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Steve Yun posted:Also isn’t this the first time an actor’s run ended with on a good note instead of starting out strong and getting progressively shittier No, because the Craig run also started out strong and got progressively shittier.
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Jun 27, 2022 13:41
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:No, because the Craig run also started out strong and got progressively shittier. To me it's more of a U-shaped curve of quality
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Jun 27, 2022 14:35
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It's tough to judge No Time To Die in a vacuum because Spectre was so lovely. So No Time To Die feels like ending on a "good note" by comparison but it's still an extremely mediocre movie. Casino Royale is the only one that I can unequivocally call a good movie so yea the trajectory of Craig Bond overall was pretty bad. Maybe not a straight downward progression into the shitter but Skyfall and No Time to Die aren't nearly good enough to redeem what ended up being a run of four films that all failed to live up to the promise of Casino Royale.
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Jun 27, 2022 15:34
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Failed Imagineer posted:To me it's more of a U-shaped curve of quality Are you saying Skyfall was the worst Craig movie?
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Jun 27, 2022 15:36
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TL posted:Jonathan Pryce makes an absolute meal out of that role. That movie has some flaws, but he knocks it out of the park. Easily my favorite villain of the Brosnan era and probably one of my top four or five. It's honestly amazing. He plays Carver as super horny for news. AceOfFlames posted:If they are dead set on continuing this franchise, I hope at least they will take the opportunity to reboot it as a Cold War period piece. Yeah it's not believable anymore to do movies with Russia as the bad guy.
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Jun 27, 2022 15:39
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Gatts posted:First I was like a James Bond TV series would be cool but then it turns out they want to ram it into the ground and make a game show and I’m like whatever milk it and kill it like Disney did Star Wars and let’s get something new. "Filming starts on the unscripted series this year" makes it sound like this will be a Bond improv show. But it should just be that the premise of the show is that there's an ENTIRE reality show infrastructure built around having its host, James Bond, plausibly be all over the world at various times lol Jose Oquendo posted:If you asked me what Amazon would do now that it has some rights to 007, I would have never ever guessed 'reality show.' It really is surprising. You'd think just doing a solid spy thriller mini-series but with the Bond name attached would be successful, but IIRC reality shows are way cheaper to make. Neo Rasa fucked around with this message at 15:57 on Jun 27, 2022 |
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Jun 27, 2022 15:53
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Chemtrailologist posted:Are you saying Skyfall was the worst Craig movie? QoS and Skyfall are both dogshit, but Skyfall at least looks beautiful
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Jun 27, 2022 16:26
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A movie can have a dogshit story but if it looks and/or sounds great it will still get a 5 star + like from me on Letterboxd.
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Jun 27, 2022 17:26
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"Skyfall is bad" is a worse opinion than Spectre is a movie.
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Jun 27, 2022 17:30
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It looked amazing and I enjoyed the themes of questioning Bond's relevance to the modern world. The plot was dumb as hell, but it was a Bond film so you kinda have to accept that. Easily second best Craig film, although that's a pretty low bar to clear. Failed Imagineer posted:QoS and Skyfall are both dogshit, but Skyfall at least looks beautiful So if you're plotting the quality of Craig's Bond movies on a graph, wouldn't it look more like an M shape than a U? Chemtrailologist fucked around with this message at 17:43 on Jun 27, 2022 |
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Jun 27, 2022 17:41
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Spectre made me laugh, so I'll at least give it that. Casting Moriarty as a shady surveillance state bureaucrat, then having a twist reveal that he's actually a bad guy is so dumb that it's actually charming in a way.
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Jun 27, 2022 18:44
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Simplex posted:it's actually charming in a way. I guess we learned what C stands for 
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Jun 27, 2022 19:06
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Chemtrailologist posted:It looked amazing and I enjoyed the themes of questioning Bond's relevance to the modern world. The plot was dumb as hell, but it was a Bond film so you kinda have to accept that.
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Jun 27, 2022 19:19
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Chemtrailologist posted:It looked amazing and I enjoyed the themes of questioning Bond's relevance to the modern world. The plot was dumb as hell, but it was a Bond film so you kinda have to accept that. Goldeneye already did this, though.
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Jun 27, 2022 19:32
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Strategic Tea posted:I guess we learned what C stands for I havent seen spectre since it was in the theaters but in my heart I feel like the film not letting this line breathe and stand on its own is symbolic of everything that sucks about it
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Jun 27, 2022 19:34
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Uncle Boogeyman posted:No, because the Craig run also started out strong and got progressively shittier. I disagree.
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Jun 27, 2022 19:55
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pretty soft girl posted:I havent seen spectre since it was in the theaters but in my heart I feel like the film not letting this line breathe and stand on its own is symbolic of everything that sucks about it Yeah that was one of the few lines in the movie to get a laugh from the audience, then M says "careless" and it's just crickets. Spectre was bad, bad bad. Wasted villains, boring car chase, Bond and Madeline have no chemistry, the needless and forced attempts to create a Bond cinematic universe and a twist lifted from Austin Powers and Star Trek into Darkness (seriously nobody gives a poo poo about Blofeld's background). I really liked the opening scene at the time but once Bond starts trying to knock out a helicopter pilot while it's flying over thousands of people you have to shake your head. I give NTTD credit for wrapping up the plot threads introduced in Spectre without feeling forced and for letting Lea Seydoux act. Rami Malek was an unfortunate waste but unlike Spectre there are times during that movie where I was having fun (the Cuba sequence, the foggy forest scene, some of the one liners land). And the OHMSS score rules 
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Jun 27, 2022 20:19
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There's no such thing as a "good" James Bond movie that stands on its own, they're all derivative and shallowly ridiculous, but the least they can do is make all the money they spent on explosions and status symbol cars click together with a snappy script, a good sense of humor, and good cinematography.
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Jun 27, 2022 20:34
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Strategic Tea posted:I guess we learned what C stands for Careless. Get it? Because we can't say cu.... (User was banned for this post)
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Jun 27, 2022 22:34
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Cacator posted:
I do sort of believe that Spectre will eventually become a particular vintage of bad movie that will make it kind of enjoyable. Die Another Day used to be my least favorite in the franchise, but I find it a lot easier to enjoy as a campy mess of trend chasing decisions with entertainingly bad special effects and abysmal performances now that we're 20 years out from it If we ever get past the point of MCU style film making being the trend to chase I can see Spectre being a fun walk down "man remember when lovely campy movies were like this" lane along side Die Another Day, A View to a Kill, and Diamonds Are Forever. I don't remember being absolutely bored to tears by it, which is more than I can say for stuff like Thunderball and Moonraker- it was just disappointingly stupid even for Bond, and the fact that this movie's stupidity would actually affect the movies before and after it made it a lot more annoying than if we were still in the era of a single movie more or less existing in a vacuum in relation to the rest
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Jun 27, 2022 23:56
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Spectre was def better than No Time to Die, it had the cool helicopter fight in the beginning and Henchman Bautista
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Jun 28, 2022 00:08
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Skyfall was not very good but definitely better than Quantum of Solace so I'd say the craig run was kind of a descending Sin wave maybe I dunno look they're all outside of Casino flawed to outright bad films and Im so friggan glad they need to get a new actor and reboot this series, again
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Jun 28, 2022 01:55
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Imagine if they let Bond have fun again
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Jun 28, 2022 01:58
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While we're at it, hire an actor who wants to play Bond not one who is forced to. (Which is a bit of a shame in my opinion because I actually think Craig is really good despite the films.)
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Jun 28, 2022 02:33
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And please no more movies with important thoughts about the place of James Bond the multimillion dollar entertainment franchise in the 21st century. The Craig series really disappeared up its own arse with that stuff from Skyfall onward.
High Warlord Zog fucked around with this message at 04:37 on Jun 28, 2022 |
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Jun 28, 2022 03:30
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But does the world still need deniable wet work done illegally on foreign soil on behest of Western Governments?
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Jun 28, 2022 03:33
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A period piece would be ideal, but it would severely limit the cross-promotional and product placement revenue streams. Sony phones don't really work in 1966, it's not Archer. So, we have to tolerate the film makers clumsily move the pieces around to make the UK government's #1 wetwork goon look like a hero.
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Jun 28, 2022 03:44
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Enough sendups of 60's Bond have been done, along with all the constant hat tipping from Bond itself that everything will always ultimately be the same anyway, that the well is very dry on retro Bond. At minimum you can just watch OSS 117, or any of the less tongue-in-cheek reworks of retro Bond that exist.
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Jun 28, 2022 03:54
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You can do Bond in the modern age just fine, an avenue absolutely exists. Ethan Hunt is an incredible modern action hero and the recent M:I movies are great, but does Ethan Hunt have tons of sex? Does he drink expensive alcohol? Does he gamble at a casino recreationally? No, no, and no, and etc for all sorts of Bond tropes. You can make a great modern Bond movie by adding some of the classic Bond movie elements to the modern action elements.
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Jun 28, 2022 05:44
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Did the books portray him as “this guy is badass I wish I was like Roald Dahl banging foreign dignitaries’ wives” Or did the books portray him as “this guy is interesting because he’s a damaged sociopath” Steve Yun fucked around with this message at 06:12 on Jun 28, 2022 |
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Jun 28, 2022 06:10
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Yes
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Jun 28, 2022 06:14
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The latter. Book bond was depressed as poo poo and not someone the reader was supposed to look up to. He's a crude hatchet man and he knows it, often contemplating that the job will kill him eventually. Also he's loving terrible with women and they all dump him. Except the female lead from moonraker that he kisses towards the end despite her giving him not so subtle signals to gently caress off. That one was happily married to someone else and she wouldn't hook up with him to begin with.
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Jun 28, 2022 06:19
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Steve Yun posted:Did the books portray him as “this guy is badass I wish I was like Roald Dahl banging foreign dignitaries’ wives” Sex isn't as big of a part of the books. For example in the book version of Live And Let Die, Bond meets Solitaire, thinks she's hot, and spends a pretty lengthy period thinking about how much he'd like to have sex with her once he rescues her from Mr. Big. When he does so, she's like "look I really appreciate you rescuing me, but I'm not interested in having sex with you" and Bond is like, okay cool well see you later I guess. It's very different from how the movies treat Bond and sex.
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Jun 28, 2022 06:19
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Yeah in the excellent let's read thread, one thing that really stands out is how it is only after Ian Fleming dies (so well into the films) that the books really start to go all in on Bond being the coolest ever you guys, with all these cringey nods and winks about his reputation with the ladies etc. Also I believe it's the guy the thread is currently on, Gardner, who had Bond do the douchiest thing ever and name his car. Poor Mr Fleming would never have allowed this!!!!
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Jun 28, 2022 07:17
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FoolyCharged posted:The latter. Book bond was depressed as poo poo and not someone the reader was supposed to look up to. He's a crude hatchet man and he knows it, often contemplating that the job will kill him eventually. I mean, isn't most of the Movie Bond attributed to Connery just being himself instead of the book depiction? It seems like the debonaire ladies' man is something he simply just brought to the screen and we've just co-opted it as what bond should be from there. It feels like Craig's bond started off more true to the book-like in Casino Royale with the first almost botched assassination scene where he causes far more property damage than is necessary and even keeps some of the gritty "blunt weapon used as a scalpel" theme throughout. Unfortunately, then he is somewhat forced into the "shaken not stirred" tropes just to please the audience but it was the first movie in a revival of a series so I understand placating a bit. The scene that sticks out most to me in early Craig Bond was the stairwell fight scene mid-poker game where he has to kill one of Le'Chiffre's henchmen but does it with no emotion - cleans himself up, wardrobe changes, and returns to the poker game. I could have gone without the silly puns when he arrives but it felt the most RAW that Bond gets. Yuzenn fucked around with this message at 14:16 on Jun 28, 2022 |
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Jun 28, 2022 14:14
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gohuskies posted:When he does so, she's like "look I really appreciate you rescuing me, but I'm not interested in having sex with you" This never happened to the other fella 
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Jun 28, 2022 14:21
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There was a new Bond book by Anthony Horowitz that came out about a month ago called With A Mind To Kill that was pretty decent. It's set after The Man With the Golden Gun, which was Fleming's last novel and it's very good at portraying a Bond who is absolutely loving done with it all. I realise that's an aspect of the character that a lot of people don't like about Craig Bond, but I've always felt it's interesting in Book Bond. Horowitz has done three (there's one set after the Goldfinger novel and another which is a prequel to Casino Royale), and I would describe them all as "entertaining enough, albeit not incredible". But he's very good at ventriloquising Fleming's literary style, and at painting different psychologies of Bond at different stages in his career. Although to get back to the earlier point upthread, Horowitz can't resist making him a bit of a shagger. edit: Hi, chitoryu12! I had no idea there was a Let's Read thread for the continuation novels. As someone who (god help me), has read all of them, I'll be sure to swing by! Matinee fucked around with this message at 16:27 on Jun 28, 2022 |
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Jun 28, 2022 16:02
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Strategic Tea posted:Yeah in the excellent let's read thread, one thing that really stands out is how it is only after Ian Fleming dies (so well into the films) that the books really start to go all in on Bond being the coolest ever you guys, with all these cringey nods and winks about his reputation with the ladies etc. Greetings! People have spent decades writing hit pieces on Ian Fleming that ignore pretty much all of the context he wrote in and often intentionally misinterpreting moments from the books to further the idea that Fleming was a horrific chud and wife beater and his version of James Bond was a self-insert who constantly rapes women. The book Bond is a weird dude who's got PTSD and is compartmentalizing his emotions while taking a fatalistic world view to cope with the regular mortal danger he finds himself in. He only attempts to kiss a woman without permission once after terribly misreading signals from her, and he gets slapped and never tries again. The references to stuff like spanking are because Fleming was into BDSM. If anything, his Bond is a hopeless romantic who gets attached to women that he wants to "fix" from their traumatic lives but the relationships always fall apart within a year or less. Tracy in OHMSS is written exactly like a person with borderline personality disorder, years before that diagnosis would become an official thing. Fleming himself was a womanizer who barely treated women as more than things up until one of the girls he was on-off with for years was killed by a freak accident in the Blitz, and he had to be the one to identify her body. He was a social chameleon who wanted everyone to like him, so everyone interviewed for his biographies had a different opinion of him and his beliefs because he'd change on a dime to match the people around him, often while drinking heavily. His private writings and travelogues talk about the value of visiting foreign countries, learning their culture, etc. In Thrilling Cities he visits a drag bar in Berlin and talks positively about a former WW2 German tank commander who hated himself until he took a job as a server there, and recommends other people go visit. There's substantial evidence from his biography that he was reading progressive literature on sexuality and interracial relationships as a teenager. He was raised wealthy in an extremely conservative society but never quite meshed with it perfectly.
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Jun 28, 2022 16:17
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The most interesting book in my original thread was probably The Spy Who Loved Me. It's written in first person from the Bond Girl's perspective, a young Canadian/British woman who suffers multiple abusive relationships and a forced abortion growing up and ends up tangled up in a mob insurance scam in the Adirondacks that James Bond coincidentally saves her from. The book is very much in the "kitchen sink drama" genre and is very careful to emphasize that Vivienne does nothing wrong to get victimized, and getting an abortion is only tragic because it's forced on her by an uncaring man who wants to rid himself of an inconvenience to his career. While she and Bond do have sex at the end, it's because he's the first man in her life to actually show some kind of real care and affection for her. The Bond Girls of Fleming's books in general are better than almost every one in the movies. Viv nearly beats and escapes the mobsters herself, including narrowly missing an ice pick to the temple, goes into a burning building for a first aid kit, and takes Bond's spare gun to shoot back at them. Gala Brand in Moonraker does rocket science in her head to figure out Drax's plan and only needs Bond to get them free from captivity and climb onto the rocket to enter her settings. Tiffany Case in Diamonds Are Forever drags Bond through the Mojave Desert to the highway for rescue. Honey Ryder in Dr. No murdered her teenage rapist with a poisonous spider and frees herself from captivity on Crab Key, and the last line of the book is her domming Bond.
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Jun 28, 2022 16:25
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Always cool to hear about Fleming and the books. Entertainment history is cool stuff. I'll say for me, I love the Bond movie series, it's been hugely influential and has its own vibe to it. I'd enjoy seeing more stuff in this kind of spy adventure fantasy genre. I'm a big fan of Lupin the Third, which is heavily influenced by that kind of thing. That's a franchise in Japan that's been going strong for a long time. A Bond fan might dig some of those movies, Island of Assassins for example. Castle of Cagliostro by Miyazaki being a great gateway movie. And that series is also a bit like Bond in that the screen adaptation is a lot different from the written one, and has a wider appeal I think.
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Jun 29, 2022 00:50
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