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"Bond, James Bond" in Dr No. and almost every film thereafter is a glaring plot hole wouldn't you say?
Come on! You're just being silly. She is the head of the Secret Service. Her office has just been targeted in a terror attack. Who else were they targeting? It is utterly implausible that special measures would not be taken to protect her at such a time.
And what does her retirement have to do with it?
Any way, this was not by any means the main problem with SF - just emblematic of a general slackness in plot and detail.
Ironically, it's Roger who's had more aliases and cover stories than any other Bond.
No news so far but given Newman's relationship with Babs and MGW last time out, I wouldn't be surprised to see someone else. Hopefully, not DA though.
But don't you think with the success of SF and the creative freedom they must be giving Mendes that he will have his pick of composers? Assuming Newman wants to come back, I guess.
Read my post again before throwing insults. I said we do not know if surveillance to her home is being done or not. If there is, this does not prevent Bond to break and enter. Is it far fetched? Yes. Does realism leaves the way to dramatic effect? Certainly. But it is not something unheard of in a Bond movie, or a movie in general. MI6 is being attacked, not its head personally (not at this point anyway). I will repeat it again: M is not the head of state, she is not the head of government, she is a high ranking civil servant about to retire. They probably did do some kind of surveillance after the attack happened, but then again, her private home would not be guarded like Buckingham Palace, or 10 Downing Street, or the Parliament, or what have you. It was a terrorist attack on a governmental building, after all.
For a realistic treatment of the same basic plot (a terrorist attack on MI6), read the first volume of Queen & Country by Greg Rucka. It is aptly called Operation Broken Ground. Completely realistic, especially in their treatment of surveillance of the agent targeted by the Russian mob who did blow up the MI6 building. And I am telling you now: surveillance is minimal.
Any way, leaving this tedious argument to one side, just read this excellent interview with Mankiewizc posted by @Royale65 on another thread.
Very interesting. I really hope Logan reads it.
I like the bit about not covering Bond's perosnal life. Makes sense to me.
http://www.empireonline.com/interviews/interview.asp?IID=1101
Thinking on what Mankiewicz says in his interview, I'm then left remembering his actual films, which are amongst my least favourite in the series. Still, an interesting interview.
I'm more than happy about this, Fiennes is a terrific actor and his small role in SF was an exciting tease for great things to come. I know there are many purists on these forums that don't like the idea of M's role being increased significantly but I'm all for something new as long as it's done well like in SF. I recently saw Fiennes in 'The Grand Budapest Hotel' and he was fantastic, he displayed the charm of David Niven and comedic talents of Peter Sellers. I really recommend the film. He's a very versatile performer. I hope Mendes and co don't waste him. Worrying hairline aside.
I posted a similar comment just a while ago re Fiennes in TGBH. He is excellent in it and saves it from being just another over stylised Wes Anderson movie. It actually made me think what a great Bond he could have been.
It does actually make me slightly more relaxed about an expanded role for M in B24. As I've said before, little about SF impressed me, least of all the novelty of Dench as the 'Bond girl', but Fiennes is just so damn good, I think the prospect of him and Craig on screen together for some good meaty dialogue is quite exciting. Just hope Logan is up to the task.
I thought that was what CR had given us...? I'm really hoping B 24 is a little closer to CR and , dare I say it, B 22, than SF.
CR yes, but B24 will be a somewhat continuation of Skyfall. Hence my sentence and I agree. CR had a sleek film noir feel to it. Some more tension too.
I do want M's role to increase, albeit not like it was with Judi Dench. M can easily be Mycroft to Bond's Sherlock. In the novel TB, he is the one deducing SPECTRE's plan. I hope we can see something similar in Bond 24 and following.
In a way, it is not so much that M was overused during the Brosnan and Craig era, but it was not developed as it could have had before.
Fair point. Dench got a lot of screen time but not necessarily for any good reason. If they can write a proper hefty part for Fiennes and use him well, then that could be really good.
As far as I can assess, we're discussing the what to expect in terms of the style of the film on the back of recent comments given by Mendes. I don't want to fall into the trap of critiquing SF - but I do think it is worthwhile giving it consideration when building a wider picture for B24. I personally think it may provide some balance between the relative freshness of CR and the slickness of SF. Expect "clever" violence, deeper - even complicated - love/relationships, and dialogue that will make the best of whatever talent we have. On top of that, some classic action and solid (but not Deakinsesque) cinematography will feature heavily.
Re Mendes' most recent comments, I'm surprised that its "still being written" if shooting is supposed to start in October/November. What I think he means, is that it is going through rewrites before anything else is confirmed in terms of casting/shooting locations. The story will be there. Hell, one or two drafts of a script may have been produced... I just get the sense that Mendes is trying to excel himself (the only reason he came back to Bond, remember) and fix any "holes in the boat".
I have been waiting for someone to comment on "The Grand Budapest Hotel", because it has another significant link to the Bond universe: there is a long (though a bit unusual) action sequence in there paying homage to FYEO and OHMSS. I was amazed that nobody had commented on it so far, but maybe I missed it. It's a very entertaining film and I recommend it highly!
You and Ludovico try to teach us that you know how these things would happen in the "real world" as if you were expert in real word espionage... So much arrogance to try to "prove" that Skyfall's chain of events is realistic !? It's as much wishful thinking as saying that going from a 2-movie story arc to a standalone movie is a minor change :)
Come on ! One more MI6-based example : when Bond is captured by Silva, Silva proves him that he has access to MI6's secret files that had just been created on the new "secure" network : he reads him his secret exam reports. When Silva is back, is the network being checked to ensure the security breach is closed ? No, after a terrorist attack on the previous MI6 HQ based on security breach of the network, after the reveal that the new HQ network have also been compromised, it's still a HQ where Silva can make all the doors open because Q plugs his laptop...
I just watched the excellent X-Men Days of Future Past. At least now I know how Silva could escape his jail after the door opening despite the guard. His real name is Raoul Quicksilva.
And therefore you get a typical movie script with movie plot holes, not the "superb airtight script" some watched here.
I just checked. In the 74 nominations Skyfall got for various awards, it seems there was 0 nominations for the screenplay or the script. I'm afraid it's only here one can read it was a strength of the movie. Put a John Glen in bad shape at the helm of this script, everyone would dismiss it I think...
But I'll add some new (unecessary) short (I don't bother going into detail with this) thoughts to the discussion:
The claims that Skyfall supposedly has been put on a pedestal over any other Bond film, where do they stem from? Certain movie critiques probably have, but I don't think it speaks for many Bond fans overall, or most of the members on this forum. Skyfall is viewed, and should be viewed, as just another Bond film. A slightly different Bond film maybe, but a Bond film. The problem here seems not to be that Skyfall is overrated (how often to we see it get praised here enyway?), more that it's being attacked and howled at with arguments of questionable purpose, rational or relevance.
The film might have certain generic "blockbuster tropes" and short cuts, but so what? Really, so what?
The film has sparked a new era in Bond, an recruited many new Bond fans. Shouldn't that be viewed as a good thing after all?
But as some has hinted already, this is the time to draw a line on this discussion, or, if its really necessary (sigh...), move it to another thread.
Write that you think that Skyfall is as full of plotholes and weird character behaviours as Die Another Day, and see what happens :) As I wrote above, only here the script seems to be considered top notch by some... but they are very vocal. It seems that for some you just need to have some dialogs in pensive mood to make a script "profound" ! Maybe watching many French films have vaccinated me from that :)
And we know the original script for Bond24 was not liked by Mendes...
I've not made any reference to Skyfall. I was conversing with @bondsum about Bond 24. This isn't a Skyfall thread.
Mendes and Logan previous work was on Skyfall. Mendes has explained Bond 24 would continue on the themes of Skyfall. Mendes said the original work of Logan for Bond 24 was not to his taste, so it's interesting to discuss in Skyfall where the script flaws were, and which scenes were created more by the director than by the author (ie : scenes that work well as individual scenes, but throw away the plot). Ignoring it to discuss Bond 24 is a bit weird.
For instance, the DB5 in Skyfall is a director's dream, even though it makes what happens on screen at that moment look like some time travel paradox in Dr Who. I think we can expect such things in Bond 24 too. Mendes said he liked that scene a lot.
Yes the "themes" of SF. Not the "plot" of SF. The two really are quite different.
Where in this post are your discussing Bond 24? I see references to the security of M's home and the lack of award nominations for SF script.
You missed the part where I explain that going from a 2-story movie arc to a standalone movie is not a minor change. Some posts I reply to have strictly zero Bond 24 content though indeed, I hope you'll make the policeman for them too :)
I, for one, have decided, that I would TRY to not fall into tha rap again - this
"I am right"
No, I wanna be righter"
Gosh, folks, who else, but me is right?
Its incredibly tiring and I know, I have been guilty of it, but boy, its not fun. Put this together with the landslide of trolls, this side will have.... 8-X