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Which films were well received upon release but are now considered weaker entries? Or vice versa?

RemingtonRemington I'll do anything for a woman with a knife.
in Bond Movies Posts: 1,534
I was looking through another site a while back and read some initial reviews for Die Another Day. The CGI was criticized but the reviews were almost glowing.

Comments

  • Major_BoothroydMajor_Boothroyd Republic of Isthmus
    Posts: 2,722
    If I remember correctly Spectre's UK reviews were fairly complimentary? While Quantum's were lukewarm. I think OHMSS must have had some ordinary reviews at least compared to its current exalted status?
  • RemingtonRemington I'll do anything for a woman with a knife.
    edited October 2019 Posts: 1,534
    Major_Boothroyd wrote: »
    If I remember correctly Spectre's UK reviews were fairly complimentary? While Quantum's were lukewarm. I think OHMSS must have had some ordinary reviews at least compared to its current exalted status?

    Yeah I don't remember hearing many negative reviews for SP until the U.S. ones dropped.
  • M_BaljeM_Balje Amsterdam, Netherlands
    edited October 2019 Posts: 4,519
    Spectre not have got his Dutch tv premiere yet, whyle QOS already be on tv after 1,5 year. Die Hard 5 take 3 years and 8 months or so and Order of Phoenix 3,5.

    Why Fox and RTL4/RTL7 hold movie back so long for his tv release. Possible it is screentime or/and there think movie stil have to much 16+ things for 08.00 pm /8.30 pm the time of movie there whant , whyle movie is stil 12+. So weird to see Fantastic Beasts get his premiere (On Net5) almoost two weeks a go. I expect Spectre have been on tv atleast in January this year (2019).
  • RemingtonRemington I'll do anything for a woman with a knife.
    Posts: 1,534
    M_Balje wrote: »
    Spectre not have got his Dutch tv premiere yet, whyle QOS already be on tv after 1,5 year. Die Hard 5 take 3 years and 8 months or so and Order of Phoenix 3,5.

    Why Fox and RTL4/RTL7 hold movie back so long for his tv release. Possible it is screentime or/and there think movie stil have to much 16+ things for 08.00 pm /8.30 pm the time of movie there whant , whyle movie is stil 12+. So weird to see Fantastic Beasts get his premiere (On Net5) almoost two weeks a go. I expect Spectre have been on tv atleast in January this year (2019).

    Umm I think you're in the wrong thread.
  • MartinBondMartinBond Trying not to muck it up again
    Posts: 862
    I'd say Moonraker is one which is often thrashed nowadays in comparison to the space science fiction mindset people had when it was released.
  • thelivingroyalethelivingroyale
    edited October 2019 Posts: 12,837
    DAD is probably the biggest turnaround in my lifetime. Nowadays it's more or less universally accepted at the worst, but I remember it being fairly well reviewed, which I didn't understand at all at the time but looking back now that the pure and burning hatred I felt for it has softened, I can sort of understand. It was a very energetic and modern feeling film (but modern/cool in the early 00s means it was pretty much destined to age poorly), the North Korea stuff was a lot ballsier, grittier and more overtly topical than we were used to, and I guess after two fairly safe films in terms of tone (not really dark, not really silly), the way in which they went all out with the OTT stuff might have been appealing to some. It was always destined to age terribly and obviously most of us proper fans could tell it was a trainwreck from the off, but in hindsight I can see why some people liked it.

    The Brosnan era in general was very popular at the time, but once CR came out public opinion seemed lower. I do feel that after SP things have swung back the other way slightly though, I've seen a lot more positive comments about those films online than I used to lately.

    SP I don't think there was really a turnaround. It was fairly well received in the UK, not so much elsewhere, and I don't know if that's really changed.
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,185
    DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER

    This would be the equivalent of Robert Downey Jr. coming back for one more film as Tony Stark after the debacle that had an unknown Australian model in the lead. Everyone was just happy to see Sean in his signature role after four and a half years.
  • GoldenGunGoldenGun Per ora e per il momento che verrà
    Posts: 7,128
    Mist be Die Another Day. At least in my lifetime. Hated it upon release, but here in Belgium even the most critical reviewers liked the overall product.

    Now that I have a more nostalgic approach to it, I’ve grown to appreciate it for what it is, but these days it is almost universally considered the absolute worst.
  • BT3366BT3366
    Posts: 1,917
    DAF immediately comes to mind because the fans and critics both welcomed Connery back. Same with NSNA, at least with the critics, who were very heavy on the Connery praise.

    MR actually had some critical supporters, I think the New York Times' Vincent Canby gave it a good review and either Newsweek or Time and another big critic supported it. The backlash did come from a lot of hardcore fans. I remember one friend of our family at the time talking about how bad it was.
  • IGotABrudderIGotABrudder UK
    Posts: 631
    "thelivingroyale wrote: »
    SP I don't think there was really a turnaround. It was fairly well received in the UK, not so much elsewhere, and I don't know if that's really changed.

    Fans probably see bigger problems with SP than non-fans. We continually compare SP with the other films in the canon but non-fans just want to enjoy a couple of hours in the cinema.

    A couple of my friends aren’t Bond fans at all - they hadn’t seen one since Roger Moore days - but they had heard that SP’s opening shot went on for a few minutes and they thought it sounded interesting, so they went along and watched it and to their surprise they enjoyed the whole film.

    The only part of SP which seemed to disappoint people when it came out was the car chase through the deserted streets of Rome. Other than that, the overall UK reception was pretty favourable IIRC and I think it’s stayed that way.

  • ShardlakeShardlake Leeds, West Yorkshire, England
    Posts: 4,043
    Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave SPECTRE 5 stars, I'm not sure I trusted his reviews
    after that.

    I sometimes think the more highbrow critics like he probably thinks he is are the ones that don't really get Bond, Kermode who I enormously respect (despite his QOS drubbing) also was very favourable of SPECTRE.

    It was indeed the U.S critics that actually saw the wood for the trees on this one.

    Like @thelivingroyale say DAD was received quite favourably here not sure about the U.S though, I'm very sceptical of critics here on the back of those 2 when the knives came out for QOS pretty savagely.

    I was too young to know about how DAF was received although I imagine the return of Connery after the Australian fella must of at time felt like a win.

    I imagine Connery's swansong alone possibly made some not see the shortcomings of the film, although I could be wrong.
  • thelivingroyalethelivingroyale
    Posts: 12,837
    Birdleson wrote: »
    (but even, at nine, then I thought that the climax on the oil platform was boring).

    Off topic I know but the more times I watch that film the more I wonder what they were actually thinking with that finale. Bond just cheerfully saunters in in a weird inflatable ball then him and Blofeld have a friendly little catch up (they feel more like old sports rivals than arch enemies) as it all builds up to the very worst of the big end battles of that era. No tension whatsoever. I can't believe that it was put together by the same people who gave us Goldfinger.

    I genuinely think there's a lot to like in DAF but everything from the Blofeld reveal is just so poor imo. I think that and TMWTGG are probably the laziest films of the series. LALD is a decent little outlier in the middle of them but still, thank god for TSWLM. Imagine if we'd just gotten another half arsed Hamilton film instead.
  • RC7RC7
    edited October 2019 Posts: 10,512
    I love DAF, but I have the benefit of not seeing it in context. I’m acutely aware of how certain films might have landed. I got into Bond between TLD and LTK, but I had no idea they existed, I was a pre-school kid into Connery and Moore at the time. My biggest disappoint is QOS, but I’m aware my attitude towards it is possibly similar to certain fans’ response to MR back in the day.
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,185
    If you look back to 2002 on Rotten Tomatoes you can see that DAD was already pretty divisive among critics, well before it gained its reputation as being among the worst of the series. I went back to the archive page because I wanted contemporary reviews that didn't include anything written that came out during the 17 years.

    https://web.archive.org/web/20021204212414/http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/DieAnotherDay-1118332/

    The site was already up in 1999, but there's no archived page for TWINE until 2004.
  • MartinBondMartinBond Trying not to muck it up again
    Posts: 862
    Die Another day was cited as "Brosnan's best Bond" upon release over here...
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,185
    I remember thinking after seeing DAD in theaters (it my first Bond in theaters) that it was Brosnan's best since GE. I still hold that opinion today, albeit his latter three films are among the bottom five in my Bond rankings anyway so...
  • Major_BoothroydMajor_Boothroyd Republic of Isthmus
    Posts: 2,722
    I think DAD suffered doubly from the change in direction to CR. I suspect contemporary attitudes in 2002 were a little more along the lines of 'well, it's goofy, double-entendres dropping, action, explosive silliness...but that's what people want Bond to be.' But after CR's critical love (even a BAFTA nomination for lead actor which was unheard of for the Bond series) then it seemed DAD's critical stock plummeted further than ever.
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,185
    CR coming after certainly cemented the perception of DAD being the BATMAN & ROBIN of the franchise. Cheesy fourth film that indulged too much into gadgetry, CGI, bad dialogue, and a lot of ice. An abysmal end for an actor who deserved a better run.
  • LudovicoLudovico
    Posts: 15,122
    From positive to negative: DAD. From negative to positive, I'd tend to say QOS, at least since I've been a Bond fan. The whole Brosnan era minus GE pretty much went from positively perceived to be viewed far more critically since CR and SF. By Brosnan himself I might add.
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