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Interesting points about Silva. I think I wrote the other day how it’s a misreading of the film when some people say Silva wins. By his own standards he completely fails, and even blowing up MI6 is fruitless in the long run.
I think he’s a wonderful villain. I love the parallels between him and Bond with both being M’s best agents, suffering due to M’s orders, and going off the map for a time before returning after being ‘dead’ as it were. The major difference is when MI6 is attacked Bond realises he has a job to do and selflessly returns, while Silva effectively goes mad because of personal vengeance. While Bond returning for a higher duty is his redemption in this story, Silva’s motivations are what lead to his undoing.
I do like Amalric though, I do believe him as a slimy, unhinged baddie. I guess he's perhaps not very big in his performance which makes him slightly unmemorable, but I think he works really well in the film. I often think he could have played Le Chiffre and done a good job.
I actually think the Craig films all had pretty good baddies really, less hit and miss than Brosnan's or Moore's.
Imagine if they got rid of Medrano and had Greene be who killed Camille’s family. At least there would be a bit more conflict between Bond and Camille because they have the same target but where he wants information out of him she just wants to kill him.
That's actually quite neat. I like it! I think Camille in QOS is a character who shows Bond the pitfalls of going for revenge, hence why he doesn't kill Yussief by the end. This would have tightened that a bit more and strengthened it.
We could have gotten a more streamlined fight between Bond and Greene too. Instead of cross cutting to the General and Camille we could have gotten a TB type thing where Greene is about to get the upper hand on Bond, but Camille kills him just in time. Perhaps they'd need to find another way for Bond to get the information about Quantum, but that seems like an easy rewrite (I dunno, maybe Greene says something about Vesper to taunt Bond during the fight that gives him a clue about Yussief, which is very in keeping with the character being a nasty little sh*t who gets inside people's heads). And Greene would have gotten a better death.
Is the death in the desert a homage to The Eiger Sanction?
That is literally the same situation as with Le Chiffre though: they want to bring him in so they can interrogate him. And I think there's not much wrong with Le Chiffre's role in that story.
Yes that's nice, although I do like all of the stuff with Greene seducing Medrano, and then revealing that he's screwed him at the end, that is good.
They could have done more with Camille's journey though- the underground dam is kind of like what the stingers were to Bond in LTK, the moment where they realise there's more going on than just their personal revenge.
What I liked about Greene was that he was an "out in the open" villain: a very public figure. To most he was a successful businessman and political influencer, even presented himself as eco-friendly (the Greene Project fundraiser was a nice touch). But there is a dark side, of course. I really thought Blofeld should have been portrayed similarly.
That would be crazy.
Olga does not get enough credit for this film. I think she's good in it and has easy chemistry, especially with Amalric.
Like SP, QoS has solid building blocks that don't quite cohere--IMHO there were too many disconnected action sequences. Another draft of the script would have helped.
What grips me is the sheer incompetence of its characters.
Bond: has two major missions and fails them both.
Silva: has an immense arsenal behind him yet uses it to kill his old boss at a meeting, for some reason, though she is already discredited and being shipped out. Publicly murdering her would prompt sympathy, wouldn't it? Easily the worst motivation ever for a Bond villain.
M: gets sacked for gross incompetence and killed. Imagine either of these happening to Bernard Lee.
Q: smugly allows the bad guys to hack into the M16 mainframe five minutes after it was originally breached, resulting in further fatalities. Essentially not sacked for doing something which got his boss sacked. Also, takes the p out of Llewellyn era GoldenEye gadget. You're good, Wishaw, but you ain't all that!
Moneypenny: no longer Bond's office flirt but a serious, independent lady with smarts and skills of her own. Which makes her descent into secretary all the more disappointing. She redeems herself towards the end yet is still relegated to flirty sec.
Mallory: his major incompetence is writ large in NTTD, however using The Troubles to vindicate his chops doesn't work. Not because the IRA weren't awful, just because the British committed serious atrocities of their own during that conflict. Properly understood this should prompt suspicion more than anything else.
Tanner: briefs Bond in the car, the weights room, the shooting room...why not just brief him in one sitting, Bill? Also fails to get his boss to safety on several occasions.
That's before we assess the terrible plot, lack of action sequences, parlous dialogue, cgi komodo dragons and the rightly condemned shower scene.
Tell me where I'm wrong.
I'd say it's an interesting film in the sense no one completely achieves what they want, although Bond certainly comes out of it the best and I'd say 'wins'. Worth saying his plan by the end was fundamentally to counter attack and kill Silva, as not only was the man on an obsessive, vendetta driven mission to murder M, but he was in the process of completely dismantling MI6 too. While M dies Bond killing Silva ultimately means the day is saved in a broader sense (and insofar as it's a more low key Bond story anyway, which is fine).
I get the sense you're overthinking the stuff about the public sympathy to be honest. I'd argue Silva actually has one of the best motivations for a Bond villain because it's so simple and works so well with the story.
Bond and Silva are very similar to the point they're almost mirror images of each other. They both nearly die and suffer wounds due to M's actions, they both go 'into the wilderness' afterwards, and use their presumed deaths to do so. The difference is Silva becomes obsessed with anarchy, revenge, and destroying M/MI6, while Bond answers the call of duty and returns despite his physical condition and issues with M. I love it personally because it shows so clearly what Bond's virtues are - his heroism you can say - and uses the villain/story to convey that. Everyone's different but for me it works well and makes it an engaging film.
To be fair neither Lee nor Brown's M were always virtuous nor competently competent (Brown's M could be outright antagonistic towards Bond, as could Lee's). Different version of the character though.
I mean, not sure what else they could have done in the sense that they incorporated Moneypenny in this one. I like that she's more involved in the story though, but that's just me.
I think you're overthinking it. His background with him being held captive and not giving up information is just a way of giving the audience a sense of his character. I think it works.
The split up speech is very funny when you notice it and actually very typical in movies.
I mean, bad effects aren't uncommon even in my favourite Bond movies (the old ones had noticeable rear projections, obvious stunt-men and continuity issues) so I don't mind the CGI dragons. The older Bond movies had comparatively fewer action scenes - less than SF in fact - and they're still awesome, so I'd say it's more about how the film engages people. I don't see any major problems with the plot or story. The dialogue I thought was a massive improvement on CR's (we don't get cringey lines like 'you know what I can do with my little finger' but we do get the rat speech which I'd say is one of my favourite villain speeches in all of Bond).
The shower scene I can understand even if it can be criticised - Severine is ultimately desperate to get away and sees Bond as a means of escape. Compared to, say, Bond tricking Solitare into sleeping with him using fake cards in LALD, or pushing Goodnight into a closet and keeping her there while he sleeps with Andrea in TMWTGG (I'm sure there are loads more examples) I don't think it's as egregious or questionable, but to each other own.
We all have our opinions on Bond films though, so at the end of the day it's just about what we enjoy more.
Bond films don’t tend to hold up against detailed plot scrutiny. No film does I suppose. They’re fundamentally escapism and there’s going to be contrivances simply to keep things moving and keep the viewers engaged. Sometimes they can be nonsensical when you start to think about them long afterwards (ie. why does Bouvar dress as his own widow to attend his funeral in TB? Why doesn’t Bond blow up the sub/ATAC in FYEO as opposed to retrieving the device? Why is Bond sent to out gamble Le Chiffre as opposed to MI6 just arresting him? That’s not even going into the situation with the password/transfer which apparently makes no sense when broken down. Why does Alec Travelyan go to the bother of becoming an MI6 agent if he was only going to fake his own death? Just cut the middle man out and become a cyber terrorist villain. You get the idea).
I’d actually say SF’s plot is a lot more airtight in the grand scheme of Bond movies. But at the end of the day it comes down to how we react to /feel when watching a movie. Still, I’m not a huge fan of trying to pick apart Bond plots.
Thanks for responding and going through it all, but your responses range from 'whataboutery' to 'over-thinking', with a hint of the ultimate stock-critic-block: 'it's only a movie'.
Which is fair enough, just proof Skyfall isn't a particularly original or outstanding film in its own right.
I'd still watch SF if it was on, which is not something I'd say for all Bond films, my gripe it doesn't belong in the staple of true classic.
Well, to be fair I think claiming a film is or isn’t ‘in the staple of true classics’ is much more a stock critic thing to say! But again, we’re all different. SF’s an interesting Bond film. I think it’s the fans who get more hung up about it and have a tendency to really hone in on things like its similarities to other movies, plot contrivances etc. The sort of stuff most ordinary viewers wouldn’t notice or care about. I always say I remember when it came out and how big the reaction to it was. In my experience it’s one of those Bond films that’s endured and is popular amongst people who aren’t necessarily Bond fans (and in fairness not all Bond films have that wider appeal, but the most successful ones seem to - GF, CR, and indeed SF amongst others).
100%
I’d say so too!
Succinctly put! 😅
Got there before me!🤪
100%
Good way of putting it and yes, the opera house scene in QOS is excellent.
I'd agree if it wasn't for the film's scarcity of brain.
Looked great, though.
A former agent publicly killing a disgraced government official would turn him into a hero in the eyes of many people. Look at how popular Luigi Mangione is after killing that CEO in NYC. That's what Silva was after. He wanted a bunch of #IStandWithRaoul's being posted on twitter.
The thing that bugs me most about Skyfall's story is the ending. I'm not opposed to Dench's M being killed off as a rule, but I don't think it made sense in this movie. If the whole third act was about Bond getting over his childhood trauma by saving his "parents" (M and Kincaid), how does that work if M dies? And why is Bond's worth proven to MI6 if his actions got M killed? M's death should mean that Bond is re-traumatized and fired from MI6. This could all be fixed by having M survive. Bond and M both redeem themselves and are hailed as heroes. M goes into retirement, Mallory takes over, and Bond is welcomed back to MI6 with the full trust of the organization. All M's death does is give the movie a big, emotional scene that doesn't make much narrative or thematic sense.
But if someone has a different take on how it's actually a good/appropriate ending, I'm all ears.
They could have had M injured in the church, looking really bad and Bond desperate to save her, then cut away to the outside of the church. Then to the iconic scene on the roof with Bond on his own (with the forebodng music) and then he is joined by a limping Dench who tells him of her retirement and thanks him for coming back. Then back to Bond entering M's office for his new mission. The "with pleasure" remark would sit better as he knew he was valued and proved he was not out of date. BUT this simply does not have the emotional impact of Dench's death scene.