Last Bond Movie You Watched

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  • Mendes4LyfeMendes4Lyfe The long road ahead
    Posts: 8,400
    I like a few of the India shots, but more or less agree. There is a huge gulf between what Glen and Campbell brought to the franchise, presentation wise. Everything in Goldeneye and Casino is directed with lots of energy, and a keen focus to capture a specific effect. Everything has its place, and there is a fair amount of flair and style woven into even the most trivial of scenes. Glen, I think, films a lot and constructs scenes with his editor later on. I noticed when watching Octopussy that there didn't seem to be much energy or impetus when Bond was hanging off the train. They just seemed to be cutting back and forth between a selection of shots, with nothing really driving the action.
  • BondJasonBond006BondJasonBond006 on fb and ajb
    Posts: 9,020
    I disagree, For me Glen is the best of the directors.
    Not only do his films have great atmosphere but they also have a great look (except AVTAK maybe).
    TLD, FYEO and OP especially are beautifully directed with very good editing and locations.
    LTK is brilliantly directed action wise and on HD you can see how beautiful the cinematography is even.

    Compared to the colour-filter loaden boring crap Mendes dished us up with SF Glen has provided 4 1/2 masterpieces. And don't start me on the worst editing job in film history (QOS). DAD and TWINE are no better, one is boring visually, the other has stupid gimmicks like slo-mo. Since Glen only GE, TND (to some extend) and CR really had good directing.

    As for budget, yes the 80's films may have had smaller budget but you don't notice it.
    Tell me where!
    TLD even is one of the more epic Bond films if you ask me. So is OP actually.

  • Mendes4LyfeMendes4Lyfe The long road ahead
    Posts: 8,400
    I disagree, For me Glen is the best of the directors.
    Not only do his films have great atmosphere but they also have a great look (except AVTAK maybe).
    TLD, FYEO and OP especially are beautifully directed with very good editing and locations.
    LTK is brilliantly directed action wise and on HD you can see how beautiful the cinematography is even.

    Compared to the colour-filter loaden boring crap Mendes dished us up with SF Glen has provided 4 1/2 masterpieces. And don't start me on the worst editing job in film history (QOS). DAD and TWINE are no better, one is boring visually, the other has stupid gimmicks like slo-mo. Since Glen only GE, TND (to some extend) and CR really had good directing.

    As for budget, yes the 80's films may have had smaller budget but you don't notice it.
    Tell me where!
    TLD even is one of the more epic Bond films if you ask me. So is OP actually.

    You're right about Glen having the knack for good atmosphere, and I think a lot of that comes from being creative on a budget. The TLD sniper sequence is tense and brilliantly constructed, and LTK is extremely atmospheric and suspenseful. I wish they would scale back and relearn some of these old practices today. Unfortunately I feel the action and the melodrama has slowly taken over through the years.
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    edited November 2016 Posts: 23,883
    The action in the Glen films is certainly very well directed. I think Glen took ideas from Spielberg's Indiana Jones films. His pacing is superb.

    However, I still think he could have used the locations better. In the old days they used to allow a scene to 'breathe' in one beautiful spot, and it left an impression on me. There was an immersive atmosphere. The first time we see Tatiana in Turkey for instance, or Connery at the Hagia Sophia. Moore in shadow in Egypt in TSWLM during morning prayer, at the pyramids, or even when looking for the MI6 Egypt HQ. There was a wonderful scale to it all and they slowed it down in those scenes to allow us to take it all in. That to me is part of what differentiates Bond from the pretenders.

    They've brought some of that back in the recent Craig films, and I'm glad.
  • Last_Rat_StandingLast_Rat_Standing Long Neck Ice Cold Beer Never Broke My Heart
    Posts: 4,589
    The 80s films don't do much for me. With the exception of Octopussy, most of them are low in my rankings. I do highly enjoy the first halves of AVTAK and TLD, and the rest of the decade I could take or leave.
  • edited November 2016 Posts: 11,189
    Inclined to agree with a lot of what @bondjames says.

    I'm a bit mixed on the 80s films. I'd agree that FYEO and TLD are probably Glen's best efforts as a director. In those films, like the films for the 60s, you get more of a "flavour" for the locations.

    In Connery's day you could often virtually smell the locations and breathe in the air.

    The problem I have with Glen is that, while I think he's perfectly decent with action sequence, I can't escape the feeling that he's a small screen director with a bigger budget. His films often seem to be missing a certain joie de vivre (to be fair I suppose you could say the same for Martin Campbell in GoldenEye, but even that film had a bit more of a slickness and enthusiasm to it compared to Glen's films).

    I think definitely in the case of OP and AVTAK (OP is a film I like by the way), you get a sense that these were just seen as "the next Bond film". They don't really leave an impression in terms of finished products.
  • Last_Rat_StandingLast_Rat_Standing Long Neck Ice Cold Beer Never Broke My Heart
    Posts: 4,589
    BAIN123 wrote: »
    Inclined to agree with a lot of what @bondjames says.

    I'm a bit mixed on the 80s films. I'd agree that FYEO and TLD are probably Glen's best efforts as a director. In those films, like the films for the 60s, you get more of a "flavour" for the locations.

    In Connery's day you could often virtually smell the locations and breathe in the air.

    The problem I have with Glen is that, while I think he's perfectly decent with action sequence, I can't escape the feeling that he's a small screen director with a bigger budget. His films often seem to be missing a certain joie de vivre (to be fair I suppose you could say the same for Martin Campbell in GoldenEye, but even that film had a bit more of a slickness and enthusiasm to it compared to Glen's films).

    I think definitely in the case of OP and AVTAK (OP is a film I like by the way), you get a sense that these were just seen as "the next Bond film". They don't really leave an impression in terms of finished products.

    That is very well said. I was watching AVTAK a few nights ago and like you said, it was just the next film. Nothing really excited me, it's just there, like bland chicken. You'll eat it when hungry, but it doesn't do much while eating.
  • MajorDSmytheMajorDSmythe "I tolerate this century, but I don't enjoy it."Moderator
    Posts: 13,978
    I disgree on the slickness of GoldenEye, I think it looks quite drab and rough. Nowhere near what it should look like, given what was spent on it.
  • Posts: 7,434
    I agree GE looks quite drab! I never got a sense of place with it! At least with AVTAK and OP, you did get the sense of Paris, San Francisco and India! GE felt like a tv movie, and it was very darkly lit in most scenes, (you'd think you were watching 'Eastenders'!!) probably to hide the cheapness!
  • Posts: 11,189
    There's Monte Carlo at the start of GE which I think looks quite impressive.

    I agree that later parts of the film do look a bit TV movie-ish like some of the shots in Cuba or wherever it actually was. But in terms of the way it's edited together I think the film has a bit more flaire to it than a lot of what came before.
  • Mendes4LyfeMendes4Lyfe The long road ahead
    Posts: 8,400
    Is simply don't understand. Where does GE look cheap? which shots? I don't get it.
  • GBFGBF
    edited November 2016 Posts: 3,197
    One should also keep in mind that most of the older Bond films took place in some very exotic locations and had nothing to do with real cold war spy thrillers (except for FRWL). The Glen films had more cold war elements and therefore usually had a European setting. Therefore, the locations are often not as glamarous and exotic as they had been in the 60s and 70s.

    But just take GF (my fourth favourite Bond film) as an example. Does this great film has any particular great camera shots or amazing and interesting locations? I personally find the chateau in AVTAK much more suitable for a Bond film than a random stud farm in the middle of nowhere, somewhere in Kentucky. OK GF has some great sets (Fort Knox), but that's about it. The greatness of the film is there because of the iconic characters, the dialouges and the great plot.
  • Posts: 11,189
    Definitely some of the model effects look quite cheap. I'm wondering whether that might have been the intention though as a kind of throwback to earlier films. Either way, it's nice that Derek Meddings came back one final time.

    There's a shot towards the end when you see Bond and Natalya running towards the dish after they see it rise from the water, which definitely looks like it's filmed on a set.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
  • jake24jake24 Sitting at your desk, kissing your lover, eating supper with your familyModerator
    Posts: 10,591
    :))
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    edited November 2016 Posts: 23,883
    GE compelled me to visit Monaco. I had a great time!

    OP (which I love) did India a tremendous disservice. There's so much more to the place than a few postcard shots of the Taj Mahal, cheap sets recreating a street fair & some jungles.

    If you want to see San Francisco at its best there are several films that do a better job than AVTAK, including The Rock, Jade, Jagged Edge, Basic Instinct, Bullitt and the heavy hitter of them all, Vertigo.

    I don't think too many folks think of AVTAK when they visualize a film set in Paris. Charade, Frantic, Bourne Identity, Ronin etc. all did a better job.

    However, when one thinks of Turkey, Switzerland, Egypt, Nassau or Tokyo, FRWL, OHMSS, TSWLM, TB & YOLT certainly come to mind respectively.
  • edited November 2016 Posts: 11,189
    I think a lot of the interior sets in GoldenEye also looked better than they had done in a while.

    -Alec's control room
    -Mi6
    -Seveneya
    -the archives
    -the statue park
    -the facility

    One thing that always bugged me about LTK was some of the cheap looking interior sets like Felix's house.
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    Posts: 23,883
    BAIN123 wrote: »
    I think a lot of the interior sets in GoldenEye look better than they had done in a while.

    -Alec's control room
    -Mi6
    -Seveneya
    -the archives
    -the statue park
    -the facility
    I agree. I remember feeling that way in the theatre on first watch. The flair was certainly back, but so were the obvious scale models as well.
  • Mendes4LyfeMendes4Lyfe The long road ahead
    Posts: 8,400
    obvious scale models? I thought it was pretty seamless for the most part. I much prefer that to the modern method of constructing a location on a computer program.
  • edited November 2016 Posts: 11,189
    This has made me want to pop in my GE Blu Ray (again).

    The film certainly seems to have more of a contemporary look to it. A "techy" look, which suits the whole "90s" era.

    However, I stand by my comments that the interior sets (generally speaking) look richer and more elaborate than they had done in a while.

    I think a lot of the enthusiasm comes from the faster style of editing and the use of shorter shots in the action scenes.
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    edited November 2016 Posts: 23,883
    obvious scale models? I thought it was pretty seamless for the most part. I much prefer that to the modern method of constructing a location on a computer program.
    The Severnaya facility looked very much like a model, especially during the explosion, when the planes went into it. That really stood out to me. Same goes for the Soviet chemical weapons facility explosion in the pretitles. The rest was ok.
  • edited November 2016 Posts: 11,189
    bondjames wrote: »
    obvious scale models? I thought it was pretty seamless for the most part. I much prefer that to the modern method of constructing a location on a computer program.
    The Severnaya facility looked very much like a model, especially during the explosion, when the planes went into it. That really stood out to me. Same goes for the Soviet chemical weapons facility explosion in the pretitles. The rest was ok.

    The shot when the Tiger helicopter lands is the most obvious model in my view as is the moment when the planes are flying over prior to the explosion ("negative so far, everything seems normal").
  • Major_BoothroydMajor_Boothroyd Republic of Isthmus
    Posts: 2,722
    Birdleson wrote: »
    So's your Mom.

    Birdleson's channeling Jinx!

  • GE looks cheap? Maybe the interrogation room does, but I think that's the point of an interrogation room.
  • Posts: 11,189
    With GoldenEye you can tell they are aiming for bigger by the scale of the sets and the action sequences, but sometimes the cheapness shows a bit via the obvious model work.

    It certainly doesn't have the level of spectacle that TSWLM or had. BUT I think the acting in GE is genuinely better than those two films.
  • MurdockMurdock The minus world
    Posts: 16,351
    I love miniatures in film. Whether or not they are obvious. There's a certain charm to that you just don't see much in movies anymore.
  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    Posts: 23,883
    GE looks cheap? Maybe the interrogation room does, but I think that's the point of an interrogation room.
    The interrogation room was great. Everything about that scene was tremendous, including the acting by all concerned.
  • Last_Rat_StandingLast_Rat_Standing Long Neck Ice Cold Beer Never Broke My Heart
    Posts: 4,589
    Octopussy.

    Highly enjoyed it. It definitely had been a long time since I watched it from start to finish. Outside of the Tarzan yell, I feel that it is one of the more series entries. Especially Bond interrogating Orlov on the train. However the whole switching train cars sequence dragged on slightly. The end on the boat should have been Moore's swan song with him and Octopussy riding off into the sunset. Instead we got him committing incest in the shower.

  • bondjamesbondjames You were expecting someone else?
    Posts: 23,883
    The end on the boat should have been Moore's swan song with him and Octopussy riding off into the sunset. Instead we got him committing incest in the shower.
    Regrettably, I must agree.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,281
    Octopussy.

    Highly enjoyed it. It definitely had been a long time since I watched it from start to finish. Outside of the Tarzan yell, I feel that it is one of the more series entries. Especially Bond interrogating Orlov on the train. However the whole switching train cars sequence dragged on slightly. The end on the boat should have been Moore's swan song with him and Octopussy riding off into the sunset. Instead we got him committing incest in the shower.

    It wasn't incest in the shower...unless they were related?!
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