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That's really interesting. In the PTS for TLD i can't help but chuckle a little when Dalton first starts running after the truck. He so oversells the running that it's almost comical.
I don't know why Brosnan always gets sympathy to the effect that he got screwed over on his directors. Both Martin Campbell and Michael Apted were more celebrated directors than the Bond series had hired in a good while. And Lee Tamahori directed the very underrated The Edge, which as a director gave him a higher stock than Glen had going into his first film.
Another line that I thought was pretty bad was the way Dalton says, "If you can't trust Heller who can you trust". The way Dalton delivers it sounds like Bond is about to start sobbing and whimpering. I'm surprised that's the take they settled on.
Agreed. Glen in alot of ways was a TV director. Competent enough to get the shots he needed but was never going to go much further beyond just getting it done.
That's a frustration I've had with the Bond series and EON. I won't say that EON was lazy but they definitely got complacent at times. Yes the John Glen Bond films of the 80s were making healthy profits but their success both critically and moreso financially was a long way off from what they experienced in the 60s and better films of the 70s. It seemed like they were perfectly fine with their diminished success. I agree with some of the above posters that the comfort zone of the "Bond family" could often be more of a detriment rather than a benefit.
Funnily enough I think the same sometimes applies to Brosnan. I remember a few months ago I was watching a play in London (City of Angels it was called). There was a scene when one of the main characters was lying on the floor in a darkened room being beaten up by a group of men. The actor on the floor was making all sorts of grunts and groans when he was hit. It reminded me of the sound-proof room scene in TND.
I wouldn't say Dalton overacts quite as much as Pierce does, but he can be guilty of being somewhat over-dramatic in his facial expressions.
I suppose the trick is make it not LOOK like the actor is acting. Someone like Judy Dench can do this very well. She's probably one of the most successful theatre actors who has also made a big name for herself in serious films. I saw Iris for the first time a few days ago and she's brilliant in it.
I think it most definitely is, but you need to adapt your demeanor and your voice. everything is bigger on the big screen, you cannot have the same range as on the stage. Some stage actors make the transaction easily, some less. And it also depends of the movie. I think Dalton struggled at times, not only in his Bond movies but in other ones as well. He was great in The Rocketeer, playing a villain, and I think villains in general are easier to play in movies for thespians.
His performance in Hot Fuzz and Toy Story would give that assumption credit for sure.
A theatre career usually wouldn't hurt you. But he just needed a director who can tell him when it was too much
I thought it was just that the pack was too heavy so he was a bit wobbly bearing up.
very astute observation. i admire glen and dalton massively. i think they gave us two really good Bond movies. just a shame they didnt get on personally.
I agree 100% that Glen is one of the great Bond directors. he was very consistent and may be apart from AVTAk I put all his films in the top half of the table.
Theatre actors don t transition very well to modern films, especially after sound was introduced in 1929 with The Jazz Singer.
In the old days with no microphones and camera close-ups, they had to oversell the emotions, lines etc. that they needed to convey to the audience in the theatre, right down to the back-seaters.
Imagine if they'd been directed by Spottiswood, Apted or Tamahori...
Not that it would bear any similarity to a Apted/Dalton Bond, but Apted directed my favourite Stacy Keach film, 1977's 'The Squeeze'. If you like your films old skool tough (REAL tough, it is made in the decade when heroes smelt of beer and Brut), I recommend The Squeeze. This image sums up the film...
Now consider this, Keach plays the flawed hero.
There's no guarantee the film would have been better. I think Koskov is actually good casting but the character could definitely have been played a bit darker. I am not a fan of Joe Don Baker.
Something that always struck me about Dalton's films were that despite that fact that they were made in the late 80s they looked like they could've been released in the 70s.
Take License to Kill and compare it to other blockbuster films released that same year like Lethal Weapon 2, Batman, The Last Crusade, Back to the Future 2, The Abyss, etc. They all look so much more polished, refined, and cinematic. While TLD and LTK at times looked like they could've been made for TV.
Yeah I have no problem with Jeroen Krabbe but Koskov was written pretty poorly and was just stupid to me. I also didn't care for Baker as Whittaker. I prefer him as Jack Wade but as a villain he's also pretty clownish at the end, That child like giggle always makes me rip out my hair.
It's not just the lightening. The quality of film and images just look older than they are. Compare it to any of the films I mentioned above. They all look so much more crisp and polished.
TLD was shot on the same stocks everybody else used at that time, 5247 and 5294, and I'm pretty sure Mills didn't force-process his imagery, so I can't imagine what would make you think the image looked older. LTK has a lot of white in its art direction, and grain shows up more strongly in white and gray areas of image, so that is about the only thing I can think of (and I've seen these two movies at least 30 times apiece. Except for FRWL and GF, have probably seen these the most of any Bond film.)
I obviously don't know as much technical information as you but all I can say is that both Dalton films look older than they are to me. The films I mentioned, not all of which were winning any awards for their cinematographers, all atleast looked like they were made in the late 80s.
Is it just me or does anyone else agree? Maybe I'm going crazy.
If I'm being honest, I really thought all of his Bond films looked pretty cheap in comparison to other fare of that era, and particularly in comparison to the previous Bond films.
I think that's partly why GE was such a success when it came out, because the 'Glen look' was gone.
Don't get me wrong, I really do like his films, particularly OP, TLD & LTK, but all of his Bond movies have a relatively cheap and less than glamorous quality to them for me, except maybe FYEO.
Spot on. I remembered when I watched LTK and GE back to back I couldn't believe that they were released only 6 years apart. They looked like films from two completely different eras. GE looked so much more polished and crisp.
And I agree FYEO was John Glen's best looking Bond film.
Which is another valid point that can be made to the argument that Dalton got screwed. Not just with his director but with his budgets aswell. Dalton signed on at a time when EON wasn't spending the kind of money that they used to on the Bond films. Everything's about timing I guess.
Imagine a Dalton Bond film helmed by a director the calibre of Sam Mendes and with an absurdly massive budget to go with it.
It's funny, I was talking to a friend of mine just last night and he said: "What was that Bond film where he's on a boat talking to some bloke and the camera keeps tilting all over the place. Terrible film. Badly made" :))
Koskov is great casting but catastrophic writing. Jerome Krabbe could have played Blofeld in another time, he's that good. I think the weak villains in TLD may have hurted Dalton's tenure overall.
Me too!