Why CR makes my head ache.
MrsDalloway
Posts: 79MI6 Agent
I liked Casino Royale. Lets get that over and done with straight away. No Bond film is perfect, and even the finest of the series have their continuity flaws and plot gaffs. But this is a clean sheet approach, a chance to right all previous wrongs, and brother William has raised a couple of points in CR that have set me brooding.
So, now we’re in a parallel universe where Bond was born in the sixties, didn’t fight in the war (or the cold war come to that). All well and good – I can accept a fair dollop of J.M. Barrie; I don’t want Bond to be a senior citizen. but my biggest criticism of the film is that the producers didn’t believe we could accept a new style of film, a new Bond and a loss of too many signature elements - in this case M. But this just leads to more confusion: did Dame Judy ever meet Brosnan? Is she still ‘the evil queen of numbers’ and did her predecessor keep an exceptionally fine single malt in the second drawer, or not? Presumably we’re going to have to have a new M soon; the poor old girl can’t go on forever. Heavens, how will we all cope?
Why the old DB5 cliche? I suppose again, it’s ‘just for fun’, but as Billy has pointed out, why bother to have Bond drive two AM products in one film, especially as the newer car is already an updated version of the GF novel & film car, not to mention a nod to Bond’s Battleship Grey Bentley. Serious case of over-egging. Why LHD? Who cares, but it might cause my head to ache if it re-appears on GB plates and with RHD in the subsequent films. I suspect this all boils down to a good photo opportunity: Bond = DB5. I felt patronised; I’m not a child. I ‘get it’; this is a Bond film even if it lacked a few of the creakier elements.
I didn’t understand the evening suit business – Bond plainly has no trouble in choosing his own Brioni (or tailored) suits, he seems to be wearing them with little trouble before and after he meets Ms Lynd – she even comments on his fine dress sense, so we’re not supposed to believe she somehow imbues him with new-found ‘style’. His budget is not in question; he can already afford the finest of everything an expense account will allow. Did Q-branch forget to issue him with a Brioni Tux? Did the budget not strech to eveningwear? Are we not supposed to notice how well dressed he is before being ‘Vesper-ised’? Or is this just ‘more fun’?
Why muck about with a fine novel? Why change the location from France to Montenegro (I don’t think anyone has proposed a good reason for this yet). Why introduce a duplicitous Mathis? Why ignore the relationship with Felix (and why for that matter is he small, black and from Washington rather than tall, blond and Texan?). There are so many important details that have been lost from the original. Expansion of the story and updating the cold war aspect I can understand – the rest just annoyed me.
Conclusion? A good shot, but not quite a bullseye. Why make it all so mumbly and difficult to follow to give an impression of depth, if you’re going to insult the audience’s intelligence in other areas?
Discuss.
So, now we’re in a parallel universe where Bond was born in the sixties, didn’t fight in the war (or the cold war come to that). All well and good – I can accept a fair dollop of J.M. Barrie; I don’t want Bond to be a senior citizen. but my biggest criticism of the film is that the producers didn’t believe we could accept a new style of film, a new Bond and a loss of too many signature elements - in this case M. But this just leads to more confusion: did Dame Judy ever meet Brosnan? Is she still ‘the evil queen of numbers’ and did her predecessor keep an exceptionally fine single malt in the second drawer, or not? Presumably we’re going to have to have a new M soon; the poor old girl can’t go on forever. Heavens, how will we all cope?
Why the old DB5 cliche? I suppose again, it’s ‘just for fun’, but as Billy has pointed out, why bother to have Bond drive two AM products in one film, especially as the newer car is already an updated version of the GF novel & film car, not to mention a nod to Bond’s Battleship Grey Bentley. Serious case of over-egging. Why LHD? Who cares, but it might cause my head to ache if it re-appears on GB plates and with RHD in the subsequent films. I suspect this all boils down to a good photo opportunity: Bond = DB5. I felt patronised; I’m not a child. I ‘get it’; this is a Bond film even if it lacked a few of the creakier elements.
I didn’t understand the evening suit business – Bond plainly has no trouble in choosing his own Brioni (or tailored) suits, he seems to be wearing them with little trouble before and after he meets Ms Lynd – she even comments on his fine dress sense, so we’re not supposed to believe she somehow imbues him with new-found ‘style’. His budget is not in question; he can already afford the finest of everything an expense account will allow. Did Q-branch forget to issue him with a Brioni Tux? Did the budget not strech to eveningwear? Are we not supposed to notice how well dressed he is before being ‘Vesper-ised’? Or is this just ‘more fun’?
Why muck about with a fine novel? Why change the location from France to Montenegro (I don’t think anyone has proposed a good reason for this yet). Why introduce a duplicitous Mathis? Why ignore the relationship with Felix (and why for that matter is he small, black and from Washington rather than tall, blond and Texan?). There are so many important details that have been lost from the original. Expansion of the story and updating the cold war aspect I can understand – the rest just annoyed me.
Conclusion? A good shot, but not quite a bullseye. Why make it all so mumbly and difficult to follow to give an impression of depth, if you’re going to insult the audience’s intelligence in other areas?
Discuss.
Comments
I too am confused why M wasn't recast as Miles Messervy SHOULD BE M at this point! Did Judi have a 5 picture contract or something?
And I have mentioned the poor casting of Felix. The actor they got is NOTHING like the Felix of the novels. If you're going to start over, do it right. To me, it's like Jeffrey the butler from Fresh Prince of Bel Air playing Felix... it don't work! He was bland and no presence, too.
The Dame Judi M makes no sense... she was M during the Brosnan era, she replaced Sir Miles and now she's M when Bond gets his Double Oh status. First (in GoldenEye) she pretty much wants to dismiss the section and now she seems to value it.
Maybe to a casual fan, it's no big deal... and you're right... it's fiction and should be enjoyed for what it is... but some of us enjoy seeing how the movie versions stack up to the source material...
My 2 cents
Try some paracetamol.
Welcome to the 'leper colony', Mrs D! CR has some fine points, but for me it's far from being the masterpiece that people want it to be.
As for the DB5, well it's part of Bond's iconography and they feel they need it in there, problem is, you have to explain why a contemporary guy would drive a 40-year-old vehicle. Will it get done up by Q's team then?
As for the rest, you would think that Vesper's betrayal etc would actually put Bond OFF the tux or drink she chose for him... not make him adopt it as personal trappings...
Montenegro is a bit more exotic than France perhaps, a bit more mysterious...
Roger Moore 1927-2017
As for the suit. . .well, it's entirely possible to have good taste in and appreciation for a fine suit but to have never worn or be interested in a tuxedo. I've somehow made it to the age of twoscore without ever once having donned a tux, so I wouldn't know a fine one from a cheapie.
And, DH, it is a masterpiece! So there!
I have to agree with Hardy here. When I saw that post, I liked to have cried. Even though I myself have just read most of the books, I knew of them and the differances.
Yes by no means CR is not perfect, the more I think and here about Felix, the more disturbing it becomes.(I'm from Texas and rather liked the fact that Bonds only true friend in the business was a big blonde Texan.)
Of course that can be over looked, but to put it rather tastefully, once you go black you never go back. We can not have a white Felix in this new series, unless they make the name Felix Lieghter just a "code name" where any agent can wear the name in which case that would be ridiculous. But again since this is trying to wipe the slate clean and start anew, I can overlook it, though my Texan pride is hurt.
Also just wanted to clear up the fact that the reason I don't like the new Felix is not because he is black, it not a problem in a racial sort of way, just that the old Felix was from Texas and this one isn't. And it isn't that I don't LIKE the new Felix, I do like him, just had an urp with the no Texan as ridiculous as that now sounds.
It will be interesting to see if Mr. Lieghter and Mr. Bond turn out to be the good friends that they are in the books. I sincerely hope so, because a man without a friend at all, is not a man my friend and Felix seems to be his only true friend now that Bond doesn't trust Mathis. But there is no point in crying over spilt milk, I'm probubly worrying over nothing.
But, poor Hardy! I fear the halls of academia are not what they once were.
But what I'd really like to address is the Vesper tux issue. I found it to be one of the best moments in the film. I don't think it means that Vesper is the source of James Bond's tastes in clothes. It's just a small moment in which the Bond girl flirtatiously turns the tables on our rather arrogant hero. There's Of course he had his own jacket -- just as she no doubt had her own dress. I thought it was fun, but hey -- probably not as much fun as the invisible cars and steel-teethed villains we've been slapping our knees to for the last 40 years.
The appearance of the DB5 is just an homage to the old Bond. I didn't attach any greater significance to it than that. Kind of like in "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" referencing the rats in FRWL. Actually, I get tired of homages in films. Tarantino has made a career out of them.
Finally, the differences between the book and the movie to my mind are fairly minor. All I recall is that Eon said the movie would be very close to the source material. They never promised an slavish adaptation in all its particulars. I think they largely delivered on their promise. The black Leiter (he said he was "the brother from Langley," which is where the CIA is headquartered -- whatever state the agent might hail from. "The brother from Texas," even from a blond-haired Felix, wouldn't have explained to Bond who he was dealing with.)
My intelligence wasn't the last bit insulted by CR, but maybe my brain's rusty ...
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
BAH! I'm going to shirk back to the leper colony! I should have known better to haunt your ivory towers!
BTW, where's that darn torture tunnel in DN anyway, I want to see spiders, lots and lots of spiders. And a great big squid.
I hate EON.
I disagree with you there, i know nothing about the Felix from the novels, because, to be honest i haven't read any of them, im not really a book kinda person, but I think they made a good choice with Jeffery Wright, i liked him, he made the role very modern, i was dssapointed with his tiny screentime, but hopefully they will incorporate him more into the next story!
I went to see the movie opening night at midnight with a few friends of mine, and one, who was sitting next to me - is about as big of a bond fan as myself (or at least close to it), but he decided not to go look into CR as much as I did, and wanted to watch it without any outside distractions.
So, Judi Dench pops onto the screen... and then mentions the "cold-war" comment... my friend looks at me and says "wait a second.." and I quickly answer "just pretend its all alright." haha.
this was my basic qualm with CR, because I'd like to think if this Bond is supposed to "Evolve" into the Bond we all know in love from the the previous 20 movies then how can he be a different Bond - it is a massive contradiction.
So i just pretend its all alright, haha - thats the only solution
As I have mentioned in other posts on other threads, some of us are well read on the source material (Fleming's novels) and do compare.
As far as bluman's post... LOGICAL subtle changes to a script are okay... the SPECTRE references (since those films were done "out of order") needed to be there... the Fort Knox thing, yeah, they couldn't carry all that gold, so that change was logical... and yes, there were low points in entire films!
The films are made, not for Bond fans, but the public... that's what I need to keep telling myself
M is M, Bond's boss.
The DB5 is Bond's car, why not show him winning it in a card game? It's cool (plus it comes with a babe, even cooler
The dinner jacket scene makes a whole lot of sense in context with the first Bond/Vesper scene: her comments dress him down, so to speak, and show him up as a comparative poser, he's just not quite there yet and she can spot it and does something about it later with the dinner jacket. It's a nice moment, maybe a bit stiff, okay, but the payoff--Bond looking at himself in the mirror as the James Bond theme swirls around him--is awesome (IMHO).
I can't tell the difference between France and Montenegro. Wherever they were, it was in Europe and it was lovely.
I liked the twist with Mathis, it was unexpected and Vesper got most of the screen time at the casino with Bond anyway, so it actually made something of the character instead of just another Quarrel Jr.-type schtick.
Never cared that much about Leiter, thought he was in CR just the right amount (ie not a lot).
For resetting Bond in a new context yet retaining or reintroducing some of the old familiar things, I thought CR did quite well. I wasn't expecting such a seemless navigation through all things Bondian, it worked (for me) very well. It's not a perfect film, very few are, but these quibbles don't even register, much less make my head spin. Jeez, I actually like Dench's M in this film more than I've liked any M since about LALD (really hated her in GE, thought that whole dinosaur thing was contrived and forced). I could've done with less "you've grown up, Bond" dialogue, but whatever.
You mean the anti-Craig, boycott CR site?
Whoa! Easy there, cowboy. I'm no anti-Craig, embargo menace fan! I like Craig, I just thought CR was a poorly done movie. To me it was kinda like painting a body on the Mona Lisa and saying "There! Now we can really see what Da Vinci saw!"
I've got to say the GF movie's plot -- making Fort Knox's gold radioactive, thereby increasing the value of his own -- was more ingenious and plausible than Fleming's own rather pedestrian robbery scenario.
And frankly, so was FRWL's. The SMERSH plot to embarass MI6 always seemed a little forced to me. Much ado about nothing. SPECTRE stealing a Lektor -- and, incidentally, embarassing MI6 and killing their nemesis, James Bond -- and then reselling the machine back to the Soviets was much more plausible.
I'm bracing for howls of protest from AJB's multitude of Fleming disciples. I am one too, but ya gotta call a spade a spade.
But what other leper colony could there be? Dude, you're no leper here--you expressed your opinions on the film intelligently, and everyone respects you. You're no leper to be cast from AJB--you're more like a Hindu untouchable who can share the same air and space as the Brahmins, but who otherwise cannot associate with them.
Only kidding. . . :007)
Changing the character of Bond into a quasi-comedian in DAF (then running with it for the next couple decades) was far, far more anti-Fleming than anything in CR IMO. Why not just call the dude Flint and be done with it? But, different strokes and all. I suppose at this late date, it's ALL Bond.
Gee, thanks...I think.
The rest -- eh? I certainly don't need Felix lighter.
I don't know whether or not this was meant with some sense of irony or sarcasm, in the nicest possible HH that's what I've taken it with and that intonation suits the way I feel about the Bond franchise and CR - if that makes sense ?:)
No Bond film will *ever* be Schindlers List kind of meaningful. The most that any of them can be is action entertainment of the highest quality as the Hollywood mainstream doesn't always care to comment politically in these unstable times. I don't think that there is much that CR doesn't offer that the most acclaimed blockbusters/action films have had in recent years.
I often get confused by fan sites in general. Not everyone was going to like CR/DC, that's life. However, a lot of people, *and not necessarily the posters in this thread I hasten to add* have no better suggestion as to how to keep the JB franchise fresh and evolving. Would the critics have been happier for the series to cease or be less credible than CR has turned out to be?? As I've said before if people were willing to write DC off just because of his hair colour then this really is a desperate situation.
I personally think the film is excellent but understand that some people dislike it and respect their opinions, I just happen not to agree. I hate LOTR and Harry Potter with a passion but I am in the minority who just doesn't get it. A lot of Bond fans feel the same about CR but I think this boils down more to personal choice than any major flaw in the film's plot, direction, production or script.
Anyway, rant over. Hope I'm not upsetting anyone, just wanted to get that off my chest!
I think you did a better job of expressing what I was trying to say: that CR is a popcorn movie, albeit a very good one, and I thought the Vesper-Bond repartee playing against Bond's reputation for sartorial splendor and the tipping of the hat to the DB5 was just good fun and not an insult to anyone's intelligence. Certainly not when you consider the goings-on in some of the other films (invisible cars, volcano lairs, etc ...).
As for the continuity thing, I was being sarcastic -- I'm as nutty against the whole concept of continuity in the Bond films as those who embrace the idea are for it, except I'm really not, and they are -- like fruitcakes. Gotta go -- the nurse says it's time to take my Prozac and tighten the straps.
I feel like we must've seen a different movie, "poorly done" isn't something I think of for CR...but oh well.
I would agree with that,
Darrenhat and Mrs Dalloways views, which i do respect them not liking CR seem to be very 'looking at the very minor details to bag the film' seriously you could do this with any bond movie and i happen to think that CR is a triumph.
Seriously this makes no ****ing sense?! Sorry to swear but its pretentious bull-**** Dalloway.
Its ok that you dont like it, but your evidence is not concrete enough to justify your views.
"Better make that two."