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I agree. I think Mendes and Logan had one great Bond film in them and should have left it at that.
I maintain Oberhauser and Blofeld should have been two separate characters. If Blofeld recruited him, Blofeld would still be "the author of all his pain."
Hinx was tying up all the loose ends of Quantum, I guess? The Quantum-to-Spectre transition could have been clearer.
There was just way too much going on in this film and most of it was half-baked.
It's reasonable to wonder if an 81 year old director is up to the demands of making a large scale action movie. There might be a few directors still at work in their 80s, but are they making big action films? If so, are they good action films?
That said, second-unit directors already handle a lot of action in the Bond films, so I suppose a very old, lower-energy director could farm out a lot of work, but then the quality of those sequences will depend on whoever they hire for the second unit.
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100% agree on this, I remember in the build up to Spectre thinking the twist was going to be Hinx was going to be revealed as Blofeld, as he was more physical presence in the books.
I still think a bigger twist would been it be revealed Blofeld was revealed to be Oberhauser
But a better deal then this nightmare scenario would be
Amazon gets 3 characters from the bond franchise (not bond of course) that they can make shows about
EON stay as producers of Bond with Gregg and David stepping in
Michael gets to retire
Babs gets 5 projects she gets funding for and she will executive producer the bond films but guiiding David and Gregg if and when they need her
This literally would of made everyone happy and keep Bond still essentially at EON
There was something about Gregg...still unclear what...
This is one aspect that'll never change. If I ever need a good laugh, I just pop over to the 007 Store and look at those prices.
Coming from the guy who literally has been belittling and gaslighting his way all the way to 17k posts. There are too many posts to count when you were out of line and you know it. I do not forget.
Mendes certainly isn't the best director out there, as he doesn't grasp action for example. Hence the example from another member. SF and SP looked good, technically and visually due to Hoyte and Roger. I know very well what directors do beside that, not what I was pointing out. Perhaps you ought to think twice before calling Mendes the best Bond director around, as he isn't. If you can't direct action well you shouldn't direct Bond. Forster is another one.
This is in the podcast is it? I need to give this a listen, sounds like they were a bit mysterious.
The only things I'd guess at would be the accident on the aeroplane set piece of Spectre he apparently was in charge of, or someone reacting badly to the quote attributed to him in that Wall St Journal piece, but I think that got a bit blown out of proportion.
The accident sounds much more like something which could potentially cause doubts, but then he's made Road To A Million since, which had members of the public up cranes and all sorts.
Clint Eastwood is good.
You say you know what directors do...but then suggest that the director has no say over "the look of a film." Neither Deakins nor Von Hoytema are going to a shoot the film in a way that Mendes doesn't want. Mendes is the one who oversees all of that. Many have stated that the hues in SP were too yellowish...it was an odd filter to go with, but it gave the film a Butch and Sundance feel, that I thought was kind of cool. In places it worked; in others it didn't.
BTW, Mendes and Forster directed two of the very best fight scenes (Bond vs Slate, Bond vs Hinx) in the entire series. One could also argue that Forster also directed one of the best car chases in the series, too. I am not sure what films you were watching.
As for Mendes, specifically: are you talking about one of the best directors, or one of the best directors for Bond? I don't think there is any doubt that he's a top notch film director, looking at his body of work. He hasn't made many or any bad films.
Eon should have realized with his pretensions of the four elements and his desire to deconstruct Bond that this probably wasn't the best idea.
If any film needed a rousing "Now this is Bond!" feel, it is QoS after the end of CR.
I love the ending, though. Different (and somewhat Bourne-like).
My issue with him is his whole 'fast as a bullet' mentality, which led to the haphazard editing/style of the film. It's a bit of a misfire (although it may have been a combination of artistic delusion and the tight schedule). But I can see a case to be made it recalls the pace/editing of the early films (I would disagree, but I can see how the argument could be made).
In some alternate universe, the rest of Craig's Bond continued in the vein of QoS.
Well, Haggis actually came up with the early idea of Vesper having a child and Bond looking for them, which they didn't like. They started again when Forster came on and helmed the development with them. So he did genuinely bring a lot. I think QOS would be worse without him story-wise.
In an alternative universe. I don't think it would have been the best path for Craig's tenure though. I think the series needed SF.
I think Forster had to fill space and time with action scenes because they didn't have a script.
Less would have been more with Vesper, and I would have preferred that she not play into the story after CR until he visits her grave in NTTD. It's not like she was mentioned in every Bond novel.*
*I looked it up. Vesper is mentioned only 4 times in 12 novels (and in no short stories): CR, FRWL, GF, and OHMSS.
Oh, sorry, just blurted that out now, didn't I.
I must confess that I've wondered if, from a creative POV, if real-world politics might have played a role in the delay on new work. Especially when, as another spy novelist observed recently, you live in a world where half your audience views Putin's Russia as a mortal threat and the other half views it with envious eyes.
Or as Fleming himself wrote in CR: "History is moving pretty quickly these days, and the heroes and villains keep on changing parts."
You could learn a thing or two about statecraft, diplomacy or basic human relations. Unless the mods want to turn this into a politics thread I suggest we get back on topic.
Thank you for that calm & interesting reply (and good quote). I am having a difficult time these days restraining myself from the full force of my anger at the fascist contingent of my country.
Happy to see the press hasn't whipped you up into a frenzy of hysteria.
No, White House press releases do that just fine.
That's why I have thought that shifting the series back to the Cold War, to the late 50s or early 60s, could give them some flexibility.
Some of us expressed similar thoughts here:
https://www.mi6community.com/discussion/21654/is-this-the-end-of-spy-movies/p1