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Well in some weird way I'd say NTTD is kinda Craig's MR. Both feel like they run with pretty 'out there' ideas, centred on things like technology and eventually world domination. Between Bond going into space and Bond dying I can also see why some fans would find both 'jump the shark' films, although I disagree on this. Both are pretty big in terms of scale and have a mixture of tones, even if MR screws a bit lighter and NTTD darker. They're both arguably the strangest films in both actors' tenures.
I get what you mean though. To be fair the Craig era has quite a variety/versatility to it too. But I'd say the closest to MR in Craig's Bond filmography is NTTD, not that two Bond films are ever the same, even if they have similarities.
I miss that.
What is it that you miss @DEKE_RIVERS
Go from MR to FYEO without changing the actor.
Couldn't have said it better mate. Craig nailed all the aspects of Bond in his first film
Craig is versatile but I'm still waiting for his Moonraker. I want different movies. That's the point.
The Bond formula is richer than the Craig formula (or the Brosnan formula).
NTTD has sci-fi stuff but the movie is about the death of Bond. It's the Craig formula...again.
Going to have to wait just a little bit longer for Craig’s Moonraker, 😂
Well technically…
Here ya go @DEKE_RIVERS, ask and you shall receive!
I wish I could play games, but I don’t have the attention, nor the skill… This ain’t pac-man…
My goodness that game was such shite.
Speaking of Moonraker, I remember seeing this year's back and thought how awesome this was.
It’s friday night mate what did you have to trigger my PTSD for.
Because we must never forget, and we must never forgive.
I’m guessing it’s a terrible game??
That's really the only time that's happened though.
Oh yeah. The stuff of nightmares!
Absolutely. While the media and some subsets of the Bond fanbase weren't giving the man half the credit he deserved, Craig himself was pushing boundaries. Every frame with him in it shows an excellence rarely achieved in any Bond film before. CR is a delight for many reasons, but Craig's powerful acting in it may be why I return to that film time and again.
It would be unfair to suggest that others, like Connery and Dalton for example, weren't as good, simply because they weren't subjected to the same challenges. I have the good fortune of liking all Bond actors so far. But I honestly believe that the density of awesome Bond moments peaked in CR. Every scene Craig is in makes him do or say something memorable, and he nails it.
One only has to look at the PTS to see precisely how committed Craig is. The bathroom fight scene is an incredibly intense collection of kicks, throws, and punches that a lesser actor would have reduced to some standard Steven Seagal stuff. Craig, however, goes all the way, knocking the last breath out of his opponent while redecorating the place, and I instantly believe that this James Bond can take on any heavy they're going to send after him. Meanwhile, Craig oozes cool just sitting in Dryden's office chair, knowing full well he's to kill the man, still letting him talk for a few minutes, and then, with a joke, coldly and quickly shooting him in the head. Not a single muscle is moved that isn't absolutely necessary, and not a single breath is wasted on small talk that serves zero purpose. Craig's James Bond tosses car keys away because why would he even bother pocketing them--he doesn't even care to look where they land! This seemingly simple don't-give-a-damn attitude is hard to portray without coming off as a loathsome bastard. The genius in Craig's acting is that his arrogance is what wins us over, and his charm is what made many of us like him so much.
I don't understand why you're making such a big point of this. Early on, the Craig Bonds showed continuity in their stories. It only makes sense that they would do so in tone as well. It'd be preposterous for the CR/QOS Bond to end up in Sci-Fi land. NTTD went several minutes into the future with its nanobots, and from what I've read here these past few years, I can safely deduce that not a lot of people enjoyed that very much. A "Moonraker" simply wouldn't fit in the man's tenure. It wouldn't have worked well in Dalton's either. Moore started with a voodoo film, and even his Moonraker was rejected by many fans. Brosnan was given his own Moonraker, and if you'd been on these forums in the early 2000s, you'd have seen blood dripping from walls in all the threads discussing DAD.
While some of these films have found reappraisal over the years, including some (and in MR's case a lot) from myself, they remain notoriously difficult to sell, especially in a cynical era like Craig's. I guess DAD got away with it because colorful over-the-top CGI spectacles were everywhere in theatres at the time. But compare DAD to GE, and the old hatred for DAD is just around the corner. Films like OHMSS, FYEO and CR are very much down-to-earth in all but a minor few regards, not just for the sake of delivering a good Bond film, but also as a Flemingesque cure to the embarrassing hangover previously suffered. (I know that many people love YOLT; I do too. But in the end, it's still a film in which the spy stuff is reduced to an absolute minimum, while rockets are eating other rockets before returning to a hollowed-out volcano lair about to be attacked by an army of ninjas.) The EON folks always seem very happy to return to films that are much more grounded in reality after going completely off the rails once every few decades. Add to that the fact that Craig would never have agreed with a Moonraker type of film, and you can easily see why holding out for a "different Craig movie" was and is absurdly futile.
I definitely think that NTTD was Craig’s “Moonraker type of film”, just constrained to the tone/style of his Bond, and his era. Orburchev for example seems exactly like the kind of goofy character that would be found in the Moore era. But I agree that Craig would never have agreed to do a film as campy/silly as Moonraker; but I think there in lies the success of NTTD. It was the movie in which the Craig era finally tied things back full circle from its inception. What started as a brilliant reimagining of the series for a more gritty post 911 world, finally circled back around to world domination plots/megalomaniacs after years and years of that stuff being considered “pastiche”, and for me personally it felt very welcomed. As somebody whose earliest experiences with Bond was watching the Brosnan films, and playing the video games from around that time, it felt very nostalgic for me to witness that style of Bond movie return after all this time because I grew up on some of those Over the Top Bond films. It was only in my teenage years that my preference for the more “Flemingesque” Bond films became more prevalent. Nowadays I appreciate a healthy mix of both silly/serious moments in Bond films, and I think NTTD nailed that mix perfectly, despite my problems with some of the story issues in the film.
Would he not have tried to do his best were it not for the naysayers?
I’m sure he would’ve always given his best, but in interviews, he’s noted that it helped inspire him.
I guess as an ‘up yours’ to the toxic naysayers.
Good points, and I agree about NTTD.
I can see why we got CR and QOS. I do vaguely remember at the time that there was a sense that the Bond films had drifted into parody, and the ‘course correction’ that CR took shook things up. That said I’m glad from SF onwards the films started reintroducing those more ‘over the top’ (or I suppose traditional) Bondian elements. While CR was a success I also remember the disappointment many felt towards QOS at the time, and indeed slightly later Blood Stone (I mean, there were car chases in that game where you didn’t have gadgets. I’m not a gamer but even I’d say that’s pretty lame). I dunno, I think there was a sense that the films had become embarrassed about themselves. I don’t think that’s true incidentally, but that was the perception.
I genuinely think had we gotten another film along the lines of CR/QOS the Craig era wouldn’t have lasted two more films, and without SF I don’t think they’d have enjoyed the financial and critical success they did later. For better or for worse by reintroducing those elements - the megalomaniac villains, the high tech world domination plots, the gadgets, Moneypenny, Q etc - while maintaining the ‘seriousness’ of the Craig era, we got a fully rounded story. We got a sense of a changing world with changing threats, and even a changing Bond. As much as I have issues with SP and NTTD it was genuinely welcomed from me as well, and I think for general audiences there’s no longer that sense of the Bond films being embarrassed about their own outlandishness. I think that’s broadly what they’ll have to do for Bond 26 too - give us an interpretation of those traditional Bond film elements while recontextualising it/putting a different spin on it. In a way that’s what Bond always reverts back to anyway.
Oh it was horrific mate. A really poor, derivative, short, rushed and cheap looking game, and a terrible adaptation of the films they chose. It looked genuinely really embarassing next to the other big games that were out at the time that cost the same price, and that was depressing for those of us who are into the games, because Bond was once the king of the shooter/action game genre, just as he’s the king of action films. None of the Activision games were great imo, but the likes of Bloodstone at least looked like they’d had some time and money spent on it. Legends was where that fall from grace became really, really appparent.
First time Craig didn’t do the voice for one of his games either. Probably because he was busy shooting Skyfall but he really dodged a bullet there. My theory is Legends being such a flop is why EON took so long giving the licence to someone else, and why they’re more involved with the new project 007 one. I reckon they don’t want the brand being tainted by a disaster like that again.
Very interesting... Thanks @thelivingroyale 👍... Is Bloodstone the game that was a kind of follow up to QOS? If so, my son had that one. I tried playing it. I was an absolute disaster and retired my licence to kill inside of fifteen minutes...
No shortage of chiseled young pretty boys who might set pulses aflutter, but Bond is more than a look. He is not necessarily good looking in the conventional sense. Bond's scar in the novels reminds us Bond is not a gorgeous hunk. Clive Own in Monsieur Spade (now too old for the role) has a raw quality about him that reminds me of Connery. Craig brought that to his portrayal. A certain roughness in his appearance and something indefinable beneath the surface. It's a quality I never saw in PB as Bond. He would have made a better Bond in his later years.
For me there's a vast difference between a star and an actor. I've written often about owning the role rather than playing one's self and calling yourself Bond. Am I seeing the star on the screen, or am I seeing Bond? RM and PB always seemed to be stars calling themselves Bond. Both have their legions of fans and their box office numbers speak to their successes. Can't deny that.
For an original fan such as myself, I am always wanting a new Bond who projects the qualities of SC. But I am not the demographic producers will be appealing to this next go round. I hope we get more than a pretty boy with a Kelce haircut.