole way is left unanswered. Will we?
Well, sometimes the old ways are the best. And radios from, apparently, the sixties, beat computers from the 2000s. Bond's resilience is what matters, his reliance on foundational material. Bond perseveres because he has a DB5 not any other car, and because he was forged (by Andrew and Monique and Fleming and tragedy) into someone that weathers, perseveres, and overcomes, even in the form of Pyrrhic victory. Bond is the last rat standing because he can rely on from whence he came, not a Batman-begins-style manor which deserves conflagration, but instead a hardwood-paneled office with a stuffed door, which deserves enshrinement.
So we burn one, and return to the other at last. Just as the producers do, whenever they are in trouble. Whenever they are out of ideas. Whenever they need to exceed expectations to qualify for the next funding round.
As does Bond, come any trend or era or generation or style or challenger. That's why folks love this nonstandard Bond story; its thematically about the crucialness of our shared, "standard" Bond elements, to our entertainment lives.
Skyfall answers whether there is any, any of the old Bond left.
But here we are, years later, still discussing, interpreting and debating what is "under the skin" when you dig a little deeper. Surely, this has to be a complement? How many other Bond movies have this depth? Still top three for me.
About the link between Broccoli as a stand-in for M vis-a-vis Craig as a stand in for Bond, it's even there in the dialogue.
"Hire me or fire me. It's entirely up to you" - he was retained
"You're sentimental about him" - so it seems
"The old ways are best" - after 12+ years, apparently
"You don't need to be an operative to see the obvious. It's a young man's game. " - 50+ seems to be ok these days
"Are you ready to go back to work? With pleasure" - let's bloody well hope so
"There's no shame in saying you've lost a step. The only shame would be not admitting it until it's too late." - let's give him his 'high' and hope he's not delusional
Oh @Getafix ever guaranteed to comment on this film, you can't stop yourself, it's quite tragic really.
He has a point while the movie really hasn't except EON big dreams of Oscar. ;)
What I find odd is that pretty much all the faults people find in SP and there already in SF, yet one is coruscated and the other lauded as a masterpiece.
It was terrible writing,lazy score,and an arrogant performance from 'superman Bond' Craig.
SF was none of those things.
It's a great standalone (to me) film and a welcome addition to the series.
SP is not.
I get it that most cinemagoers probably like it and have forgotten all about it by now,but for a Bond fan its quite insulting to be so presumptuous that we wouldn't notice quite how lazy the whole thing is.
Also Craig's performance is excellent in SF,and phoned-in,unlikeable and arrogant in SP,different to the character of his Bond in all the other films.
But that's my opinion only of course.
None of these elements were in SP for me. Even the score seemed played out.
So perhaps I was just dazzled by all the gloss in the prior film, but it continues to impress me on each viewing even today. It's actually my most enjoyable and re-viewable Craig film, untainted for me by the silly retro connections. The much more highly rated CR hits higher peaks (particularly in the casino sequences), but doesn't do it for me after Le Chiffre's death. I still like it though, but it has been declining in my rankings of late.
I recognise that directors are not necessarily the best judges of these things but in his comments on SP Mendes speaks about how the PTS was the one bit of SF he was really not happy with and how he really wanted to do something a lot better for SP - regardless of what anyone thinks of the overall merits of the two films, I think it’s hard to argue the SP PTS isn’t superior in pretty much every conceivable way. A proper bit of well put together filmmaking as opposed to the generic plodding action tedium that we might get from any other franchise.
The action isn't a patch on the SF PTS, which moves seamlessly from car to bike to train, with several participants involved either directly or by remote. I find it incredibly tense, and it's capped by a surprising moment which segues nicely into Adele's moody song.
The worst part for me is the ending. It finishes with a cool Bond moment in the copter and segues into that pathetic depressing song, which doesn't reflect what we just saw before onscreen. Completely tone deaf film making imho.
Agreed.
The SP PTS bores me as soon as Bond lands on the old sofa ,I have never found the rest of the PTS interesting or helicopter fight interesting at all.
I like about 2/3 of the SF PTS ,much more thrilling and urgent,as they try to get the disc back etc.
jumping from car to bike to train is not really the essence of Bond action to me. that's cartoon OTT action. the SF PTS sequence leaves me bored and annoyed by the end.
I'm swimming against the tide but I actually quite like Smiths song
Not really?
My main problems with SPECTRE are (and many users seem to agree with me):
- Bond quitting the service for a woman he doesn't love
- Poor retconning
- Overuse of the scooby gang; a whole B-plot is devoted to them and they're heavily featured in the third act
- 1/3 of the score is simply copy pasted from the previous entry
- The main villain being closely linked to Bond's childhood
- Bond being a Terminator mere moments after he's been tortured
None of these things were in Skyfall last time I checked.
Regardless of how I feel about SF as a whole, watching Bond fall into the train and adjust his cuffs afterwards never fails to make me smile. Great little moment.
I didn't mind Smith's song at all when I first heard it in the movie opening night, but the more I've heard it since, the worse it's gotten.
Mendes can't really do action.