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Comments
Connery did it first in FRWL. Not quite Kite surfing a Tsunami.
That is not the point. What I mean is that it is so extremely uncreative. The climax is probably the most important part of each film and much of the writers' ambition should be used for this. The usual formular is that you have to have a few twists, a few surprises. That Bond succeeds is pretty clear but surprise us how he is doing it. Simply shooting down the helicopter is really lame and uninspired.
But I also think SF had a powerful ending. Punchy, captures the essence of Bond and harkens back to the classic films. QoS's ending was also excellent, but the overall performances and atmosphere of the movie just aren't on par with Skyfall's, which is really just a superior product of film-making. So for me, it wins, no contest, though I can see QoS being underrated and perhaps deserving of a bit more credit.
Apart from the part about Spectre I very much side with you on this issue. Very, very much!
Quite frankly, it's one of the few recent Bond films which I really look forward to viewing all the way through to the end.
I will say this much for SF's ending - conceptually it is a great idea.
When I heard Mendes was setting the final scenes in the Highlands, I pictured a tense, atmospheric homage to Hitchcock's The 39 Steps, but what we got just falls flat for me.
The QoS desert climax is not a classic by any means, and conceptually it's about as run of the mill as you can get, but because I prefer the film in totality, I'm prepared to accept it for what it is.
To be honest I think any Bond film goes a long way to top OHMSS ending, it bettered YOLT's big battle and even SWLM in my view can't top it.
OHMSS set a high bar in a lot of departments that is yet to be surpassed.
I like all the climaxes to the DC films bar SPECTRE.
I don't look at them at flawless but I think the magnifying glass is being applied far more on these films than many would dare to on the previous era.
While us DC fans are being accused of overseeing things so are fans of the some of the classics as they are referred to.
Sometimes I think the word classic means nothing anymore, it just seems to mean vintage or old, some people would refer to DAF as a classic, says it all really.
The real test will be how these films fair in another 10 years say, CR will be twenty years old and SF 15.
Some are so convinced this era is going to date and be seen for a lot of hype and a bad time for the series, they are a product of their time, it will take some time before we can truly assess their place in the series.
I also agree that CR & SF will always be looked upon as excellent Bond films, but I think Connery is quite safe at the top of the pile for eternity. Nothing will touch those first four films, and even prior to SP's release I thought talk of Craig matching or surpassing him was rather overblown. B25 won't change that.
Bottom line is much of the iconic and much imitated memories and imagery of Bond come from those early films (60s in particular, but also the 70s). That will never change. It's part of the lexicon of this genre.
QoS better than Goldeneye and Skyfall. You're going to give me a stroke one of these days @Getafix
Is there really an other way to see it?
Well they are #4.#6 and#7 in my rankings at the moment,so I cant complain.
I have a theory (pure agism I know) that the younger fans likle QoS and the mature fans like SF. As I approach the "grumpy git" era,. obviously SF is my favourite. It really gives the characters space to breath and develop and it has far more emotional depth but ,I understand , that this "space" translates to slow for many fans.
It's also dumber than a box of rocks.
Agreed.
Only thing I mind in QoS is the editing and a little bit the music in SF.
The way I see it is: Goldeneye is one of the few films where everything just works really well (even Serra's score fits the film). It's a great movie that defined a new generation of Bond fans. Skyfall is also a great movie, the perfect film for the 50th anniversary, arguably the best looking Bond film and just what they needed to get things back on track. And Quantum of Solace is a crap rushed mess of a film that has no idea of what it wants to be except "not a James Bond film", that seemed to immediately squander all the potential of the reboot and made me wish they hadn't bothered.
Funny, I actually feel that tonally QoS is closer to the early Connery films. None of the Connery films drags like SF (apart from perhaps TB). Dr No, FRWL, GF - they're all nippy, well paced little thrillers. It's one of the main reasons I enjoyed QoS so much. Bond films have become so ponderous and perhaps slightly pretentious. QoS was a like a palette cleanser and just what was needed by the franchise.
I'm not remotely saying QoS is as good as those early films, just that in its brevity and relative lack of self consciousness it feels closer in spirit to the earlier films. I don't see any tonal similarities between SF and the early Connery films. In large part SF is actually a scene by scene remake of TMWTGG and has a similarly stodgy consistency to those early Hamilton-directed Moore entries. No surprise I suppose that Mendes was growing up around those films as a kid.
Get where you're coming from but for me it's not the choppy editing and (frankly repetitive and often superfluous) action in QoS that I enjoy, but the genuinely tense and dramatic scenes. Obviously Tosca, the initial meeting with Mathis, Greene's party, the Felix bar meet, Bond and Mathis on the plane, and various other bits and pieces scattered through the film. Having said that, the PTS car chase is actually very good IMO.
Despite its running time I never feel invested in the characters in SF. Bond is almost a supporting character. I always found Dench's M irritating. The most intriguing female character gets bumped off after a few minutes. Apart from that am I really supposed to be intrigued by Silva and the Scooby Gang? Another scene with Rory Kinnear? No thanks. Silva goes from a great entrance rapidly into pantomime villain territory. What always amazes me with SF and SP is just how little we get to know about any of the characters in what are 2 incredibly long Bond films. Mendes I think has a soft spot for over-wrought and padded dialogue - the SF screenplay needed a ruthless edit - much of the stodgy dialogue should have been cut. Being long does not necessarily mean you get to learn anything more about the character. SF doesn't contain what I call interesting character studies or gripping drama, although I understand why some people choose to interpret them this way.
I'd argue the albeit brief dramatic and character scenes we get in QoS are better written and directed than pretty much anything in SF, which is all stodgy style over substance.
And action is actually very important to the best Bond films. As F. Scott Fitzgerald said, "Action is character", which I think is too often forgotten. The action in QoS may be superfluous but it's better directed than the plodding tedium in SF. The PTS in SF is a dire, relentless, uninspired snore fest. Car, bike, train, digger... tick, tick, tick. It's like a bad action joke. Talk about derivative. Mendes himself regards it as one of the weakest parts of the film. He cannot direct action but (I think) insisted on directing it all himself any way.
Yes QoS is heavily Bourne inspired, but frankly, those first 3 Bourne films wiped the floor with Bond at the time. No wonder Babs was desperate to get on the bandwagon. And let's face it, the very fact that Craig was cast would probably have never happened without Bourne. Never forget that the alleged genius that is Martin Campbell was heavily in favour of Henry Cavill, arguably the most wooden leading man in Hollywood (definitely worse than Brosnan).
Also, the Bond character in QoS also feels very much like a continuation of Dan's performance in CR as well. It's a taut, quite up-tight and punchy take on the character.
By SF (and SP), it feels like we are watching a different Bond. That's not a bad thing in itself, but I guess I prefer CR and QoS Craig to what came after.
In terms of SF, I was more referring to its style and ambience evoking the earlier films in my prior post. My comment about pacing was more in direct comparison to its predecessor QoS. It's definitely more bloated than the earliest Connery films though, and you could be right that Mendes was influenced by Hamilton's work with Moore given his age, but then again I really like those entries.
QoS does not really deliver any of these aspects. Neither is Craig very iconic as Bond, not are there many iconic scenes in that film which are remembered in the future. QoS also does not make us care about Bolivia at all. We hardly see anything of it. Most of the time, the film takes place in random hotels or buildings. Bond hardly interacts with local people. Furthermore, whereas Dr. No is iconic as a villain, Greene is not....
I'm not suggesting in any way that it's in DN's league. The first film is without doubt one of the greatest Bond films of all time with the greatest actor to ever play the part delivering one of his best performances as the character.
MI6_Cart, although I appreciate your viewpoint on QUANTUM OF SOLACE, I am not completely certain that I agree with your comments on SKYFALL.
I think that QOS is a very mis-maligned film. As MI6_Cart points out, the film appears to
have a lot happening that is more of an undercurrent, rather than the obvious veneer, which is clearly visible on first viewing. If one watches the film with an eye toward the sub-plot occurrences, then things take shape that alters your perception of the overall movie.
With Bond being the voice of reason for Camille in her quest for vengeance from Medrano, Bond's character displays some of the growth that M suggested a "blunt instrument" would find difficult in Casino Royale. At last, the "blunt instrument" gathers some of the perspective that he will need when he eventually confronts Vesper's former lover. With Yusef Kabirain in his pocket and the female Canadian operative dismissed with a warning, Bond can do as he pleases and get some payback for Vesper. Instead he merely turned the POS over to the proper authorities. After a brief discussion with M, Bond drops Vesper's necklace in the snow, his revenge is complete and he ascribes no value to the Algerian Love Knot any longer and simply walks away. Though he tried to hide his feelings for Vesper throughout the movie, whenever he is confronted with her memory his emotions are pretty transparent, especially for the individuals he works with. Intelligence community staffers are trained observers and have a good deal of training to discern motivations in others. There is little chance of Bond being able to fool any of them as he deals with Vesper's death, her betrayal and the people behind that betrayal, e.g., Kabirain. Bond's hope of disguising his emotions about Vesper are simply wasted time. When he confronts Kabirain, Bond does "the right thing" in the end. I'm not sure I would have been able to let the guy off the hook that easily.
Something that MI6_Cart pointed out: "...Camille as a non-sexualized Bond girl..." Absolutely true, I thought it demonstrated growth in Bond and kept a professional attitude between him and Camille.
The only serious problem I have with QUANTUM OF SOLACE is the MTV video-like editing. It's just fast at times and kind of jerky, for my tastes.
In spite of having some issues with SKYFALL, it is still a very good movie. Though the more I watch it, with critical eyes, the more I am convinced it is not quite the "amazing" movie I initially thought it was.
Some background on me: Among other careers, I'm an internet engineer and spent a decade doing it for a living beginning before there was a World Wide Web. Anyway, I know about computer networks and network security. My question is why, oh why, would an allegedly smart cookie and techno genius like Q plug an enemy's computer into MI6's secure network without precautions? When Q pulls that idiotic move, all hell breaks loose, just as Silva had hoped. It is beyond stupid and there is only one reason it would happen: to ramp up the plot.
One of the other plot issues I have is that Bond takes M to Skyfall. What? Why would he do that? Again, there is only one reason that I can think of and that is to increase the tension in the plot, that's it. It is certainly not the course of action that someone well versed in personal protection would take. He hasn't been there for years, he doesn't know for certain what type of weaponry will be available to him there and if he has trouble that is beyond his ability to handle he has no back up plan at all. Who, in their right mind, would head to Skyfall for a "last stand" against Silva? I wouldn't and I'd be willing to wager that anyone reading this who has any tactical training, like Bond should have, would do it either. It is just a really bad idea. He had no idea that Kincaid was still residing there! That certainly shows that he knows zero about the current state of affairs at Skyfall.
These two major problems bring to my mind the real culprit; lazy story telling, plain and simple.
How much were Logan, Purvis and Wade paid for this script?
The correct answer is: TOO BLOODY MUCH!
Oh and Michael Wilson is said to have developed the story idea during the filming of QUANTUM OF SOLACE, so he needs to shoulder some responsibility too.
I enjoyed reading your comments MI6_Cart. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
Best to all-
kia