Raoul Silva

245

Comments

  • Posts: 11,425
    Getafix wrote:
    No, I understand you do things in a film for dramatic effect. I just thought Silva's appearance and the fight in the committee room was an anti-climax. It didn't fit well with his supposedly ingenious masterplan. It felt 'small' compared to the wannabe epicness of the themes and characters.

    I thought it was just fine. But as I already said, I see where you are coming from. It works for me though.

    Fair enough. Although technically it is an anti-climax. Silva is denied his big moment and the big confrontation is delayed until they all meet again at Skyfall. I just thought they could have made more of the scene though.
  • Getafix wrote:
    Getafix wrote:
    No, I understand you do things in a film for dramatic effect. I just thought Silva's appearance and the fight in the committee room was an anti-climax. It didn't fit well with his supposedly ingenious masterplan. It felt 'small' compared to the wannabe epicness of the themes and characters.

    I thought it was just fine. But as I already said, I see where you are coming from. It works for me though.

    Fair enough. Although technically it is an anti-climax. Silva is denied his big moment and the big confrontation is delayed until they all meet again at Skyfall. I just thought they could have made more of the scene though.

    I understand, though it features the Tennyson moment, so imo it was great enough. I also love the confrontation of M and Silva. I really don't see what else was left to say between them.
  • QsAssistantQsAssistant All those moments lost in time... like tears in rain
    Posts: 1,812
    I thought he was a great villian but I wish he and Bond would of had a hand-to-hand fight, on the ice at the end perhaps.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    edited December 2012 Posts: 28,694
    I thought he was a great villian but I wish he and Bond would of had a hand-to-hand fight, on the ice at the end perhaps.

    I haven't heard a single person who saw Skyfall not mention this. We all wanted it, but at the end of the day it just wouldn't have worked with how the plot was laid out.
  • Posts: 1,310
    I thought he was a great villian but I wish he and Bond would of had a hand-to-hand fight, on the ice at the end perhaps.

    I haven't heard a single person who saw Skyfall not mention this. We all wanted it, but at the end of the day it just wouldn't have worked with how the plot was laid out.
    I didn't. ;)
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 2,081
    You beat me to it, SJK91. ;) I was just about to reply to "I haven't heard a single person..."
    I have been surprised so many wanted a physical fight. I hadn't even thought about it before I read people mentioning that. Their sparring and duels were not physical at any point, but very much psychological, and to me it would have seemed wrong to change that at the end. A fist fight or some such thing sounds like a horrible idea to me. The only physical contact between them all the way through was one-way only, and extremely gentle, too, so kinda unique. Fist fights are so... ordinary. I thought it was perfect just as it was.
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 2,081
    double post
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 2,081
    geez
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 2,081
    Apologies. I'll get the hang of this eventually... sleeping occasionally might help, too...
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 11,425
    Tuulia wrote:
    You beat me to it, SJK91. ;) I was just about to reply to "I haven't heard a single person..."
    I have been surprised so many wanted a physical fight. I hadn't even thought about it before I read people mentioning that. Their sparring and duels were not physical at any point, but very much psychological, and to me it would have seemed wrong to change that at the end. A fist fight or some such thing sounds like a horrible idea to me. The only physical contact between them all the way through was one-way only, and extremely gentle, too, so kinda unique. Fist fights are so... ordinary. I thought it was perfect just as it was.

    Well there was actually a massive fight between Bond and Silva - just with machine guns and grenades. And it was very ordinary and went on a very long time.

    I think what people wanted and feel was missing was actually a face-to-face confrontation between Bond and Silva. Just something to round off the scene on the island. It didn't need to be a fist fight necessarily, but just a scene where there is a final face off - something more psychological actually.

  • I disagree. It was not so much about Bond and Silva as it was about M and Silva. Bond was nuisance in Silva's plan. His aim and conflict was M. There was no need for a final showdown between Bond and Silva imo.
    We get one between M and Silva and in the end the "nuisance" comes back to show he is the better man.
  • RC7RC7
    Posts: 10,512
    It was not so much about Bond and Silva as it was about M and Silva. Bond was nuisance in Silva's plan. His aim and conflict was M. There was no need for a final showdown between Bond and Silva imo.

    That is true and this is where it goes a bit awry for me. In a TV series it's fine to shift the focus between different characters week to week but this is a 'Bond' film and I think it should primarily be about him, not his boss.

  • edited December 2012 Posts: 11,425
    RC7 wrote:
    It was not so much about Bond and Silva as it was about M and Silva. Bond was nuisance in Silva's plan. His aim and conflict was M. There was no need for a final showdown between Bond and Silva imo.

    That is true and this is where it goes a bit awry for me. In a TV series it's fine to shift the focus between different characters week to week but this is a 'Bond' film and I think it should primarily be about him, not his boss.

    I agree. Odd move. And given the length of the film there was no reason that they could not have intertwined Bond's story more with Silva's. Why was Severine included in the film at all? She could have provided the perfect personal motivation for Bond's conflict with Silva. It would have just added an extra layer of interest/enjoyment. I just think the absence of these other strands to the story is simply down to bad writing. A more sophisticated screenplay and script would have made the climax into a more satisfying resolution of all the key character's story arcs. Instead Bond is treated almost as a side character.
  • Posts: 2,081
    Getafix wrote:
    Well there was actually a massive fight between Bond and Silva - just with machine guns and grenades. And it was very ordinary and went on a very long time.

    I think what people wanted and feel was missing was actually a face-to-face confrontation between Bond and Silva. Just something to round off the scene on the island. It didn't need to be a fist fight necessarily, but just a scene where there is a final face off - something more psychological actually.

    Ok... I thought by hand-to-hand fight people meant literally a hand-to-hand fight, so I responded to that.

  • edited December 2012 Posts: 11,425
    May be some people wanted a hand to hand fight. May be that could have worked. All I'm saying is that I think a lot of people obviously felt something was 'missing'. Even if the film is about M, does that not allow space for that other minor character, namely James Bond, to have an interesting story arc with some sense of resolution? The resolution could still be a downer - i.e. that no one really wins this time and that everything is morally ambiguous etc - but I just feel that great scene on the island between Bond and Silva required some follow-on or capping off.


  • Getafix wrote:
    RC7 wrote:
    It was not so much about Bond and Silva as it was about M and Silva. Bond was nuisance in Silva's plan. His aim and conflict was M. There was no need for a final showdown between Bond and Silva imo.

    That is true and this is where it goes a bit awry for me. In a TV series it's fine to shift the focus between different characters week to week but this is a 'Bond' film and I think it should primarily be about him, not his boss.

    I agree. Odd move. And given the length of the film there was no reason that they could not have intertwined Bond's story more with Silva's. Why was Severine included in the film at all? She could have provided the perfect personal motivation for Bond's conflict with Silva. It would have just added an extra layer of interest/enjoyment. I just think the absence of these other strands to the story is simply down to bad writing. A more sophisticated screenplay and script would have made the climax into a more satisfying resolution of all the key character's story arcs. Instead Bond is treated almost as a side character.

    I never felt Bond to be a side character. He is in almost every scene and he does his job. It's just that the motivation of the bad guy is not world domination but to kill his Boss. Thus the face off meant more when it was between M and Silva. In that scene, Bond takes a step back...but rightly so imo.

    I love the ending, so for me there is a satisfying resolution and I can't call it bad writing. At least not imo. It may not appeal to everyone but I don't think bad writing is right here.

    I found the ending refreshing. For once they didn't try to squeeze another action scene into the end and tried to focus on the characters. For me it worked.

  • Posts: 11,425
    Getafix wrote:
    RC7 wrote:
    It was not so much about Bond and Silva as it was about M and Silva. Bond was nuisance in Silva's plan. His aim and conflict was M. There was no need for a final showdown between Bond and Silva imo.

    That is true and this is where it goes a bit awry for me. In a TV series it's fine to shift the focus between different characters week to week but this is a 'Bond' film and I think it should primarily be about him, not his boss.

    I agree. Odd move. And given the length of the film there was no reason that they could not have intertwined Bond's story more with Silva's. Why was Severine included in the film at all? She could have provided the perfect personal motivation for Bond's conflict with Silva. It would have just added an extra layer of interest/enjoyment. I just think the absence of these other strands to the story is simply down to bad writing. A more sophisticated screenplay and script would have made the climax into a more satisfying resolution of all the key character's story arcs. Instead Bond is treated almost as a side character.

    I never felt Bond to be a side character. He is in almost every scene and he does his job. It's just that the motivation of the bad guy is not world domination but to kill his Boss. Thus the face off meant more when it was between M and Silva. In that scene, Bond takes a step back...but rightly so imo.

    I love the ending, so for me there is a satisfying resolution and I can't call it bad writing. At least not imo. It may not appeal to everyone but I don't think bad writing is right here.

    I found the ending refreshing. For once they didn't try to squeeze another action scene into the end and tried to focus on the characters. For me it worked.

    But there is a very long action scene with the attack on Skyfall Lodge, followed by a chase across the moors and a fight in the lake. Apart from a minute or two in the chapel, the last half hour of the film is all action.
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 2,081
    Getafix wrote:
    May be some people wanted a hand to hand fight. May be that could have worked. All I'm saying is that I think a lot of people obviously felt something was 'missing'. Even if the film is about M, does that not allow space for that other minor character, namely James Bond, to have an interesting story arc with some sense of resolution? The resolution could still be a downer - i.e. that no one really wins this time and that everything is morally ambiguous etc - but I just feel that great scene on the island between Bond and Silva required some follow-on or capping off.

    I never felt Bond was a minor character in this story. Also, to me he had an interesting story arc with a sense of resolution. He was at a very different place at the end than he was for a considerable time after his "death". When he returned to work at the end, he did so "with pleasure". If that was meaningless or insufficient to you then I can't help.

    I agree the Bond-Silva scenes on the island were great, and I wouldn't have minded more of that at all, but I don't know how it should have been done, nor am I sure the story would have needed it. Bond's biggest fight was not with Silva, but with himself. and unlike you, I felt the main character in this movie was very much Bond himself.



  • edited December 2012 Posts: 11,425
    Tuulia wrote:
    Getafix wrote:
    May be some people wanted a hand to hand fight. May be that could have worked. All I'm saying is that I think a lot of people obviously felt something was 'missing'. Even if the film is about M, does that not allow space for that other minor character, namely James Bond, to have an interesting story arc with some sense of resolution? The resolution could still be a downer - i.e. that no one really wins this time and that everything is morally ambiguous etc - but I just feel that great scene on the island between Bond and Silva required some follow-on or capping off.

    I never felt Bond was a minor character in this story. Also, to me he had an interesting story arc with a sense of resolution. He was at a very different place at the end than he was for a considerable time after his "death". When he returned to work at the end, he did so "with pleasure". If that was meaningless or insufficient to you then I can't help.

    I agree the Bond-Silva scenes on the island were great, and I wouldn't have minded more of that at all, but I don't know how it should have been done, nor am I sure the story would have needed it. Bond's biggest fight was not with Silva, but with himself. and unlike you, I felt the main character in this movie was very much Bond himself.



    Well, it wasn't me but Mendes who said the film is about M.

    I don't know how it should have been done either, but that's why I'm saying it's bad writing. Working those kind of satisfying scenes, character arcs and plot resolutions into the film is what you expect good screenwriters to do - something that Purvis and Wade have shown themselves to be incapable of on numerous occassions.

    I like the way that people are reading so much into the film. It is indeed quite complex and does invite multiple interpretations. I think that's down to good acting though and decent direction rather than the plot/script itself. Mendes and the cast have made the most out of some very average material. May be that's enough and it's certainly all you can ask for from the actors, but I just expected more from the script.
  • RC7RC7
    Posts: 10,512
    Getafix wrote:
    I like the way that people are reading so much into the film. It is indeed quite complex and does invite multiple interpretations. I think that's down to good acting though and decent direction rather than the plot/script itself. Mendes and the cast have made the most out of some very average material.

    I agree. I've said this on numerous occasions. What I can't fathom is how people seem so keen to dismiss this argument. I've not seen a single review from a critic or fan that labours over how impeccable the script is, it's just pushed to the sidelines and not really referenced.
  • Just to add, that once again I didn't find the Bardem character overly menacing or anything, merely just different from your usual Bond villain. Offered no more interest or threat than what came before him with a lead adversary such as Greene, LeChiffre etc, for the Craig tenure

    Was one moment when being held at the interim MI6 headquarters when he shows us the effects of his botched suicide attempt, with his cyanide rotted teeth that was quite unnerving, if only for an instant, and the screen doors slide back, but apart from that, there was nothing exceptional about him. A bisexual villain with a 'mommy issue' and changing agendas that culminated in a poor ending and that was about it really. We haven't had a villain of caliber in James Bond since Davi's Sanchez, and that was over 20 years ago now

    I have been quite disappointed with most of the villains of the Craig tenure. This time was no different. Got a lot to do today so will get back to this another time, but there's no sense in lying
  • edited December 2012 Posts: 204
    I was just wondering something regarding Silva. We learnt that he was an agent for M, and he says " Say it! My real name! "

    Later M tells Bond that Silva's real name was Tiago Rodriguez

    So does that mean that the name James Bond is also just a code name?
    Just like in QoS Bond asks Mathis if 'Mathis' was his cover name...?
  • Posts: 1,310
    I was just wondering something regarding Silva. We learnt that he was an agent for M, and he says " Say it! My real name! "

    Later M tells Bond that Silva's real name was Tiago Rodriguez

    So does that mean that the name James Bond is also just a code name?
    Just like in QoS Bond asks Mathis if 'Mathis' was his cover name...?
    Well, Bond's parents' graves are just outside that chapel at the end of the film which would debunk that, I think.
  • Oh yeah I forgot about that part... good call!
  • Posts: 11,425
    Just to add, that once again I didn't find the Bardem character overly menacing or anything, merely just different from your usual Bond villain. Offered no more interest or threat than what came before him with a lead adversary such as Greene, LeChiffre etc, for the Craig tenure

    Was one moment when being held at the interim MI6 headquarters when he shows us the effects of his botched suicide attempt, with his cyanide rotted teeth that was quite unnerving, if only for an instant, and the screen doors slide back, but apart from that, there was nothing exceptional about him. A bisexual villain with a 'mommy issue' and changing agendas that culminated in a poor ending and that was about it really. We haven't had a villain of caliber in James Bond since Davi's Sanchez, and that was over 20 years ago now

    I have been quite disappointed with most of the villains of the Craig tenure. This time was no different. Got a lot to do today so will get back to this another time, but there's no sense in lying

    Yes, I think the cartoon performance actually detracted in some ways. I personally prefered LeChiffre althouth he wasn't very menacing either.
  • I was just wondering something regarding Silva. We learnt that he was an agent for M, and he says " Say it! My real name! "

    Later M tells Bond that Silva's real name was Tiago Rodriguez

    So does that mean that the name James Bond is also just a code name?
    Just like in QoS Bond asks Mathis if 'Mathis' was his cover name...?

    This is how I see it: Silva was a "shadow", living off the grid. Of course he would change his name. There's a good chance the blonde hair isn't even his natural color, and he's wearing contacts too.
    When he got the prosthetic jaw, he changed his entire identity.

  • bond50bond50 Banned
    Posts: 42
    Silva :The Beauty Shop Villain


    It all gives Javier Bardem, as the villain Raoul Silva, the freedom to overact with a zest that makes Kevin Bacon, as the campy gay hair-salon owner in Queen Latifah’s Beauty Shop, appear dignified and profoundly reserved. None of the scenes are safe from Bardem’s craving jaws (which, incidentally, he can yank from his mouth, a repulsive thing best viewed on an empty stomach, or best not viewed at all). Mendes attempts to give him a dramatic entrance—a long walk after coming out of an elevator to confront the Craig-Bond—but the camera work is so deep-focused that it’s distracting, and when we finally see him up close, we can barely look at the character without laughing. If you ask me, the Bond makers are fighting an uphill battle to present a spy thriller with a villain who resembles Stuart Smalley. Moreover, the script and direction reduce the character to a ridiculous harmless entity, and forces Bardem to spend too much time attempting to evoke sympathy when the audience is told of Silva’s suffering in the hands of the Chinese. The backstory itself is equally useless: the aforementioned ex-MI6 agent was betrayed by M for essentially being overenthusiastic in his duties during pre-handover Hong Kong days.

    Bardem’s character is also a variation of the flamboyant, pansexual villain in Quantum Of Solace, Dominic Greene, and we wonder whether Silva, at one point in his Bond villain career, was ever involved with Greene’s gay group Quantum. It seems the Bond makers regard these twisted characters as the epitome of Eurocoolness. The scene where Silva amuses himself by unbuttoning the Craig-Bond’s shirt and caressing the agent’s chest and legs will live on as the most revolting display of blatant political correctness in the series. Not only is it an awkward homoerotic scene, it also serves zero purpose in the plot, forcing us to wonder if it was inserted in the movie to heighten pre-release publicity with a risque buzz. Yet Craig’s Bond is more at ease in this scene rather than in his romantic interludes with Severine and the island girl—once again, the filmmakers are implying a quasi-gay Bond, calculated to draw the widest possible demographics by appeasing feminists and, at another level, appealing to gay audiences.

  • Posts: 1


    This is how I see it: Silva was a "shadow", living off the grid. Of course he would change his name. There's a good chance the blonde hair isn't even his natural color, and he's wearing contacts too.
    When he got the prosthetic jaw, he changed his entire identity.

    [/quote]

    I thought the Blond hair would have come from the fact that he ate Hydrogen cyanide? The colour is obviously not meant to be the original hair colour of the character and even his eyebrows are platinum blond, which would indicate it wasnt dyed.
  • 4EverBonded4EverBonded the Ballrooms of Mars
    Posts: 12,480
    I loved the entire performance by Bardem and I enjoyed the character a lot, as written and played. I have no nitpicking or problems with any of it. I thought it was an outstanding performance and clearly one of the best villains in series.
  • Posts: 3,333
    I much prefer Bardem's performance as Romeo Dolorosa in Perdita Durango than I did his Silva character in SF. If you want to see Javier Bardem showing exactly why is he considered the best Spanish actor of his generation and haven't seen Perdita Durango then you should maybe check this film out as it's one of the best performances of his career - much better than his work in SF.
Sign In or Register to comment.