James Bond In Skyfall - - - - Part 13

[NY1981]

I would much rather like to see a Craig movie like From Russia With Love, For Your Eyes Only, or The Living Daylights where its more of a spy story that doesn't involve some super villain trying to take over the world. I guess my definition of formula is different from yours. I know Craig's villains didn't have that world domination goal like Blofeld, Drax, or Stromberg had but something still seems off after having watched many of the older ones I got on the 50th anniversary blu ray set I got for Christmas. Craig's definitely stray from some of the classic elements that I feel are missing and if you take those things away you might as well watch one of the Bourne movies. There's a reason Bond has survived for 50 years and if you change too much it loses its identity.

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

I agree that there is definitely a fine line you walk with Bond movies. I disagree that CR followed the formula like Brosnan's movies, however.

The lack of gimmick actions scenes with CR and going back to straight up practical actions scenes helped. No over reliance on gadgets nor CGI. Nor was the plot ridiculous. Implausible, well, yes, but not ridiculous. I have no problems with ridiculous plots in Bond movies, but pardon my friend, The VILLAIN HAS TO SELL THAT S**T! Not to mention the villain didn't try to take over the world. Then there's no Q, nor Moneypenny.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Did I just read spy film and FYEO and TLD in the same sentence?

I do find the idea that Bond is losing its identity when it was the late Connery films and the start of Moore's run that started to really lose what made the the early films so great for the most part. "Classic" Bond is Dr. No, FRWL, Goldfinger, Thunderball and OHMSS. CR and Skyfall have more in common with those then the ridiculousness that followed.

I agree that there is definitely a fine line you walk with Bond movies. I disagree that CR followed the formula like Brosnan's movies, however.

The lack of gimmick actions scenes with CR and going back to straight up practical actions scenes helped. No over reliance on gadgets nor CGI. Nor was the plot ridiculous. Implausible, well, yes, but not ridiculous. I have no problems with ridiculous plots in Bond movies, but pardon my friend, The VILLAIN HAS TO SELL THAT S**T! Not to mention the villain didn't try to take over the world. Then there's no Q, nor Moneypenny.

The final action scene in CR is gimmicky. I love it, but it is gimmicky.

 

[NY1981]

I love Casino Royale and its in my top 3 of all the Bonds. I don't mind the different approach of a Bond every now and then with movies like License to Kill, The Man with the Golden Gun, or Moonraker that kinda mix things up but after those kinds of movies you gotta come back to the formula which I haven't seen yet in Craig's.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Formula is bad. The worst part of Skyfall is straight formula.

 

[gwynplaine]

I love Casino Royale and its in my top 3 of all the Bonds. I don't mind the different approach of a Bond every now and then with movies like License to Kill, The Man with the Golden Gun, or Moonraker that kinda mix things up but after those kinds of movies you gotta come back to the formula which I haven't seen yet in Craig's.

You don't mind really bad movies? To each their own though.
(License to kill, I don't remember very well actually.)

 

[DarthSkywalker]

You don't mind really bad movies? To each their own though.
(License to kill, I don't remember very well actually.)

Miami Vice meets Scarface meets Bond with ninjas. It is better left not remembered.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

The Man with the Golden Gun is definitely different, even if it isn't good. Moonraker on the other hand is a good example of the formula being followed to the letter.

 

[Thundercrack85]

How can you not love Moonraker? It was so ridiculous.

 

[NY1981]

Did I just read spy film and FYEO and TLD in the same sentence?

Yeah you did and obviously haven't watch them lately or at all if you don't get it. Let me spell it out for you.... FYEO doesn't deal with some crazy plot about some madman trying to take over the world or wipe it out. It's a very simple but effective plot about a sunken spy ship with a sought after computer used for missiles that is also highly sought after by the Soviets. It basically involves Bond trying to find out what happened and he gets caught up in the revenge quest by Mileena. It concludes with a great climax on this mountaintop villa with Bond and General Gogol both wanting the ATAC computer. TLD also has a low key story that involves a KGB defection,revival of Smert Spionam, and arms dealing.

If you seriously don't see how those are considered the more "spy" stories of Bond compared to ones like You Only Live Twice, Moonraker, Thunderball, The Spy Who Loved Me, or Goldfinger, then I guess I just wasted 10 minutes typing to brick wall.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

How can you not love Moonraker? It was so ridiculous.

Because it is not so bad it is good, just bad.

 

[NY1981]

You don't mind really bad movies? To each their own though.
(License to kill, I don't remember very well actually.)

Never said I was in love with those movies just that every now and then it doesn't hurt to try something different. Sometimes it works (Moonraker is a guilty pleasure) and sometimes it don't. My point was that every now and then you need something to break up the monotony but then you usually get something great after it. Just like for every Batman and Robin you get a Batman Begins.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Yeah you did and obviously haven't watch them lately or at all if you don't get it. Let me spell it out for you.... FYEO doesn't deal with some crazy plot about some madman trying to take over the world or wipe it out. It's a very simple but effective plot about a sunken spy ship with a sought after computer used for missiles that is also highly sought after by the Soviets. It basically involves Bond trying to find out what happened and he gets caught up in the revenge quest by Mileena. It concludes with a great climax on this mountaintop villa with Bond and General Gogol both wanting the ATAC computer. TLD also has a low key story that involves a KGB defection,revival of Smert Spionam, and arms dealing.

If you seriously don't see how those are considered the more "spy" stories of Bond compared to ones like You Only Live Twice, Moonraker, Thunderball, The Spy Who Loved Me, or Goldfinger, then I guess I just wasted 10 minutes typing to brick wall.

I have watched them all very recently. Nice little marathon before Skyfall came out.

Thunderball is more of a spy film then either of those not so great films. Smaller does not make a film more "spyish", being spy film does that.

The films in the series that can be called spy films is very short. Dr. No, FRWL, Thunderball, OHMSS, CR, QoS and Skyfall. That is the list. Why? Because they are actually spy movies.

 

[NY1981]

I have watched them all very recently. Nice little marathon before Skyfall came out.

Thunderball is more of a spy film then either of those not so great films. Smaller does not make a film more "spyish", being spy film does that.

The films in the series that can be called spy films is very short. Dr. No, FRWL, Thunderball, OHMSS, CR, QoS and Skyfall. That is the list. Why? Because they are actually spy movies.

Thunderball is very overrated and borderline boring at some points. It's not a bad film but the previous 3 are sooooo much better. I pretty much consider it the downward slope for Connery films.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Thunderball is very overrated and borderline boring at some points. It's not a bad film but the previous 3 are sooooo much better. I pretty much consider it the downward slope for Connery films.

I'd say YOLT is when Connery's film start to hurt bad.

I like Thunderball better then Goldfinger. The underwater scenes definitely go on to long and aren't very interesting, but the rest of the films works very well. It is the event film Goldfinger could have been. It is Bond doing real work, not unlike the Craig films.

FRWL is my favorite Connery film, and definitely in my top 3 alongside Casino Royale and Skyfall. My appreciation for Dr. No is definitely growing.

 

[AnneFan]

Bond might be the only franchise I can think of where people actually want a film to be formulaic. A strange phenomenon.

True - for example when the "Bond, James Bond" is absent for a film people lose it. It's been said the goal of a Bond movie is to do the same thing every time but differently. Like Q gives out the gear, but this time he's out in the field, etc.

IMO the Craig era has been bold in areas, used the formula of course but in a fresher way where it seems like anything can happen. Bearded and captured Bond in DAD was a step in this direction, but then it fell back to formulaic. I'm all for making movies for the here and now and doing new things. Not being afraid of putting the gunbarrel at the end and starting the movie in black and white. Bond saying he doesn't give a damn about how his martini is prepared due to his mood and Q commenting on exploding pens makes me smile. There's a fun postmodern twist going on.

Back in the day they were pioneers carving out their own road, and we should hold onto that attitude today. Put Bond in new siuations and seeing how he reacts and what it says about him - staying dead and choosing to come back to service with an injury, Silva hitting on him. I like how Craig and the writing has humanised the character, it's made things more interesting with a bigger sense of threat.

 

[gwynplaine]

Never said I was in love with those movies just that every now and then it doesn't hurt to try something different. Sometimes it works (Moonraker is a guilty pleasure) and sometimes it don't. My point was that every now and then you need something to break up the monotony but then you usually get something great after it. Just like for every Batman and Robin you get a Batman Begins.

Good point.

 

[gwynplaine]

Miami Vice meets Scarface meets Bond with ninjas. It is better left not remembered.

t:

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

Did I just read spy film and FYEO and TLD in the same sentence?

I do find the idea that Bond is losing its identity when it was the late Connery films and the start of Moore's run that started to really lose what made the the early films so great for the most part. "Classic" Bond is Dr. No, FRWL, Goldfinger, Thunderball and OHMSS. CR and Skyfall have more in common with those then the ridiculousness that followed.

I'll say this about Roger Moore. Even at their worst, in TSWLM and his movies after, I find Roger Moore so damn entertaining. Say what you want about the movies, Moore did his best with what he had, even when was the only thing good about some parts of movies. That's why he was so sorely missed by fans when Dalton became Bond.

I like Timothy Dalton as an actor, but his performances in the Bond movies felt so restrained. Like there is a balance between being new and sticking to the Bond formula, with Bond as a character there needs to be a balance of movie Bond and novel Bond. Dalton is an example of why you shouldn't stray too close novel Bond because Bond in the books isn't as charming and straight hates what he does a lot of the time. Craig plays close to the novels too, but has more charm and more dry humor to him than Dalton.

I wish more of Moore's Bond was written as great as in The Spy Who Loved Me and people would have thought differently of him. That's the key reason why I like The Spy Who Loved Me more than most Bond movies save for Skyfall, From Russia With Love, Goldeneye, and Goldfinger.

 

[gwynplaine]

Moore was great in LALD too. A really good Bond film imo. But I've loved Moore since The Saint and The Persuaders, so I might be a little biased too.

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

With Moore, I felt that he was weak in the first half (which has to do with how he was introduced and the fact that he didn't really do anything the first half) but the second half he shined, especially in the Bus chase scene and the scene where he seduces Solitaire with a deck of the same card.

With The Spy Who Loved Me, he finally got adjusted to the role, and the writing was finally strong enough to support it. He was just plain badass in TSWLM while keeping his witty humor.

 

[gwynplaine]

With Moore, I felt that he was weak in the first half (which has to do with how he was introduced and the fact that he didn't really do anything the first half) but the second half he shined, especially in the Bus chase scene and the scene where he seduces Solitaire with a deck of the same card.

With The Spy Who Loved Me, he finally got adjusted to the role, and the writing was finally strong enough to support it. He was just plain badass in TSWLM while keeping his witty humor.

 

[TheVileOne]

Did Sony distribute MIB worldwide? Because it gross over $600 million.

Yes they also released MIB worldwide since the worldwide gross counted to their domestic and international marketshare which they topped for studios in 2012.

 

[Roose Bolton]

I'd say YOLT is when Connery's film start to hurt bad.

I like Thunderball better then Goldfinger. The underwater scenes definitely go on to long and aren't very interesting, but the rest of the films works very well. It is the event film Goldfinger could have been. It is Bond doing real work, not unlike the Craig films.

FRWL is my favorite Connery film, and definitely in my top 3 alongside Casino Royale and Skyfall. My appreciation for Dr. No is definitely growing.

YOLT is horrid. The plot is a complete bastardization of Fleming's masterpiece, it utterly destroyed the character of Blofeld and features one of the poorest performances of Sean Connery's career. In my opinion if it wasn't for the cinematography it'd be one of the worst of the series.

 

[Mrs. Sawyer]

If I actually read the novel I get the feeling I would hate the movie. I'm now actually glad I haven't read it yet.