Best Bond film ever?? Best Bond ever??? Definitely not! But a decent movie it is. Read on to find out more.
I’ve been a Bond fan for as
long as I can remember; I probably have my dad to thank for that. Like a lot of the people online these days, I
grew up in the Roger Moore era. I enjoyed
his movies; they were fun, lighthearted, featured some of the best and most
sarcastic one-liners and were just an all round good time.
It wasn’t until I was
slightly older that I acquired the entire Bond collection on VHS, then on DVD
(in a fancy aluminum briefcase with embossed 007 logo) and maybe if my girlfriend’s
reading this, on Blu-ray this Christmas.
It was on VHS that I was introduced properly to Connery, Lazenby,
Dalton, Brosnan etc.
Connery was easily the
best. He had the humour combined with a
suave sophistication that the others have yet to match, something that most men
aspire towards.
The unmatchable Connery - just look how cool he is!
Lazenby was actually a
pretty good Bond and with Louis Armstrong’s ‘We Have All the Time in the World’
on the soundtrack, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service has my respect as a decent
Bond movie despite all the negative criticism people usually throw at it.
Dalton failed in my eyes to
be a good Bond. This is where I see a
divide between fans of the Bond movies and fans of the novels. The Bond character portrayed in the books and
in the movies have become two very different and separate entities. So arguing that Dalton was more faithful to
the books means little to me. Connery, who writer Ian Fleming felt wasn’t a
good Bond, to me was the best Bond and has become my benchmark for actors
assuming the role since. Dalton was just
way too serious and almost completely void of any charisma or charm in the
role.
Brosnan was a very good Bond
in not so great Bond movies. Despite
being pretty absurd at times, with way too many over the top gadgets and three
out of four of his movies featuring a satellite of some sort firing a laser
beam down to the earth, I still enjoy watching his movies to this day.
Now comes Daniel Craig’s turn
as Bond. People that know me will know
how I was far from happy with the casting.
I was hoping Clive Owen or Gerard Butler with his Connery style vocal
mannerisms would get the role.
Bond
actors would often be Bond like in real life and it was these qualities that
they would bring to the movies to make the character their own. Craig to me seemed more policeman than suave
superspy. I tried to look beyond this
but nonetheless still didn’t enjoy Casino Royale; it was just trying too hard
not to be Bond. Like Batman Begins, The
Amazing Spiderman and other reboots, it seemed unnecessary and was trying too
hard to be dark, gritty and ‘real’. By
doing so Bond was becoming just another Hollywood style action movie rather
than a film about one of the coolest characters ever conceived, James
Bond. Subsequently Quantum of Solace was
deemed forgettable by even Craig fans.
Finally this leads us to Skyfall.
It’s been quite a few years
since the last Bond movie and I could feel the withdrawal symptoms setting
in. Craig and I have set aside our
differences and now all I wanted was to see a decent Bond movie. So how was it? Not bad but not great either.
The movie starts with an
exciting chase scene culminating in the apparent demise of Bond following a shocking order given by M. Bond is presumed
dead and life goes on. We see Bond
taking time out from spy duties, drinking and womanizing, as one would imagine
Bond would. However, an attack on MI6,
which seems to be specifically targeted at M, brings Bond out of retirement and
back to British soil. In true Bond
style, he must travel around the world via exotic locales to eventually track
down our villain, Javier Bardem as Silva, an outrageous and over the top bad
guy who’s hell bent on getting revenge on M.
I did enjoy Skyfall probably
more than Craig’s other outings as Bond but it still lacked some unquantifiable
element that stopped my mind from accepting it as a true Bond movie. It wasn’t so much Craig but the movie
itself. The first half is very
entertaining and I found myself enjoying Bond’s exploits in Shanghai and Macau but the latter part of the movie in Scotland seemed to lose its identity. So maybe the problem isn’t Craig but rather
the material he has been given to work with and the direction the franchise is
being taken in.
Watching Dr. No after
watching Skyfall it’s easy to see how less is more. You don’t need huge explosions and set pieces
to make a great Bond movie; you need a great Bond to have a great Bond
movie.
I found it interesting that
for a movie that tries so hard to be modern and disassociate itself from
previous Bond movies, the most memorable moments are those that hark back to
Bond’s history; the return of Q, the return of gadgets, the vodka martinis, the
Aston Martin, the womanizing, Miss Moneypenny.
I can see things going full circle and eventually returning to how Bond
movies were. Until then, Skyfall is a
reasonable stop over.
Rating 3.5/5
Bobby
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