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What happens after the chase is what I really loved. Bond just going all out and gunning those bastards to pieces. Such clever maneuvering by him throughout, tied off wonderfully by him sending Ash to hell. It was one of those moments where he felt like the Bond of old, though all that time had passed off the job. It was the confirmation that he still had it, after being a tad sloppy in Cuba.
So do I really care that there are no standout, groundbraking stunt during the sequence? Not really. I suppose if it had one I wouldn't complain as such, but that is not what the scene is about for me. It is all about how Bond is in a desperate situation with limited resources. That is what makes it spectacular.
But for the most part the action scenes are pretty believable in a Bond movie type of way.
There is also the dramatic contrast. In Matera Bond is wound up, a maelstrom of seething emotions. He is triggered by Vesper memories and raging with Madeleine to such an extent that he’s incapable of listening to her about the baby. In a Norway it’s quite the opposite and the only thing important to him is protecting the woman and child
From memory, most of how Bond dispatches the other vehicles is by ramming them or grinding against them until there is a hump he sends them into the path of that flips them, which I found pretty realistic, all things considered.
As others have said, I feel what's inventive is the context of the whole thing. Bond isn't with another agent, in which case you'd feel a lot more "safe" and comfortable watching it unfold since the stakes would feel lower. Instead, he's got no resources, his position has been completely compromised and he has to find a way to protect his family while being vastly outnumbered. It's that narrative component that trumps any spectacle to me, really taking that moment to the next level and making it stand out from other chases in the franchise.
I also just enjoyed seeing Bond in casual wear, as it really is Dan's specialty.
“ Sending Ash to hell “ was definitely a high point....even if it did rip off a key scene from FYEO.
Besides, Locque was in a car that Bond kicked off a cliff sending Locque to his death.
Ash was on the outside of a crashed car, and Bond dislodged it, sending it crushing Ash to death.
I didn't find it massively realistic to be honest- he touches them in this old 4x4 and they leap into the air. And that's the only thing he does, over and over; it's very lacking in invention or wit. As with the real of the film I found it a bit disappointingly low of Bond moments- where he does something clever and unexpected, or even just cool. Everything of that kind is done before the credits: even the moment when he skids to a stop on that motorbike and just drops it, or where he runs straight at Primo to get him off the bike- moments which make you laugh because they're so badass and cool. But after that all he does is shoot people and bang into them, nothing clever or Bond-ish. The closest we get is when he pulls the winch rope across the road to dismount a bike rider.
I like the film, but I thought Fuknaga missed the Bond feel and his action scenes were a bit ordinary.
That scene and FYEO felt different enough to me. Big difference between Bond kicking a car with someone inside and collapsing a car onto a person who is outside the car already. I actually think FYEO is much more brutal, given that we can see the "body" of Loque falling in the carnage. Ash's demise is very quick and "off screen," which gives it less of an edge. Don't know how I'd feel if it was a little more graphic. I kind of wish it was, actually, since NTTD didn't shy away from that kind of imagery elsewhere.
I think Bond has moments of invention throughout, or at the very least where you see his strategic mind at play. NTTD has a lot less action than your standard Bond film, but what strikes me about the action is that each sequence has a very personal undercurrent to it that drives it. Bond's Matera battle is powerful because he has to keep his wits about him while being certain Madeleine has betrayed him, making the drama of Vesper's betrayal come back to him. The Cuba sequence has him up close and personal with SPECTRE where they're all killed in a twist at the same time that his rival 00 Nomi strikes to take the scientist away. And obviously the forest sequence and island fights are the most emotional of all, as Bond is protecting his family first and foremost.
I love the choreography of these moments, but what is the most special is how the narrative context makes me all the more engaged in the action because the stakes are so personal. It's those emotional undercurrents that really sell all the action to me in ways that just a sequence with a lot of spectacle would fail to. And I think that's always been one of the strengths of the action in the Craig era: things always feel personal and intimate.
This is it for me too you're just better at expressing it.
Completely agree with this.
I guess it must be tough to write unique action scenes for Bond, especially when you have to make Bond always appear competent and in control but still tense and gripping for us the viewer.
NTTD was definitely a step up from Spectre in my opinion, but the set pieces did feel like they were over quite quickly. Although I could be remembering that wrong I haven't seen it in about 6 weeks
I think people forget that Rogers Bond could be quite brutal when he had to be.In TSWLM he shoots Stromberg in the BALLS! And then proceeds to shoot him two more times!
I would say that -and do bear in mind I liked NTTD over all so this isn't a big bash- Spectre did seem to at least keep that feeling of what Bond does and what makes things feel Bondy a bit more. I agree with most people when they say the snow plane chase in Spectre doesn't quite come alive, but it does feature Bond skiing the fuselage of a plane down a hill and crashing it through a building to stop an escaping baddie: that is a very Bond thing to do. I haven't seen it anywhere else and it features that classic Bond thing of lateral thinking during an action scene and being cool under pressure to come up with a solution, no matter how ridiculous, to win the situation. So where anyone else would get eaten, he sees a group of crocodiles lining up as a set of stepping stones to get off an island. He sees a tank as a perfectly good vehicle to give chase through St Petersburg in; he can use a cello case as a toboggan; a digger as a bridge to hop into a train carriage; he realises he can waterski behind a seaplane to make his escape. Inventive and ridiculous solutions to his predicament: that's what we love about a Bond action scene and they tell us about his character- how he's cool under pressure and cleverer than the baddies and how even his style in an action scene is full of swagger.
But beyond the bike stunt and machine gun doughnut of Matera, NTTD gives us none of that. The Cuba action scene is just him punching and shooting people (Paloma actually does the most Bond thing of the sequence by smashing the car into some scaffolding to drop Valdo to them); this Norway car chase is just bumper cars. He does nothing interesting or Bondy, nothing to even make us smile in that bond moment way. And even Spectre, despite it being a bit of a disappointment of a film, still knew what Bond is and does and at least tries to give it to us. I liked NTTD, but there was a Bond flavour -to the action especially- which I thought was missing.
That death is deliciously cold, simple, effective. One of my favorite moments from Moore's era; as you say, the man could still be calculating and unforgiving amidst all the cheeky one-liners and eyebrow raising.
It has now been a while since I have seen the film, so I don’t have the details as clear, but I think there was a moment where Bond walks out of the Bar onto the street and starts shooting guys there, that I liked a lot. However, that is basically the opposite of what you are looking for: He just shoots guys. But Craig just looks so fantastic doing it.
I also was left a bit cold by the Norway chase. For me that was the clearest point where I thought „I shouldn’t have followed the production and the trailers so closely“ because I felt all the coolest parts of that section where shown before and the rest was kind of lacklustre. So I was in more of a „Oh yeah, I’ve already seen all of this“-mode.
I think what I like about the action in NTTD is that Bond isn't perfect, he's caught in tough situations and has to struggle to survive. In a lot of Bond movies it just looks too easy or effortless to him, but I think the Craig era did a good job of showing Bond really having to work for it. You see the high skill level of those in his field or that he's against, and it brings the tension and danger up.
In the Matera sequence Bond is absolutely outnumbered and nearly dead to rights on occasion, even taking a bullet to the shoulder that could've done him in if he wasn't careful. The Cuba sequence shows him faltering a bit, and obviously the finale is a real survival test for him. His ascension up the stairwell isn't him one shotting guys, he's constantly on his toes, running out of ammo, needing to steal guns to shoot oncoming men, and dodging explosives left and right. He really has to earn it in NTTD, and I love that added sense of danger and despair....except for when Safin shoots him. That just makes me cry.
Yeah I had the same feeling: I think the stuff on the boat and maybe in the poison garden was the only stuff we hadn't really seen a hint of before it came out (and even then I guess we'd seen Bond on the sinking boat).
I know what you mean about Craig walking onto the street with the machine gun in Cuba (good point about the drinks tray- I'd forgotten that)- he does give good swagger energy there: but it is just shooting, indeed.
That was the idea I had when things were gearing up, but I caved pretty soon thereafter. I only saw the trailers a handful of times but they were revealing enough, then moderating unveiled a ton of unexpected spoilers in the time before it released in the U.S. Honestly, though, I think it made my enjoyment even greater (though of course I would've enjoyed going into it knowing nothing).
I wish I had success with this method! I really tried it with Spectre, but still found myself able to call out various scenes from trailers... For NTTD, I didn't try; I watched the first couple of trailers as they came out, and then stopped when they started releasing several new ones.
@mtm your view on NTTD's action is more how I feel about SP. Outside of the Hinx fight, I feel a lot of the action just lacks something to me. I know Dan's injury probably made the film's action need to be based around vehicular action, like the car chase in Rome and the plane chase, but that stuff doesn't ever hit for me. I'm usually not a fan of Bond chases on the whole, as I like Bond being right in the thick of it, gun in hand, or fighting in close quarters. Something about staging action in a vehicle sort of removes him from the danger enough to lack a lot of impact, with the Craig era being the only chases I actually find effective in feeling dangerous and intense. In SP I just often don't feel the danger to Bond, like in the escape from Blofeld's lair where Bond has perfect aim and just breezes his way out.
That's part of why I enjoyed the action of NTTD: I feel danger for Bond in every single piece of action, as the drama and stakes are always heightened. So for the brevity people find in the set pieces, or how they're staged, how it conveys the danger to Bond really sells it for me.
I liked everything about Blofeld's Lair in Spectre, honestly, except for the bit you mention about Bond getting out on Agent difficulty. It would have been slightly more polarizing I think, but it was a huge missed opportunity to not have Madeleine be the badass there and help Bond escape. It would have given some weight to both Blofeld's ability to incapacitate Bond, as well as Madeleine's "history of violence" backstory they were building.