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But isn't that more interesting? If mi6 were presented as the same organization we had come to know in previous films, SF wouldn't have worked. If anything I find it more intriguing that you find the operating of mi6 more disturbing than that of the mind of Silva, and I can definetly see your argument and in many ways i completely agree. The way situations had been handled by mi6, including Silva's capture and torture, were terrible and shine a bad light on the organization as a whole. The film essentially goes out of its way to may the organization crumble, and it does this not only literally but physically. Firsty by blowing up mi6 hq, then there is the inquiry shoot-out and finnally the NATO agents being killed around the world. mi6 and the secret services of the world are in tatters, but it is in those final scenes that we see the rebith of mi6, it's resurrection. The bringing in of the new guard if you will. The only way you can build soemthing new is if you tear down what was there before, and that is what SF does and is central to the film's theme of the old and the new. Mi6 could'nt continue the way it was going, hence why M died and the organization was bought to its knees. Now it has been destroyed, it can be rebuilt. We have left the old building, we have a new M, etc, its a fresh start for the organization.
I think you are probably completely right and it's certainly my loss that I was not able to enjoy the film more. I guess I really thought we'd finished with all the reboot, building the framework stuff. I didn't personally find the way in which MI6 was exposed as this incompetent shambles so interesting that it compensated for the loss of familiarity. Like I said before, I don't watch a Bond movie to be reminded how hopelessly incompetent most British institutions have become - I only need to turn on the BBC for that. If Bond films had been accurately portraying the terminal decline of Britain over the past 50 years, they would have made for extremely depressing viewing.
The other gripe, which countless others have pointed out already, is that if you're going to come over all 'realistic' and serious with elements of the story, then I really expect fewer plot holes and inconsistencies. It feels like Mendes wanted to have his cake and eat it - to make his political statements and then switch to daft unexplained actions sequences and bizarrely incoherent character motivations. It just doesn't hang together.
I think perhaps - and this to the film's credit - I went in expecting a 'classic' Bond movie, and what Mendes has actually done is created a film that genuinely tries to say something quite profound and serious about the state of modern Britain. In effect I'm saying that I went in expecting not to have to think very hard and have belatedly realised it's full of latent symbolism and much of what I thought was unintentional is utterly deliberate. The Turner and Tennyson references were very in your face - all about old hulks past their prime etc - but I think it goes much further than this.
It's all very interesting and in fairness, I probably owe it a second viewing. Having said that, I didn't enjoy my first viewing and for me, it's difficult for a film to come back from that. While I might come to appreciate it, I'm unlikely to ever enjoy it. And at the end of the day, all I expect from a Bond movie is to be entertained. Leave the heavy stuff at the door.
I enjoyed her in the Brosnan films but I hated her in CR/QOS. I liked her in SF though, because they added some comedy with her and Bond.
I might've felt even sadder if Kincade had died. He'd given me more entertainment in his 10 minutes of screentime than Dench did in 17 years.
Agreed, the movie is not "fluff"; it will require one to engage their brain and pay attention, and that's part of what I so like about it. At no point did the movie insult my intelligence.
Exactly. Well said. This is something I think many people here don't seem to get. A large part of the franchises' move away from the 'fantasy' element of Bond (that so many here seem to prefer) and toward a more 'reality-based' Bond, is portraying the modern world of espionage and war for what it is. There are no knights in shining armor or pillars of moral purity. They don't exist. They never did. In order to preserve the common good, choices have to be made that result in good people getting killed (sending people off to war being the most obvious).
We all take comfort in the legends of heroes and the fantasy that the cause of righteousness is pure and untainted. There's part of all of us that need to believe that's true. But it's not reality. The real world is an incomprehensible morass of moral ambiguity. Everyone has blood on their hands.
Flawed men and women make horrible choices that result in the preservation of good. It's sometimes hard to wrap our minds around that. But I find art - like Skyfall - that explore that moral grey area much more interesting than your simplistic "classic Bond" formula.
Yep. I've recently started reading the Flemming novels and I'm amazed how close Craig's portrayal is to the original Bond. I think it's the closest to Flemming's Bond we've seen on screen so far.
I was sad when she died (which, btw I predicted ;))but that was because I felt bad for Bond more than anything else.
Timothy Dalton says hi.
Anyone who's risen to the level that M has, has to learn not to feel regret - or at least not to get bogged down by it. When you're making life and death decisions on a daily basis, you have to learn to shut down that part of your humanity that makes you feel regret or remorse. If you didn't, you just wouldn't be able to function in your job. (I would think doctors have the same issue - learning not to feel too much toward their patients - because if they felt too much sympathy or human kindness, they wouldn't be able to get out of bed in the morning, given how much death and sadness they have to deal with.)
That said, there is a moment toward the end of Skyfall where M says, with great sadness, something along the lines of "a lot of people have died from the decisions I've made". If that's not regret, then it's at least a recognition of what her job has done to her humanity.
Also, agreed about Dalton. He was pretty close to Flemming's Bond. But I never got the sense of inner conflict from Dalton that I get in spades from Craig. Both are good though. Very good.
It’s interesting because I think that in SF they set-up Mallory to be a lot like Judi was back in GE. Both are bureaucrats who think that Bond is old-fashioned and believe that as an agent he is obsolete in the modern spy game. The trick with Mallory will be transitioning him to what Lee’s M was like: a stern yet discreet boss who was quite indifferent to Bonds social life and had absolute unquestioning confidence in him as an agent. I think that this transition began in SF as Mallory saw what Bond was capable of up-close in the fight at the intelligence hearing, and he was proven wrong about Bond’s investigating methods. At the beginning of SF, Mallory believed that “there are no more shadows” left to hide behind in the modern world, but by the end both Silva and Bond proved that not only are there still plenty of shadows, but that all the really important espionage still happens behind them. I think that in Bond 24, Mallory will be less skeptical of Bond because of the events of SF, but it will still take one solid mission for him to have full confidence in 007. By Bond 25, Mallory will be just like Lee’s M.
This line makes no sense since at the key moment at the start she doesn't trust Bond to get the job done and makes a decision that undermines him and (once again) shows she has no faith in him. I could add all the other stuff about why doesn't Eve take another shot, and that the tunnel is about to take them both out any way etc etc.
Any way, at the root of all this is whether you expect or even desire for Bond to be a 'realistic' series of films. And if you're going to turn M into some ultra unemotional intelibot, don't you have to follow this through in the rest of the film? The hyper reality of M's character does not sit well with Komodo dragons eating people and a bizarre third act in which all modern communications technology disappears and Bond thinks it's actually a good idea to hole himself up in a defenceless old house in the Highlands to take on an army of goons. The final scene is supposed to be Bond staying one step ahead of Silva, and yet if he's laying a trap surely he has some SAS guys lying in wait to bob Silva when he arrives...? This film wants to have its cake and eat it.
For me it's a flop. Other films have done the political and moral compromise stuff far more effectively (Bourne) and the action (frankly, Bourne again). The action here is utterly generic. The PTS is yawn inducing and the final shoot out utterly lacking in tension. If this is supposed to be a homage to Straw Dogs or Assault on Precinct 13, Mendes has totally failed to capture the genuine fear and menace of those films. This movie just falls between two stalls for me. Dreary, predictable (a plot about hardrives and hacking - what is this, 1985?) and ultimately we end up back where we thought we were at the end of QoS in 2008, which is expecting a proper Bond movie next time.
Actually @Getafix said that first bit and @JimThompson45 said he disagreed. At any rate I think I fall somewhere between both of your thinking. From the sound of it Jim liked it very much and Getafix had to fight to stay awake the whole film. While I agree that it was a good movie with great cinematography and texture, I did also find the plot a bit basic and predictable. Of course that may be because I know so much about it going into watching it for the first time because I read so many spoilers on this forum, and yet I can’t help but think that even if I hadn’t, the plot wouldn’t have surprised me much, except maybe the big one about M that is. Anyway I want to like Skyfall so much but at the end of the day I do end up feeling like I’m still waiting for a proper Bond movie to come along next-time. If Bond 24 isn’t a full-on classic Bond-gasm, I’m going to begin to lose interest.
That has pissed me off a bit, even though I loved SF. People are saying exactly what they said after QOS.
To be honest I'm wondering if we'll ever get just a regular Bond film (where he gets his mission and does it, no personal twists or M being used more), again.
And why should we? We've had 20+ "regular" Bond films. It's been done, over and over and over again to the point of self-parody (as Mike Myers clearly showed us, or wheren't you paying attention?). We always have our DVD collection if you want a classic Bond fix (which I certainly do, from time to time). But times change. Move on.
Repetition is the death of art, as they say, and I can think of no quicker way of killing the entire Bond franchise than the producers cranking out the same damn type of film every couple years.
I’m the one who likes to insert a chat about Blofeld wherever I can, so here goes. I believe that the best way to get both an emotional nuanced plot within the template of a classic Bond movie they must re-introduce Blofeld! Scream parody and ‘not him again’ all you like, but in this new re-boot era he could be the key to making a truly epic Bond film. If they took the time to re-invent him and his relationship with Bond, there’s a lot of room there for dramatic depth and emotional complexity. At the same time though it would allow them to construct a good old-fashioned Bond movie plot where Bond gets a mission at the star of the movie, and completes it by the end, only with the added bonus of it containing Blofeld! What’s more Bondian than that?
So what do you suggest? Make it this time it's personal every single film? That's getting stale too. Every Craig film has been personal, I'm not saying we shouldn't have any personal Bond films but it's time to shake it up a bit.
I said I wanted a film where Bond just goes and does his mission. Sorry if that's too samey for you but it worked for over 40 years and it wouldn't kill the franchise.
I always thought @Grinderman that Austin Powers parodied the OTT gadgets, one liners and villians. But no, he parodied the fact that Bond went and did a mission without it being personal or M being used more. Silly me!
I said I wanted a normal Bond where he just does his mission and for some reason in your head you pictured a cliche Austin Powers type film.
So "doing a mission" is a Bond thing? Huh? Batman doesn't have a mission? Liam Neeson in the "Taken" movies isn't on a mission? The Mission Impossible movies aren't about a mission? (If not, they really need to change the title.) Heck, the dudes from "A Bridge Too Far" were on a mission, weren't they? How is being on a mission a Bond thing?
All I'm saying is this (and this is a overly-big statement, but bare with me): we need to keep moving and growing as human beings, otherwise our life becomes, well, not much of a life at all.
I'm not listening to same music I was 20 years ago. I'm not wearing the same fashions. I'm not watching the same TV shows. I hold different opinions on some things than I did 20 years ago. I've allowed my view of the world and politics to evolve and change. As Bob Dylan said, if you're not busy being born, you're busy dying.
The world has changed as well. Very few people use fax machines or land line phones. The Iron Curtain fell. Our enemies aren't so visable anymore.
So why in the world would anyone expect the Bond films to remain the same? In fact, you can make a very convincing argument that the only reason the Bond films continue to be made is because the have always changed with the times.
I get that the "this time it's personal" thing can get stale as well. But I didn't get that from Skyfall at all. The personal aspect comes from returning to his childhood home and from coming back from a personal low point (his "enjoying death" time spent away). But the nature of the mission is NOT personal. The bad guy is trying to rip apart MI6 and kill M. Bond's mission is to try to stop him. That's not personal. That's his job. It would be the job of any agent in Bond's position. Heck, it was Q's job to help stop Silva too, right? Does that make it personal to Q? And Eve? And everyone else on the side of MI6? Of course not.
In other words, there were personal aspects to the story, in that we learn more about Bond's past life. But his mission was not personal in nature.
I'm not saying make it DAD, I'm just saying why not just have a normal Bond on a mission type film, without M being used more or any this time it's personal stuff.
My thoughts entirely. It's slightly missing the point of Bond isn't it to claim that sticking to a tried and tested formula will kill the series - that's the whole reason for Bond's on-going success. That said, EON has always periodically mixed things up a bit. However, I agree with @thelivingroyale - the personal story lines are becoming a bit samey and predictable. SF felt like a TWINE/GE mash-up with lots of schmultz to me - and not particularly interesting or enjoyable shcmultz either. I don't know if going back to the traiditional 'formula' is the way forward (it seems to me they haven't made a really successful one of those since TLD), but I am sure that if I get any more poorly conceived back story or tedious exposition on the role of Bond in the modern world* I'm not going to be very happy.
*Note to EON - Bond has no role in the modern world. He was archaic and an anachronism already by the late 60s. That's why he lives in a fantasy world with little relation to contemporary politics or reality. As soon as you bring him out of his world, he begins to look rather sad.
See, I think Skyfall was one of the rare times in the series where we got a "James Bond" movie, not a movie about the wholly unbelievable exploits of a well dressed superhero.