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Didn’t they have to trim parts of Casino Royale to keep it from being Rated R?
Haven't heard about that, but maybe they trimmed down Bond being tortured by Le Chiffre? There wer sveral cut schens of about 10 minutes in total, at least these were are the scenes which were included on the DVD.
Maybe somebody with inside-insight can tell us this?
All of the interviews jointly and separately that I have seen with Lea and Daniel suggest they have a profound connection and real understanding of each other as people and actors and are very comfortable being in the same space together. When they do their stuff and are acting they both really understand how to pursue the iceberg technique and make it work and that comes from a professional and personal connection. The stills from Matera, the rehearsals could make it very easy for me to consider they are having an affair whilst filming. As for whats on the screen as they tear there clothes off each other on the train you can see Madeleine laughing with the excitement of it all a very natural typical and organic reaction where as she says she acts with her body.
I tend not to compare Daniel with x or Daniel with y. I just think Paloma is a throw back to the type of "bond girl" that a lot of the Bond audience want and part of that quips, single mission, fun need as opposed to the layered angst ridden narrative that Daniels period has tried to explore about being an assassin.
Just watching those deleted scenes of CR is a reminder of how brilliant that film is. Honestly, any one of those deleted scenes dropped in to QoS, SF, SP or NTTD would have made those films instantly better, IMO.
After a while, with the reissues, they replaced the cut-down version with the unrated which basically played everywhere else.
You can see the differences here.
The PG-13 version is basically an alternate cut of the film, it's interesting to own if you are a completist.
What strikes me about these scenes is how far Bond has travelled. The innocence, all in love of Vesper to the man that is interviewed in Skyfall for competency, to the man confronted by a shouting deeply distrustful and angry Madeleine in Austria.
That Daniel should play Madeleine with an explosion of doubt and then simmering mournfulness and regret shows just what you can do with the players when you make each movie a movement in a symphony and explains the logic of presenting entirely different types of connections for him and why dare I say it comparisons are not only unhelpful but actually miss the point of what is trying to be portrayed... a man evolving changing and reacting to his experiences.
But, one thing no one can deny is that Malek's character has been handled quite poorly. His connection and further obsession with Swann is too thin. His motivations are kinda explained but too much was left out of the film. Too many things were just implied, or slightly hinted at best. Just read this:
Rami Malek Safin sets out to create a world where there is less bloodshed, to remove the world from hand-to-hand combat, from killing people in this animalistic way, as Bond essentially does, when he can kill in such a clean, precise manner. In his mind, this radically progressive technology will help humanity feel less guilty in the wars that they fight.
Gregg Wilson We don't say it, but it is implied that Safin's poisoning also rendered him infertile, so he is the last of his family line. He knows that his legacy is only what he makes and leaves behind through his actions. Now he has found the scientist and the technology to wipe out entire family lines. When you have the potential to say, "this isn't just going to kill you, it's going to kill all your descendants", that is a powerful threat to wield.
Yes, this is what I was referring to. Thanks for posting the deleted scenes of CR. What a true masterpiece this film this. Honestly, I would have left all those scenes in! Maybe one day we will get a director’s cut and include them.
Again, not wanting to sound like a broken record because everyone here knows my stance now on NTTD, but Safin was a wasted character. They ditched Blofeld for a far inferior character, again to develop another family backstory angle, this time with Madeline.
They couldn't use Blofeld again because his personal angle (Bond's brother) was used up in the last film, and the franchise now has to rely on the villain having a personal angle somewhere down the line. The villain can't be, you know, just a villain anymore.
He wants to give people oblivion because that's what humans really want but at the same time he believes our society would evolve and become a better place to live thanks to his precise killing technology - so no more blood on the streets and cities destroyed.
He wants to live with Madeleine and raise Mathilde with him in the island - they're even presented to us as "his family" - but then he just uses Mathilde as leverage pointing out her only way out to safety would've been with Bond if they leave the island.
I loved the film but I got much more from Safin a second time and in that regard can not wait for the Home Viewings where all the subtleties will emerge over time. But then those that believe everything should be dished up nice and clear that is a fail and certainly different markets have different views about to what extent they want to be spoon fed. To come out with talking points is great in my view.
My favourite scene is where he is sat on the floor with Mathilde he seems so comfortable and careful of her which itself is chilling. Reminds me of Saddam Hussein in those dreadful televised encounters with children.
It's the other kind of film, the kind you need to rewatch to get all the subtext because it's not funneled out to you. Nolan films have zero rewatchability (save for some actors performances). Which will never be the case for any 007 film. Certainly not this one, which achieve what it sets out to do: bow the Craig era out standing proud.
A matter of opinion; for me it is the reverse between Nolan and NTTD.
I saw he film 5 times and I got everything I can possibly get from Safin. He's a fascinating character, as I said before, but he's half-baked as well.
For example, the fact that he's indeed infertile would've made both his revenge towards SPECTRE - killing their descendants as well - and him "stealing" Bond's family more powerful to witness.
Remember in the theatrical cut of Aliens, the subplot about her daughter having died of old age was removed. I like the idea and the extended version, but I think it was smart to delete it from the theatrical release, because discovering the film and getting this right away would have resulted in groans and bad word of the mouth.
I got the vibe that Safin's "real life parallel" is intended to be Mark Zuckerberg or other careless Silicon Valley types blended with Blofeld's plot in the YOLT novel (have power over life or death but in a passive fashion). The nanobots are like a global version of the novel's poison garden, he gets the satisfaction that he enables purpose through death. He has a nebulous idea of how he wants to be an unseen god in everyone's life and doesn't care what collateral damage or chaos he causes. Similar to Facebook or other internet products, he wants to distribute his creation widely without any safeguards except for his control. He acts entitled to anything and everything he wants (such as Bond's family) because he is so impressed with his own intelligence as the internet oligarchs act as if they are above society's normal rules.
Except for the fact that he totally doesn’t care about Mathilde… first he uses her as leverage in order to convince Bond to leave, then he randomly sets her free because she bites him.
Mmmh. I feel like there is also stuff in the film that goes in the opposite direction and therefore muddles those hints and implications.
I would have preferred it if there was one clear surface-level way to read the character - he is obsessed with Madeleine, or he is obsessed with ending bloodshed, or he wants revenge on the world or he wants his creation to outlive himself, because he is infertile or he is racist or whatever - and then you can peel that back and find other stuff or fill out blanks with you own headcanon. Safin is, in my personal opinion, too muddled on the surface to allow for really rewarding deep-reading. There are too many things that are not mysterious but rather just completely unclear and sometimes even contradictory.
In turn, my personal reading/headcanon for the character is that really, he himself doesn't know what he wants other than revenge on SPECTRE. He is all pseudo-philosophy and grand gestures, but there isn't really anything behind it. He takes Mathilde hostage and then just let's her go, because he doesn't really know what to do with her. He mass-produces Heracles and gives a grand speech about it but then he just wants to sell it after his own personal revenge is complete. He is completely stunted emotionally with his whole life revolving around the death of his family and his saving of Madeleine and he simply has no way to get to grips with any of that and therefore is all over the place.
The real villain is Valdo.
God, Daniel looks so YOUNG in this, almost makes me feel...old.
Glad they cut the hosptial/emergency room scene, looks like smth out of Casualty (BBC)
The extra Montenegro scene where they walk towards the car however is pure gold - just watch how DC swivels and hands the tip to the courier - THAT IS PURE CONNERY right there :-O
It’s just such a cold ending to me, I wish I could get anything out of it but I currently don’t. It’s odd, because I said before the movie came out that I didn’t think Craig deserved a happy ending to his arc, but after watching it, I really think that Bond did deserve one after everything that happened to him up to this point. I really hope I am able to warm up to the ending in the future because the rest of the movie I find so damn good. So many little moments that I love: the opening, Vesper’s grave, the Matera square shootout, Bond’s exile in Jamaica, Cuba, the SPECTRE party and Blofeld’s re-introduction in the prison, the cat and mouse game in the fog in Norway, Ash’s death, Bond chucking the lone grenade up the stairway only to have three more drop down to him, the single shot on the stairway. Zimmer’s score was miles above anything Newman produced for the last two flicks. The direction is incredible and spot on, I get so much more out of action here (a good comparison would be the Norway Rover chase to the Rome chase in the previous movie, this movie has so much more intensity and dramatic tension).
I definitely need to sit on this one longer as I cannot even really attempt to rank it. I like it much, much more than Spectre, which currently sits in my bottom five above TND, DAF, DAD and AVTAK. After the past couple of years between Covid and losing close family members, I was really hoping to see my childhood idol ride off into the sunset finally after fifteen years of betrayal, death and misery, but it sounds like that was never in the cards to begin with. I love seeing that other people do enjoy the ending, and hope that someday I’m able to, too, because the film would easily be in my top 5 if so.
And I would have liked them to leave the Cricket match section in..it added atmosphere + we got an extra few beats in that excellent fight sequence!
Yes, much depends on what we each bring to it ... so naturally all of our reactions will be different in kind or degree. And yet, despite all the popcorn thrills, the conclusion is about a reckoning with mortality rather than evasion from it. I enjoyed the movie immensely and yet have found some solace in it as well. I don't think the two need be mutually exclusive ... though I can understand why many would wish it otherwise.
Bang on.
This ties in with the plans that Thiel et al are hatching:
https://www.businessinsider.com/ways-rich-invest-in-living-forever-young-blood-cryonics-2019-8
And there's no real rationale why people like Thiel do these crazy things other than ego, emptiness, and a fear that they're ultimately human like the rest of us. This makes Bond's acceptance of being human such a compelling counterpoint to Safin trying to be a god.