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I'd take it over seeing our hero get obliterated though
You only know that because YOLT isn’t the last book. If Fleming had ended it there we all would’ve assumed that it was it for him.
I get your perspective mate because it seems like you wanted a happier ending and that you wouldn’t have been over the moon with the YOLT one either. @jetsetwilly loves the side of the Fleming/Dalton sort of Bond, the killer on borrowed time, and generally wants the films to be darker and grittier, so I struggle to see where he’s coming from sometimes with the new ones.
Yeah cliffhanger implies there’s going to be more. An ambiguous ending is probably a better way of putting it, and even then I’m not sure how ambiguous it’d feel. Bond is a survivor and he usually always wins, but if they’d chosen not to show him do that this time, then that’s probably not what they want you to think happened, even if you don’t actually see him die.
That's it mate yeah. I love the dark and gritty tone of the Craig era, but the ending of NTTD just didn't work for me. But I do sympathise though, because I think it'd be impossible to end a Bond film with the death of Bond and make it satisfying.
Also, sticking to the faithful adapted ending, we Fleming fans all know what happens in the next one (TMWTGG) and to me this is the best opening in the entire series. I would love to see this adapted, and it would have made a great entrance for the new actor to play Bond too.
So as depressing as it would be to see an amnesia ridden Bond sailing off to Russia, we know it leaves the door wide open for the next film, and excited anticipation too. How does Bond get out of this one? How does he come back?
Instead, we get a poor old Bond deprived of being happy with his partner, and instead lives as a hermit in exile for 5 years, then at the end of the film he decides to kill himself, knowing he had a chance at a normal family life, while his widow and daughter drive off into the sunset. Literally, the worst possible downbeat ending ever.
It's almost as though the producers hated the character so much, they wanted to really put him through absolute torment and hell before killing him off completely. Bond really didn't deserve that.
I'm going to take a stab at this:
A book and a film are two different art forms. What may work in one's mind, may not work well for a film.
Two, having Craig Bond wander off at the end of NTTD, only to be re-cast for the next film (and picking up where the last film left off), would be more confusing to audiences, than NTTD's closure (wait, this younger Bond is supposed to be the same Bond as in the last film? The one who was retired for five years? Who was with Swann, who had a child with her? Who fell in love with Vesper?... THIS young guy in his 30s, is the supposed to be the same character?
This worked pre-Craig because there was very little continuity in the EoN films. I just can't see this flying with a contemporary audience).
And the producers hating the character? Man, I find this so hard to swallow. No one takes two to three years out of their life, and use hundreds of millions of dollars to produce something they hate. I've never met one producer or writer or director who ever hated their project.
But what the producers and writers did do, is what all great scripts do: never make it easy on your protagonist. Put escalating obstacles in front of them. Make the hero's journey as brutal as you can, so by the end of the second act, they're usually at their lowest point, or at their most desperate point, but they still need to drag themselves back to battle (in Bond's case it was to stop Safin, destroy the compound, to save the world (and his family)).
I can appreciate your opinion of a film, but find the "hatred" perspective too hard to swallow, I'm afraid, @jetsetwilly
And yet the generally accepted best Bond movies are the ones which closely follow the books. Most fans and critics alike will usually have the likes of FRWL, GF, OHMSS, Dr. No, CR, etc. in their top ranks.
And on the flipside, most of the films which stray too far from the books, with little or no Fleming adapted scenes, tend to end up at the bottom of most people's rankings - DAD, TND, MR, AVTAK, TWINE, DAF, SP, etc.
Coincidence?
But I'll answer that, or try: the general ideas of the novels/films you mention above translated well to screen because of the broad brush strokes, or big ideas that Fleming created.
But you're talking a specific idea of Bond wandering off with amnesia...
It worked well for the YOLT novel.
And it may work well for some Fleming purists (depending on how it's directed; once you see it play on screen, I'm sure some would argue "that's not the way this should have been shot").
But I can guess this ending, for a global audience (most not having read YOLT and TMWTGG), would find this ending a downer, and, it'll confuse them even more with a recast, and younger actor, opening the next film a la TMWTGG...
Sometimes novels shouldn't be adapted to film, or, more specifically in this case, some hard ideas of a novel (amnesia and wandering into the lion's den; opening the next film with a new actor, adapting the introduction of TMWTGG), shouldn't be in a film that's for a global audience.
Broad brush stroke and big ideas are easier to adapt than smaller, more specific fan-loved threads from novels (that most audiences won't understand)....
I still think audiences will find it easier to accept a cliffhanger ending, an ambiguous ending (did he make it or not), than killing the character off completely and then claiming at the end credits `James Bond will return' and then starting the next film as though nothing happened.
To me that is a far harder task the producers have made for themselves, and asking a lot more from the audience by killing the character off completely, and then expecting them to be completely ok with seeing a new Bond for the next film, with no questions asked.
I don't mean the producers hate working on the project, I just meant for this film they really put Bond through absolute misery (far worse than he has ever gone through before) and then gave him no uplifting reward or goal as a payoff at the end. Instead they made it 10 times worse for the character. Give him a taste of what he could have had for a few seconds, then force him to kill himself.
Seriously! How much worse can it get? Fleming often moaned about the character he created, and sometimes put him through unbearable struggles, but I bet even he did a few somersaults in his grave at what they had done to Bond by the end of the film.
If the global audiences were confused about the future of a pop icon like Bond, there’d be dozens of articles stating : James Bond is forever gone!! It’s not like the media hasn’t printed about his, and the series, demise before. But when they actually kill Bond, we hear nary a word about his future!! I think it’s pretty well accepted, that James Bond will indeed return.
And as far as this being the greatest punishment Bond has ever gone through, well, after 60 years of close shaves, this was bound to happen.
But again, you interpret the ending as downbeat. Others of us have described it as the ultimate sacrifice, and one that is actually uplifting.
So again, there’s no right or wrong. It’s interpretation and it’s subjective.
Fair enough. I do wonder though if we had got the ending I wanted (YOLT), whether fans on here would be as up in arms about it, as I am about seeing Bond get killed off completely.
To me NTTD is now the worst film in the entire franchise because of the crazy decisions they made. I wonder if fans would feel as strongly had EON opted for the cliffhanger ending instead?
Sadly we'll never know.
Well I wouldn't like it for one, it sounds bad to me for the reasons I've outlined.
If it’s the global audience you’re talking about, I’m sure an amnesiac Bond walking into the Lion’s Den would have been bleak and depressing, more-so than watching his death (to save the loves of his life).
And if a few years later, a new, young actor was cast as 007, and was introduced as a continuation of Craig-Bond, entering M’s office to kill him a la TMWTGG novel, I think they’d be confused and reject this notion. Remember, most of the worldwide audience members haven’t read the Bond novels. They wouldn’t understand any of this, and it wouldn’t be cohesive, especially after a decade and a half of Craig’s contained universe.
I’m sorry this is the worst of the bunch for you, @jetsetwilly . I unabashedly adore it. I’ve seen it more times than I care to share, and it delivers every time; I love the story, the characters, the way they constructed every single scene; I’m moved by the tragic romance of Bond and Madeleine (and I’m on record here in how much I didn’t like them in the previous film, and I was disappointed when it was revealed that Madeleine and Blofeld were returning). And of course, I LOVE the ending. This wasn’t preordained (like I said, I was a critic of Spectre). I know that no film is perfect (not Citizen Kane, not GF 1&2, not Nosferatu… No film has been made without blemishes and flaws), bu NTTD hits me and remains my top Bond film as well as joining my top overall films….
EDIT: I must add that NTTD also made the impossible, possible: for me, it IMPROVED Spectre. I can sit down and now enjoy the film we got, knowing that things I was dissatisfied with were greatly elevated by the next and final film (in this contained universe).
Watching all five films, back to back (one a night), was an amazing time for me (I have done it once, with one of my daughters; both of us saw a beautiful evolution from the man we first met in CR).
I don’t mind the ending, but I *do* think a few tweaks here and there, and having Madeline die with Bond leaving the service as a Single Father (and widower — I would have them marry in the Matera sequences) would have been a good ending. I mean, it would likely have pissed some people off, for some reason, but it also fits in with the points you make here, as well as echoes OHMSS as well.
A little coda with the ‘aunties and uncles’ of MI6 coming over for a birthday party, including Nomi as the new oo7 again too. Maybe it’s only at that ‘one year later’ that we find out it *was* Madeline and not Bond who died on Safins Island (keep in mind I would have rejigged bits of the rest of the film too) would have even given a ‘have the cake and eat it’ approach to Bonds death. (You don’t even have to kill off Madeline for it to work, she could as easily be ‘missing’ or disabled with Bond as carer for the ultimate mission change — without changing his role. He is still a guardian.)
But as I say, I am fine with NTTD ending as it is, and the only reason I am sad about it is *for* Bond and his family. They lost each other.
I genuinely wish I could see NTTD through your eyes, mate.
I hear you @jetsetwilly … This is what makes books and films and paintings (and art period) so mysterious in some ways, so endlessly debatable: it’s subject to interpretation. However, I wish I could share things with others, that move me; to have them feel WHAT is moving me. But, in the end, something works for someone, or doesn’t.
In the end, I’m only right about NTTD, for me, and no matter how I feel about the film, your opinion about it (as a film), is not wrong to me either (although I could debate with you about the ending and why it may work better for a worldwide audience; however, your feelings ABOUT the film, and it being your least favourite isn’t wrong in my eyes (it’s just not something I can agree with, because I had the polar opposite reaction! But I can still accept it).
In the end, it’s all good. I appreciated the discussion.
Unlike Bond, it was the hook the entire character was built around so they had to go there, so I can forgive them doing it. But if Bond lost his memory from a bang on the head, I would be pretty unimpressed. Someone suggested that it could have happened after Blofeld’s drill torture in Sp; yeah, I’d have swallowed that. Maybe the mention of memory wipes there was even P&W tipping their hat to the Fleming amnesia plot.
Funnily enough, Jason Bourne is only called Jason Bourne because the writer of the books researched actual cases of amnesiacs — so some people kind of *do* retain their skills that way.
They already brushed up against ‘amnesiac Bond’ in Spectre, by having Blofeld threatening him with it.
Yes, exactly. If only copying Austin Powers had also been off-limits, then we'd never have had Brofeld... ;)
Yeah mate if only 😅
Our understanding of memory is a lot different now, so it reads as dated.
Don't go there! Next thing they'll claim it was Covid set up by big pharma! Can be, but it is contrived, especially combined with that age-old cia is behind everything and an evil power plot. The films, well the first two, were properly made and that made them bearable, but it remains a cheap parlour trick. I'm glad they didn't use it in Bond, and I hope they'll stay away from it. Perhaps yolt should have been Fleming's last, but I'm a huge fan of the tmwtgg novel, despite the start.