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
More like the other way around. Brosnan was working very hard to keep himself in the public's eyes I think, and as the legitimate Bond, so to speak. His whole pre-Bond career was aimed at Bond and built on Bond.
100% with you on this.
Daniel Craig is a much better actor.
Although I do prefer Daniel Craig as an actor, I would not go that far. He is, however, far more comfortable with everything Bond: with the icon, the media attention, the baggage the character brings. Again, this is partially due to circumstances: Brosnan was the heir apparent in 1987, which must have brought incredible pressures to Dalton. Brosnan had no heir in 2005 when Craig was cast and, while he had his fans who wanted him to carry on, he was no longer making unanimity.
Dalton is actually a very good actor. I just think it's down to timing. No one was looking for the kind of changes they brought in 1989 with LTK and it was too much for a lot of people. Like him or not, Roger Moore had also cast a long shadow and anyone who tried to mess with his long standing interpretation was bound to hit resistance from the general public.
I didn't say he wasn't.
Craig's just that much better.
TD projected an entirely different set of qualities closer to SC, which is why I suspect so many SC loyalists didn't object much to TD.
I don't think Dalton failed so much as LTK failed him. They needed to go all the way dark with the film for it to succeed in my opinion. They got cold feet and tried to add some classic Bondian elements and some humor and it just falls flat. Add in the fact that the ending is so happy and there are no consequences for Bond and you have a film devoid of any meaning.
I agree that it was too soon to go down that route with Dalton. The jury was still out on him as far as the public was concerned and then they gave us something so different. It was an important failure though as it set up things to come. I will give them credit for having the guts to shake things up a bit but the execution was a little lacking.
The problem with LTK for me was they were straddling the two universes. They should have just gone all in (no matter how dark it would have been). The classic Bondian elements were a little out of place in it, and the Bouvier whining was annoying.....in both Dalton films they tried to keep him less promiscous but there was a schmaltzy element to it for me that seemed a little out of place.
I also agree that these were necessary lessons, as was TWINE imo.
When we got round to CR, EON knew exactly how to make a serious Bond film without the classic elements and also how to make their Bond still retain his masculinity in the face of love. They wouldn't have been able to succeed so well with CR if not for the learning process that came before.
Also I disagree with the premise of the thread. TLD did perfectly well at the box office and is generally regarded as pretty good. LTK fared less well in the US but performed fine everywhere else. So Daltons second film was not a huge success? So what. Remind you of anyone else? TMWTGG hardly set the box office alight but EON and Rog came back with Spy and rest is history.
With Pam?
I agree that the upbeat ending is fine. But I think Bond should have ended up in the sack wit pam and lupe! That would have cemented Daltons legendary status!
Yeah, they could have wrapped that bit up a bit better.
As a rule, the movie-going masses are not the brightest bunch. They will swallow just about anything the movie industry churns out - as long as it is in keeping with the general zeitgeist. Dalton's gritty 'blunt instrument' take on the character went against the grain of what the average cinema-goer had been fed throughout the 1980’s.
All that changed in the 00’s. Brooding, dark, ‘realistic’ heroes were completely in-vogue once Craig’s 007 came along – and not only due to the Bourne series. EoN obviously paid attention to the snowballing super hero movie-market after Brian Singer’s X-Men series struck box office gold, and once Nolan’s gutsy ‘noir-ish’ approach to Batman Begins (which was not considered to be a sure thing before it was released back in 2005, not by a long way) proved successful it was a complete no brainer, really.
Dalton would have been a HUGE hit if he had become Bond any time after 2005 rather than when he did in ’86 …
Chr*st yes! Blade Runner is such a magnificently bleak, dystopian downer of a film – that type of sci-fi noir just didn’t stand a chance in ’82.
To put it into perspective - this was a movie going public that had been narcotized on a steady celluloid-diet of Star Wars, Close Encounters’, Rocky, Superman, Moonraker and Raiders of the lost Ark. There was no way they were going to opt to have to turn on their brains & immerse themselves in Blade Runner when they could get all cozy doped up on E.T and Tootsie !!
I wonder if by LTK the perception of Dalton as Bond was already sealed. When he said it might be the last Bond movie, you could feel his frustration.
I love LTK as much as I do CR. To me they are cut from the same cloth, both have the most violent scenes in the franchise, and both feel like Fleming.
Dalton's take feels more like the Fleming literary character, and Dan's take feels more of a cinematic interpretation in the mould of Connery, which is why ultimately I think he has been accepted more than Dalton.
He could still play Bond now! ;)
Half of me wanted McClory to makes Warhead 2000, especially when there were rumours he wanted Dalton. Not that Tim would have done it.