I really enjoyed Spectre. I thought the plot was great in this modern age of companies getting rid of departments in restructuring the danger of the 00 section been not needed! Q moving to an outside area to get on with his work! Bond continuing an operation on the old M's behalf and been held accountable for it. The locations were beautiful also. The story line was well thought out.
If it is DC's last film what a way to go ! Driving off in the Aston.....!
The clothes in the film were beautiful as were the Bond girls. The character of Blofeld was dangerous in his demeanor . the fear that he held over the other members of spectre was clearly seen in their behaviour towards him .
The fact he could have people killed in front off him with such detachment and then talk about it after with no feeling or revulsion was really well portrayed.
The fact M Moneypenny Q and Tanner were not aware of what James Bond was doing and could not support him until half way through the film, showed James's inner strength to carry on !
The Omega 300 watch was a nice touch , considering 009 was getting everything else ...you could see 007's disappointed look in the film.
The PTS start is amazing!
The film song when I first heard it did not feel like a bond song , but when seen in context of the film fitted very well.
All in all a great film ....that with time I think will age well.
Watching a clip from The Legend of Tarzan, I can't help but think they missed a trick
in SP, not to have a meal with the villain scene. As Waltz seems to have given some of his best
performances, sitting at a diner table.
Its rubbish like this which modern Bond fans don't want.
Bond travelling to the baddie and giving himself up (proceeding to be tortured)
Bond having dinner with the baddie
Keep doing this and the Bond franchise is dead. We're fed-up of all this "lets be best buds with the baddie" nonsense.
When the film first came out I told you all on here it was rubbish and the 6.8 on imdb pretty much confirms it.
I really enjoyed Spectre. I thought the plot was great in this modern age of companies getting rid of departments in restructuring the danger of the 00 section been not needed! Q moving to an outside area to get on with his work! Bond continuing an operation on the old M's behalf and been held accountable for it. The locations were beautiful also. The story line was well thought out.
If it is DC's last film what a way to go ! Driving off in the Aston.....!
The clothes in the film were beautiful as were the Bond girls. The character of Blofeld was dangerous in his demeanor . the fear that he held over the other members of spectre was clearly seen in their behaviour towards him .
The fact he could have people killed in front off him with such detachment and then talk about it after with no feeling or revulsion was really well portrayed.
The fact M Moneypenny Q and Tanner were not aware of what James Bond was doing and could not support him until half way through the film, showed James's inner strength to carry on !
The Omega 300 watch was a nice touch , considering 009 was getting everything else ...you could see 007's disappointed look in the film.
The PTS start is amazing!
The film song when I first heard it did not feel like a bond song , but when seen in context of the film fitted very well.
All in all a great film ....that with time I think will age well.
Just my two pence worth! -{
You thought the plot of private companies taking over Governmental intelligence services was great? You are aware that would never happen in real life, right? The closest they come to is being allowed to fund/build their headquarters. Its just total nonsense, bit like Q connecting Silva's laptop to their internal network. Even an 18yr old networks student would know that.
And you weren't bothered by the lazy approach to suddenly connect all the previous baddies? In QoS Greene was actually working for Quantum, oh but wait, Quantum were actually working for Blofeld........ yawn.
I found this review on imdb which I think summarises my views:
By the third time a helicopter flew into view, I was exhausted, and dreaded the prospect of yet another interminable and unconvincingly rendered crash scene.
The plot was an unappealing mess of recycled ideas. This film brings us yet another revenge story about someone who shares history with Bond but has since turned evil. That was precisely the plot of the last movie - and rather like the last three Star Trek films, most Batman films, the Superman reboot, this year's Avengers, etc.
Like last time, the stakes are raised by nebulous and non- frightening, yet world threatening (so we are told, but never shown) computer network technology.
The film once again focuses on the question: "are spies still relevant?" I don't find that to be an interesting premise for a Bond film. Why not just assume that the answer is 'yes' and make a fun and smart action movie with a heart? Casino Royale nailed this. If you really must cover the question of whether your main character is relevant, then at least deal with it once and accept the answer! In Skyfall we learned that you still want a man in the field. In this movie, we learn that you still want a man in the field (and, in case anyone was still not getting it, poor Ralph Fiennes in his role as a flaccid M spells it out literally).
While I liked both actors involved, I didn't care for the romance - the movie desperately wants to build it up to be something more than an just another Bond girl. That is an admirable idea, but since the result pales in comparison to the stellar romance in Casino Royale, it seems totally unconvincing when Bond sacrifices his entire career for her at the end. Holy moly - Bond settles down? For THIS girl? What an ending to Craig's character arc that started with Vesper's death (so much more meaningful than anything in any of the other Craig Bond films). Bam, all his emotional problems are solved, because he met a hot blonde. "I've got something better to do than all this!" (throws gun away, gets into car with whatshername). Gee, great ending.
All the interesting plot developments from Casino Royale and (and even Quantum of Solace to some extent), such as Bond's emotional state after losing Vesper and the Quantum organization, are chucked out the window. Skyfall discarded Quantum in favor of a good idea (Bond/M son/mother relationship) and a bad one ("is MI6 still relevant?"). Now, Quantum is back... Kinda. This time, it forms no threat at all - you see, it turns out this OTHER organization that THIS movie is about is even moar powerfuller. And it was really this other, super duper evil organization all along. Muahaha!
That is a tiresome plot twist if ever I've seen one. It completely missed the mark for me; it's weak to try and make your own plot look better by retroactively stating that all villains of the previous movies were really just pawns in this guy's game of chess.
And that's not the only aspect of Bond history that is severely diminished by this film. In Skyfall, we learned about Bond's youth, spent with an old Scottish dude named McAngus. I think. And, of course, his relationship with M.
This time, however, it turns out that Bond actually grew up in the Bavarian Alps with a couple of yodeling Germans named Oberhausen. Errr? Am I the only one confused here? (Possibly.)
Bond turns out to have a sort of surrogate brother, who is very blond, very German, and very jealous. Oh and he also happens to be a supervillain, with an enormous army, who somehow managed to stay absolutely hidden for all these years. There is a powerful and compelling reason for his having all these skills and resources: it's convenient for the plot.
And so, all previous Bond movies are reduced to one large scam operation, a plan by an Alpine superhero that makes absolutely no sense, in a failed attempt to give this movie a great villain. Christoph Waltz is a joy to watch, but he is never allowed to be a real threat. The man gets little to work with, as did Javier Bardem in the last one - criminally underused, awesome actors.
The film's tone was confusing. There is one gruesomely violent scene involving eyeballs - I don't enjoy seeing such aggressive violence, although here I seem to be in a vanishingly small minority. Call me old fashioned, but I was always happy that Bond films used polite violence: gentle fist fights until one guy faints, or perhaps someone shoots a gun and somewhere else, far away, someone falls to the floor.
Putting my personal feelings aside, it was jarring to have this scene be followed up by a cartoonish fist fight on a train, after which the eye-ripping guy is yanked out of a train by a rope, but not before realizing his predicament like Wile E. Coyote hanging over the ravine and saying "****!". Is this a corny spy movie with train fights a la Bond vs Jaws? Where Bond leisurely glides a crashing airplane around for a few minutes and then humorously lands precisely on top of the bad guy's car? Or is it a somber drama about an aging man's career in a time when nobody knows whether spies are still relevant? Or does it want to be a raw, violent gangster film like Goodfellas, reveling in the sight of bad guys proving their credentials by maiming others?
It is indeed a very poor outing, very poor, very long and very expensive. I get the feeling that everyone involved knew it. The press junket and interviews with key figures including Waltz and Daniel seemed very lacklustre to me. I think EON are surprised and relived that they mostly got away with it due to goodwill and momentum from Skyfall. I hope it does create a rethink. We have been here before where an overblown outing forces a leaner, cheaper and taughter outing next time. It's to Daniel's credit that he senses this and has not been keen to return. Even I have found myself wondering if we need another Bond Film. Perhaps like Daniel we are 'done', at least for a good while.
Of that of which we cannot speak we must pass over in silence- Ludwig Wittgenstein.
I stand by what I said, I really enjoyed Spectre, with all the competition in movies I think it was a great action packed film with great scenes ...the car chase in Rome was brilliantly shot. I think it is easy to be critical in fact over critical about things. Spectre was made to entertain and it certainly did for me and many others!
As for hoping its an end for bond ....I hope its a beginning of a new era for Bond and it goes from strength to strength.
Having grown up with Bond films from Goldfinger onwards and worked in Security for 20 years I know from experience that even with the best plans things can go a stray (the what if!) And I think DC's Bond portrayed this very well as a pro-active Bond who doesn't wait for things to come to him, but goes out actively seeking foes, just like Fleming intended!
I Guess you can't please everyone ! And we are entitled to our own opinions! -{ -{
I enjoyed Spectre, I don't think it's the best of Craig's Bonds. A little too much humour for my taste, and yes it
Has a few plot holes or annoyances in it. Although it has many really great scenes, so my opinion hasn't
Changed much. It's a good Bond film but not one of the best ( only my opinion ion, of course )
"I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
Cant forget what Pierce Brosnan himself thought of Spectre: "I was looking forward to it enormously. I thought it was too long. The story was kind of weak - it could have been condensed. It kind of went on too long. It really did. Daniel in the fourth go-round, has ownership of it. He had a nice looseness to him. He's a might warrior, and I think he found a great sense of himself in this one with the one-liners and a nice playfulness there. Just a tighter story, and he'll have another classic"
in contrast, here are his thoughts on Skyfall: "I loved it, I did, I really did"
Cant forget what Pierce Brosnan himself thought of Spectre: "I was looking forward to it enormously. I thought it was too long. The story was kind of weak - it could have been condensed. It kind of went on too long. It really did. Daniel in the fourth go-round, has ownership of it. He had a nice looseness to him. He's a might warrior, and I think he found a great sense of himself in this one with the one-liners and a nice playfulness there. Just a tighter story, and he'll have another classic"
in contrast, here are his thoughts on Skyfall: "I loved it, I did, I really did"
Yeah, and that's notable because he's been rather reluctant to criticize Craig and his movies in the past. Understandably so.
LoeffelholzThe United States, With LovePosts: 8,998Quartermasters
Watching a clip from The Legend of Tarzan, I can't help but think they missed a trick
in SP, not to have a meal with the villain scene. As Waltz seems to have given some of his best
performances, sitting at a diner table.
Its rubbish like this which modern Bond fans don't want.
Bond travelling to the baddie and giving himself up (proceeding to be tortured)
Bond having dinner with the baddie
Keep doing this and the Bond franchise is dead. We're fed-up of all this "lets be best buds with the baddie" nonsense.
When the film first came out I told you all on here it was rubbish and the 6.8 on imdb pretty much confirms it.
Well, by this definition, I'm clearly not a 'modern Bond fan,' as I enjoy the trademark 'Fleming' touches, such as Bond meeting the villain socially; putting his head in the lion's mouth, as it were---being a provocateur. But the beauty of the Bonds is that they evolve and adapt and thus survive for half a century, and some stuff will unavoidably displease someone.
SP may have been a bit of a misfire in some regards, but in others it very much remembers and honours what and who the chatacter is, IMHO :007)
Check out my Amazon author page!Mark Loeffelholz
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
Hmmmm, I liked this movie and it was enjoyable in many short spurts, but like Thunderball and Moonraker a bit mechanical and lacking in places despite being very polished.
'Alright guard, begin the unnecessarily slow moving dipping mechanism...'
This thread may be long dead, but I will probably have a review in this coming week up. Necro-bump, I know and SPECTRE isn't that talked about now but I will have my own perspective of this great film up.
Just finished rewatching spectre i don't need to go into its shortcomings that been spoken about enough.
However with thoughts of bond25 in mind and i've got to say it.
I think bond 25 is going to strenghten spectre,
When madeline asks if he'd ever leave the service on the train i thought of how bond 25 is said to begin.
I really think a bond film gets out of the firing line when the next one comes out.
I think if bond 25 compliments and follows the arc from casino, it will likely give more context to spectre.
I'm watching Spectre again and I still hate it. If they insited on keeping the connection between Bond and Oberhauser and SP and CR/QOS I'd do it like this.
I just thought about how the producers maybe could have saved the character of Oberhauser and organization SPECTRE in the film Spectre, but still let them be brothers and connect CR and QOS to it. 1st: Cut Silva from SPECTRE, he has nothing to do with them, as a lot of people already pointed out. 2nd”: Let him tell a story about how he got on the wrong path. How he left the house because of Bond. How he started dartling around until he found this organization, Quantum. Eventually with Bond killing their top guys, Quantum was falling apart. So, he started a new organization, called Spectre. He hired old Quantum employees, like Mr. White. But he’s more brutal and obscure, that’s why Mr. White left him. Now are Craigs first two films connected and not because “I have a stupid brother and I want revenge”, but because Oberhauser is crazy and he developed himself in the underworld. If they worked out this part well, I could live with the ‘now I’m Blofeld’ scheme, but only if there was a good reason for it. Maybe an alias was obligated, or maybe his body was still missing from the avalanche. Anyway, this all didn’t happen and I still hate Spectre because of all the missed potential.
But well, that's not what we got and not something we'll ever see. Oh yeah I believe my TV now has the tendency to display everything a bit more yellow....
Don't confuse me with the other DutchBondFan, but be sure to follow his YouTube account. You can read my articles on James Bond Nederland: www.jamesbond.nl/author/gosse/
I don't get the yellow reference but it is awfully late.
It's odd how the whole Blofeld thing messes people up. It doesn't me, but I can see how it would totally. I guess they wanted Blofeld for what might be Craig's last film. So they shoehorned him in. In some ways it make sense, the idea that his half brother of sorts wouldn't just kill him but prefer to toy with him over years as is the wont of Bond villains. On the other hand, the retro ruse (there's a world for this someone on this sight came out with) tries to cover up the fact that the producers really didn't quite have a gameplay for the Craig era and tried to make it up retrospectively.
Comments
If it is DC's last film what a way to go ! Driving off in the Aston.....!
The clothes in the film were beautiful as were the Bond girls. The character of Blofeld was dangerous in his demeanor . the fear that he held over the other members of spectre was clearly seen in their behaviour towards him .
The fact he could have people killed in front off him with such detachment and then talk about it after with no feeling or revulsion was really well portrayed.
The fact M Moneypenny Q and Tanner were not aware of what James Bond was doing and could not support him until half way through the film, showed James's inner strength to carry on !
The Omega 300 watch was a nice touch , considering 009 was getting everything else ...you could see 007's disappointed look in the film.
The PTS start is amazing!
The film song when I first heard it did not feel like a bond song , but when seen in context of the film fitted very well.
All in all a great film ....that with time I think will age well.
Just my two pence worth! -{
Bond travelling to the baddie and giving himself up (proceeding to be tortured)
Bond having dinner with the baddie
Keep doing this and the Bond franchise is dead. We're fed-up of all this "lets be best buds with the baddie" nonsense.
When the film first came out I told you all on here it was rubbish and the 6.8 on imdb pretty much confirms it.
And you weren't bothered by the lazy approach to suddenly connect all the previous baddies? In QoS Greene was actually working for Quantum, oh but wait, Quantum were actually working for Blofeld........ yawn.
I found this review on imdb which I think summarises my views:
By the third time a helicopter flew into view, I was exhausted, and dreaded the prospect of yet another interminable and unconvincingly rendered crash scene.
The plot was an unappealing mess of recycled ideas. This film brings us yet another revenge story about someone who shares history with Bond but has since turned evil. That was precisely the plot of the last movie - and rather like the last three Star Trek films, most Batman films, the Superman reboot, this year's Avengers, etc.
Like last time, the stakes are raised by nebulous and non- frightening, yet world threatening (so we are told, but never shown) computer network technology.
The film once again focuses on the question: "are spies still relevant?" I don't find that to be an interesting premise for a Bond film. Why not just assume that the answer is 'yes' and make a fun and smart action movie with a heart? Casino Royale nailed this. If you really must cover the question of whether your main character is relevant, then at least deal with it once and accept the answer! In Skyfall we learned that you still want a man in the field. In this movie, we learn that you still want a man in the field (and, in case anyone was still not getting it, poor Ralph Fiennes in his role as a flaccid M spells it out literally).
While I liked both actors involved, I didn't care for the romance - the movie desperately wants to build it up to be something more than an just another Bond girl. That is an admirable idea, but since the result pales in comparison to the stellar romance in Casino Royale, it seems totally unconvincing when Bond sacrifices his entire career for her at the end. Holy moly - Bond settles down? For THIS girl? What an ending to Craig's character arc that started with Vesper's death (so much more meaningful than anything in any of the other Craig Bond films). Bam, all his emotional problems are solved, because he met a hot blonde. "I've got something better to do than all this!" (throws gun away, gets into car with whatshername). Gee, great ending.
All the interesting plot developments from Casino Royale and (and even Quantum of Solace to some extent), such as Bond's emotional state after losing Vesper and the Quantum organization, are chucked out the window. Skyfall discarded Quantum in favor of a good idea (Bond/M son/mother relationship) and a bad one ("is MI6 still relevant?"). Now, Quantum is back... Kinda. This time, it forms no threat at all - you see, it turns out this OTHER organization that THIS movie is about is even moar powerfuller. And it was really this other, super duper evil organization all along. Muahaha!
That is a tiresome plot twist if ever I've seen one. It completely missed the mark for me; it's weak to try and make your own plot look better by retroactively stating that all villains of the previous movies were really just pawns in this guy's game of chess.
And that's not the only aspect of Bond history that is severely diminished by this film. In Skyfall, we learned about Bond's youth, spent with an old Scottish dude named McAngus. I think. And, of course, his relationship with M.
This time, however, it turns out that Bond actually grew up in the Bavarian Alps with a couple of yodeling Germans named Oberhausen. Errr? Am I the only one confused here? (Possibly.)
Bond turns out to have a sort of surrogate brother, who is very blond, very German, and very jealous. Oh and he also happens to be a supervillain, with an enormous army, who somehow managed to stay absolutely hidden for all these years. There is a powerful and compelling reason for his having all these skills and resources: it's convenient for the plot.
And so, all previous Bond movies are reduced to one large scam operation, a plan by an Alpine superhero that makes absolutely no sense, in a failed attempt to give this movie a great villain. Christoph Waltz is a joy to watch, but he is never allowed to be a real threat. The man gets little to work with, as did Javier Bardem in the last one - criminally underused, awesome actors.
The film's tone was confusing. There is one gruesomely violent scene involving eyeballs - I don't enjoy seeing such aggressive violence, although here I seem to be in a vanishingly small minority. Call me old fashioned, but I was always happy that Bond films used polite violence: gentle fist fights until one guy faints, or perhaps someone shoots a gun and somewhere else, far away, someone falls to the floor.
Putting my personal feelings aside, it was jarring to have this scene be followed up by a cartoonish fist fight on a train, after which the eye-ripping guy is yanked out of a train by a rope, but not before realizing his predicament like Wile E. Coyote hanging over the ravine and saying "****!". Is this a corny spy movie with train fights a la Bond vs Jaws? Where Bond leisurely glides a crashing airplane around for a few minutes and then humorously lands precisely on top of the bad guy's car? Or is it a somber drama about an aging man's career in a time when nobody knows whether spies are still relevant? Or does it want to be a raw, violent gangster film like Goodfellas, reveling in the sight of bad guys proving their credentials by maiming others?
As for hoping its an end for bond ....I hope its a beginning of a new era for Bond and it goes from strength to strength.
Having grown up with Bond films from Goldfinger onwards and worked in Security for 20 years I know from experience that even with the best plans things can go a stray (the what if!) And I think DC's Bond portrayed this very well as a pro-active Bond who doesn't wait for things to come to him, but goes out actively seeking foes, just like Fleming intended!
I Guess you can't please everyone ! And we are entitled to our own opinions! -{ -{
Has a few plot holes or annoyances in it. Although it has many really great scenes, so my opinion hasn't
Changed much. It's a good Bond film but not one of the best ( only my opinion ion, of course )
in contrast, here are his thoughts on Skyfall: "I loved it, I did, I really did"
Yeah, and that's notable because he's been rather reluctant to criticize Craig and his movies in the past. Understandably so.
Well, by this definition, I'm clearly not a 'modern Bond fan,' as I enjoy the trademark 'Fleming' touches, such as Bond meeting the villain socially; putting his head in the lion's mouth, as it were---being a provocateur. But the beauty of the Bonds is that they evolve and adapt and thus survive for half a century, and some stuff will unavoidably displease someone.
SP may have been a bit of a misfire in some regards, but in others it very much remembers and honours what and who the chatacter is, IMHO :007)
"I am not an entrant in the Shakespeare Stakes." - Ian Fleming
"Screw 'em." - Daniel Craig, The Best James Bond EverTM
However with thoughts of bond25 in mind and i've got to say it.
I think bond 25 is going to strenghten spectre,
When madeline asks if he'd ever leave the service on the train i thought of how bond 25 is said to begin.
I really think a bond film gets out of the firing line when the next one comes out.
I think if bond 25 compliments and follows the arc from casino, it will likely give more context to spectre.
I just thought about how the producers maybe could have saved the character of Oberhauser and organization SPECTRE in the film Spectre, but still let them be brothers and connect CR and QOS to it. 1st: Cut Silva from SPECTRE, he has nothing to do with them, as a lot of people already pointed out. 2nd”: Let him tell a story about how he got on the wrong path. How he left the house because of Bond. How he started dartling around until he found this organization, Quantum. Eventually with Bond killing their top guys, Quantum was falling apart. So, he started a new organization, called Spectre. He hired old Quantum employees, like Mr. White. But he’s more brutal and obscure, that’s why Mr. White left him. Now are Craigs first two films connected and not because “I have a stupid brother and I want revenge”, but because Oberhauser is crazy and he developed himself in the underworld. If they worked out this part well, I could live with the ‘now I’m Blofeld’ scheme, but only if there was a good reason for it. Maybe an alias was obligated, or maybe his body was still missing from the avalanche. Anyway, this all didn’t happen and I still hate Spectre because of all the missed potential.
But well, that's not what we got and not something we'll ever see. Oh yeah I believe my TV now has the tendency to display everything a bit more yellow....
It's odd how the whole Blofeld thing messes people up. It doesn't me, but I can see how it would totally. I guess they wanted Blofeld for what might be Craig's last film. So they shoehorned him in. In some ways it make sense, the idea that his half brother of sorts wouldn't just kill him but prefer to toy with him over years as is the wont of Bond villains. On the other hand, the retro ruse (there's a world for this someone on this sight came out with) tries to cover up the fact that the producers really didn't quite have a gameplay for the Craig era and tried to make it up retrospectively.
Roger Moore 1927-2017