Bond vs Bourne

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  • doubleoegodoubleoego #LightWork
    Posts: 11,139
    Reviews by whom? Critics? The GP in my experience think and thought DAD was garbage even by the silly standards that the series had at that time been known for.
  • edited October 2013 Posts: 12,837
    doubleoego wrote:
    Reviews by whom? Critics? The GP in my experience think and thought DAD was garbage even by the silly standards that the series had at that time been known for.

    Most people I know thought it was ok. My GF at the time enjoyed it apart from "the bit with the giant lazer"

    It has 59% on rottentomatoes with critics and 53% of the audience liked it. So I think most people thought it was mixed. People on here though like to think everybody hated the film. Especially since Craig has become Bond and it's become fashionable to bash Brosnan and his films.

    Not defending DAD btw, it's my least favourite, but lots of people talk about how there were tons of negative reviews and everybody hated it, etc, when it's not true.
  • doubleoegodoubleoego #LightWork
    Posts: 11,139
    doubleoego wrote:
    Not just the physical aspects of the role but the credibility if the stories too. DAD made money, great but it's hardly respected. That kind of dynamic is short term and even more so when you had protagonists and anti heroes who are delivering the goods such as Borne.

    On another note, I was disappointed with the Bond/Vesper's boyfriend showdown...if you can even call it that. I was hoping for something similar like the resolve of Bourne meeting and confronting Neski's daughter in Supremacy.

    Bond and Yusef's meeting was 10X better than Bourne meeting Neski's daughter. All he had to do was muster up the resolve to admit he killed her parents and apologize, while Bond literally had to use every fiber of his being not to shoot Yusef for what he did to the woman he loved.

    I disagree. The Bond and Yusef scene was serviceable but extremely underwhelming given the gravity of what Bond had been through since CR. I liked that Bond didn't kill Yusef but they missed a great opportunity to really showcase the confrontation between Bond and the man that was a key facilitator to the anguish GE had been feeling. Bourne seeking out Neski and talking to her was better executed for me because it wasn't just about telling the girl what he did but also to come to terms with his own past and just how impactful it is on the lives of those who don't deserve such pain. Marie being killed was in part a motivation for him to seek out Neski and relate to how she felt.
  • 4EverBonded4EverBonded the Ballrooms of Mars
    Posts: 12,480
    DAD had a solid first half and Brosnan was, in my opinion, fine throughout the film.

    I can see where the comparison of Bourne and Bond may help the producers and director to make better choices, I think; and I hope less CGI is one of them.

    Re QOS ending - I loved the ending, it pulled everything together for me and I thought it was beautifully acted and relevant. 0Brady is spot on in his comments.
  • edited August 2012 Posts: 4,622
    The new Bourne film IMO is absolutely brutal. A lame rehash of the original story but with a different Bourne-like character.
    SF will blow this latest dog-Bourne of a film out of the water.
  • 4EverBonded4EverBonded the Ballrooms of Mars
    Posts: 12,480
    timmer wrote:
    The new Bourne film IMO is absolutely brutal. A lame rehash of the original story but with a different Bourne-like character.
    SF will blow this latest dog-Bourne of a film out of the water.

    Ha! Love that.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    Dog-Bourne? Out of the water? Is it an otter?
  • 4EverBonded4EverBonded the Ballrooms of Mars
    Posts: 12,480
    Dog-Bourne? Out of the water? Is it an otter?

    Maybe it's an otter lame duck (oh my, how many more animal puns can we throw into this mix?). Actually I like Jeremy Renner and hope he is good in it; box office looks good in the U.S. But I am not excited about the series since Matt left.
  • I didn't think Legacy was bad. But it's not as good as the other films. Still, I'd like more Bourne films in the future.
  • I thought Legacy was very good up until what we have to accept as its "ending"...
    No where near as good as Ultimatum (One of my top 10 films), but I still thought it was good.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    Legacy was in no way horrible, and Renner was great. The problem was the film just had a weird progression going for it, nonetheless that it never was necessary and had no Matt in it.
  • Posts: 1,146
    timmer wrote:
    The new Bourne film IMO is absolutely brutal. A lame rehash of the original story but with a different Bourne-like character.
    SF will blow this latest dog-Bourne of a film out of the water.

    Ha! Love that.

    The irony of all this is that we'd still be seeing Brosnan films without the Bourne films. Looking forward to Skyfall, and looking forward to seeing Legacy.
  • 0BradyM0Bondfanatic70BradyM0Bondfanatic7 Quantum Floral Arrangements: "We Have Petals Everywhere"
    Posts: 28,694
    timmer wrote:
    The new Bourne film IMO is absolutely brutal. A lame rehash of the original story but with a different Bourne-like character.
    SF will blow this latest dog-Bourne of a film out of the water.

    Ha! Love that.

    The irony of all this is that we'd still be seeing Brosnan films without the Bourne films. Looking forward to Skyfall, and looking forward to seeing Legacy.

    Not quite. It was more due to the growing lack of bombastic action growing to insuperable levels which left little room for further expansion.
  • The irony of all this is that we'd still be seeing Brosnan films without the Bourne films.

    Nothing wrong with that as long as we don't get another DAD. But really Brosnan wouldn't be Bond now, if he hadn't been fired then he'd probably have retired one or two films later anyway.
  • I re-watched the Bourne Supremacy last night and enjoyed it but I didn't find it as satisfying as I previously had.

    The story is really rather weak and any attempt to say this is an 'intelligent' film are foolhardy. The film is a proper thriller, there is enough crash-bam-wallop for your price of admission and it's mostly distracting and fun. Though there is an interesting melancholy edge running through it. I think the reason people really responded to the film back in 2004 was that it introduced a new way for Hollywood to make action films; the so called shaky-cam/kinetic/'putting-the-audience-in-the-moment' kind of filmmaking.

    What struck me was that there are a number of very similar beats from the film in the DC movies, CR in particular. These beats do seem far from coincidences.

    -Borune confronts an enemy who he formally worked with and gets to the scene first and empties his enemy's gun. Not to dissimilar to Bond's meeting with Dryden in CR.
    -Bourne strangles this same enemy in literally the same position as Bond kills Obanno.
    -Bounre has to wash the blood from his hands before confronting himself in the mirror much like Bond in CR.
    -The finale with Bourne meeting with the girl resembles Bond's capture of Yusef.

    However, in actual tone and execution there are massive differences between CR and Bourne Supremacy. QOS however is actually rather close.
  • doubleoegodoubleoego #LightWork
    Posts: 11,139
    There will always be similarities but the question is, should we even care? As long as the scenes are presented in an engaging way that immerses the viewer into what's going on, that's all anyone can really ask for. Bond has done it all. I can think of numerous and more grim strangulation scenes in Bond films, such as Bond strangling Bouvar with a fire-poker in TB or how about Lazenby strangling/drowning a goon on the beach in the OHMSS PTS. Gun emptying? Bond let's Dent fire his 6 shots into a pillow and then proceeds to calmly execute him or even Frost removing the clip from Brosnan's gun in DAD as he was ready to pump her face with lead.

    That being said, I think the Bourne movies were a great way to facilitate that protagonists of the genre don't have to be resigned to wise cracking arsonists, shooting everything and everyone in sight. An emphasis on internal reflection and exploring the layers of what makes these characters who they are can be for great viewing and more so for Bond as Fleming always gave the reader an insight as to what Bond was thinking. The Craig movies are taking a more Flemingesque approach in conveying the Bond character to the audience and I do personally feel that Bourne was somewhat instrumental in making it at least something for EoN to take a serious stab at and it's in no way a bad thing.
  • Creasy47Creasy47 In Cuba with Natalya.Moderator
    Posts: 40,978
    While I'm always going to prefer the Bond films over any other series, I also love the Bourne trilogy (key word: "trilogy," couldn't stand 'Legacy'.) They're fun globe-trotting thrill rides with some gritty fight/chase sequences that still entertain me to this day. I thought Damon was good in the role, the henchmen and villains were well cast, and while a bit of that grit can be seen in Craig's Bond films, who cares? I enjoy seeing it, and many of you know I'm still in love with that Bond vs. Slate hotel fight scene and would be ecstatic to have more fights like that during Craig's tenure.

    I think you should be allowed to like them both, I see zero issue with that.
  • doubleoego wrote:
    There will always be similarities but the question is, should we even care? As long as the scenes are presented in an engaging way that immerses the viewer into what's going on, that's all anyone can really ask for. Bond has done it all. I can think of numerous and more grim strangulation scenes in Bond films, such as Bond strangling Bouvar with a fire-poker in TB or how about Lazenby strangling/drowning a goon on the beach in the OHMSS PTS. Gun emptying? Bond let's Dent fire his 6 shots into a pillow and then proceeds to calmly execute him or even Frost removing the clip from Brosnan's gun in DAD as he was ready to pump her face with lead.

    That being said, I think the Bourne movies were a great way to facilitate that protagonists of the genre don't have to be resigned to wise cracking arsonists, shooting everything and everyone in sight. An emphasis on internal reflection and exploring the layers of what makes these characters who they are can be for great viewing and more so for Bond as Fleming always gave the reader an insight as to what Bond was thinking. The Craig movies are taking a more Flemingesque approach in conveying the Bond character to the audience and I do personally feel that Bourne was somewhat instrumental in making it at least something for EoN to take a serious stab at and it's in no way a bad thing.

    Very well made post.

    In fact I thought the scenes in CR that are very reminiscent of those in Bourne 2 were actually handled better in CR. Mainly because the audience is feeling Bond's pain throughout his gruelling fight scenes; a big thematic concern of CR is violence and it's repercussions. Bourne 2 is different as the film is definitely not trying to court the audience's sympathies, Bourne is supposed to be cold and we are only granted brief glimpses of what is happening internally despite it being obvious that he is full of remorse and guilt.

    Bourne Supremacy is a good film and gave the Bond series a kick up the ass but I can't help but feel that CR was a more satisfying and complete film. However, Bourne Supremacy was something of a trend-setter and even re-watching it I became more aware of just how copied and emulated the film has become in the last 10 years. Chris Nolan's Batman films and Paul Greengrass's Bourne flicks really did change the action/movie genre for the better.
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