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I've always loved Brosnan. He's effortlessly cool and charismatic and carries his films in a way none of the others had to. Moore, Dalton and Craig all got films tailored to their strengths. Brosnan didn't. Look at DAD, it's constantly switching from gritty and hard edged to Moore era silliness yet Brosnan gives it his all and somehow still makes his Bond seem like the same person in all those scenes and keeps the film from completely falling apart. It seems weird to say this because of how popular he was at the time but now that Dalton is getting the respect he deserves I think Brosnan is easily the most underrated Bond.
I think there's more to this. When Dalton got the role he basically ignored whatever Connery and Moore did and focused solely on the writing of Ian Fleming, and IMO 110% succeeded in bringing that specific characterization of Bond to life on the big screen, and that's exactly why I don't think he was embraced by audiences. Connery and Moore were notable for giving Bond a sense of humor combined with their own swagger. Dalton ignored those aspects. This is why you often heard complaints that Dalton took the role too seriously. He wasn't playing Bond as a sex symbol, because Fleming's Bond wasn't what Connery or Moore were. I think had Dalton had the opportunity to move forward with a third film, there would have had to be a re-calibration of his take on the character and make him less intense and more closer to the cinematic idea of Bond. IMO, I think he could have succeeded. If you go look at the film THE ROCKTEER, that's basically cinematic Bond where Dalton is turning up the charm and swagger in a way he never did with Bond because that was not what he was going for in TLD and LTK.
With that said, Craig was definitely bringing back a level of intensity that Dalton did 20 years earlier, but the biggest difference is that instead of going full Fleming like Dalton had, he retained the cinematic Bond's humor and swagger. When CR came out, my summation of Craig Bond was that he's a fusion of Fleming's cynicism and Connery's machismo. I think it's great that Dalton is getting much more appreciation in light of Craig's run, but I'm not entirely sure a full Fleming approach could ever work for the cinematic Bond that is recognized by our cultural lexicon.
But that doesn't mean a full Fleming would be incompatible in other mediums. In theory, the best place that Fleming interpretation can thrive at is on Netflix. There, you could drop all the cinematic iconography and just do straight up period adaptations of the novels, as a film on a streaming service would not have the same connotations of what we expect in a crowded movie theater.
=D> =D> =D> =D> =D>
That would include me. Tim is my absolute favourite of all the Bond actors, but I’m a massive Pierce fan as well.
And me. Both are great. And so are the others. I'm so glad there hasn't been a Bond actor I dislike so far.
Pierce should have been given his From Russia With Love. Instead, he got a DAF, TMWTGG and MR to work with.
This is so true.
@DarthDimi has worded better than anyone could.
BTW, the one Bond actor I could possibly see getting even better as Bond with age is Dalton. He looks menacing nowadays. Pierce looks good but I'm afraid he lost his islander looks and gained a mid-atlantic accent with a California tan. If he passed as english at one point, he doesn't now, IMO.
I agree with this. By the time Brosnan took the role, every facet of the character had been covered. Connery had done the cool, Roger had done the Suave, Lazenby had done the vulnerability and Dalton had done the hard nosed. Obviously there are more nuances to each of those, but I am sure you get my drift. I am not sure there was anywhere left to go for a truly original version of Bond.
When Pierce took over he essentially took a slice of Connery, and a slice of Moore and put them together. No bad thing in my book.
Daniel Craig has basically done the same thing, just with Lazenby and Dalton.
I hate to admit it but I was sort of in that camp. It wasn't Craig I hated - my anger was at the people behind the scenes. I wouldn't have been against Craig nor the idea of a reboot... but I really wished Brosnan could have gotten one more.
People aren't daft. After DAD people could see that this couldn't go on forever. But there was ONE MORE they could've squeezed out of Brosnan.
I think it would have been nice if he got to make that movie - and maybe they could've hung a campaign on the fact that it was gonna be his last one. Give him a chance to say goodbye to the role and fans a chance to say goodbye to him.
I think Brosnan really deserved better than he got.