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Please do join me in squealing like a little girl if B24's director can deliver on this sort of brutality :)
Action is what primarily disappointed me of Skyfall :( , I can only hope with Mendes gone B24 has the potential to deliver on this.
While I loved SF, I do agree that the action wasn't as intense in most scenes as QoS was, mainly thinking of the fight scene in Macau. I did love the fight between Patrice and Bond in both Shanghai and Turkey.
Haha! glad you see it :) .
Macau fight scene was terrible in my opinion.
Patrice fights both of them were good in theory but they could have been executed more brutally and bumped up the intensity, the fact that the bar hasn't been raised saddens me .
This is Bond ! We used to be the pioneer of set piece action ;)
and can people stop asking Danny Boyle i mean jeez find a new director to pester people
Watch it again buddy , watch all 3 of them back to back you'll get a clearer perspective minus the hype ! ;)
It's not just the quality of the choreography. They lacked any intelligence - that special something that sets a good Bond action sequence apart from the crowd. Motorbikes on rooftops, train top fight, chase on train and tube, helicopter blowing up a building - seen it all before and better elsewhere. It's just all a bit dull and tired. Like Mendes knew he had to have lots of action, but either didn't have the inclination or ability to put the thought and creativity into it to do it really well. Some of the 'dramatic' scenes in the film are done very well - like Silva's entrance and the casino dialogue with Severine - you can tell Mendes is in his element. But IMO he failed to integrate action with character and narrative. That's where he could have learned a thing or two from John Glen.
It was not only shorter my friend, It lacked that sense of threat and danger the Bond-Slate was at the same length of Bond-Patrice, but the quality of action are poles apart
Oh I don't know. It's not my job is it?
This is totally unrelated, but one thing I would have changed re the plot is that I would have had the hard-drive with the list of agents as belonging to the Americans - leaked or sold to the highest bidder by a disgruntled CIA agent. Thus Bond is seeking to intercept the deal or retrieve the disk and clear up a US mess. This would have been more in line with the old movies, where Uncle Sam is constantly walking into bear traps and Bond is the one who saves the day. One thing I really disliked about SF is how it depicted MI6 and most of its staff as totally incompetent. I mean, what's the Point of a Bond movie where Bond risks his life to save a bunch of idiots. In the past the other 00s were always depicted as competent and brave - but just not quite as good or lucky as Bond - but he was amongst people that he respected and could largely rely upon. In SF MI6 are a shambles.
How exactly was MI6 incompetent, considering they had to downgrade to survive. Plus, we don't even see 00s in the film. You could argue Eve is one, but she doesn't strike me as a seasoned agent like Bond.
Oh I do. That's the whole point of Bond isn't it? I don't think it's remotely true for a second, but it's part of the Bond narrative.
Can't go through it right now but thought it was obvious. Perhaps easier to ask what does MI6 and its staff actually do right at any point in the film?
Here Here! The Daltonites are very quick to make out his films are superior and forget these things, anything to bash SF and praise TLD & LTK, which are pretty flawed films anyway, the only thing that is constant in his 2 entries his Dalton.
LTK if it lost the Bond theme and the cliches would be Dalton's equivalent of QOS, Bond goes rogue on his own agenda and seeks revenge although QOS looks better and is nowhere as cheap looking as LTK, as for TLD it's a Moore film with a few tweaks and a terrific debut from Tim. The story is nothing different to what we've seen before, Dalton is the biggest difference, he's what makes his era not John Glen's so called amazing direction that seems to be now being called as justifying SF's weaknesses.
But there are few workmanlike directors in the UK like Terence Young, Guy Hamilton or Lewis Gilbert, who had other work done, okay mainly the latter like Alfie and Reach for the Sky. In a way I'd opt for Hugh Grant directors, because his films have a British warmth, while getting in a first-rate second unit guy to deliver the action.
Take that new Welcome to the Punch director. Obviously angling for Bond, and no shame in that, but reviews suggest his film is all style no substance and no heart.
i dont know whether i stand with the majority or minority on this one... but I had no problem with it, only because the story didn't call for it... one thing i don't like to see is action shoehorned into a film for the sake of action...
as brilliant as i feel FRWL is, the whole helicopter bit was shoehorned in, and makes no real sense to the rest of what was going on - it's only purpose was to rip off North By Northwest, and to add just one more action piece... they could've gone from the train to the boat with no problem - maybe it was all an excuse to explain why Connery had put on that stupid captains hat lol... but i digress....
QOS i felt like had some good action moments (the ones you could see) - like Bond's fight with Slate, some of opera shoot out, and the end at Perla De Las Dunas.. even the PTS wasn't as confusing as the boat chase... but it was overkill, QOS was the perfect example of 'action for the sake of action'... and if thats what people want, god bless them.. for me, i want a little more meat with my potatoes please... so while SF might not have more than 3 or 4 action/fight pieces, it definitely felt more conducive to the story than merely just thrust into a plot for no reason whatsoever like in QOS... the whole bit in Shanghai with Bond following then dropping Patrice off a building i felt was masterfully executed, even right down to Newman's score.. the only part i didn't like was Bond doing his best to look like Rob Halford from Judas Priest in the Shanghai airport lol.
The Skyfall train scene was unnecessary long and was action just for the sake of action ,
Now if we remove that and all other 'action for the sake of action'. we're gonna be left with none!
Its a matter of fact that action is made for the sake of action , since its an action movie after all.
Now imagine if they wanted to make it out to be how any sort of gun violence happens in the real world. Just a few shots fired and people die or injure on the spot. No running on top of trains and such sort of crazy's though it will be more realistic and it won't be action for the sake of action, It will be dull for the audience and their won't be any sense of enjoyment. That's a movie I would gladly skip ;)
Action is not made for the sake of action, its made to give that joy ride kind of feeling, with thrills and excitement which ultimately boils down to how it is executed, which Skyfall fell short on compared to its predecessors .
I also see the sinking building sequence at the climax of CR as this: action just because EON wanted the film to have one last big action piece, style over substance. I would much rather have had an emotional piece where true to Fleming Bond finds Vesper dead in her bed with her suicide note. Dan would have emotionally sold that scene and it would have been far more rewarding to get even deeper into Bond's psyche and examine his shock and feeling of betrayal in that moment as opposed to having an action sequence that seems to only be there to fit one more big bang up into the film before credits rolled. A big missed opportunity that would have really sold the film home even more with sheer emotional content alone.
I must say that I've been slowly warming to the idea of Fincher over the last couple of weeks. He has a pre-existing relationship with Craig, could attract some great talent to the project, has an interesting visual style, and is quite well regarded.
The biggest concern that I have when I think of Fincher is that he's one of those creative people who came of age in the early 90s where everyone was indoctrinated in the "dark and disturbing" school of art. In other words, if something is fun or light it's an insult to and betrayal of "art" (this school of thought applies from everything from music to movies to even comic books). Now, I'll be the first to admit that this could perhaps be a knee-jerk reaction (I was so tired of grunge music and films with brown colour palates in the early 90s) and that I'm not being fair to him. Perhaps he could have the lightness of touch that's needed for a Bond film - even Craig's films have some great humour along side the seriousness.
I suppose that the worst case scenario would be what happened with QoS - EON gives the director too much free reign and he imposes too much of his personal style on the film. However, given the success of the Craig era in delivering quality product (although not to everyone's tastes) I'll give Fincher the benefit of the doubt.
i define 'action for the sake of action' a little different than probably you do... i understand that action sequences are often times drawn out, overblown, and very unrealistic in terms to what would happen in real life - thats where suspension of disbelief comes into play when dealing with action films... half the crap Bond does during action sequences in all his films could not possibly be achieved in real life (notice i said half, because some excellent practical stunts they have pulled off without the sake of CGI or wired assistance).. that is part of the fantasy of it.. all action films do it...
what i classify as action for the sake of action, is cramming in a scene (like i mentioned in FRWL with the helicopter) that makes absolutely no sense in forwarding the plot of the film, and it's merely there to take up space - i could argue that the train sequence in SF was led up to by the bike chase before it, which was led up to by the brief car pursuit before that - all of which though is predicated by Bond trying to get to Patrice to get the stolen hard drive back.. so the action sequence that follows makes sense.. as do all the others in SF... the only one i could possibly make the case for being shoehorned in was the bit at the casino, but that was really is it.. the rest of the action was there to perfectly forward the plot of the film..
in CR, the only bit that felt like 'action for the sake of action' was probably the sinking house at the end.. but i understand that Bond films usually end with a big action set piece at it's climax, so even though it was shoehorned in, it doesn't really offend me..
though the Miami airport sequence sort of feels like the same thing, it really isn't - because the plot of the film can't happen without it.. we knew Le Chiffre was planning something big involving a 'terrorist attack' - only the full details of what he was doing wasn't made aware to us until after the fact when M meets with Bond... therefor, the film set that scene up beforehand, and it managed to further the plot of film going forward.. because of Bond's interference, Le Chiffre needs to set up the poker game in order to get himself out of the red..
could all of that had been done without any action? of course.... but it's a Bond movie, action is expected lol.
Yes in FRWL they could've gone from the train to the boat no problem but they wanted to add an action scene to make things more entertaining.
Every Bond film has action for the sake of action, SF included. Take CR, Bond could've just shot the bomb maker in the leg when he started running off, not killing him, but injuring him. Why didn't he do that? Because without it we wouldn't have an awesome parkour chase.
Filmmakers don't only put in action scenes when they're needed. They put them in because they're entertaining and people expect to see them in a Bond movie. Pretty much every action scene is action for the sake of action.