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I’m okay with NTTD doing that because I know it’s only a one-off, rather than something that will permeate throughout the rest of the run. SUPERMAN RETURNS actually tried to introduce that and was one of the reasons we got a reboot instead of a sequel because no filmmaker wanted to deal with that.
Bond hasn’t set trends since it’s heyday in the 60s. It never will again.
Yes, it would have been more interesting if they adapted the actual Oberhauser story onscreen.
No apologies necessary; I didn't mean ignored by you, rather, the person you were quoting!
Yep indeed, it's how films work. And frankly it makes the action scenes tenser when you feel a connection and involvement with the characters because you don't want them to die even more, it's just not a bad thing at all.
I don't want to just watch things blow up, I can watch a cartoon for that. I want a film where I'm watching a character's progress with a compelling story. It's simply not a negative.
Can anyone think of a blockbuster action film since about 1985 which has featured no emotional/personal story arc for the main character at all? I'm sure there would have been one, but I struggle. Funnily enough the closest I can come up with off the top of my head is Knives Out with regards to Blanc, and (despite it not being an action or adventure film) even then I think it's arguable that Craig's character isn't the lead.
And also when you watch Tomorrow Never Dies what are the scenes all the fans love? The ones of Bond looking tortured drinking vodka in his hotel room. That's the stuff fans enjoy, Dalton simmering with rage etc. And then Eon get these mixed messages where they say they don't want that stuff, they want him to be a button-pressing robot. Imagine the confusion.
Although I don't think it works and I think they should have taken a step back, I can completely see why they did that with Blofeld in Spectre. Basically they decided to adapt Fleming's Octopussy, where Bond goes after the murderer of his childhood mentor Oberhauser. That's the personal angle right there, and it's direct from Fleming's pen. They've then decided to blockbuster-it-up a bit by making that murderer turn out to be Blofeld- and that's no more of a coincidence for this Bond, he's never heard of Blofeld, Blofeld is just some guy to him (the problem is that it does feel like a coincidence for the audience, and I think they lost sight of that a bit). We already have the childhood mentor thing, the coincidence is baked in from Fleming, where we have a plot where the death of a guy Bond knows happens to cross his desk; so why not add to the childhood angle and make Oberhauser's killer be his own son? After all, the baddie needs to be vaguely close to Bond's age for him to be an effective baddie in this movie so he would have been a kid at the time too. Which then takes you to the foster brothers angle, cuckoo etc.
All of these steps are fairly logical I would say, and you can see how adapting this plotline from the books took them in this direction, and if you're following it though progressively like that it probably doesn't feel that bad. But the problem is that when we're faced with the final concept of Bond and Blofeld knowing each other as kids, it just feels silly.
Should they have any action scenes then? After all, other action movies do that; should Bond set the trend of an actionless action movie?
It's not really about setting trends; at some point you just have to follow the convention of what's expected of a film.
I’d pay to watch a Bond film where there is no action at all; just him doing paperwork at the office all day and being frustrated.
The problems there are obvious and were ripe throughout the script, it suggests one "wronged" boy went on to set up an entire evil organisation to get back at someone from their childhood who just so happens to be an agent for MI6, which is already convoluted in itself. Then, to add the unnecessary attempt at tying up loose ends by having him be the "author" behind Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, and Skyfall, which completely undermines everything those films achieved on their own, whether you liked them or not.
And not to mention the fact that this is all so easily fixed. Firstly, don't bother with tying up loose ends. Skyfall certainly didn't need it and by 2012, no-one besides some fans really needed Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace to be built upon. Have Hannes Oberhauser's son be the villain, but make him an independant villain who turned down a path of terrorism and crime after murdering his father who has no interest in Bond whatsoever. Don't even have Bond adopted by Hannes, just have it be what it was in the novel, someone who for a brief time taught him mountaineering during his summer breaks, and then if you want SPECTRE involved because you've now got the rights. Have them possibly be an organisation that recruited Oberhauser's son just to tease their appearance and then build upon them in Bond 25. Simple. It didn't need to be as convoluted as it was, but considering the script leaks and possibly the fact that Mendes' heart wasn't completely in it, it comes at no surprise I guess.
It’s almost as if… those who are making the films… know what they’re doing…
I don’t think they’re gonna keep mining Bond’s past from here on. I wouldn’t even include NTTD since that was more about Madeleine’s past than Bond’s specifically.
I think you’re misinterpreting the story of Skyfall… Bonds emotions, wants and desires didn’t become the story, Silva’s desire to kill M was the story.
But given how much you’ve said about NTTD having never seen it, maybe you haven’t seen Skyfall either?
And it wasn’t very compelling either.
Well that’s a fair opinion. I just think we need to get the story straight.
I’d argue Bond’s emotions are just as integral to the story as Silvia’s desire to kill M, hence going back to Skyfall for the third act, but that’s just how I view it.
He says as much when they first get in the DB5. It was part of the story insofar as the major theme throughout the entire film is “sometimes the old ways are the best”. Bonds emotions don’t play into it, except that I suppose he feels strongly that he wants to prevent M from dying.
That’s a good point, I just always looked at it as Bond confronting his past by choosing to go back to Skyfall to protect M. Maybe that’s me reading into a subtext that wasn’t there.
No, you are entirely correct. The whole of "Skyfall" plays out in an Oedipal fever dream — how Silva interacts with M with this deadly lust tips this all out there. So why does Bond go back to Skyfall? Because he has to resolve his own contentious relationship with his mothers: M (this is the one the film literally gets it) but also his dead mother. We gather from what Kincade says that Bond (understandably) didn't take the death of his parents (for purposes of this we'll focus on his mother) well, and MI6 targets orphans because that anger at the ultimate "abandonment" makes them the perfect people to become killers (both "Casino Royale" and "Skyfall" get at this point, with "No Time to Die" alluding to it as well). So of course when Silva marches to the church to kill M, he sees Bond's parents' grave and says "It had to be here". Becuase it, well, had to be here. All of Bond's anger towards the maternal combining into one. And he lets go of all of it — M, Monique.
I really don’t think this is why Bond decides to take M to Skyfall. In a narrative sense, perhaps, the filmmakers wanted the story to conclude here for these reasons, but do you really think Bond thinks to himself, “it’s really time for me to address my childhood issues, I think I’ll take M there during this plot to have her killed so I can get that much needed therapy”?
I suppose that’s what makes Skyfall interesting, many different readings of it. But I think you have to look at the intentions of the filmmakers (which I think you were getting at), and the intentions of the character Bond (which I think is what you’re missing). It would just be wildly out of character for Bond to choose to take M to Skyfall because he feels he needs to address his childhood issues.
Agree to disagree there. From a filmmaking perspective I think it was done well.
The point I’m trying to make is that the above posts hit on a bunch of things the filmmakers put in the narrative to tell the story they wanted to tell. But as far as Bond, the character, was concerned, he took M to Skyfall because it was isolated, devoid of technology, and familiar to him. All of which is important when you’re in the 21st century and are facing a villain that can seemingly bend technology to his will.
It was unexplored and insignificant at best. I get what they tried to do, but it didn’t tie together with the rest of the film very well.
Hey, your opinions are 100% valid. We’ll just have to be content to have different ones.
It’s not the worst, but I do feel it’s very overrated, the same way I feel QoS is underrated. I exaggerate accordingly.
I don’t hate the idea of an another dark, realistic or dramatic bond in a similar vein. I just think it can be written better.
I probably agree to a lesser extent maybe. Like I said before I think Skyfall is a bit boring, and I love Quantum more and more each time I watch it.
They really are the art house films of the series, I think. In terms of themes and color ideas.
I think you could perhaps have Spectre finding out about Franz Oberhauser (who is a different person to Blofeld) having killed Hannes and them recruiting him to kind of torture Bond in some way, or even just lure him in so they can get access to him. But then I guess you end up with three baddies rather than two, and it kind of makes sense to streamline him into Blofeld. And although it maybe is a bit trite, it gives Blofeld the motivation of hating James since he was a boy.
It's so weird, every time I try to think of a better way of doing it I end up seeing exactly why they did what they did because the threads do tie up pretty well, and yet it never really works because you always end up with this big stumbling block of Bond and Blofeld essentially being brothers and it's just a bit too silly.
Watching last night I was struck by how beautiful Skyfall is. I honestly don't think there's a better-shot Bond film, and it has some good competition.