SKYFALL Post-Release - Page 4

I am sad this bit from an international TV Spot was cut: Mallory: "Any word on Bond?" M: "Last I heard, he was somewhere in the south china sea."

Mike's Pants, Hopefully future Bond films will be better.  Bond is basically...M's...Bodyguard through the 2nd half of the film.  Silva is...Nothing like an old school Bond Villain.  His plan is to kill...M!  Bond doesn't have to save the world from S.P.E.C.T.R.E, or Fort Knox's Gold, he just has to save his supervisor.  Thankfully, The Bond Series is...Moore than this...Dud.

Just a few little bits, because I will need more time to collate my thoughts for a longer review, but I loved the references to Bond's pill use, and I LOVED to see Severin smoking cigarettes. Christ, how long has it been in a Bond film since we've seen a woman enjoy a smoke? Even Xenia in Goldeneye smoked Cigarellos. Bernice was beautiful and heartbreaking and awesome. I was blown away by the quiet power of her performance. Love that she got hot for Bond after watching him drop someone out of a skyscraper! (and I loved that Bond tried and failed to hold the hit man up - very Flemming).

Loved Kleinman's titles. They are close to his best yet. Loved how it was pure fantasy, seamlessly merging real world with Bond's decent into darkness represented by a yawning, impossible sinkhole at the bottom of the river. Note perfect.

But Duke, isn't M the most important relationship in Bond's life? He's given up the chance of a normal life to be n the service, and within that world there is no one to whom he has a closer (forgive me) .... Bond.

In that sense the stakes in this film were uniquely high for the Bond series.

I felt like Silva wanted to show how clever he was, wanted to show M how stupid she'd been to give him away. I felt like he'd spent years in captivity planning his revenge, wanting it to be as perfect and humiliating for MI6 as possible.

In the film I never once questioned his plan, and as to the risks of failure? It was clear that the plan was the only thing keeping Silva going. It was what his life was about. He wouldn't want to cheat and do things the easy way. He appreciated the risk and the challenge, and wouldn't have had it any other way. He liked being up against the likes of Bond - it was flattering to his ego.

Dr Harford, Bond could have retired after his disappearing after being shot.  He didn't.  Bond is there to do things that ordinary agents, police etc cannot do.  Bond didn't get to 23 official films by just protecting his boss.  There are few Gadgets, they actually make fun of things like Exploding pens, Craig is not only uncomfortable in delivering puns, he is awful at it as well.  Timothy Dalton was serious, but no where near as Dour as Craig.  Bond has a relationship with M, but it doesn't have to be the main cog in the villains plan.  There should have been a bigger reason to eliminate M.

00 means you illegally kill people in other countries, at the behest of the British government. One could be a solder or a spy, and still not be in a job where you're undercover at a cricket game, and then drown a Pakistani national in a bathroom sink (as happens in the opening of Casino Royale).

For Bond of the novels, he spent most of the war as a regular spy, but then became a 00 after performing two kills: one a Japanese American spy in the RCA building in New York City. A killing that was beyond the scope of normal espionage or the rules of war.

Just got back... I dug it. Need more time to digest, but I'd say it's not in the CR or FRWL class-- I'd put it up there with OHMSS, though, and that's pretty damned high.

 

I guess you put me in the camp that was taken out of the movie by the Goldfinger DB5. I didn't hate it, but I think the movie could have done without the couple of gags it provided.

 

It looked gorgeous, the performances and action sequences were all pretty great, and I did love the final scene about as much as I do the one from CR.

 

Now, can we put the fucking gun barrel back where it belongs next time?

Dug it. Everyone needs to see it in IMAX. Had stayed spoiler-free, so some of it came as a shock.

 

Loved the London tube chase, reminded me so much of my time there riding them during rush hour. 

I'm really glad to see people appearing here who enjoyed the movie as much as I did. I've seen Skyfall twice already and can't wait to own it on Blu-ray. It sits quite comfortably behind The Avengers as one of my favorite movies of the year, despite its flaws.

I absolutely loved this film. The opening action scene was incredible, and the title sequence gave me the fucking chills. They brought back the Bond tropes without losing anything they gained. I could watch Bardem as Silva for days. Craig delivered as usual, Dench, Fiennes, Whitshaw... all the cast was excellent. I'm struggling to come up with anything I didn't like. I don't see how anyone could say this doesn't belong in the same class as FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE or GOLDFINGER. The only question in my mind at this point is is it better than CASINO ROYALE. I think it might be.

 

But I'm sure someone will pop in and say it's not better than FOR YOUR EYES ONLY or some shit. Crazy talk.

Jesus Christ, this movie. It's the Wrath of Khan, the Dark Knight... and not without compromising its wit.

 

Let me preface by saying this: I think Casino Royale is great until the disorienting mess of a third act, and overall it's overrated as far as its praise. Quantum of Solace is a good idea marred by terrible execution. All that said, Daniel Craig's dark, calculating take on James Bond got lost in the filmmakers' efforts to cash in on the Bourne films and play him as a Jack Bauer-esque superagent. After six years and three films, however, Craig has finally found an entry in his stint as James Bond that matches the caliber of his interpretation of the character, which may be the most scowling and insubordinate since Timothy Dalton's second and final outing (and a personal all-timer), Licence to Kill.

Putting aside quality comparison - although to give the lie to that I thought there wasn't much of a gulf in class between the two films - the world M describes in the inquiry as being the new espionage paradigm is basically no different to the premise in Goldeneye. No more state on state spying but borderless, shadowy threats. Which is one of my issues with Skyfall. I felt like we'd seen all these themes before. The difference was the pretty packaging and more overt psychology.

Mileage on this film seems to vary considerably, at least from my anecdotal experience. Reactions I've heard are incredibly divisive. Some seem to align with the idea this is a first class Bond. Others, like me even on second viewing in IMAX, are very disappointed. Not much middle ground.

I'm also done with Craig as Bond. His first efforts in Casino Royale were transcendent. But his style in the films since is developing into a cliche of a scowling, damaged sourpuss, that's becoming as rote as the effete playboy tropes Moore was wheeling out in the early 80s. We make like our heroes conflicted and morose these days, but I am definitely ready for a more charming interpretation.

Much better than FYEO. No annoying teenage stunt casting for a start. Although, Bibi aside, the gap ain't that huge.

Pretty much my feelings after witnessing this film in IMAX this evening.

 

For me, there's no question that Skyfall and the Dark Knight Rises sit side by side for blockbuster of the year.  Because both are deeply invested in character, they're just a much more satisfying cinematic experience than the rest we've had this year.

 

Can we just finally say what everyone's been thinking for a while now, in that Craig's the best Bond to grace the screen?  No disrespect to Connery but Craig's got him in spades.

I have very mixed feelings... it is definitely a good film, but it feels strange to me: A bit too small, a bit too arbitrary. Like dream sequences cut together, you try to connect them but it feels off… sorry, can’t explain it better

 

The good stuff:

-Actors. All of them were great and well cast.

-Deakins/ the Alexa: All the nighttime shots, especially the ones that aren’t lit (cityscapes) look brilliant. Just one exception (see below)

-music: nice use of elements of the Bond theme throughout the film. nice subtle stuff (i.e. in the chapel)

-the use of long shots. i.e. Silva’s introduction. calm un-gimmicky cinematography.

-Silva’s creepy "medical revelation" in his glass cell - the only surprising thing in the second act.

-they used Bond’s past subtly. imagine how this would have played out with Purvis/Wade/Brosnan. shudder.

-the last act is brilliant.

-I will see Naomie Harris in Bond 24, which is a good thing.

 

definitely not good:

-Severines death followed by the cavallerie arriving in choppers is Brosnan era bullshit. This makes Bond look like he doesn’t care one bit about her. I know that what I just wrote is *technically* wrong – but it feels like this to me, because the film is wasting her randomly. The film doesn’t care, so it seems like Bond doesn’t too. What, for example, if Bond got Silva pinned down in the fight, the choppers arrive, it looks like Bond has won and then Silva shoots her? Big difference to me.

- Bond follows a contract killer to a job in Shanghai. The killer does his thing, Bond lets him shoot the target just to question him right after the shooting about another of the killer’s jobs three months ago in Istanbul. And this whole art-buying-thing in the apartment with Severine was about what exactly? It was set up like “just another job” for this killer. It is a mere coincidence that this Shanghai-job is connected to Silva via Severine. Lazy stuff.

-why does this 200m movie have a blatantly shitty digital looking shot and it is Judy Dench’s last one in the film/ series?

 

the “I don’t know”:

-The scene with Silva in the glass cell. How many serial-killer-b-movies had that kind of scene? Every one. How do they end? all the same: guy does creepy stuff, then escapes two scenes later. You can say that about many scenes in a Bond film, i know. But it feels like it parodies other genres now.

Actually the whole

- middle part with Silva’s escape/ M’s hearing felt like something from a lesser movie. Maybe that’s just me because I have seen too many similar “oh, he planned it all along”-sequences. I mean was anyone of you guys surprised by any of this? Did the film try to milk these moments and failed?

Also M’s speech/poem were heavy-handed and just sounded pretentious.

-The Aston Martin: I’m on the fence here, it was used for two great gags, but somehow the continuity of Craig winning a similar car in CR but then having the Goldfinger version in this film annoyed me. I know. Nitpicking.

- a friend was annoyed by the title sequence “telling the story” too much – for her all the gravestones were a hint that someone would die. Surely not Bond, so she was sure M would die. I don’t see this as a problem, but I noticed too that the sequence was entirely comprised out of stylized versions of scenes that had happened or would happen later, including a stylized image of Silva. Looked like something out of a Mission Impossible film.

“A Bond intro sequence needs naked women and tits.” – that’s what she said :)

 

Generally speaking:

I start to get the complaints about Bond becoming kind of “random” – maybe that’s because this film has so many great elements that the flaws stand out in contrast. Connections to Bourne this time: The sequence where Bond cavorts in (?) after he is shot reminded me of the beginning of The Bourne Supremacy. And this film has Albert Finney.

This was a good action thriller. But was it a great Bond film?

 

I miss the Nelson DeMille-like humour from CR and QOS where Bond is a smartass (or in the scenes with Vesper tries to be one). I suppose that came from Haggis.

 

That was a really well-written review. I enjoyed reading your thoughts.

 

Prepare to be verbally beaten to death by the Dalton and Connery fans! (Though, in my opinion, you're right).

I've got to disagree with this. Goldeneye was very much about the unexploded bombs of the 20th century (to borrow a phrase from Warren Ellis), Soviet and American super-weapons falling into the hands of non-state affiliated enemies (and it's been a while since I've seen Goldeneye, but I vaguely remember it opening with M telling Bond that she thought he was a dinosaur and his form of espionage was no longer necessary). Skyfall is very much about 21st Century cyber-terrorism and the requirement for more complex intelligence networks to effectively combat it.

Don Swoosh, Craig the...Best Bond?  Not to me.  After this...Terrible film, I am not sure he is even better than...Brosnan!  I rank Skyfall...24th!  The...Worst Bond Film! Silva is an...Awful, villain!  I definitely will not be seeing this ever again.  Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton and Sean Connery remain my top 3 Bonds.  Brosnan might even be...4th.  Lazenby is still the...Worst Bond but not by much.

Best audience reactions at my screening (midnight, 600 in attendance) were the DB5 reveal and "How do you know I never did?".

 

But I thought the mansion siege just dragged and dragged.

All of this.

 

But story-wise this is the same.

 

Edit: i mean there might be different reasons for questioning the need for field agents/ "blunt instruments" - but the questioning itself is not different. And it serves the same prupose in both films: Creating artificial tension on Bond/ M when there are bigger dangers in both films.

Edited by Mr Pretzel - 11/9/12 at 5:03am

 

But it's so bad...

*Puts on his Bane mask, breaks Mcnooj's back and then throws him down a hole which leads to the The Dark Knight Rises Post Release thread*

 

Translated for people with good taste in movies: SKYFALL is great and Daniel Craig is the best Bond of all time. 

Yeah, no it's not.

GoldenEye doesn't take it as far as Skyfall does.

 

Dude.  Duke has every right to dislike the film.  He has provided reasons for disliking the film that you can argue against.  Do that instead of just slamming him.

Seconded. I value Duke's enthusiasm too much to do anything other than respect the man's opinions.   

Duke never gives good reasons for liking or disliking anything. I'm not going to engage him in a debate about how Silva isn't EEEEEEEEEVIL enough or some stupid shit, sorry. I get that people have come to enjoy his schtick but don't ask me to engage him in thoughtful debate. 

 

Oh yes it is!  :D

I'll give you this much Nooj; I agree that SKYFALL is better than THE DARK KNIGHT RISES.

Their defenses are broken!

LET THE SLAUGHTER BEGIN!!!

 

 

 

OK, a summary of Duke's reasons for not enjoying the film:

 

1.  Bond is M's bodyguard through the second half of the film.  He doesn't like that this is how the plot uses him.

2.  Silva's plan isn't 'big' enough.  Duke would prefer something bigger that will affect the world rather than something so personal.

3.  Bond is used incorrectly (see point #1).  He should be doing things that ordinary men can't do, not just saving his boss.

4.  There aren't enough gadgets in the film to his liking.

5.  Duke enjoys it when Bond delivers funny quips, ala Roger Moore.  Craig doesn't do this at all in this film, decreasing his enjoyment value.

6.  Duke is not satisfied with the reasons for why Silva would focus on M so much.

 

I haven't seen the film yet (I'm seeing it tonight), but those sound like valid concerns regarding the plot AND valid expressions of personal preference.

Duke has an assistant now. Quite impressive and a first for the Chud forums as far as I recall!

I'm just standing up for him in this instance.  Cut through all of the ellipses and you'll find his reasons for disliking the film.

 

I'm also sick of people dismissing him so easily.  He may have opinions that go against the grain but SO WHAT.  He never goes after anyone, regardless of what they say about him, and he's exceedingly polite.  He's well regarded in the B Action thread and in the sports threads.

 

Cut him some damned slack.

Judas, you haven't seen the movie. Two of Dukes's "valid" criticisms aren't even true! Bond makes many quips and does things no normal human can do. And the rest of his criticisms boil down to "I wanted a different movie" (a dumber, more cliched and typical one), which is not taking the film for what is it which is the very definition of invalid criticism. 

 

I'm sorry but Duke lowers the bar of conversation around here. Nothing personal against the guy but I'm going to call that shit out when it bugs me. 

Duke Fleed is fucking awful and all of his reasons for hating a movie should be more proof that it's quality.

 

And this is probably the last thing I ever want to say about that poster.

 

See, that's a reasonable discussion to have with him.

 

For the record, I don't have any issues with you or any of you.  I just feel that some of this slagging on Duke is overly mean-spirited, especially when he NEVER reciprocates this attitude towards anyone else.

I'm sure Duke doesn't give two shits that I think his taste in movies is terrible. That's all I'm saying. Because it's true. 

 

Fair enough.

Back to non-Duke related discussion:

 

The comparisons to THE DARK KNIGHT RISES are really apt; there's a lot of similarities going on here, though SKYFALL really does execute them so much better. It's interesting that this broken hero coming out of retirement thing seems to be part of the zeitgeist right now. As an aging dude I appreciate it. 

Since my praises have already been covered earlier, I think I'll just sink into my qualms. Spoilers spoilers spoilers (are we still doing that?)

 

Given that one of the subplots is whether or not M should be retired, they probably shouldn't have made every call she makes in the movie a bad one. I think the only one she really got right was putting Bond on duty, which is like making Michael Jordan your first pick in a game of hoops. Yeah, no shit. But before and after that, she…

 

1. Lets an agent bleed out instead of letting Bond stay with him to give first aid, as Bond asks to (she needs Bond to go after a bad guy, but she's got a second agent there. Send one off, let the other help the wounded).

 

2. Tells Eve to shoot Bond and Patrice instead of letting Bond punch the guy out like he's done, oh, five hundred times in his career (you could say this is on Eve for flubbing the shot, but M put her in the field in the first place).

 

3. Falling for Silva's plan.

 

4. When given warning of Silva's escape and attempt on her life, goes "No thanks, I'll just stay here and read some poetry." This leads to several people dying.

 

5. Turning on a flashlight when she's running away from gunmen at night.

 

6. Also, during the opening where Bond and Eve are chasing Patrice, must she ask for a report every ten seconds? What does she hope to accomplish there? "Bond, what's going on?" "Well, I'm punching the bad guy in the face and he's punching me back." "Punch him hard and dodge his punches!" "Jolly good, mum, will do."

 

In fact, all of the newbies are for some reason introduced as being awful at their jobs. Eve hits Bond instead of Patrice and then gapes like an idiot instead of, oh, firing again. Q just plugs a master hacker's laptop right into MI6's servers, which is the equivalent of the CIA accepting a care package from Osama bin Laden. Only Mallory really comes off well, taking a gunshot for M (see Point 4 above) and then covering her escape. No wonder they put him in charge; he's the only person in Britain who knows what he's doing.

 

I understand that this is the 21^st century and Moneypenny can be a badass lady spy now, but I don't see what it adds to the mythos to have her be a badass lady spy who is actually quite terrible at her job and ends up relegated to a desk where she can't shoot anymore of her co-workers. People can't just be secretaries now? Will we be finding out that Betty Brant is actually a failed superhero in the next Spider-Man movie?

 

I suppose the old thing of Bond having perfectly consensual sex with a girl at the end of every movie and then them parting ways is terribly sexist, since no woman would ever want to have a fling with Daniel Craig, but I don't see how having girls just to wear backless dresses, shag Bond, and get murdered by the villain is any better. Bond actually has more reaction to his car getting blown up than Severin being blown away; I kept expecting there to be a line of dialogue going "Oh, we got her to a hospital, she's fine," to justify why he doesn't seem to give a shit. The way it plays is especially odd since immediately afterward we get a badass action scene and Bond making triumphant quips. I know the old Bond movies killed off Bond girls too, but at least Sean Connery would look sad for a few seconds.

 

In fact, given the point the movie makes about Bond's compassion as it starts, he's weirdly blasé for the rest of the movie. He lets an assassin kill someone before attacking him (hope the target didn't have kids, orphan) and then the thing with Severin. Seems odd.

 

I think we should have a moratorium on "yes! We captured the bad guy! Wait, no, it was all part of his master plan!" plots for the remainder of the decade. It worked in The Avengers and The Dark Knight, but here it just seems pointless.

Silva: Yes! After years of work, I've bombed MI6 headquarters to force them into their secondary headquarters, allowed myself to be captured, and now hacked their computers to allow my escape and bombed a subway train to cover it! Time to execute my master plan!

 

Henchman: What are we going to do, boss? Free a political prisoner? Steal valuable data? Set off a bomb?

 

Silva: We're going to dress up as policemen and bust into a courthouse, guns blazing, to kill M!

 

Henchman: What, really?

 

Silva: Yes, brilliant, I know.

 

Henchman: Couldn't we just… do the policemen thing without all that other stuff?

 

Silva: I have to look her in the eyes before I kill her and let her know it was me who did it!

 

Henchman: So say "Remember me?" before you shoot her. But the way you have it now, you're actually warning her you're coming by escaping.

 

Silva: Look, I'm crazy, you're a henchman, you know how this works.

 

Henchman: Yeah, but didn't you see Casino Royale? Bond snuck into her house, like, five times. Can't we do that? I'll tie her up, you can talk to her as long as you want, you shoot her, we're out of here.

 

Silva: I don't think you understand. I'm… CRAZY. That means I get to do whatever convoluted thing the script demands even when there's a much simpler way to get what I want.

 

I mean, it's good that they thought through the emotional, character stuff so thoroughly, but they could've spent more time on the actual plot. (Also, this is really a quibble, but given how they establish Silva as such a match for Bond and a physical threat in a way Le Chiffre and Greene never were, it's a shame that their big showdown is Bond shanking Silva in the back.)

I think the execution between the two films is about equal.

I found it odd that Eve resigns herself to a deskjob despite the fact that she was a total natural on the field.  She didn't even seem all that bothered about shooting Bond in the beginning.  But otherwise, she was of valuable help through the film.

 

There was no sense that she would ever consider not being an agent.  It really felt like she was pigeonholed into the deskjob simply because of the "MY REAL NAME IS ROBIN!  OHOHOHOH!!" moment the film had to have.

 

She just seems cool with everything.  It didn't bug me all that much... I just found it odd.

I found this stuff odd too.

 

I disagree. Though I do like THE DARK KNIGHT RISES, it felt like a film with a stalling engine. Bruce Wayne's character arc was this strange double comeback -- he's out of commission, he comes back, he gets put out of commission again, he comes back again -- it lacked the proper momentum. In SKYFALL, Bond's arc is straightforward and satisfying. The constant exchange of trust and mistrust between M and Bond keeps the story feeling like it has forward momentum. And Silva is there to stoke it by seeding the mistrust in Bond while at the same time forcing him into a position to protect her. It just works. I always felt like I was moving forward with SKYFALL, where as THE DARK KNIGHT felt like two steps forward, two steps back again. 

 

TDKR would have worked so much better for me if it had started with Batman still in operation. Then it would have felt like a story that moved forward rather than a herky-jerky start and stall.