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How Violent Should a Bond Film Be?
In a Bond film, someone usually dies. Fans today expect all sorts of bloodpumping action in their Bond flicks. But I feel that in at least two Bond films there was way too much violence.
I mean LTK and QOS. Both of those films give you a very nasty aftertaste after watching them. Simply put I feel like the amount of violence, blood, gore, killings and sheer anger made those films just so disagreeable. My view of LTK has since improved, but QOS remains one of my lowest. The killing of Slate was nearly unwatchable. I couldn't make it past the halfway point, sometime about the time Bond returns to find Fields drowned in oil I simply couldn't watch anymore; granted most of that was because of the editing, but a lot of it was because I couldn't deal with it at that point. You feel like killing someone after watching either of these films and I don't mean it in a good way.
On the other end of the spectrum I will attack TMWTGG. That is a very anemic Bond film. Bond literally kills a grand total of one person in the entire film, his absolute lowest. His kill is one of just seven in the movie (look, you can count them: gangster, Gibson, karate student, Hai Fat, Andrea, Scaramanga, Kra). Long stretches of Bond doing lots of cartoony stuff more than actual Bond stuff.
Did anyone else find issues with the amount of violence in any of those films or is that just me?
I mean LTK and QOS. Both of those films give you a very nasty aftertaste after watching them. Simply put I feel like the amount of violence, blood, gore, killings and sheer anger made those films just so disagreeable. My view of LTK has since improved, but QOS remains one of my lowest. The killing of Slate was nearly unwatchable. I couldn't make it past the halfway point, sometime about the time Bond returns to find Fields drowned in oil I simply couldn't watch anymore; granted most of that was because of the editing, but a lot of it was because I couldn't deal with it at that point. You feel like killing someone after watching either of these films and I don't mean it in a good way.
On the other end of the spectrum I will attack TMWTGG. That is a very anemic Bond film. Bond literally kills a grand total of one person in the entire film, his absolute lowest. His kill is one of just seven in the movie (look, you can count them: gangster, Gibson, karate student, Hai Fat, Andrea, Scaramanga, Kra). Long stretches of Bond doing lots of cartoony stuff more than actual Bond stuff.
Did anyone else find issues with the amount of violence in any of those films or is that just me?
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Comments
LTK's gore was just pathetic. A truly dark film achieves this darkness through atmosphere, Hitchcockian suspense, and genuinely good acting/storytelling. Not through having uncensored blood splatters. Sanchez was definitely very good, but something like the two shark kills in the movie were fine. Milton Krest exploding, however, was stupid. It added absolutely nothing to the film and wasn't required in any way. Bond isn't about pornographic effects - you're not supposed to dwell on blood and brains splattering everywhere. Even in the more intense kills of the series, the kills themselves are censored because it's supposed to left to the imagination. Watching people get caught by piranhas or sharks and then hearing them scream off-screen while the villain laughs or something along those lines has way more effect than watching some guy scream as he gets pitched into a grinder while fake blood squirts onto the camera. Dario's death had some effect, I guess (though it still should've been censored), but the gore in Milton Krest's death was completely unwarranted.
Ah yes I forgot to mention that, the part where Milton Krest's head explodes in the depressurisation chamber was very gratuitous and they definitely went overboard. I had to look away the first time I saw it.
The guy who is killed by the cocaine grinder is Dario, Sanchez's right-hand. I didn't notice him the first time either. And I had to look away from that as well.
An R rated Bond would be terrible.
Sums up everything I think about Bond killing only one person.
Well that is an opinion that might make a few LTK-apologists angry! But I do agree with you. They definitely went overboard with the head explosion, and the grinder was also unwatchable (but I appreciate the suspense of the scene and the concept of the deathtrap).
What you say about leaving kills to the imagination is something very important as well. AVTAK did that with the killing of that KGB agent by Zorin (you see the reading/bump as he is killed). But then there is the mine massacre. Oops.
Everybody's entitled to their beliefs, I just think that excessive gore makes the film seem more like a horror movie than a Bond flick at times. And that's not what we want, is it?
Yeah, Moore later said exactly what I said in my post above about the mine massacre. He said you're not supposed to dwell on the blood and gore, which is why Zorin machine-gunning down swaths of miners was horrific to him.
Traditionally, I would not cite Octopussy as an example of a serious Bond film. But for an example of a seriously dark kill which wasn't gory and properly censored, I'd see to the yo-yo beheading of Vijay. We see the yo-yo saw coming down, and just before it hits, the screen cuts away to some birds being clearly disturbed and flying away. That's a proper dark kill for a Bond movie.
Technically speaking the deaths of all the allies in Glen's films are 'left to the imagination' in a way. Luigi's and Sharkey's are unseen. You see Tibbett being strangled by May Day just before the car roller comes down the wind screen. And Saunders death is not shown up-front, it is to the side, but you hear him cry out and there is a sudden smash.
I don't necessarily want or need to see an R-rated Bond film, but the violence we have witnessed in the movie franchise since its inception has been neither excessive or gratuitous (or even truly "gory").
Some of the posters here should perhaps stick to Mary Poppins or somesuch... American TV shows -- shown on the broadcast networks, not pay-cable -- are gorier than any 007 film.
A death in which barely a drop of blood is seen?
Watch the scene carefully... The director uses broken red glass to subliminally suggest blood (which in reality would have been all over the place after the leg stabbing).
That's right. They had to use broken glass to "suggest" the presence of blood. Did NOT show it.
And that's going too far?
The killing of Slate is brilliant! Absolute love Dan's expression as he waits for him to bleed out. And as @CraterGuns states there is very little blood seen. Yes they both have cuts and bruises but there's only one brief shot of Slate with a pool of blood behind his head. This is no worse than Rodney getting a bullet in the forehead, Luigi with his throat slit or Mr Howe getting shot in the heart at point blank range. And those are all Rog films.
And one of the most disturbing deaths, Corinne, comes in one of the most ludicrous films.
In terms of brutality the Slate fight is no different at all to the Grant fight. The shriek Grant gives when Bond sticks the knife in is bloodcurdling and then he's cruelly garrotted to death. But this is as it should be based on a chapter from the book entitled 'Ten Pints of Blood'.
There was a quote, from Dalton I think, along the lines of 'Bond is a fantasy for adults that kids can enjoy.'
They are not kids films. The violence has always been there and if you actually have to turn a film off (????) because it's too much for you then perhaps this might not be the best film series for you.
Inventive and gory deaths are a staple of the series and I for one would like to see us get back to more of them. The death of Guerra in SP was quite enjoyable and a step in the right direction. Hopefully as they've brought in the scar and the cat we'll see Blofeld utter the 'this organisation does not tolerate failure' line as he kills someone in an amusing fashion in B25.
The gore itself isn't overwhelming, it just doesn't have place in a Bond film. Calm yourself, please. I can watch gorier stuff. But this is Bond. It's not about gore. For that matter, even without the gore it'd be a poor sequence (I'm referring to the explosion in the pressure tank).
Yeah ok sorry about that but I'm just amazed people dislike gore in principle in a Bond film. I think @TheWiz says it best with his Dalton quote.
I think the difference is about what you see on the screen and what is left to your imagination. It is not about what is going on. Bond villains have always been very brutal.
You list OHMSS as a good film that conforms to your 'non-gore' template but what is the 'he had lots of guts' scene if not gratuitous gore? I don't really see much of a distinction to be made between Milton Krest's head going off and the SPECTRE goon getting shredded and seeing him being sprayed across the snow.
And how is a blood soaked Bond brutally choking Obanna to death any less callous/gory than him calmly watching Slate bleed out?
But why does it always need to be left to the imagination. Bond is primarily for adults so what is the problem with sometimes showing the gore?
Speak for yourself mate! If we're talking Eva Green then I think there's plenty of us who would be well up for that!!!
Try and get through at least one chapter every day if you have enough strength in your wrist to turn the pages ;)
Me too, but maybe not in a Bond film :-) Would probably be difficult to concentrate on something else afterwards :-)
Afterwards?? After what? :))
I leave it to your imagination :-)
I mean the first time I watched it I found it very difficult to watch. You are all too right about the red shattered glass suggesting blood. When I first watched it I actually mistook all the glass for blood and it had a very large impression on me. Then when I watched it again I realised it was just glass.
You are right about showing minimal blood but honestly that scene is literally the hardest watch in any Bond film, in fact nothing in that film really leaves you with a good feeling after watching it. Hence why after watching LTK and QOS the first time I felt like I wanted to kill someone there was so much brutality in either of the films and sometimes it felt pretty senseless and pointless as well.
They are with their pussy galore virgins in the sky now.
I'm fine with having cruel, brutal deaths (especially if they enhance someone's character), it's just that they're always better done with a level of censoring. That's all.
I don't see any difference between the OHMSS death and Dario. We see the same thing - bits of body being churned out of the machine - in both. The only difference I can tell is one is mixed with snow and one cocaine.
Ok we see Dario screaming more than the other guy but that's just a scream. The scenes both display a similar level of gore but the OHMSS one is over a bit quicker that's all.