Posted on 11/05/2015 3:33:52 PM PST by Perdogg
A license to kill is also a license to not kill,†M lectures his new boss in the 24th James Bond film, “Spectre.†Well, it’s not a license to bore as much as this bloated drag manages to do.
After a smashing opening sequence with a rooftop chase set against Day of the Dead observances in Mexico City, we’re plunged into a patchy plot (basically the same as the last “Mission: Impossible†outing) that’s little more than an excuse for random homages to the series’ illustrious past — reminding us how utterly mediocre this one is.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Len Deighton, a protege of Ian Fleming, created the series that gave us the Harry Palmer Films.
Spectre is bad. Not as Bad as Die Another Day. Weird movie. Blatant rip-off of several recent spy films. More in my official review. Embarrassedly creepy title sequence.
Quantum of Solace was pretty boring IMHO, so I cannot imagine this being any worse.
you cannot imagine. More later.
I trust you on this. Was it as apparent to you, as the other reviewer noted, that Craig either looked bored or “didn’t want to be in it” (as they say) ? That alone could kill a movie when the audience can tell the star’s heart isn’t in it.
I know Connery was reaching his breaking point while filming YOLT in Japan, especially after the infamous restroom stall incident, where an aggressive Japanese fan stalked him in a restroom and climbed from one stall into his to get to him.
You probably said so in the past, but what’s your opinion of the Harry Palmer films ?
>> Spectre is bad. Not as Bad as Die Another Day. <<
Die Another Day is over the top and ridiculous, but has a “so bad its good” quality for me. And I LIKED the opening title sequence (though Madonna’s techno theme was a weird fit for a Bond movie). Integrating Bond’s months of torture by the North Koreans was clever to do for the credits sequence, and was one of the few times the credits advanced the story along.
Incidentally, I haven’t seen Spectre and won’t watch until its out on DVD, but I checked out the theme song on youtube out of curiosity. If that’s anything to go by, its the worst of the Craig themes. And the three previous movies (Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, and Skyfall) have themes that reflect the quality of the movie overall:
Casino Royale had one of the coolest openings in Bond history (LOVED how they integrated the famous “gun barrel intro” INTO the credits themselves, to show Bond getting his 00 license) and the song was great and the visuals themselves were the most “tradition Bond” element of Craig’s un-Bondish reboot. I pity the fact Timothy Dalton never got to appear in this.
Casino Royale
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BD0uP25yxl8
Quantum had an somewhat annoying but passable opening song, but the music didn’t feel “James Bond-ish” at all. And the credit visuals themselves were even worse... most of it is throwing CGI sand at the camera. Big step down after CR.
Quantum of Solace
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMXT3aJxH_A
Skyfall had a great intro, the BEST of the four Daniel Craig theme songs (it won an Oscar and FINALLY used the traditional Bond element of intregrating the film’s title into the song’s chorus) and some very neat symbolic visuals.
Skyfall
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4gdhsVKTcs
Specter... well... I can’t even finish half the music video. This song is literally putting me to sleep, and I don’t know what the movie credits are like, but the music video has dour Daniel Craig standing around at a funeral, doing nothing.
Spectre
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jzDnsjYv9A
Watching films in the theater today is an exercise in how fast one wants to completely lose their hearing. I take it that is one of the reasons you watch the films on DVD instead (that and avoid the moron/thug element at the theater).
I think I went on the opening day for “The Living Daylights”, but at a late night showing (I can’t believe that was 28 years ago). The crowd went nuts, jumping out of their seats hooting and hollering. But that was at least a good Bond film (and the last to be filmed and take place in Eastern Europe before the fall of the Berlin Wall). LTK, of course, was set in Florida and Mexico.
I watched the Spectre music video. It’s not bad, it has a bit of a Barryesque feel to it (the lyrics are unmemorable). But from the clip, it’s apparent Craig looks utterly miserable (so much so that even non-Craig fans like me want to give the poor bloke a hug). That’s not a recipe for a good JB film.
Are you Harry Palmer?
Die Another Day wasthisclose to being classified as a “Fantasy” film.
I agree. After Craig's stylistic 180 my appreciation of it has grown.
I liked the last 4 songs, not digging this Spectre Song. Eh.
Speaking of the Gun barrel sequence, it's finally back at the start of the movie I hear, after inexplicably being at the end in the last 2.
As you correctly said, different strokes for different folks. I personally believe that the selection of Daniel Craig was the best decision done in a very long time when it comes to the Bond franchise. At first it did not make sense to many people, but he has not only had immensely high box office takes (Skyfall alone was over US$1 billion) but also revived a brand that after Pierce's run was felt to have run its course (not because of anything wrong Pierce did, although by the rolling of credits of Die Another Day it did seem shaky).
Daniel Craig has been a major boon for the Bond franchise, and the numbers support that significantly.
As for Clive Owen - his name ran prominently at the time the producers were thinking about who would replace Pierce, however I think it would have been a mistake to cast him (and that the producers did a good thing opting for another lead). His action movies (e.g. The International, Killer Elite and Shoot 'em Up) clearly show why he wouldn't have made a great (or for that matter, a good) Bond. While Bond movies are not necessarily famous for their acting, Clive Owen is simply wooden in all his portrayals. Either too serious, or too stiff, or too serious and stiff. Whether it is in movies that ask for physicality and brutality (his role as an assassin in the first Bourne movie, where his hand to hand skills were staccato), or where the scene called for intelligent investigative acumen (opposite Denzel in The Inside Man), or in a James Bondish role in The International, all of them are woody.
He would have been a George Lazenby, or better yet, a Timothy Dalton. An actor who comes close to the character that Ian Fleming may have had for Bond (particularly Dalton), but one that most movie goers would have bought into (both in terms of accepting the character, and paying their hard earned cash to watch).
Anyway, too long a post for actors and movies, and as mentioned it is just one person's opinion, but I do believe that Craig was a better choice than Owen. Even though if one resurrected Ian Fleming, the man would probably see Clive Owen as closer to his idea of what Bond was (in the same way Dalton and Lazenby were close to the portrayal of the character in the original books ...a flawed man, who is a bit of an 'everyman,' is not charming, has real alcohol issues, and the only flair he has is a love of good watches, good wines, and drives a Bentley ...Aston came later). But for movie goers ...Craig is a billion Dollar draw.
Back in the late ‘90s, there used to be a James Bond newsgroup which apparently was read (and sometimes heeded) by the JB producers. At the time, I was particularly critical of Pierce Brosnan (I infamously gave him the nickname of “Pirs Bonbons”). He may have looked the JB part, but his insufferable smugness/arrogance with a touch of silliness (as with Roger Moore still channeling Simon Templar/The Saint in his portrayal, Brosnan was still doing Remington Steele) made him the Bond you just wanted to slap for being a jackass. I complained he was making Bond too silly (the scene of him adjusting his necktie underwater during a boat chase when it momentarily went upside down), and with the next casting, they needed to go with a more serious-minded actor.
I have to admit to not seeing those films you cited from Owen’s oeuvre, however your complaints about Owen’s acting skills remain my virtually identical criticisms of Craig. It’s almost like the producers took my complaints about Brosnan and went in the complete opposite direction, a soulless, bored, bitterly cold blonde thug. No charm, no humanity, just a person distantly staring off into space. A thoroughly miserable soul. If I had been him with that entire outlook, I’d have splattered my brains after Vesper Lind’s death. I’m frankly flabbergasted (gobsmacked ?) that he has found any popularity in the role whatsoever. But the viewing public’s preferences (and voting habits) are often counter to mine.
As was cited in another recent thread, “Moonraker” was a top box-office draw, but other than being high camp, as a serious Bond film it is utter rubbish (I treat it as a comedy, the best way to watch it). By that reckoning, you’d want to keep making “Moonrakers” to keep the bucks rolling in. The public was less enamored of its follow-up, “For Your Eyes Only”, where Rog finally jettisoned the lunacy of the ‘70s films, returned to earth and became the Cold Warrior more appropriate for the character and politically relevant.
Continuing in the theme of box office draw, this 4th film of Craig’s may have been one too many, as it is already apparent that the bad reviews are taking a toll, and it is underperforming “Skyfall.” As cited already, and Craig let the cat out of the bag, how “thrilled” he was to do this one, and it shows.
As for Owen, I watch his Cinemax series, “The Knick”, and he acquits himself in the role quite well. But I still watch him with the lamentation that he should’ve been in these 4 Bond movies instead of Craig.
Touché.
The one point I'd say Craig has one up on Owen is brute physicality. While both look like they can fight, Craig looks like he has fought. I almost half-expect to see he has 'cauliflower ears' that are commonly seen in boxers due to injury to ear cartilage. He's definitely the most physical of the Bonds, and that's one area he doesn't need to act. Owen can do similar, but for him it's more like an otter underwater as compared to Craig's Pike.
As for Moonraker - I have the entire Bond collection up to Skyfall, and I am proud to say I have never brought myself to watch Moonraker. I have tried, but sadly (fortunately?_ to no avail.
Back to Craig. The more I think about him and Owen the more I realize that they are somewhat interchangeable. Maybe not like to like (i.e. not lion/tiger, where it doesn't matter much since beneath the skin the beasts are similar enough as not to matter) but more like a wolf/coyote (or jaguar/leopard), where they look similar but are actually different in many ways. Again, I'm not sure who is the wolf and who is the coyote between the two, but they are definitely both canids. Also, even though Craig is the bigger box office draw, that is as a result of the Bond movies. It is very possible that had Owen gotten the gig he could also have done well given the same exact scripts and timing.
Both of them, after all, follow the same 'realistic' trend and thus would have produced very similar outcomes.
As for this movie. I have watched it, and apart from it being a tad too long (actually, too long at 2.5 hours) it was an enjoyable movie. Was it better than Skyfall? Absolutely not, but then again there was little chance for ANY follow-on Bond movie to be better than Skyfall. Skyfall was simply a movie too good to follow, in much the same way that the third Batman movie (The Dark Knight Rises) by Nolan was NOT a bad movie, but because it followed The Dark Knight it seemed to be a 'bad' movie. It doesn't matter who produced/acted/directed the Spectre ...or what the script was or may have been ...it was never going to shine bright right after Skyfall.
I enjoyed the movie, and while I see some of the points some of the critics raised, I believe that even if those points weren't there the critics would still have found more.
The same fate awaits the sequel to Avatar.
Alas, we won’t get the chance to see how Owen would’ve done with the part (and how much the script might’ve been altered to fit him). Of course, I similarly wish we had had the opportunity to have seen George Lazenby and Timothy Dalton given a few more rounds. Dalton should’ve been a big star. It’s funny that he passed on the Bond role 18 years earlier in 1969 when given to Lazenby, citing his being too young (early 20s, which would defy reason as a ranked Naval Commander - maybe if they had altered it to ‘Leftenant’).
Alas, both of them, had they carried on into the ‘70s, would’ve been saddled with the “silly era” of films, which at least Rog Moore dove into with aplomb (had he been as Craig, those films would not only not have had an element of humorous enjoyability as high camp, they’d have been outright miserable outings). I probably should be grateful that my father passed on taking me to the release of “Moonraker” in 1979, because when he took me to my 1st in 1981 (FYEO) I wouldn’t have been asking him why JB wasn’t still up in space having laser battles like in Star Wars and Star Trek.
As for Craig’s sheer physicality, that could point to why it would’ve been better to have had him play a henchman (although again, he still lacked for charm — look at how the magnificent Robert Shaw could turn on a dime as Red Grant, between psychotic killer and charming dinner companion in “From Russia With Love”). Bond was never supposed to be, as far as I know, a gym rat. What with all that rich food (pâté de foie gras) and high quality liquors (Martinis, Vodkas, et al) sloshing around in his belly, nevermind his liberal appetite for tobacco, that would seem a bit counterintuitive (if the latter not being outright counterproductive). He was a man unlikely to make it out of middle age (much like Ian Fleming).
When you get right down to it, the single biggest flaw with respect to Bond is that he’s really a man of the post-WW2 era up through to the mid 1960s at the height of the Cold War. Allowing him to move past the time into an era where he is viewed (as Dame Judy Dench sadly put it), “a misogynist dinosaur”, may have been a terrible mistake. Perhaps keeping him, and the films, set in that 20+ year period where he was in his element was a better idea. Come up with another character or characters appropriate for the more unfortunate post-1960s crude and classless era we are trapped in today.
As for the Batman films or “Avatar”, I’d have to yield to more hard-core fans as to their appropriateness (or lack thereof) to source material. I’ll watch them once and shrug my shoulders. I’ve never been a comic-book person (beyond reading Garfield or Peanuts or whatever daily strips appear in the newspaper), so I can’t render a truly informed opinion on that subject. I am a Star Trek fan going back to early childhood in the 1970s, and have voiced my extreme displeasure with the recent remakes, which I abhor with a singular disgust.
Addressing “Avatar” one last time, I do feel pity for those fans who are so caught up in it that they are loathe to return to their boring and miserable lives, who suffer from enormous withdrawal symptoms. Such is the culture we live in today that is so debased and downbeat that many have little to nothing to look forward to other than fantastic fantasy films. This is so terribly wrong. Contrast it with 55 years ago when almost everyone was looking forward to the future and the space age and the wonderful things it would bring in reality. It’s like we fell down into a giant dark pit. Hopefully soon this will change, though too many dark forces like it just as it is.
Hulu has the Bond films available at the moment, so I took a look at ‘On Her Majesty’s Sercret Service’ for the first time in ages...”He had lots of guts”...ROTFLMAO!
Of interest:
https://www.yahoo.com/movies/s/spectre-why-daniel-craig-stupid-james-bond-201224785.html
What did you think of my review?
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