It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
^ Back to Top
The MI6 Community is unofficial and in no way associated or linked with EON Productions, MGM, Sony Pictures, Activision or Ian Fleming Publications. Any views expressed on this website are of the individual members and do not necessarily reflect those of the Community owners. Any video or images displayed in topics on MI6 Community are embedded by users from third party sites and as such MI6 Community and its owners take no responsibility for this material.
James Bond News • James Bond Articles • James Bond Magazine
Comments
"For some reason the second one is a lot of people's favourite of my Bonds. I much prefer the first one".
(Quote from Dalton in James Bond Unmasked)
I had a blast as always. It still remains my #2 Bond film, primarily on the strength of Connery's uber cool & confident performance, Claudine Auger's sultry Domino and her scenes with Bond, Paluzzi's icy cold and sharp Fiona Volpe & Adolfo Celi's thuggish Emilio Largo. Sure, the underwater stuff drags on a bit and the pacing could be tighter in the latter half, but I still love it. The holiday atmosphere and dreamy score are intoxicating and pull me in every time. In fact, this time around I realized just how instrumental Barry's score is to making me enjoy this film. Without his expertise during the many essentially non talking scenes I probably would still rank it high, but not quite so high. Having viewed this and a few Moore films recently, I realize how good he and Connery were as Bond. The trick: Both of these two were just so effortless with the absurd stuff. Case in point: Bond's seduction of Pat shortly after suffering on the rack is ridiculous on the face of it, but Connery sells the scene.
The scene of the divers hiding the plane underwater would not be the same without Barry.
Saw QOS again recently. Maybe I should be posting this in the "Controversial opinions about Bond films" thread.... lol.... because I loved this movie when I first saw it in the cinema and it still holds up as one of the strongest Bond films in the series for me.
I'll never quite understand the hate that this film gets. For being made during a writer's strike (I believe Craig has been on record as saying the film was written on the go (but, hell, it worked for Iron Man), which was difficult for everyone involved), the film was able to weave a number of very strong narrative threads about Bond's loyalties/motivations, revenge, and features a lot of character for Craig to chew on (and he's phenomenal). The role of Camille is even fleshed out deeper than your usual Bond girl. The dialogue is great too - I love the exchange between Bond and Mathis that's basically ripped out of chapter 20 of Fleming's Casino Royale; there's great little flakes of humor throughout ("she's seasick"); and there's hardly a more to-the-point, spot-on line that sums up Bond in the series next to "I'm motivated by my duty." Sure, some of the editing is quick and dense in some parts but I don't see any full-on "shaky cam" - Forster wasn't playing it safe and made an incredibly stylish movie when all is said and done, I certainly prefer a more interesting looking film to a bland one; these are supposed to be moving pictures, after all. QOS is 4 minutes shorter than DN - that's not exactly a sin in my book but some people seem to freak out about how supposedly short the film is. The word I'd use is "taut" - it's fast-paced, atmospheric and exciting; with some classic scenes (at the opera; Bond at the end with Vesper's betrayer and with M ("I never left" - beautiful)) and David Arnold really punches up the film with a wonderful score.
All in all, it's a fantastic coda to CR - sure, Bond will return in even better form in SF but QOS shows us that Bond never really leaves. Despite the vitriol it seems to get, I have a hard time seeing QOS leaving the 11-13 range of my Bond rankings (and sometimes it dips its foot into the top 10).
Favorite Element: Daniel Craig as James Bond.
Favorite Scene: Bond's night at the opera.
Brosnan is comfortable in the role and could have done one more while EON was in preparation for CR with a new 007.
And I really love the sword fight in DAD and the comment at the end of that setpiece by the valet was priceless.
Thunderball has always ranked somewhere around the middle of my overall Bond film rankings. It was the last Connery Bond I saw (and that's taking Never Say Never Again into account), and when I first saw it, I largely forgot about it in the days to follow. Connery gives another flawless performance, and dare I say his last "good" performance, but I'll talk about that when I watch YOLT. The characters for the most part aren't that memorable. Largo feels weak compared to the villains of the previous 3 films, Domino is bland, and the henchmen (save Fiona Volpe) are boring. The underwater sequences aren't that breathtaking either. While it isn't my least favorite Connery Bond, it's far from the best for me.
@Jazz007, fully agreed, and I don't get the hate either (I feel the same about TB and SP in this way). QoS tells such a great subtle story, and is by far the greatest example of Bond going against his agency's wishes (even though he really doesn't, at least when it comes to the uncorrupted M) that we've ever seen in the entire series. The filmmakers were able to take the concept of a modern Bond film and surprisingly tell a story about forgiveness, loyalty, grief and acceptance, all built around Bond gradually going through those stages of grief.
The script is structurally brilliant, as is the very human dialogue that has a great sound to it throughout. It's one of the best Bond scripts ever, very economical and brave in pacing, theme and continuity. It's also the only Bond film along with just DN or FRWL where I don't think there's any point where you question what the script is telling you or things don't add up. What you see is what you get, and the film doesn't try to trick you.
Be sure to visit our QoS appreciation thread here on the forum if you want to gush more about its strengths, or discuss anything about it in general:
http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/1117/quantum-of-solace-appreciation-thread-we-found-a-better-place-to-meet#latest
Wonderful to see another sane person! QoS has been my favorite Bond film for quite a while and I have adored it since the opening night.
I have a soft spot for this one. To say this is the one in the series where it really begins to distance itself from the source material, I am an admirer of the film, I would rather EON follow up Thunderball with a different Fleming book (since they had always wanted to do OHMSS, but the need for winter locations delayed filming), rather than mess up the order of the books. But that aside, it's very entertaining. Connery does look bored in this movie, and dare I say starts to show some age. Donald Pleasence, though iconic and a good villain, felt like somewhat a let down, especially when compared to the faceless Blofeld of FRWL, and Thunderball. However, he has this creepy glance in his eyes, that is very unsettling and unnerving. I do wish they would've combined the two Bond girls into one character, but I prefer Aki, over Kissy. Tiger Tanaka was a very badass ally, I wished they had filmed a final decent scene with him, but oh well. To say this was the first Bond film to really emphasize on the over the top aspects, it still manages to be entertaining. While not being as good as the first three, I believe it's an improvement over Thunderball. Now, I can't wait to watch OHMSS!
The question is, do you feel lucky? Well, do you....punk? This is what I asked myself before making the decision to put myself in harm's way. You see, I've been having a blast going through some older Bond films recently. I had started with 24 out of 24 for me (TWINE) as I normally do, because getting that PoS out of the way first always helps me.
Therefore I approached DAD's turn with some trepidation tonight, because I didn't want my momentum spoiled. Well, I needn't have worried. I had a great time with it. The revelation was Brosnan as Bond. He truly is excellent in this film, especially in the earlier half. He's pretty bad after the legendary CGI surf debacle, but I can't blame him for that. Anyone would suck after such a disgrace, and especially with what he had to deal with in the plane. The rest of the cast is pretty OTT and camp throughout, but very entertaining to watch, especially Toby. Halle however is truly useless (one of the poorest Bond girls in my view), but even she has a redeeming feature: she's great to look at.
There's a lot of money up there on the screen, apart from the CGI nonsense. I have to say, I enjoyed the somewhat cartoonish XXX aspect of it all. Great fun & entertainment, even if it's a joke of a Bond film.
Was always last on my list but I might need to change my ratings....
Connery is so good in this. Funny, arrogant and looks like he's really enjoying himself. Yeah Blofeld has the wrong actor, the story is stupid and the climax is crap. But it also has some great stuff too. Bond vs Franks in the elevator, the Mustang chase and that cool scene where Bond uses the piton gun to get to the penthouse suite.
Great Barry score too. And Jill St John sizzles!
Maybe I was wrong about this film or I've had too much whisky......
There's so amazing themes and moments in there, best of which is the noir-styled plot where Bond is essentially a Marlowe like private detective on the hunt for diamonds. People sleep on the film big time, but I shan't any longer!
Thunderball
EDIT: I see the sarcasm now.
The transition from Connery to Lazenby was one that bothered me growing up and watching the films. This one didn't hit with me as a kid, I found so much of it boring, it wasn't until watching the film a few years ago that I realized how much of a jewel it is in the series. Lazenby plays Bond with a physicality we wouldn't see in a Bond actor until Daniel Craig. For how wooden he could be in some scenes, his screen time with Diana Rigg, the definitive Bond girl in my humble opinion, is just superb. Telly Salavas plays Blofeld in this one. Of the all the screen Blofelds, Salavas is my second favorite (behind Dawson/Phoulman.) He, like Lazenby, has a physicality to him we don't see in much other Bond films. You could argue he kicks Bond's arse during the bobsleigh chase sequence. The action sequences and love scenes are what make the film for me, and it's tragic ending is always one that hits me like a shovel. I can officially say that OHMSS is tied with FRWL for being my favorite Bond film. Pure class.
Yeah agreed @0BradyM0Bondfanatic7
Have you got a link to that review?
http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/3468/diamonds-are-forever-1971#latest
But soon I'll be doing minor edits and adding pictures and other graphics to back up my points when I publish it on my Bond blog. I can send you the link to that sometime when I have it completed, but if you don't want to wait around for that, that's fine.
Thanks! Good stuff.
Finally, someone I can agree with on the Craig films
Having read the superb review by Brady regarding the film, I walked into this movie with an open mind set. And it sure did pay off. I had a lot of fun with the film. It's one of those movies where you have to take it for what it is. Connery gives a better performance here than in YOLT, even though he has aged quite badly in the 4 years between these films. Kidd and Wint are some of my favorite Bond henchmen, and Jill St. John is great in the scenes she's in. Charles Gray provides a campy portrayel of Blofeld, one which I don't mind. The only thing that slightly gets to me would be the actor they hired to play Felix Lieter, and Lana Wood also, can't really say I enjoyed them to be honest.
At the moment I have it above both GF and YOLT for Connery, as it's a far more original script with more interesting ideas and a lot of interesting themes, well staged action, location shooting, music and much in between. It's the ultimate "James Bond survives the desert city of lights" tale with all the mythic and medieval imagery that idea elicits and I love the kudos it appears to pay to the detective genre, as Sean's Bond so often was that kind of detective and spy blend on his missions. All in all, I find it a far more satisfying and rewarding finale for him than YOLT could ever hope to be, and have 180ed on it entirely from three or four years past.
He didn't age badly, he let himself go!
Based on how he looked in NSNA, The Great Train Robbery and for that matter, The Rock, there is no reason Sean could not have looked basically the same as he did in GF and TB. Rather, he's out of shape has an ill fitting hairpiece and his eyebrows are in Darby O' gill and the Little people territory .
Sean received a hefty payday for DAF He should have come in lean, fit and groomed.