On Her Majesty's Secret Service is, to me, the best Bond film story, and the writing supports that. It's not the most fun -- that nod goes to Goldfinger, which is directed better -- nor the best film -- that nod goes to From Russia with Love, which is written almost as well but a better production.
It may sound contradictory since On Her Majesty's Secret Service seems so personal a film, but that's not entirely true. Bond's chasing down Blofeld is still extant of his relationship with Tracy until the two stories converge. It unfolds naturally, the primary difference here being that Bond more deeply falls in love with the Bond girl, who always ends up threatened by the villain anyway. There's nothing as ham-fisted as Blofeld being Bond's foster brother or whatever in Spectre. The film is also part of a series and not a one-off, and it introduces the deeply personal element at a time when that wasn't simply part of the formula.
The writing in On Her Majesty's Secret Service is the most solid because it's the most human and grounded, even though the movie more or less sticks to formula. Bond is treated not as the hero but as a character. This happens on occasion -- its bookend, Casino Royale, for instance, is more a movie about James Bond than a James Bond movie -- and the films of the Connery era arguably did more in this regard and more consistently than most of what followed. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is framed as a tragedy, full of irony (Bond is glib and carefree at the beginning while Tracy is suicidal; at the end, when Tracy is happiest and has everything to live for, she's gunned down and Bond is left broken). It's left up to the viewer to decide if Bond really saved her life or got her killed by association.
In between, there's action, romance, suspense, and comedy. It delivers with stunts, chases, and set pieces, albeit more realistically framed than most other Bond films, right down to Blofeld, equally tired of the chase, just wanting amnesty and retirement. There are some great lines -- even Bond's usual sophomoric quips, like "At least for tonight," take on greater significance as the story travels toward its sad conclusion. Of course, nearly all of this is in the book, but given how many Bond films often have comparatively little to do with Fleming's literary character, this is one of the purest adaptations while also making its own contributions.
The main problem with The World is Not Enough is pretty typical of a modern film, which is to say, it raises a lot of issues and then does little or nothing to deliver on them. The idea of a terminally ill villain who can no longer feel pain should be terrifying and great fodder for action and suspense, yet almost nothing is done with the Carlyle character. He ends up being a garden variety thug who has, what, two or three tepid scenes with Bond? Even the often puerile The Man with the Golden Gun, another movie that promised more than it delivered in these regards, let Bond and Scaramanga interact on occasion during the film.
Elektra being the true villain comes across more as a stunt -- a twist that's supposed to make us say, "Golly, didn't see that coming.
They're so clever." Again, there's no build up, no real emotional weight to it in the construction of the story, despite the ski scene that starts with almost a shot-for-shot remake of the one from On Her Majesty's Secret Service. I guess we're supposed to harken back to Tracy with Elektra and do the work of the writer to make the emotional connection. Consider how much is told to us in expository dialogue -- how Renard got shot, how Elektra was kidnapped and tortured, how her father wheeled and dealed, how M and he have been friends since they were young, and so on. We never once see any of this developed onscreen, but our knowledge of such is somehow supposed to fill in the emotional blanks for us.
Compare that to On Her Majesty's Secret Service. About the only thing we're told in this respect that compares is how Draco came to meet and marry Tracy's mother, and then how Tracy lived too greedily to get to the state she was at the beginning of the film -- when Bond enters the picture. There's a dreaded montage scene of their romance, which they can't resist repeating in Casino Royale, but it's still better than a character just talking about it onscreen. But pretty much everything else is shown to us, and it's done in an organic way.
The World is Not Enough could have stopped after the first 20 minutes. At least nearly all of that is narrative, and it's good. There are a few, I guess, inventive puns later -- "Christmas came twice this year (ho, ho, ho)" and "I never miss."
To me, the best written of Brosnan's Bonds is Tomorrow Never Dies, which would have been better under its original title Tomorrow Never Lies. It, too, suffers from too much exposition, but by gum, the villain actually does something, unlike in the overrated Goldeneye, where as with Renard, a rogue 00 agent -- another fantastic idea for a villain they do almost nothing with-- is just another pretty ordinary bad guy with a Russian general and a computer nerd on the payroll.
The second best Bond film in terms of writing is Dr. No, and if it wasn't for some of the pulp fiction lines that make it seem more like a 40s or 50s movie, I might even argue it's the best. This movie not only establishes the Bond character but also creates the template for the Bond villain, and that dinner scene is never eclipsed in any other Bond film, though many of them have their version of it.
So, to bring this all back to No Time to Die -- whose generic title already makes me fear we'll get a fairly standard Bond film but with muddled modern sensibilities -- I would love to see some real scenes, with real dialogue and emotion, and not just going through the motions to get to the action set pieces, in a real, coherent story.
Casino Royale for the most part did that -- it only needed another 10 minutes of actual romance rather than the sketch we got, but it was the best written and directed Bond by far in many years -- but it was downhill from there.
The vastly overrated Skyfall, arguably the best of the other Craig Bond scripts, got by mostly on sentimentality, which it has no shortage of, but its script was still just crap. It's one of those movies where rather than the story unfolding organically and with some hint of logic, plot elements are jammed in to make the rest of it work, with questions abounding:
1) Why does MI:6's greatest computer hacker even need to hire a hit man to steal a laptop hard drive?
2) Why is a 00 sent to retrieve said hard drive, along with two agents who apparently are neither as skilled nor experienced?
3) How is it Bond is fitted with a tracker in Casino Royale (and again in Spectre) in an age of facial recognition and cameras everywhere, yet both he and Silva can just disappear off the grid without effort?
4) How could Silva's plan to infiltrate MI:6 possibly have predicted every last detail, such as where Bond would be standing precisely when an Underground train is passing where a bomb somehow has been planted by somebody well beforehand and that a hearing on MI:6's relevancy would be scheduled later that day?
5) How is it that Silva has destroyed MI:6 headquarters and outed agents worldwide but M's home is neither guarded nor treated as a target, too, even while MI:6 is now on "war footing"?
6) If Bond has been declared legally dead, to the point that his family estate is being sold off, why are his effects in storage, and who pocketed the money when his flat was sold? If MI:6 owned the flat, why did they sell it?
7) Just why does Bond think going to Skyfall somehow evens the odds when apparently he has no plan whatsoever for when he gets there other than to lure Silva there?
8) If Bond's goal was to stop Silva and keep M alive, how is it it he's not beyond despair for getting her killed?
I won't even go into the issue of Kincaid and the flashlight since he's an amateur nor all the expository dialogue, such as Silva's tedious introduction out of the elevator, telling us a story about rats that could as easily have been shown to us in an actual scene, still with the voiceover if they felt the need, Silva's recounting of the torture and cyanide incident, Kincaid's recounting of the young Bond's night in the priest hole (boy, that doesn't sound right), or M's filling us in on why Silva got betrayed.
Any or all of these elements could be easily fixed with minor script revisions, which is why it's crap. Silva never needed the hard drive -- he just wanted to lure Bond into a trap and tells him so later. M's house isn't unguarded -- she's left herself vulnerable in an attempt to get Silva to make his move, only he doesn't take the bait, and Bond figures this out. Does M have a death wish from her guilt? This foreshadows the climax, as it's not Bond who chooses to go to Skyfall but M -- again, in an attempt to flush Silva out -- and Bond is reluctant for both personal and professional reasons to go along with the plan; Mallory is to dispatch reinforcements, but Silva's men cut them down before they can arrive.
My expectation is Bond 25 will have a script more similar to Skyfall than to Casino Royale. It'll be jazzed up with some swipes at misogyny and with moments of female and gender empowerment to show that Bond now has a 21st century sensibility or whatever. But I'm not anticipating something truly character-driven that makes great sense. I could be wrong, and I hope I am. But the Craig era started by setting a high standard and hasn't lived up to it in terms of the writing.
I completely agree with Gassy Man. Nicely written critique, too.
I really like CR but it's not perfect. It's just quite a good film, ish. For a Bond. Then QoS I actually really like, even though the quality is lesser than CR. Skyfall I find massively overrated as well. Everyone loved it, but to me almost nothing made sense. Worse than QoS for me. Then Spectre. Huge disappointment. Waltz was awful (blame the script, whatever), and the entire plot was just useless. I hope NTTD is better.
I hope it's good, but I won't hold my breath.
IMO each Craig film has been worse than the previous...
"It is better to be as well dressed as possible to stave off, at least for a very little bit, the total collapse of civilization"
Do you think purvis and wade are to blame at all?
Or do you think they are simply often the scapegoats?
You should do an audio commentary on your thoughts on
One of the bond films, could be interesting.
Not all of it. Casino Royale is the only script of theirs I think is better than average, and Paul Haggis had to be brought in to polish it up. At the same time, I've read here and there about how they had other more creative ideas but somehow these don't make it to the screen. They could be mundane, formulaic writers or they could be trying to bring something better to the screen but keep getting overridden by other interests.
Film is a collaborative process, and when there's too many cooks in the kitchen, the result is usually a mess. That's why the better commercial film directors -- Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, and so forth -- tended to work with the same writer(s) or wrote scripts themselves. Hitchcock in particular was known to put actors in their place. From his point of view, it was the director's job to have the vision for makes it to the screen from the script. Actors were to create the characters from the script, not write and direct.
But when directors, producers, and actors start meddling, ideas usually get diluted. Is that the writer's fault? Maybe, maybe not. I suppose it depends on how strong the script is to begin with it and how turf-centered everyone else is. Someone is supposed to keep track of whether it all makes sense, but after shooting four hours or more of film, some editor often is tasked with putting something together than makes sense. In fact, editing may be the most important part of the process.
Eh, I babble about this sort of thing, among other, when I teach. I don't know that anyone else beyond the generous people on these boards needs to be inflicted with it. )
I completely agree with Gassy Man. Nicely written critique, too.
I really like CR but it's not perfect. It's just quite a good film, ish. For a Bond. Then QoS I actually really like, even though the quality is lesser than CR. Skyfall I find massively overrated as well. Everyone loved it, but to me almost nothing made sense. Worse than QoS for me. Then Spectre. Huge disappointment. Waltz was awful (blame the script, whatever), and the entire plot was just useless. I hope NTTD is better.
I hope it's good, but I won't hold my breath.
IMO each Craig film has been worse than the previous...
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Skyfall is one of those movies masquerading at being far more clever than it really is. All of the things that don't make sense are written off with "But Silva is a mad genius -- if we don't tell you, you can just assume he had a way." Even if we assume that lazy explanation, why doesn't Bond make sense? I still want to know just what strategy Bond had in mind by going back to Skyfall? And why he doesn't personally feel responsible for M's demise?
I thought Waltz should play Blofeld from the time I saw him in Inglorious Basterds. The problem is the script gave him almost nothing to do. This is a huge problem with Bond scripts and has been for at least 25 years. Casino Royale is an exception -- both LeChiffre and Mr. White were given adequate screen time and development to impact the events of the story. Marginally, so were Green and Silva in their films, but still nothing on the order of Blofeld in the older films or Goldfinger.
Modern Bond films also waste a lot of time with ponderous shots where nothing of import is happening -- like Bond on the skiff to the Macao casino or traveling up river to find Mr. White -- and elaborate action set pieces, to the degree that there's not as much time left for character development and onscreen dialogue exchanges. It's interesting that people tend to think older movies are slower, but if you watch the Connery Bonds in particular, you'll see they move a lot faster. They just don't spend as much time on these other distractions. Again, Casino Royale is better in this department. We see Bond simply walking up to the casinos -- his body language communicates who he is and his intent. That's a lot more interesting than a guy just standing rigidly still in some arty pose while the camera eats up precious seconds showing us the set.
1) Why does MI:6's greatest computer hacker even need to hire a hit man to steal a laptop hard drive? [Because he can't get the info otherwise]
2) Why is a 00 sent to retrieve said hard drive, along with two agents who apparently are neither as skilled nor experienced? [The deal went sideways when Patrice intervened and Bond was called in as cleanup]
3) How is it Bond is fitted with a tracker in Casino Royale (and again in Spectre) in an age of facial recognition and cameras everywhere, yet both he and Silva can just disappear off the grid without effort? [They're spies. And no tracker in Skyfall!].
4) How could Silva's plan to infiltrate MI:6 possibly have predicted every last detail, such as where Bond would be standing precisely when an Underground train is passing where a bomb somehow has been planted by somebody well beforehand and that a hearing on MI:6's relevancy would be scheduled later that day? [He had bombs set to go off all around London and lured Bond to that location]
5) How is it that Silva has destroyed MI:6 headquarters and outed agents worldwide but M's home is neither guarded nor treated as a target, too, even while MI:6 is now on "war footing"?[I don't remember this but M makes it clear that she doesn't want a bunch of carnage]
6) If Bond has been declared legally dead, to the point that his family estate is being sold off, why are his effects in storage, and who pocketed the money when his flat was sold? If MI:6 owned the flat, why did they sell it? [Nobody was living in it]
7) Just why does Bond think going to Skyfall somehow evens the odds when apparently he has no plan whatsoever for when he gets there other than to lure Silva there? [Silva's tech advantages would be limited, Bond would have the machine gun equipped AM and he expected to find a small armory of hunting rifles that he could use to pick off Silva's men from 500+ yards.]
8) If Bond's goal was to stop Silva and keep M alive, how is it it he's not beyond despair for getting her killed? [He was.]
Interesting Response Gala Brand to Gas Mann's thoughts.
some interesting views, its nice reading something every now and then which really gets you thinking, hmm
you know i never looked at it that way.
Then getting another different spin on it all.
both perfectly valid points there.
ok so from a writing perspective from "No Time To Die"
what do you think most of us want out of it?
and how could it be achieved?
1) a brilliant villain?
2) possibly good henchmen?
3) a story which isn't predicable? (i appreciated theres been a few of these movies now)
4) gadgets/minimal gadgets no gadgets?
5) strong dialogue and performance
6) snappy editing-quantum
slower editing- spectre
abit of both- casino
or other?
(i'll just state this hear also under editing, i agree wholehearted with your thoughts on editing "Gass Man" i'd love to know
how bond would have turned out if we hadn't had Peter Hunt from the get go.)
7) a story thats grounded, or takes away from current reality
8) a film that recognises the current changes i.e metoo.
(i personally think that bond has often included the trends
and is apart of why its has evolved and lasted so long)
9) a score that echoes its title goldfinger, diamonds are forever (like the sound of clanging gold bars or twinkling diamonds)
i appreciated this one might take a bit of imagination but say for example the prospect of time, a score like dunkirk which has a real ticking feel.
a score which underscores throughout- spectre
it sits nicely in the film keeping it company throughout, but never shouting the bond theme "hey look yeah i'm over here"
A David Arnold Techno Trip- Twine & DAD- a score that can get us right pumped up like those of us that have the LA LA LAND records realise of twine and Show me the Money burns into Come in 007 your time is up. or the crazy bombast of bond goes to iceland in Die another day.
A gritty/darker score- Casino royale/licence to kill. bits of african rundown, the stairwell fight, fall of a house in venice. licence to kill gun barrel, licence revoked, escape from wavekrest.
A John Barry classic style bond score- Octopussy, A View to A Kill.
I personally don't want this on the scale of note for note, im sure like most consider barry to be the best. Obviously composer's can be inspired by or pay tribute to barry. But i don't think we want a carbon copy of his sound, i think it might just be an insult to his legacy really.
1) Why does MI:6's greatest computer hacker even need to hire a hit man to steal a laptop hard drive? [Because he can't get the info otherwise] That's just speculation -- there's nothing onscreen to confirm this. It's like saying Silva used a helicopter at the end because no cars were available at the rental agency.
2) Why is a 00 sent to retrieve said hard drive, along with two agents who apparently are neither as skilled nor experienced? [The deal went sideways when Patrice intervened and Bond was called in as cleanup]Again, speculation. There's nothing onscreen to confirm this. If anything, based on the timing and onscreen information, Bond is in the middle of the operation, not sent in after the fact.
3) How is it Bond is fitted with a tracker in Casino Royale (and again in Spectre) in an age of facial recognition and cameras everywhere, yet both he and Silva can just disappear off the grid without effort? [They're spies. And no tracker in Skyfall!].Speculation. If spies are as good as this, they would never be able to find one another. And Bond does get the radio tracker late,r which is how the helicopters get to Silva's island.
4) How could Silva's plan to infiltrate MI:6 possibly have predicted every last detail, such as where Bond would be standing precisely when an Underground train is passing where a bomb somehow has been planted by somebody well beforehand and that a hearing on MI:6's relevancy would be scheduled later that day? [He had bombs set to go off all around London and lured Bond to that location]What is the onscreen evidence of this? How did he lure Bond to the location when he wouldn't even know if Bond would still be at MI:6?
5) How is it that Silva has destroyed MI:6 headquarters and outed agents worldwide but M's home is neither guarded nor treated as a target, too, even while MI:6 is now on "war footing"?[I don't remember this but M makes it clear that she doesn't want a bunch of carnage] If she doesn't want a bunch of carnage, why is she even staying in her own home? If MI:6 is on "war footing," why is she not staying there? She's arguably the most important person in the organization.
6) If Bond has been declared legally dead, to the point that his family estate is being sold off, why are his effects in storage, and who pocketed the money when his flat was sold? If MI:6 owned the flat, why did they sell it? [Nobody was living in it]That still doesn't answer the question. If no one is living in the flat and MI:6 somehow has the authority to sell it, then why not also sell Bond's effects, too? What is the purpose of storing his personal belongings? And if MI:6 owns an expensive flat in a wealthy section of London, why not just keep it for the next 007?
7) Just why does Bond think going to Skyfall somehow evens the odds when apparently he has no plan whatsoever for when he gets there other than to lure Silva there? [Silva's tech advantages would be limited, Bond would have the machine gun equipped AM and he expected to find a small armory of hunting rifles that he could use to pick off Silva's men from 500+ yards.]Onscreen evidence? The best we get is that he's dismayed that there's not much left. But even considering Bond might plan to play sniper -- which we have zero confirmation of -- that doesn't make sense when the plan we're shown is to hole up in the house. In fact, nothing really makes sense. How did Bond know of Mallory's leaving "bread crumbs" for Silva to follow? Why doesn't Mallory dispatch reinforcements? Why would Bond assume Silva's tech advantages are limited when he shows up in a heavily armed helicopter with a commando team? I could almost give credit to the idea that Bond's plan was only to hide at Skyfall, but then Bond says onscreen that he knows Silva is coming. There's nothing about Bond's plan that makes any sense strategically.
8) If Bond's goal was to stop Silva and keep M alive, how is it it he's not beyond despair for getting her killed? [He was.]Where onscreen does he say this? He appears to grieve for some moments and then spend a lot of time on the rooftop staring. But I don't see a moment where he seems affected by guilt at all, including in Spectre.
Hope that helps.
You've done more work here than the screenwriters -- which is why it's a lazy script. I appreciate the effort, but there's very little onscreen to corroborate the speculation here.
What you're doing is what Star Trek fans do to explain away inconsistencies when the continuity is disrupted. Why didn't they use the shuttlecraft? Oh, it was broken that week. How is it Vulcans can't lie, but Spock does more than once during the series? He's half human, so he can invoke that side of his heritage when necessary. Why don't they just beam the genesis device into oblivion? They couldn't get a lock on because of the nebula.
Better scripts don't require speculation. Major plot issues are answered concretely either in dialogue or action or both. Skyfall's is so sloppy in this regard, people have to do what you're doing, though my suspicion is the writer and director just assumed nobody would pay that close attention. They bundled something together, put it out there, it made money, and that's that.
We don't need minor, obvious actions explained. Did Bond open the car door before he got in? Yeah, there's no other way except to break the window, which is intact. How did Bond know where the warehouse was located? I dunno, he googled it? It's not hiding. Where did M get that bulldog figurine? A store. How did Bond get back to London? Airplane? Then maybe a taxi? These sorts of ordinary things have zero bearing on the plot.
Now, compare this to the script for Casino Royale. Why was LeChiffre going to bomb the plane? He's a mathematical genius who needs to crash the stock to cover gambling losses. Why doesn't M just have him assassinated? She wants to shut his operation down and not just eliminate him personally. Why does LeChiffre poison Bond? He needs Bond out of the game and to make it look like natural causes. Why is Vesper put on the mission? She controls the finances and is a check-and-balance against Bond being reckless. Why does Vesper turn on him? She's being blackmailed by LeChiffre. And so on.
The only thing the script doesn't really answer is whether or not Mathis really was a double agent working against Bond. That's not even fully resolved in Quantum of Solace. However, the implication is he was, in fact, a double agent since MI:6 takes him away in Casino Royale. So it's really Quantum of Solace that muddles things, even though it's suggested in the film he wasn't (the girlfriend says he wasn't, but then Mathis' final words make it less certain.)
Interesting Response Gala Brand to Gas Mann's thoughts.
some interesting views, its nice reading something every now and then which really gets you thinking, hmm
you know i never looked at it that way.
Then getting another different spin on it all.
both perfectly valid points there.
ok so from a writing perspective from "No Time To Die"
what do you think most of us want out of it?
and how could it be achieved?
1) a brilliant villain?
2) possibly good henchmen?
3) a story which isn't predicable? (i appreciated theres been a few of these movies now)
4) gadgets/minimal gadgets no gadgets?
5) strong dialogue and performance
6) snappy editing-quantum
slower editing- spectre
abit of both- casino
or other?
(i'll just state this hear also under editing, i agree wholehearted with your thoughts on editing "Gass Man" i'd love to know
how bond would have turned out if we hadn't had Peter Hunt from the get go.)
7) a story thats grounded, or takes away from current reality
8) a film that recognises the current changes i.e metoo.
(i personally think that bond has often included the trends
and is apart of why its has evolved and lasted so long)
9) a score that echoes its title goldfinger, diamonds are forever (like the sound of clanging gold bars or twinkling diamonds)
i appreciated this one might take a bit of imagination but say for example the prospect of time, a score like dunkirk which has a real ticking feel.
a score which underscores throughout- spectre
it sits nicely in the film keeping it company throughout, but never shouting the bond theme "hey look yeah i'm over here"
A David Arnold Techno Trip- Twine & DAD- a score that can get us right pumped up like those of us that have the LA LA LAND records realise of twine and Show me the Money burns into Come in 007 your time is up. or the crazy bombast of bond goes to iceland in Die another day.
A gritty/darker score- Casino royale/licence to kill. bits of african rundown, the stairwell fight, fall of a house in venice. licence to kill gun barrel, licence revoked, escape from wavekrest.
A John Barry classic style bond score- Octopussy, A View to A Kill.
I personally don't want this on the scale of note for note, im sure like most consider barry to be the best. Obviously composer's can be inspired by or pay tribute to barry. But i don't think we want a carbon copy of his sound, i think it might just be an insult to his legacy really.
something different- something we've yet to have.
And anything else you guys think of course.
I'd like a believable adult relationship between Madeleine and Bond.
Any Bond script has to start with the villain. What he or she does puts everything else in motion. The rest is just decoration.
I want a Bond with real emotions and strong dialogue. If that happens, everything else will fall into place. If it doesn't happen, everything else will have to be used to try to cover up for it.
It's been done, even with the movies that produced great action and suspense -- Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, Thunderball, You Only Live Twice, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and so forth. It can be done again.
1) Why does MI:6's greatest computer hacker even need to hire a hit man to steal a laptop hard drive? [Because he can't get the info otherwise] That's just speculation -- there's nothing onscreen to confirm this. It's like saying Silva used a helicopter at the end because no cars were available at the rental agency.
2) Why is a 00 sent to retrieve said hard drive, along with two agents who apparently are neither as skilled nor experienced? [The deal went sideways when Patrice intervened and Bond was called in as cleanup]Again, speculation. There's nothing onscreen to confirm this. If anything, based on the timing and onscreen information, Bond is in the middle of the operation, not sent in after the fact.
3) How is it Bond is fitted with a tracker in Casino Royale (and again in Spectre) in an age of facial recognition and cameras everywhere, yet both he and Silva can just disappear off the grid without effort? [They're spies. And no tracker in Skyfall!].Speculation. If spies are as good as this, they would never be able to find one another. And Bond does get the radio tracker late,r which is how the helicopters get to Silva's island.
4) How could Silva's plan to infiltrate MI:6 possibly have predicted every last detail, such as where Bond would be standing precisely when an Underground train is passing where a bomb somehow has been planted by somebody well beforehand and that a hearing on MI:6's relevancy would be scheduled later that day? [He had bombs set to go off all around London and lured Bond to that location]What is the onscreen evidence of this? How did he lure Bond to the location when he wouldn't even know if Bond would still be at MI:6?
5) How is it that Silva has destroyed MI:6 headquarters and outed agents worldwide but M's home is neither guarded nor treated as a target, too, even while MI:6 is now on "war footing"?[I don't remember this but M makes it clear that she doesn't want a bunch of carnage] If she doesn't want a bunch of carnage, why is she even staying in her own home? If MI:6 is on "war footing," why is she not staying there? She's arguably the most important person in the organization.
6) If Bond has been declared legally dead, to the point that his family estate is being sold off, why are his effects in storage, and who pocketed the money when his flat was sold? If MI:6 owned the flat, why did they sell it? [Nobody was living in it]That still doesn't answer the question. If no one is living in the flat and MI:6 somehow has the authority to sell it, then why not also sell Bond's effects, too? What is the purpose of storing his personal belongings? And if MI:6 owns an expensive flat in a wealthy section of London, why not just keep it for the next 007?
7) Just why does Bond think going to Skyfall somehow evens the odds when apparently he has no plan whatsoever for when he gets there other than to lure Silva there? [Silva's tech advantages would be limited, Bond would have the machine gun equipped AM and he expected to find a small armory of hunting rifles that he could use to pick off Silva's men from 500+ yards.]Onscreen evidence? The best we get is that he's dismayed that there's not much left. But even considering Bond might plan to play sniper -- which we have zero confirmation of -- that doesn't make sense when the plan we're shown is to hole up in the house. In fact, nothing really makes sense. How did Bond know of Mallory's leaving "bread crumbs" for Silva to follow? Why doesn't Mallory dispatch reinforcements? Why would Bond assume Silva's tech advantages are limited when he shows up in a heavily armed helicopter with a commando team? I could almost give credit to the idea that Bond's plan was only to hide at Skyfall, but then Bond says onscreen that he knows Silva is coming. There's nothing about Bond's plan that makes any sense strategically.
8) If Bond's goal was to stop Silva and keep M alive, how is it it he's not beyond despair for getting her killed? [He was.]Where onscreen does he say this? He appears to grieve for some moments and then spend a lot of time on the rooftop staring. But I don't see a moment where he seems affected by guilt at all, including in Spectre.
Hope that helps.
You've done more work here than the screenwriters -- which is why it's a lazy script. I appreciate the effort, but there's very little onscreen to corroborate the speculation here.
What you're doing is what Star Trek fans do to explain away inconsistencies when the continuity is disrupted. Why didn't they use the shuttlecraft? Oh, it was broken that week. How is it Vulcans can't lie, but Spock does more than once during the series? He's half human, so he can invoke that side of his heritage when necessary. Why don't they just beam the genesis device into oblivion? They couldn't get a lock on because of the nebula.
Better scripts don't require speculation. Major plot issues are answered concretely either in dialogue or action or both. Skyfall's is so sloppy in this regard, people have to do what you're doing, though my suspicion is the writer and director just assumed nobody would pay that close attention. They bundled something together, put it out there, it made money, and that's that.
We don't need minor, obvious actions explained. Did Bond open the car door before he got in? Yeah, there's no other way except to break the window, which is intact. How did Bond know where the warehouse was located? I dunno, he googled it? It's not hiding. Where did M get that bulldog figurine? A store. How did Bond get back to London? Airplane? Then maybe a taxi? These sorts of ordinary things have zero bearing on the plot.
Now, compare this to the script for Casino Royale. Why was LeChiffre going to bomb the plane? He's a mathematical genius who needs to crash the stock to cover gambling losses. Why doesn't M just have him assassinated? She wants to shut his operation down and not just eliminate him personally. Why does LeChiffre poison Bond? He needs Bond out of the game and to make it look like natural causes. Why is Vesper put on the mission? She controls the finances and is a check-and-balance against Bond being reckless. Why does Vesper turn on him? She's being blackmailed by LeChiffre. And so on.
The only thing the script doesn't really answer is whether or not Mathis really was a double agent working against Bond. That's not even fully resolved in Quantum of Solace. However, the implication is he was, in fact, a double agent since MI:6 takes him away in Casino Royale. So it's really Quantum of Solace that muddles things, even though it's suggested in the film he wasn't (the girlfriend says he wasn't, but then Mathis' final words make it less certain.)
1) Silva requires a trojan horse. Both times, with hacking M's Laptop and with the Laptop being plugged into Mi6, they let him in.
2) the two agents in the flat were not retrieving it, they were simply in possession of it when Patrice broke in.
3) short answer is hopefully we aren't living in 1984, otherwise Silva and Blofeld are the good guys.
4) The subway bomb was planted by a henchman to a) cut off Silva's exit so he can't be followed and b) to cause a distraction which keeps the police away from the hearing. It doesn't matter where Bond is, and he can look up the train schedules online. He knows about the Meeting because he hacked M's email.
5) She should be guarded but since she's the boss she can do whatever she wants and her character fits the stubborness
6) Mi6 didn't own the flat. As the sole beneficiary, "sold" means they terminated the lease. And they would auction his stuff eventually.
7) It evens the odds because Sierra has no hacking power because there are no computers.
+ Its an estate with a large deer population so Bond would logically expect rifles. He could've picked off some of the first wave, but the plan was always to booby trap the house because he anticipated correctly that Silva would likely show up at night.
+ Bond told Q to leave the Breadcrumbs
+ Several reasons Mallory wouldn't send reinforcements: 1, he isn't M and doesn't have the authority. 2, He said he doesn't want the PM to find out or they'll all be fired. 3, Reinforcements mean company cars which means Silva would see them and not bother to show up. The Breadcrumbs are basically an invitation to finish it.
8) no reason to feel guilty.
Mathis is innocent. Vesper is the one that told Le Chiffre his tell. Le Chiffre says "My friend Mathis" just to keep Bonds suspicion off Vesper, so that he can threaten to kill her to get the password.
Nice thoughts there. I'm going to watch skyfall tomorrow at the Royal Albert Hall for my b day should be a good laugh.
If the trailer for "No time to die" drops tomorrow as some expect. It would be cool if its played at this event.
Looking forward to the trailer dropping then we can further speculate on where the movie might rank.
My ranking, exactly, Ellipsis. All I know for sure is that we're in for an action packed PTS, probably the longest PTS in Bond history, and a great CR-style gunbarrel transition into the TS. Other than Matera, the trailer suffers from a lack of action and Bond doing bond things. As the producers confirmed, Bond takes second stage to the three leading ladies. Two take over the action and one takes over the plot (at least in the trailer). Beyond Bond taking second stage, action is again taking second stage to plot and tertiary characters, as was the problem with Spectre. Instead of correcting that, they are doubling down.
If I had to guess, it's looking in between QoS and TMWTGG, at #21 on my list. A great way to rank higher, or lower, would be running time. Between 110 and 120 minutes and we could have a breezy fast-paced action movie. Longer than Spectre and I'd just as soon rank it dead last.
My ranking, exactly, Ellipsis. All I know for sure is that we're in for an action packed PTS, probably the longest PTS in Bond history, and a great CR-style gunbarrel transition into the TS. Other than Matera, the trailer suffers from a lack of action and Bond doing bond things. As the producers confirmed, Bond takes second stage to the three leading ladies. Two take over the action and one takes over the plot (at least in the trailer). Beyond Bond taking second stage, action is again taking second stage to plot and tertiary characters, as was the problem with Spectre. Instead of correcting that, they are doubling down.
If I had to guess, it's looking in between QoS and TMWTGG, at #21 on my list. A great way to rank higher, or lower, would be running time. Between 110 and 120 minutes and we could have a breezy fast-paced action movie. Longer than Spectre and I'd just as soon rank it dead last.
I just hope it is better than Spectre. Being better than Quantum should be a given as that was a disaster. If it gets to the levels of Skyfall, then it is in top 10 territory and I am just not going to let myself get into that mentality. If it's a great movie, I'll be the first to standup and sing its praise but I don't want my expectations to be set high and leave myself disappointed.
I'm not even considering Casino Royale as that is my favorite Bond movie. If it surpasses that, then it would be my greatest Bond movie of all time and I don't think any of us are going into it with that mentality.
I just hope it is better than Spectre. Being better than Quantum should be a given as that was a disaster. If it gets to the levels of Skyfall, then it is in top 10 territory and I am just not going to let myself get into that mentality. If it's a great movie, I'll be the first to standup and sign its praise but I don't want my expectations to be set high and leave myself disappointed.
I'm not even considering Casino Royale as that is my favorite Bond movie. If it surpasses that, then it would be my greatest Bond movie of all time and I don't think any of us are going into it with that mentality.
Great trailer though -{
Casino is amazing, I think it could be on par with casino though. What's 2nd and 3rd at the top for you? Then your bottom 3?
I just hope it is better than Spectre. Being better than Quantum should be a given as that was a disaster. If it gets to the levels of Skyfall, then it is in top 10 territory and I am just not going to let myself get into that mentality. If it's a great movie, I'll be the first to standup and sign its praise but I don't want my expectations to be set high and leave myself disappointed.
I'm not even considering Casino Royale as that is my favorite Bond movie. If it surpasses that, then it would be my greatest Bond movie of all time and I don't think any of us are going into it with that mentality.
Great trailer though -{
Casino is amazing, I think it could be on par with casino though. What's 2nd and 3rd at the top for you? Then your bottom 3?
1. CR
2. OHMSS (Very close second)
3. FRWL
I haven't give too much thought to my bottom 3 but here are movies that I genuinely don't like in release order: A View to a Kill, License to Kill (need to rewatch this but remember not liking it), TWINE, DAD, and Quantum. There are others that are questionable but I choose to see the positive in them.
I will now leave my list for the trailer drop. So that I am not tempted to revise it, I will call this my final countdown:
000
24. SP
23. TND
22. DAD
001
21. TMWTGG
20. QOS
19. OP
002
18. DAF
17. TWINE
16. YOLT
003
15. SF
14. FYEO
13. LTK
004
12. DN
11. AVTAK
10. GE
005
09. TSWLM
08. FRWL
07. CR
006
06. TLD
05. TB
04. OHMSS
007
03. GF
02. LALD
01. MR
(Spectre had one of the best trailers, so I'm not sure how helpful it will be in ranking) :007)
I see Spectre is 24 on your list, do you think theres any chance No time to die might strengthen your enjoyment of spectre and push it up the list??
The continuity stuff is pretty bad, but that isn't even my main gripe with Spectre. As I stated to Ellipsis, Spectre is long, dull, focuses on tertiary characters and subplot and not enough Bond and the villains, and the action sequences are just high speed photo ops.
I can overlook anything so long as there is fast pacing and good action.
Time will tell, but I don't expect it (NTtD) to be one of my favorites. It's likely they'll switch the style from that of SP, although if they go dark enough I might dig it.
"Hostile takeovers. Shall we?"
New 2020 ranking (for now DAF and FYEO keep their previous placements)
1. TLD 2. TND 3. GF 4. TSWLM 5. TWINE 6. OHMSS 7. LtK 8. TMWTGG 9. L&LD 10. YOLT 11. DAD 12. QoS 13. DN 14. GE 15. SF 16. OP 17. MR 18. AVTAK 19. TB 20. FRWL 21. CR 22. FYEO 23. DAF (SP to be included later)
Bond actors to be re-ranked later
After watching the trailer, and ofcourse everyone have their own opinions i think NTTD will end up on number 3 for me. Because i hate QOS. Spectre i sort of liked better than some people i believe, mine will end up like this i think. So this is just by the trailer, but i am fairly optimistic and say NTTD beats Spectre for me.
The new trailer that dropped a few hours back today 25th February with cary fukunaga chatting about some aspects of bond is really promising. Every new scene we see just looks so beautiful, filled with vivid colours, atmosphere and iconic shots. I know some is recycled but I'm glad this is the case we've seen quite alot of footage since the first trailer drop. This movies heating up. Just over a month left and we'll be ready to rock n roll.
This movie looks pretty intense to say the least, as cary fukunaga said originally he wanted to up the ante. This movies probably gunna have about 6 chases in it, Be it bike, car, boat, plane, helicopter.
Just throwing a question out there
What are some things you (anyone) want to see and
Would up your ranking for NTTD not just in the craig canon
But all 25 movies.
A few of mine
Gunbarrel
Some one liners & or iconic lines
A great villian (a bond film only as good as its villian??)
A PTS seperate from the main story but could tie in slightly.
Good bond song & title sequence to prepare
us for the ride ahead
Gadgets!!!
Subtle Easter eggs.
Iconic moments.
that say a casual bond fan might refer to..
The one with the car that goes underwater...the one with the tank chase... the one where his wife dies at the end... the one where the lazer beam goes up his jaffas haha.
This is going to be an emotional Bond for me, to be honest.
I love Bond, always have and each Bond (actor) has sort of been an anchor for a particular period of my life with Craig probably being the most eventful.
The stages of my life I've gone through with Craig being Bond have been some of the most important for me. Wether that be positively or negatively.
I know it's pretty ridiculous but as Craig's tenure as Bond comes to an end, I do feel that randomly its coinciding my a particular time of my life coming to an end and I'll genuinely miss Craig as Bond. I'm melancholic about the prospect of no more Craig movies. So this will be one of the best Bond movies for me.
Will it be a good film in it's own right? I'll be surprised. What with all the chopping and changing and what not.
Will it be a good Bond Film? I'm unsure, I'm not sure I'm totally in love with the direction we've taken Craig as Bond.
Will it be one of my favourite Bond films? 100%
This is going to be an emotional Bond for me, to be honest.
I love Bond, always have and each Bond (actor) has sort of been an anchor for a particular period of my life with Craig probably being the most eventful.
The stages of my life I've gone through with Craig being Bond have been some of the most important for me. Wether that be positively or negatively.
I know it's pretty ridiculous but as Craig's tenure as Bond comes to an end, I do feel that randomly its coinciding my a particular time of my life coming to an end and I'll genuinely miss Craig as Bond. I'm melancholic about the prospect of no more Craig movies. So this will be one of the best Bond movies for me.
Will it be a good film in it's own right? I'll be surprised. What with all the chopping and changing and what not.
Will it be a good Bond Film? I'm unsure, I'm not sure I'm totally in love with the direction we've taken Craig as Bond.
Comments
It may sound contradictory since On Her Majesty's Secret Service seems so personal a film, but that's not entirely true. Bond's chasing down Blofeld is still extant of his relationship with Tracy until the two stories converge. It unfolds naturally, the primary difference here being that Bond more deeply falls in love with the Bond girl, who always ends up threatened by the villain anyway. There's nothing as ham-fisted as Blofeld being Bond's foster brother or whatever in Spectre. The film is also part of a series and not a one-off, and it introduces the deeply personal element at a time when that wasn't simply part of the formula.
The writing in On Her Majesty's Secret Service is the most solid because it's the most human and grounded, even though the movie more or less sticks to formula. Bond is treated not as the hero but as a character. This happens on occasion -- its bookend, Casino Royale, for instance, is more a movie about James Bond than a James Bond movie -- and the films of the Connery era arguably did more in this regard and more consistently than most of what followed. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is framed as a tragedy, full of irony (Bond is glib and carefree at the beginning while Tracy is suicidal; at the end, when Tracy is happiest and has everything to live for, she's gunned down and Bond is left broken). It's left up to the viewer to decide if Bond really saved her life or got her killed by association.
In between, there's action, romance, suspense, and comedy. It delivers with stunts, chases, and set pieces, albeit more realistically framed than most other Bond films, right down to Blofeld, equally tired of the chase, just wanting amnesty and retirement. There are some great lines -- even Bond's usual sophomoric quips, like "At least for tonight," take on greater significance as the story travels toward its sad conclusion. Of course, nearly all of this is in the book, but given how many Bond films often have comparatively little to do with Fleming's literary character, this is one of the purest adaptations while also making its own contributions.
The main problem with The World is Not Enough is pretty typical of a modern film, which is to say, it raises a lot of issues and then does little or nothing to deliver on them. The idea of a terminally ill villain who can no longer feel pain should be terrifying and great fodder for action and suspense, yet almost nothing is done with the Carlyle character. He ends up being a garden variety thug who has, what, two or three tepid scenes with Bond? Even the often puerile The Man with the Golden Gun, another movie that promised more than it delivered in these regards, let Bond and Scaramanga interact on occasion during the film.
Elektra being the true villain comes across more as a stunt -- a twist that's supposed to make us say, "Golly, didn't see that coming.
They're so clever." Again, there's no build up, no real emotional weight to it in the construction of the story, despite the ski scene that starts with almost a shot-for-shot remake of the one from On Her Majesty's Secret Service. I guess we're supposed to harken back to Tracy with Elektra and do the work of the writer to make the emotional connection. Consider how much is told to us in expository dialogue -- how Renard got shot, how Elektra was kidnapped and tortured, how her father wheeled and dealed, how M and he have been friends since they were young, and so on. We never once see any of this developed onscreen, but our knowledge of such is somehow supposed to fill in the emotional blanks for us.
Compare that to On Her Majesty's Secret Service. About the only thing we're told in this respect that compares is how Draco came to meet and marry Tracy's mother, and then how Tracy lived too greedily to get to the state she was at the beginning of the film -- when Bond enters the picture. There's a dreaded montage scene of their romance, which they can't resist repeating in Casino Royale, but it's still better than a character just talking about it onscreen. But pretty much everything else is shown to us, and it's done in an organic way.
The World is Not Enough could have stopped after the first 20 minutes. At least nearly all of that is narrative, and it's good. There are a few, I guess, inventive puns later -- "Christmas came twice this year (ho, ho, ho)" and "I never miss."
To me, the best written of Brosnan's Bonds is Tomorrow Never Dies, which would have been better under its original title Tomorrow Never Lies. It, too, suffers from too much exposition, but by gum, the villain actually does something, unlike in the overrated Goldeneye, where as with Renard, a rogue 00 agent -- another fantastic idea for a villain they do almost nothing with-- is just another pretty ordinary bad guy with a Russian general and a computer nerd on the payroll.
The second best Bond film in terms of writing is Dr. No, and if it wasn't for some of the pulp fiction lines that make it seem more like a 40s or 50s movie, I might even argue it's the best. This movie not only establishes the Bond character but also creates the template for the Bond villain, and that dinner scene is never eclipsed in any other Bond film, though many of them have their version of it.
Casino Royale for the most part did that -- it only needed another 10 minutes of actual romance rather than the sketch we got, but it was the best written and directed Bond by far in many years -- but it was downhill from there.
The vastly overrated Skyfall, arguably the best of the other Craig Bond scripts, got by mostly on sentimentality, which it has no shortage of, but its script was still just crap. It's one of those movies where rather than the story unfolding organically and with some hint of logic, plot elements are jammed in to make the rest of it work, with questions abounding:
1) Why does MI:6's greatest computer hacker even need to hire a hit man to steal a laptop hard drive?
2) Why is a 00 sent to retrieve said hard drive, along with two agents who apparently are neither as skilled nor experienced?
3) How is it Bond is fitted with a tracker in Casino Royale (and again in Spectre) in an age of facial recognition and cameras everywhere, yet both he and Silva can just disappear off the grid without effort?
4) How could Silva's plan to infiltrate MI:6 possibly have predicted every last detail, such as where Bond would be standing precisely when an Underground train is passing where a bomb somehow has been planted by somebody well beforehand and that a hearing on MI:6's relevancy would be scheduled later that day?
5) How is it that Silva has destroyed MI:6 headquarters and outed agents worldwide but M's home is neither guarded nor treated as a target, too, even while MI:6 is now on "war footing"?
6) If Bond has been declared legally dead, to the point that his family estate is being sold off, why are his effects in storage, and who pocketed the money when his flat was sold? If MI:6 owned the flat, why did they sell it?
7) Just why does Bond think going to Skyfall somehow evens the odds when apparently he has no plan whatsoever for when he gets there other than to lure Silva there?
8) If Bond's goal was to stop Silva and keep M alive, how is it it he's not beyond despair for getting her killed?
I won't even go into the issue of Kincaid and the flashlight since he's an amateur nor all the expository dialogue, such as Silva's tedious introduction out of the elevator, telling us a story about rats that could as easily have been shown to us in an actual scene, still with the voiceover if they felt the need, Silva's recounting of the torture and cyanide incident, Kincaid's recounting of the young Bond's night in the priest hole (boy, that doesn't sound right), or M's filling us in on why Silva got betrayed.
Any or all of these elements could be easily fixed with minor script revisions, which is why it's crap. Silva never needed the hard drive -- he just wanted to lure Bond into a trap and tells him so later. M's house isn't unguarded -- she's left herself vulnerable in an attempt to get Silva to make his move, only he doesn't take the bait, and Bond figures this out. Does M have a death wish from her guilt? This foreshadows the climax, as it's not Bond who chooses to go to Skyfall but M -- again, in an attempt to flush Silva out -- and Bond is reluctant for both personal and professional reasons to go along with the plan; Mallory is to dispatch reinforcements, but Silva's men cut them down before they can arrive.
My expectation is Bond 25 will have a script more similar to Skyfall than to Casino Royale. It'll be jazzed up with some swipes at misogyny and with moments of female and gender empowerment to show that Bond now has a 21st century sensibility or whatever. But I'm not anticipating something truly character-driven that makes great sense. I could be wrong, and I hope I am. But the Craig era started by setting a high standard and hasn't lived up to it in terms of the writing.
Or do you think they are simply often the scapegoats?
You should do an audio commentary on your thoughts on
One of the bond films, could be interesting.
I really like CR but it's not perfect. It's just quite a good film, ish. For a Bond. Then QoS I actually really like, even though the quality is lesser than CR. Skyfall I find massively overrated as well. Everyone loved it, but to me almost nothing made sense. Worse than QoS for me. Then Spectre. Huge disappointment. Waltz was awful (blame the script, whatever), and the entire plot was just useless. I hope NTTD is better.
I hope it's good, but I won't hold my breath.
IMO each Craig film has been worse than the previous...
Film is a collaborative process, and when there's too many cooks in the kitchen, the result is usually a mess. That's why the better commercial film directors -- Billy Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, and so forth -- tended to work with the same writer(s) or wrote scripts themselves. Hitchcock in particular was known to put actors in their place. From his point of view, it was the director's job to have the vision for makes it to the screen from the script. Actors were to create the characters from the script, not write and direct.
But when directors, producers, and actors start meddling, ideas usually get diluted. Is that the writer's fault? Maybe, maybe not. I suppose it depends on how strong the script is to begin with it and how turf-centered everyone else is. Someone is supposed to keep track of whether it all makes sense, but after shooting four hours or more of film, some editor often is tasked with putting something together than makes sense. In fact, editing may be the most important part of the process.
Eh, I babble about this sort of thing, among other, when I teach. I don't know that anyone else beyond the generous people on these boards needs to be inflicted with it.
Skyfall is one of those movies masquerading at being far more clever than it really is. All of the things that don't make sense are written off with "But Silva is a mad genius -- if we don't tell you, you can just assume he had a way." Even if we assume that lazy explanation, why doesn't Bond make sense? I still want to know just what strategy Bond had in mind by going back to Skyfall? And why he doesn't personally feel responsible for M's demise?
I thought Waltz should play Blofeld from the time I saw him in Inglorious Basterds. The problem is the script gave him almost nothing to do. This is a huge problem with Bond scripts and has been for at least 25 years. Casino Royale is an exception -- both LeChiffre and Mr. White were given adequate screen time and development to impact the events of the story. Marginally, so were Green and Silva in their films, but still nothing on the order of Blofeld in the older films or Goldfinger.
Modern Bond films also waste a lot of time with ponderous shots where nothing of import is happening -- like Bond on the skiff to the Macao casino or traveling up river to find Mr. White -- and elaborate action set pieces, to the degree that there's not as much time left for character development and onscreen dialogue exchanges. It's interesting that people tend to think older movies are slower, but if you watch the Connery Bonds in particular, you'll see they move a lot faster. They just don't spend as much time on these other distractions. Again, Casino Royale is better in this department. We see Bond simply walking up to the casinos -- his body language communicates who he is and his intent. That's a lot more interesting than a guy just standing rigidly still in some arty pose while the camera eats up precious seconds showing us the set.
2) Why is a 00 sent to retrieve said hard drive, along with two agents who apparently are neither as skilled nor experienced? [The deal went sideways when Patrice intervened and Bond was called in as cleanup]
3) How is it Bond is fitted with a tracker in Casino Royale (and again in Spectre) in an age of facial recognition and cameras everywhere, yet both he and Silva can just disappear off the grid without effort? [They're spies. And no tracker in Skyfall!].
4) How could Silva's plan to infiltrate MI:6 possibly have predicted every last detail, such as where Bond would be standing precisely when an Underground train is passing where a bomb somehow has been planted by somebody well beforehand and that a hearing on MI:6's relevancy would be scheduled later that day? [He had bombs set to go off all around London and lured Bond to that location]
5) How is it that Silva has destroyed MI:6 headquarters and outed agents worldwide but M's home is neither guarded nor treated as a target, too, even while MI:6 is now on "war footing"?[I don't remember this but M makes it clear that she doesn't want a bunch of carnage]
6) If Bond has been declared legally dead, to the point that his family estate is being sold off, why are his effects in storage, and who pocketed the money when his flat was sold? If MI:6 owned the flat, why did they sell it? [Nobody was living in it]
7) Just why does Bond think going to Skyfall somehow evens the odds when apparently he has no plan whatsoever for when he gets there other than to lure Silva there? [Silva's tech advantages would be limited, Bond would have the machine gun equipped AM and he expected to find a small armory of hunting rifles that he could use to pick off Silva's men from 500+ yards.]
8) If Bond's goal was to stop Silva and keep M alive, how is it it he's not beyond despair for getting her killed? [He was.]
Hope that helps.
some interesting views, its nice reading something every now and then which really gets you thinking, hmm
you know i never looked at it that way.
Then getting another different spin on it all.
both perfectly valid points there.
ok so from a writing perspective from "No Time To Die"
what do you think most of us want out of it?
and how could it be achieved?
1) a brilliant villain?
2) possibly good henchmen?
3) a story which isn't predicable? (i appreciated theres been a few of these movies now)
4) gadgets/minimal gadgets no gadgets?
5) strong dialogue and performance
6) snappy editing-quantum
slower editing- spectre
abit of both- casino
or other?
(i'll just state this hear also under editing, i agree wholehearted with your thoughts on editing "Gass Man" i'd love to know
how bond would have turned out if we hadn't had Peter Hunt from the get go.)
7) a story thats grounded, or takes away from current reality
8) a film that recognises the current changes i.e metoo.
(i personally think that bond has often included the trends
and is apart of why its has evolved and lasted so long)
9) a score that echoes its title goldfinger, diamonds are forever (like the sound of clanging gold bars or twinkling diamonds)
i appreciated this one might take a bit of imagination but say for example the prospect of time, a score like dunkirk which has a real ticking feel.
a score which underscores throughout- spectre
it sits nicely in the film keeping it company throughout, but never shouting the bond theme "hey look yeah i'm over here"
A David Arnold Techno Trip- Twine & DAD- a score that can get us right pumped up like those of us that have the LA LA LAND records realise of twine and Show me the Money burns into Come in 007 your time is up. or the crazy bombast of bond goes to iceland in Die another day.
A gritty/darker score- Casino royale/licence to kill. bits of african rundown, the stairwell fight, fall of a house in venice. licence to kill gun barrel, licence revoked, escape from wavekrest.
synth driven score- FYEO/Spy Who Loved Me- Runaway, ski, shoot, jump. Bond77
A John Barry classic style bond score- Octopussy, A View to A Kill.
I personally don't want this on the scale of note for note, im sure like most consider barry to be the best. Obviously composer's can be inspired by or pay tribute to barry. But i don't think we want a carbon copy of his sound, i think it might just be an insult to his legacy really.
something different- something we've yet to have.
And anything else you guys think of course.
What you're doing is what Star Trek fans do to explain away inconsistencies when the continuity is disrupted. Why didn't they use the shuttlecraft? Oh, it was broken that week. How is it Vulcans can't lie, but Spock does more than once during the series? He's half human, so he can invoke that side of his heritage when necessary. Why don't they just beam the genesis device into oblivion? They couldn't get a lock on because of the nebula.
Better scripts don't require speculation. Major plot issues are answered concretely either in dialogue or action or both. Skyfall's is so sloppy in this regard, people have to do what you're doing, though my suspicion is the writer and director just assumed nobody would pay that close attention. They bundled something together, put it out there, it made money, and that's that.
We don't need minor, obvious actions explained. Did Bond open the car door before he got in? Yeah, there's no other way except to break the window, which is intact. How did Bond know where the warehouse was located? I dunno, he googled it? It's not hiding. Where did M get that bulldog figurine? A store. How did Bond get back to London? Airplane? Then maybe a taxi? These sorts of ordinary things have zero bearing on the plot.
Now, compare this to the script for Casino Royale. Why was LeChiffre going to bomb the plane? He's a mathematical genius who needs to crash the stock to cover gambling losses. Why doesn't M just have him assassinated? She wants to shut his operation down and not just eliminate him personally. Why does LeChiffre poison Bond? He needs Bond out of the game and to make it look like natural causes. Why is Vesper put on the mission? She controls the finances and is a check-and-balance against Bond being reckless. Why does Vesper turn on him? She's being blackmailed by LeChiffre. And so on.
The only thing the script doesn't really answer is whether or not Mathis really was a double agent working against Bond. That's not even fully resolved in Quantum of Solace. However, the implication is he was, in fact, a double agent since MI:6 takes him away in Casino Royale. So it's really Quantum of Solace that muddles things, even though it's suggested in the film he wasn't (the girlfriend says he wasn't, but then Mathis' final words make it less certain.)
I'd like a believable adult relationship between Madeleine and Bond.
I want a Bond with real emotions and strong dialogue. If that happens, everything else will fall into place. If it doesn't happen, everything else will have to be used to try to cover up for it.
It's been done, even with the movies that produced great action and suspense -- Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, Thunderball, You Only Live Twice, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and so forth. It can be done again.
Positively shocking.
1) Silva requires a trojan horse. Both times, with hacking M's Laptop and with the Laptop being plugged into Mi6, they let him in.
2) the two agents in the flat were not retrieving it, they were simply in possession of it when Patrice broke in.
3) short answer is hopefully we aren't living in 1984, otherwise Silva and Blofeld are the good guys.
4) The subway bomb was planted by a henchman to a) cut off Silva's exit so he can't be followed and b) to cause a distraction which keeps the police away from the hearing. It doesn't matter where Bond is, and he can look up the train schedules online. He knows about the Meeting because he hacked M's email.
5) She should be guarded but since she's the boss she can do whatever she wants and her character fits the stubborness
6) Mi6 didn't own the flat. As the sole beneficiary, "sold" means they terminated the lease. And they would auction his stuff eventually.
7) It evens the odds because Sierra has no hacking power because there are no computers.
+ Its an estate with a large deer population so Bond would logically expect rifles. He could've picked off some of the first wave, but the plan was always to booby trap the house because he anticipated correctly that Silva would likely show up at night.
+ Bond told Q to leave the Breadcrumbs
+ Several reasons Mallory wouldn't send reinforcements: 1, he isn't M and doesn't have the authority. 2, He said he doesn't want the PM to find out or they'll all be fired. 3, Reinforcements mean company cars which means Silva would see them and not bother to show up. The Breadcrumbs are basically an invitation to finish it.
8) no reason to feel guilty.
Mathis is innocent. Vesper is the one that told Le Chiffre his tell. Le Chiffre says "My friend Mathis" just to keep Bonds suspicion off Vesper, so that he can threaten to kill her to get the password.
If the trailer for "No time to die" drops tomorrow as some expect. It would be cool if its played at this event.
Looking forward to the trailer dropping then we can further speculate on where the movie might rank.
000
24. SP
23. TND
22. DAD
001
21. TMWTGG
20. QOS
19. OP
002
18. DAF
17. TWINE
16. YOLT
003
15. SF
14. FYEO
13. LTK
004
12. DN
11. AVTAK
10. GE
005
09. TSWLM
08. FRWL
07. CR
006
06. TLD
05. TB
04. OHMSS
007
03. GF
02. LALD
01. MR
(Spectre had one of the best trailers, so I'm not sure how helpful it will be in ranking) :007)
so
1) Casino Royale
2) Skyfall
3) QOS
4) NTTD
5) Spectre
My ranking, exactly, Ellipsis. All I know for sure is that we're in for an action packed PTS, probably the longest PTS in Bond history, and a great CR-style gunbarrel transition into the TS. Other than Matera, the trailer suffers from a lack of action and Bond doing bond things. As the producers confirmed, Bond takes second stage to the three leading ladies. Two take over the action and one takes over the plot (at least in the trailer). Beyond Bond taking second stage, action is again taking second stage to plot and tertiary characters, as was the problem with Spectre. Instead of correcting that, they are doubling down.
If I had to guess, it's looking in between QoS and TMWTGG, at #21 on my list. A great way to rank higher, or lower, would be running time. Between 110 and 120 minutes and we could have a breezy fast-paced action movie. Longer than Spectre and I'd just as soon rank it dead last.
Out of interest what are your top 3 bond movies?
I see Spectre is 24 on your list, do you think theres any chance No time to die might strengthen your enjoyment of spectre and push it up the list??
I'm not even considering Casino Royale as that is my favorite Bond movie. If it surpasses that, then it would be my greatest Bond movie of all time and I don't think any of us are going into it with that mentality.
Great trailer though -{
Casino is amazing, I think it could be on par with casino though. What's 2nd and 3rd at the top for you? Then your bottom 3?
1. CR
2. OHMSS (Very close second)
3. FRWL
I haven't give too much thought to my bottom 3 but here are movies that I genuinely don't like in release order: A View to a Kill, License to Kill (need to rewatch this but remember not liking it), TWINE, DAD, and Quantum. There are others that are questionable but I choose to see the positive in them.
The continuity stuff is pretty bad, but that isn't even my main gripe with Spectre. As I stated to Ellipsis, Spectre is long, dull, focuses on tertiary characters and subplot and not enough Bond and the villains, and the action sequences are just high speed photo ops.
I can overlook anything so long as there is fast pacing and good action.
New 2020 ranking (for now DAF and FYEO keep their previous placements)
1. TLD 2. TND 3. GF 4. TSWLM 5. TWINE 6. OHMSS 7. LtK 8. TMWTGG 9. L&LD 10. YOLT 11. DAD 12. QoS 13. DN 14. GE 15. SF 16. OP 17. MR 18. AVTAK 19. TB 20. FRWL 21. CR 22. FYEO 23. DAF (SP to be included later)
Bond actors to be re-ranked later
After watching the trailer, and ofcourse everyone have their own opinions i think NTTD will end up on number 3 for me. Because i hate QOS. Spectre i sort of liked better than some people i believe, mine will end up like this i think. So this is just by the trailer, but i am fairly optimistic and say NTTD beats Spectre for me.
1) Casino Royale (offcourse)
2) Skyfall
3) NTTD
4) Spectre
5) QOS
This movie looks pretty intense to say the least, as cary fukunaga said originally he wanted to up the ante. This movies probably gunna have about 6 chases in it, Be it bike, car, boat, plane, helicopter.
Just throwing a question out there
What are some things you (anyone) want to see and
Would up your ranking for NTTD not just in the craig canon
But all 25 movies.
A few of mine
Gunbarrel
Some one liners & or iconic lines
A great villian (a bond film only as good as its villian??)
A PTS seperate from the main story but could tie in slightly.
Good bond song & title sequence to prepare
us for the ride ahead
Gadgets!!!
Subtle Easter eggs.
Iconic moments.
that say a casual bond fan might refer to..
The one with the car that goes underwater...the one with the tank chase... the one where his wife dies at the end... the one where the lazer beam goes up his jaffas haha.
I love Bond, always have and each Bond (actor) has sort of been an anchor for a particular period of my life with Craig probably being the most eventful.
The stages of my life I've gone through with Craig being Bond have been some of the most important for me. Wether that be positively or negatively.
I know it's pretty ridiculous but as Craig's tenure as Bond comes to an end, I do feel that randomly its coinciding my a particular time of my life coming to an end and I'll genuinely miss Craig as Bond. I'm melancholic about the prospect of no more Craig movies. So this will be one of the best Bond movies for me.
Will it be a good film in it's own right? I'll be surprised. What with all the chopping and changing and what not.
Will it be a good Bond Film? I'm unsure, I'm not sure I'm totally in love with the direction we've taken Craig as Bond.
Will it be one of my favourite Bond films? 100%
I hear you brother {[]