Why Brosnan lost it.
Eagleman
Posts: 26MI6 Agent
Having become a real fan of the Bond films while Pierce was still at the helm, I was devastated when EON let him go. But looking back over his films I can see that his reign as Bond was not all that good.
Brosnan made four films. All with different Directors. Only two, Martin Campbell and Michael Apted, were good enough to handle a 007 film. My favourite Brosnan film is 'The World Is Not Enough'. Because this was the only film that Pierce shown us any emotion that Bond had in the novels. When he kills Renard, you see he nailed Bond with the line "She's waiting for you". It had a very cold feel that the assassin that Bond is would have said.
Where as 'Tomorrow Never Dies & Die Another Day' were more fitting to Roger Moore's Bond. They were comic strip films. Much like 'Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice, Diamonds Are Forever, Man With The Golden Gun, Spy Who Loved Me, Moonraker, Octopussy & View To A Kill'.
For me Bond is not a comic strip. I like it gritty. The best Bonds are the ones like Dalton's, Lazenby's. Then 'Dr No, From Russia With Love and Casino Royale'. I hope that Daniel Craig can stay on as Bond for another 3 or 4 films. And that EON stay on the path of realism. Let Bond do what he's best at. Killing, not lying space ships or driving invisible cars!
Brosnan made four films. All with different Directors. Only two, Martin Campbell and Michael Apted, were good enough to handle a 007 film. My favourite Brosnan film is 'The World Is Not Enough'. Because this was the only film that Pierce shown us any emotion that Bond had in the novels. When he kills Renard, you see he nailed Bond with the line "She's waiting for you". It had a very cold feel that the assassin that Bond is would have said.
Where as 'Tomorrow Never Dies & Die Another Day' were more fitting to Roger Moore's Bond. They were comic strip films. Much like 'Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice, Diamonds Are Forever, Man With The Golden Gun, Spy Who Loved Me, Moonraker, Octopussy & View To A Kill'.
For me Bond is not a comic strip. I like it gritty. The best Bonds are the ones like Dalton's, Lazenby's. Then 'Dr No, From Russia With Love and Casino Royale'. I hope that Daniel Craig can stay on as Bond for another 3 or 4 films. And that EON stay on the path of realism. Let Bond do what he's best at. Killing, not lying space ships or driving invisible cars!
Comments
But most of all, what I find lacking in Brosnan is his interpretation of Bond. It was good but safe. The acting was solid but it added nothing to the character. For this reason I find Brosnan believable as Bond whilst I'm watching the movies but instantly forgettable when I think back at the Bond character in general.
I also like Bond to be gritty rather than cartoonish, hence my prediliction for Dalton and the Connery of FRWL, and my appreciation of CR.
But...
What exactly was Pierce Brosnans Bond all about - Connery, Dalton, Craig and Moore all had a Bond you could latch on to. One you could define. Brosnan just seemed like a safe pair of hands. There was nothing distinctive about him.
He reminds me of David Tennant's Dr Who - attractive, young, female friendly - but ultimately soulless...
Couldn't agree more about that first scene with Jinx. I cringe every time I watch it. As for Brosnan I think he was a great Bond. All the actors put their on spin on Bond and for the most part they have all been good in there own ways, and for their era. I do think that Brosnan was let down by the material but in spite of that gave us four good films.
I would agree that Pierce was poorly served by the writers- there is nothing wrong with him whatsoever, imho. He had the potential to be one of the best Bonds, as Goldeneye shows, but I feel TND and DAD weren't just comic book but were too glossy for their own good. DAD was the most soulless Bond film ever (after the first half hour or so, which is fairly decent), imho, and Bond was basically just a catalyst for bad one-liners and big explosions. Every character was poorly written and acted, really. I think Casino Royale showed up a fair proportion of the Brosnan era for what it really was.
This I tend to agree with, yet just as often he was worse than the material he was given, IMO. His now you see me act, now you don't Bond was ultimately a failure, and he shares equally in that blame. IMO.
He was far, far better in non-Bond films, more consistent with his acting choices and stronger in his characters. For some daft reason I've never been able to figure out, Bond just seemed to flummox him, at the weirdest times too--meeting Onatopp, meeting Wade, meeting Carver and Wai Lin, looking at weapons in Wai Lin's hideout, Carver's death, with M telling him about Elektra (and all the Dr. Warmflash stuff), in the casino and again in the casino with Elektra, trading the sneakers, the death of Renard, the kiss of life, meeting Jinx, before the swordfight, in the ice bar with Frost and Jinx, getting into bed with Frost...off the top of my head. Just no rhyme or reason to it, there are just as many amazingly similar scenes that he nailed. Schizo-weird.
The writers/directors/producers did him a disservice, sure. But he (perplexedly) helped stir the dish that was fed to him. His was the one step forward, one step back Bond...maybe that's part of why folks get the feeling he didn't have his "thing" like the other Bond actors did? As much as he annoys me in the role for choices he made with the material given to him, can't help but imagine him in a Bond film that actually played to his strengths. Same thing could be said for Dalton IMO, neither actor got the Bond film they could've soared in, EON was still too enamored with the Bond (and revenue) that Moore built. And why not? As dodgy as the past couple decades of Bond have been, they made a wad of cash for everyone involved in the making of, and entertained millions.
I can honor Brosnan for one thing--showing up. He kept on coming, even if he was on shaky ground at times. His considerable old-school movie star polish and charm carried not only him in the role, but the series, and through some of the weakest surrounding efforts imaginable (outside of the utterly unimaginative Glen, of course). Was in only one passable Bond film (TND), but thanks for the fish anyway, and the bigger blame was definately EON's (I know the apologists out there will say, it was all EON, but watching his performances it's pretty easy to see that it took two for that particular Bond tango...IMHO).
Lol. And pretty much agree with supes's summation as well (it's shorter than mine, always a plus, I tend to ramble...).
Dalton and Craig have a right to be considered as the Bond of the books (and Eagleman, that does matter despite what others may have said). My vote goes to Dalton in that respect; Craig may supersede that, given time and the right scripts, but IMO he hasn't yet. Neither of these two gents possess the sheer star quality (a difficult thing to define though it undeniably exists) of Connery, Moore and Brosnan that endeared them to the general public, which does not consist of Bond purists although it brings in the bucks. If the Bond actor's non-Bond films still succeed, then the public has warmed to their charisma- Moore did Gold, Shout At The Devil, etc, Brosnan had Thomas Crown etc, Connery's are legion; Dalton's Hawks went nowhere, Craig is still to be tested.
Brosnan's Bond was a little more than superficial and to his credit he's on record as wanting more from the role. GE was a restatement as it had to be; TND (much as I love it) was 007 by the numbers. His success in the role led to the more character-driven TWINE which did have some meat on the bone. DAD's failings were not his doing (the CGI wasn't his fault and he didn't direct the film).
At the end of the day the Bond films are producer's films- they don't "belong" to the actor, director or writer.
Accurate depiction of Brosnan's 2 "worst" Bond films which actually are the two I like best of his entries in the 007 series. Brosnan's Bond was essentially the 2nd coming of Roger Moore. Like Moore, Brosnan suited the fantasy Bond films better. I think Brosnan was out of his range in his attempts to be "serious". GE would have been so much better suited to Dalton who it was originally written for and TWINE suffered from an overdose of soap opera histrionics. TWINE was clearly supposed to be Bronsan's OHMSS but the excellent CR as well as the classic OHMSS have made TWINE look really weak by comparison.
There is little doubt in my mind Brosnan was a good choice for 007. He had been a favorite for the part for years, he fit the popular conception of the character, and he seemed to be not just an interpreter of the role, but a fan of the series. On top of that, he had a strong list of "intangibles" that made him seem great for Bond: the first movie he ever saw was Goldfinger, he was born the same year Casino Royale was written, his wife had been in a Bond film, he has blue grey eyes and a scar on his right cheek/upper lip (gotten during a Bond movie no less). Combine that with GoldenEye being the first Bond film I ever saw, along with the rest of his films having good memories attached to them, and its hard for me not to enjoy looking back on his era.
Objectively however, I don't think we were offerred much in terms of quality. The dialouge really wasn't all that great, the action, though cool in some instances, began to consume the film not even in an interesting way, the plots seemed to all lack a focus, and Brosnan, for all of his action scenes, didn't really come off as a suave assasin, just suave.
This really isn't an indictment of the Brosnan era either. Since 1969, the series really has been like a sine wave in terms of quality with only recently have we achieved the hights of authenticity to the character, and great entertainment that formed the early films. That being said, I disagree with the notion that Brosnan didn't try hard, or didnt work with what he had. Most fans recognize, even in the worst parts of his films, Brosnan carries himself very well. And he did work to expand the influence the Fleming source material would have on the films. In short, his era provides an evolution that was necessary for us to get to Casino Royale. Perhaps our problem is we all expected Brosnan to be the Bond to end all Bonds, and really, he simply fit into an evolution of the character. Perhaps in ten years time after this sets in we will be more receptive to the Brosnan era and take it for what it was and led to.
As for why he lost it, well, DAD crashed the series really. Not his fault, but it seemed like a finale anyway with the all the jokey visual references, plus once you have an invisible car then it really is all over. You can't just move on and pretend it didn't happen, as they more or less did with MR.
So the time was ripe for a reboot, especially as they had Casino Royale at last.
On top of which, Brozzer began lobbying Tarantino to do CR. Maybe he knew this was gonna be the next film and wanted in, maybe he couldn't resist a slice of A-list talent after inappropriate Bond hacks (though fat lot of good it did him really with the likes of Boorman, Attenborough, Burton, Tierman and so on - he still wasn't an A-list actor, always a nearly man), whatever it would have put EON's noses out of joint for him to be doing this. So Brosnan had to go...
Roger Moore 1927-2017
The king is dead. Long live the king. There's a new man in town and he's tougher and has more grit than his "pretty boy" predecessor.
A year ago Daniel Craig was the great pariah, now he's the second coming, praise the lord. Whereas, the previously popular Pierce Brosnan is now the great pretender. My, how fickle Bond fans can be.
You're not trying to incite more division, are you, MNL?
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
But yes, I too NEVER want another of those big budget, hi-tech, soulless extravaganzas that so characterised the Brosnan era. I still liked him as a Bond though.
Well, there is at least a grain of truth in what I said, but I'll happily admit I exaggerated things for dramatic effect. One thing's for sure though, it really was not intended to incite more division.
No, you're not alone. All of the actors brought their own contributions to the party.
Sorry if I've rambled, just linking some random thoughts, hope it's not gone to off-topic.
Moore Not Less, can't get any better than that.
Of course, I wish Roger was more popular with the Bond community than he actually is, but I'm not planning on leaving because of the regular swipes.
Back on topic, all the chatter on this board about Brosnan has definately made me look closer at his films/performances, and some things I've found I like better than I remember, but alas some things are worse, and the balance still definately weighs to the latter. I get the impression, posterity is gonna be less kind to him than say Moore...I dunno, maybe not, but to reset Eagleman's opening statement of this thread:
"Having become a real fan of the Bond films while Pierce was still at the helm, I was devastated when EON let him go. But looking back over his films I can see that his reign as Bond was not all that good."
Nutshell.
I'm fully prepared to blame whomever is most responsible for that one :v
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM