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I don't think that's a bad thing, actually, but I don't really mind having him captured as much as my other problems with the last act of the film. Also, I agree with you in it being a far more humiliating outcome for him.
I agree 100%. I don't mind having a true success for Bond as an ending but it's how it was all put together that sours the triumph in my view.
It probably does, but the pretentiousness is still there. If EON continue to hire "prestige directors" like Mendes, chances are we'll be getting more of it in the future.
That approach is starting to bug me, and IMO they need to find directors who know how to tell a story without trying too make a "smart" movie.
I actually want a smart movie. The thing I find frustrating about Mendes is that SF in particular poses as a smart film but is total nonsense. I agree SF is very pretentious.
I actually find SP a lot less pretentious though. It just feels a lot more like aN old school Bond romp.
Oh the look on his face! Pure hatred. That made me want to see more of him.
Ditto. And we are in a situation we have never been in before with a captured Blofeld. More exciting than the usual 'escape'.
Just to get some things right: "The Dead Are Alive" does not only refer to the PTS or Oberhauser. It is a consistent theme throughout the movie.
- Oberhauser
- The late Hannes Oberhauser who basically formed the two main characters: The good and skilled James, and Hannes seeking revenge and seeing his life impacted by him
- M giving Bond his assignment
- The death Vesper still having an influence on Bonds nature
- The dead Mr. White who basically influences his daughter's life after she had long forgotton him
...
If you don't see this as a theme in the movie, I'm afraid it's rather your fault not to blame Mendes.
Oh and by the way: I though it was a pretty damm cool moment when after the gunbarrel, those words were "hammered" there. Love that moment.
Apart from that:
I don't get this argument that Mendes' movies are pretentious. Here we have, for the first time in the series, a director who combines maginificent visual story telling with some kind of weight to the story, and he gets called "pretentious".
I'm so happy that the Bond movies are not made for the fans but rather for the other 99% of the audiences.
Well they once worked with someone who in the 2 years just before working on Bond got several Oscar nominations under his belt, and even won one. And it gave us a Bond movie that was a critical success despite very negative word of mouth even before it was released. So, well, job done.
But it was the writer of Casino Royale, not the director.
I'm not sure the best director can deal with a bad story...
My criticism is rather that it is so hammered (like the "old ways are the best" in SF)... It's written on the screen, it's hammered by Bond after the M video, it's hammered by Bond when Q tells him Franz O. is dead, etc, etc.
As a sidenote, in the script, the video surveillance theme was even more hammered than it is on the screen now. It was quite a "heavy" script, not very subtle...
Imagine Mendes'Bond 25 : We learn Hannes Oberhauser is not dead but at the hand of SPECTRE, and that Bond has to free Blofeld from MI6 to see Hannes again. Will it be pure genius, of the fan-fiction critics will love to hate ?
Though SF has nothing as ludicrous as making Blofeld a part of Bond's childhood past.
To me that is far more damning than anything in Skyfall. No Skyfall isn't genius but it's far more thrilling than the cobbled mess that is SPECTRE.
Once again it just proves throw the elements at the screen and some Bond fans will swallow any old nonsense.
For the first time? I see you haven't seen all the Bond films then.
There is a distinction between hardcore fan and regular fan, but both are fans.
The hardcore are just more engaged via multiple viewings and analysis and discussion.
The hardcore is actually the group you are taking note of because that is the group you get your feedback from.
Most businesses go to great lengths to beg for feedback, with survey enticements etc, but in the movie business fans just serve it up without being badgered.
Mendes is a good film director, but I think he has been a terrible choice for Bond.
I find his thematic pretentions to be dull in both SF and especially SP.
In SF they were kind of interesting but in SP , I found the Dead Do Live theme to forced, trite even. Its not that interesting.
I will allow the Dead Do Live, does reference a tad more than Franz coming back from the dead and the Day of the Dead street party.
Yes we also get M speaking from the grave.
But Hannes doesn't haunt the proceedings. The elder Oberhauser influenced both Bond and Franz very much while he was alive and not from beyond the grave in any big way, other than the normal carry forward one might expect.
But alive he caused son Franz to lose his mind and while alive he caused Bond to mature as an an adolescent.
Vesper's death impacting Bond I guess is true, but we are long past that. It's nothing new for this film.
The dead Mr White yes does hold sway with daughter, in that his death is catalyst for her to journey to the SP compound.
So OK the title card does reference a few aspects of the story, but still they strike me as anecdotal. I don't get the sense of a prevailing theme.
The movie is more about Bond simply executing a mission that M happened to give him from beyond the grave, but still the film is mainly about Bond on mission. He's just trying to get the job done.
The movie is also about Blofeld finally coming face-to-face with this nuisance Mi6-agent nemesis from his childhood and his continued fruitless attempts to finish him off...which alas is the bane of Blofelds existence....to be continually thwarted by Agent 007.
I find Mendes thematic pretentions to be not really very interesting, and the fact that he actually says that he needs Bond to be on a personal journey, or he can't make the movie, I find to be tedious.
I don't think Mendes was ever a good fit for Bond, but whats done is done.
Bond will persevere and move on to the next mission, because that's what he is, Flemings blunt instrument, motivated by duty.
He's not really that interesting a character emotionally or thematically, rather his appeal has always been that he is exciting.
Craig to his credit, at least in this film, really does find the authentic Bond-on-mission persona despite Mendes.
Spectre is a triumph of Bond over Mendes I do believe.
That's part of the appeal for me.
SF though was a triumph of Mendes over Bond.
But how could you forget to include the Tarzan call in Octopussy!
Other than that, a very interesting analysis timmer ; )
I am excusing the Tarzan yell only because its part of a broader jungle schtick which also includes telling a tiger to sit etc.
This was an attempt to give Blofeld a reboot in the same way that Bond was given a reboot in Casino Royale, but they couldn’t devote the necessary amount of screen time to it, as the audience expects Bond to be front and center from the get go. To succeed they would have had give Blofeld as much back story development time as the Green Goblin or Dr Octopus received in Spider-man or The Joker and whoever the villains were in the third Chris Nolan Batman movie. But what would a Bond audience have made of that?
The worst part is they stole the idea from...
"Austin prepares to shoot Dr. Evil, when Nigel Powers appears and reveals Dr. Evil and Austin are brothers"
OMG the irony of it all!
Furthermore, Blofeld is generally portrayed as a cautious, silent, menacing, powerful and intelligent control freak who does not handle any direct confrontations. The way the Rome scene and the Lair introduction are handled do this very powerfully in my view. This also goes back to the previous films, where he is so shadowy that no-one knows about them. So what the hell is he doing in London at the MI6 building? There is no reason for him to be there, and the helicopter scene capitalizes on this problem, putting him in a un-blofeld like vulnerable position. This makes no sense to me, even after three viewings.
And the way how Bond escapes the lair also has this problem in a way, but now that Bond can be tortured and without effect run out, shoot a couple of bullets and somehow blow the entire building without breaking a sweat. Highly bizar.
This weak story telling can partly be fixed in my view, by connecting the next film and filling in the parts that are now missing, therefore making it a more gritty film as well. Just my two cents anyway.
Basically I agree.
I'd agree about the easily destroyed lair in Morocco but so was dispatched Dr No's lair.
-Give the film a different title. SPECTRE is too on the nose, and robs the film of the chance to build the organization up as something of a mystery. For example, the board room scene should have been later in the film and should have been something of a reveal, a chance for Bond, and the audience, to see our first visual confirmation that the organization does in fact exist and that it is indeed called SPECTRE.
-Go back to the idea of the code book and discovering Blofeld and/or SPECTRE through the deciphering of the code book. The SPECTRE ring can figure into Bond's infiltration of the meeting later on in the film, but the uncovering of the organization and its leader should have been a mystery for Bond to unravel, not something that we get handed to us in the pre-titles.
-The identity of Blofeld should have remained a mystery throughout. Set several people up to be the leader of SPECTRE. Give the film some twists and turns, similar to what they did with the Hunt/Faust relationship in Rogue Nation, but on a much more complex level than the somewhat basic double-agent thing they had going in that film, and have Bond work with people of questionable allegiances, so that we're left wondering who Bond can actually trust, who is actually on his side and who may or may not be an agent (or leader) of SPECTRE (the MI6 crew would not be a part of this, however. The whole trust issue has been played to death on that level).
-Give SPECTRE a scheme that's actually threatening. The surveillance scheme is a solid one, but if they are truly the authors of all Bond's pain, then their fourth go-round should be something truly sinister, more along the lines of a Thunderball plot rather than selling a surveillance system to the world's governments. The plot needs to be something that is of urgent importance to the governments of the world, such as a series of terrorist attacks or some kind of violence (or threat of violence) on a large scale that gets their attention, even though they don't know who is behind it and the extent of their global influence.
-Get rid of the step-brother aspect of the Bond/Blofeld relationship. It's unnecessary.
-Introduce Madeleine Swann much earlier in the film and really give her and Bond a solid romantic subplot so that the events of the climax of the film are earned. I'd largely leave the climax of the film unchanged, only changing things to make it a bit more exciting, such as finding a different way for Bond to take down Blofeld rather than simply shooting his pistol at the chopper until it crashes.
-Maybe (and I'm only being half-serious here ;) ) end the film on a cliff-hanger. Bond and Madeleine driving through the countryside (I'd film it exactly where they filmed the ending of OHMSS and we see a car appear behind him as we go to the credits).
I agree with most of your suggestions Dalton, but your last point:
I actually think this would've been really interesting. I wouldn't have thought of it but I can totally imagine the shock on Bond fans when seeing that followed up by the message James Bond will Return. Good one!
Mexico
The long shot was awesome, but IMO it would have made it so much more incredible if it had continued until Bond got into the chopper. Since the long shot was really 3 separate shots anyways, why not make it a few more and extend it out?
When Bond is scoping the window where the shot does end, instead of having it cut, have the camera pan back and forth a bit between bond and the window, and then have it pan quickly left and right as he shoots everyone and the bomb.
Then have it pan back and go back over to him. I would cut the part where the building falls on his building for reasons I'll explain at the end of the scene.
Then you just have the camera continue following/panning around a bit as he makes his way down the building to meet up with Sciara. Once you get to the streets its easy to have it continue the long shot until he makes it to the chopper.
Yes it'd be pretty tough to do, and would likely extend the 3 "single long shot" scene to as many as 7-10, but I think it'd be spectacular. Having the long shot continue in the chopper really wouldn't work, so no need for that.
Then at the end of the scene, they really missed an opportunity here, although with the building he started in destroyed, he couldn't do it. They should have had him land the chopper somewhere on the original building, and hop back in the window to see the girl. He did tell her after all "I won't be long". That would have been a true bond opener ending for me, with him right back with the chick. It'd be a bit corny and Moore like, but still awesome IMO.
And very in tone with many of Fleming's novels, but I understand why, after three bittersweet ending when Bond even when winning is alone, they wanted him to have one unambiguous victory where not only he defeats the villain, but he triumphs over him, gets the girl, etc. Since they could not kill Blofeld right away, they had to have him captured. And in itself, that makes Bond's triumph even greater: Blofeld is humiliated far more than had he been killed.
Blofeld is not dead so even the thickest audience members know that he's going to escape and odds on shoot Madeline in the head in the next film.
Bond is only victorious in the context of the running time of the film SPECTRE. In B25 we all know Blofeld is going to escape so why not just let him do it here instead of convolutedly having him survive being blown up a second time without being killed and then having to come up with an equally convoluted escape from prison scene at the start of the next film?
As @Guntram_Shatterhand says above the Blofeld character is weakened by his stupid actions in the final act. They finally got their hands on the rights to Blofeld and SPECTRE and rather than come up with a rebooted criminal mastermind a la Fleming's Blofeld from TB the novel they make him just a whining teenager.
Other SPECTRE operatives should be out in the field while Ernst sits behind a desk safely out of harms way. What function does it serve to his scheme for him to be skulking around the MI6 building as Nine Eyes go live?
The stepbrother thing is a pile of shite - I think we can all agree on that point - but I could overlook it if they just left it in the lair. The trouble is by having Blofeld come to London they demean the character as he's only obsessed with stalking Bond.
It's C who is the professional here dealing with the Nine Eyes launch whilst Ernst Potters about the basement of MI6 trying to torture Bond.
F**king Bond over as an incidental pleasure to the rest of his activities I can live with but in the final act it is all he cares about despite all the effort that has gone into Nine Eyes.
This is poor and makes 'super criminal' Blofeld come across as an amateur. I blame Mendes almost exclusively for this as it's him who has to have this personal angle all the time.
Yes the personal angle is key to the Bond-Blofeld dynamic but why does it need to be there from the start? Why can't we see it evolve? Isnt it personal enough in this film for him to have been involved in the deaths of Vesper and M? And then in the next film presumably Madeline? Why do we have to shoehorn this stepbrother bollocks in as well?
Possibly the root of the problem is down to the fact that they couldn't hold back and shot their wad over Blofeld too quickly. Why couldn't we build up to his reveal slowly over a few films?
But no because they were scared that this might be Dan's last and they were so desperate to get Mendes back they let them go from never having heard of Blofeld to foiled and captured in one film.
Babs needed to be stronger and say 'we're just setting Blofeld up in this film. If you can't commit to B25 Dan fair enough - another actor will get that payoff.'
I worry that Babs is making decisions that effect the series adversely just to give Mendes whatever he wants.
EON need to remember that no one is bigger than the club.