Where does Bond go after Craig?

SecretAgentMan⁰⁰⁷

I was just thinking. Maybe in contrast to Craig's Bond, Bond 7 is somewhat a pacifist. Maybe he plays villains against each other to kill themselves. Then only kills when he must...to defend himself. It's something we can easily imagine Moore's Bond doing. But maybe Bond 7 can do it without necessarily being lightweight.

DarthDimi

slide_99 wrote: »

Bond movies always differentiated themselves from other franchises in how fights and chases were never just fights and chases, but always had something extra to make them interesting.

Take FYEO. The chase starts off with Bond on skis being pursed by bikers. Already it's wildly different from other chase scenes, but then Bond skis down a luge, and Krieger follows him on the bike. That's something you'd only ever see in a Bond movie.

The recent movies have largely lost that type of novelty. Ironically, only Spectre attempted to bring back old-fashioned Bond action sequences with the opening chopper fight (good) and the car/plane chase in Austria (original but boring).

Going back to SF, what if instead of Bond also getting on a conveniently-available bike, he has to use some alternate form of transportation to keep up with Patrice? That's how they would've done it during the classic era.

I think you're putting too much emphasis on the SF bike being conveniently available, @slide_99. Bond will use it to drive atop unusually small walls and then jump off a bridge onto a moving train. The bike is not so much convenient as it is practically needed to give us some cool action moments a few seconds later. Also, using a crane on a moving train to fight his enemy is pretty innovative. I'd say that's something "extra to make them interesting", as you said.

The "classic" era had some surprising moments, as you described, but "alternative forms of transportation" have also slipped into goofy nonsense that some fans buy and others resent. The moon buggy, the conveniently positioned jetpack, the Q-equipped gondola, and so on, are not without their detractors. And speaking of a conveniently available bike, TND showed us the one BMW bike in Beijing with the keys still in it... Also, I'm glad Glen decided to cut the magic carpet in TLD, or we'd have been stuck with that embarrassing little alternative mode of transportation as well.

Now I get what you're saying about the Bonds differentiating themselves from other action series. Unfortunately, other action series have learned from Bond, taken from Bond, and done their own thing with it. Look at F&F; since its 6th film, anything goes in the "alternative mode of transportation" department. Even a car equipped to fly into space and orbit Earth is perfectly fine now. In a way, the Bonds can differentiate themselves from such extravaganza only by omitting the extra bits and going back to the sober roots of muscled Friedkin / Peckinpah car action. QOS opens with a car chase that was, in my opinion, shot and edited a tad frenetically, but it was a car chase at its purest: fast, done for real, no gadgets, no sudden wings, lasers or stingers, and no laughs. It's hard and sober, rough and serious. Later Craig films, like SP, did add a few extra comedic beats, such as the slow-driving opera singer wannabe being gently pushed on by Bond's Aston, but you're right in saying that in the end, it's just a car chase, and nothing more.

That "nothing more" is, however, what the Craig era has more or less been all about. A reset. A dialling down of the extravaganza taken too far in previous films (which, can I remind the room, include an invisible car. An invisible car, folks.) I don't think that was the wrong impulse. The Craigs have managed to fill plenty of seats because people were pleasantly surprised by this serious Bond. The over-the-top crazy stuff from the past had already put too many off.

But, I will concede this much: it's all about balance. You lose a bit of Bond if you go too sober, and you lose a bit of Bond if you go too crazy. Did the Craigs get the balance right? I myself will say yes, but others will say no. And that's what keeps things interesting.

007HallY

I think there’s something wonderfully absurd about the SF PTS that’s mixed so well with the tone of the film. Again, we start with a pretty standard chase which slowly escalates to Bond chasing Patrice through a bazar on a motorbike, and then of course having to jump on a train. How does Bond get to the carriage while he’s being shot at? The only logical thing of course - hijack a digger that’s being transported and using it to scoop out half the train and jump on just before adjusting his cuffs (why was the key to this digger left in the ignition you ask? Don’t worry about that. May as well query how Bond is able to operate the tank in GE, or why there’s a key in the showroom car in TMWTGG).

For me it’s classic Bond. It’s heightened reality. You kinda need that spectacle and absurdity otherwise you just get standard action.

mtm

The only thing I think when I watch it is, why doesn't Bond turn the digger to the left rather than right, so the arm gives him some cover as it turns? Silly James! :D

Mallory

mtm wrote: »

The only thing I think when I watch it is, why doesn't Bond turn the digger to the left rather than right, so the arm gives him some cover as it turns? Silly James! :D

Yep, and Bond would've shoved the Beetle cars off the other side of the train and therefore avoid almost wiping out Eve in the car :))

Mathis1

This reminds me of when John Glen stated that when they were filming the pts of OP, the pilot of the Acrostar jet said he could do the stunt of the plane flying through the hangar for real, but there couldn't be any bystanders present, and it would last only seconds! Glen wisely stated that it wouldn't be very cinematic, and so they went with the jet mounted on a car!!