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@BondCommentator
The empty streets are part of what makes me enjoy SP so much. Whether it was by choice or practical necessity that they all but depopulated the world, I think there's more poetry in that than many are willing to acknowledge.
Indeed, most scenes in SP play either at night or in remote places across the globe. (It almost feels as if the film was shot during the pandemic.) But this makes sense to me given the emotionally cold, borderline hypothermic state that both Bond and Madeleine find themselves in when we first meet them. At this point, Bond has lost both his parents, his surrogate mother and the love of his life. He’s about to be dealt yet another blow by a specter from the past. Blofeld is on a mission to flat-out torment and destroy Bond. It’s only fair to say that Bond is in a very bad place in this film.
(Of course, he sort of always has been since the ending of CR, so one criticism I will give the Craig era, which I love, is that this Bond was rarely happy or devoid of personal demons.)
Our cold Bond will eventually find solace in the arms of another tragic figure who, as we will especially learn at the start of NTTD, has to put up with a lot too. In a way, we’re seeing a kind of emotional codependency form between these two. Most of the film will be them against the world.
What better way to visually tell that story than by emptying streets, isolating Bond and Madeleine with the aid of snow, desert heat, night time, …?
Yes, the PTS shows us extremely crowded streets. It also introduces a theme of death. That makes sense too, right? Bond’s world is in rapid decay, even more so now that ‘C’ is gunning for an effective termination of the 00 program. The world of SP is a cemetery, a collection of falling tombstones. Even the film’s climax takes place in ruins, the ruins of Bond’s once so vibrant professional home.
Even the score heavily relies on ambient sounds that enhance feelings of distance and remoteness, of hollowness and emptiness. I insist that there’s poetry in this. It’s dark poetry, but it’s poetry.
After all of the above, one might think that SP is also a dour, sinister, emotionally ugly or frigid film. In truth, I see a lot of warmth in the film too. There are obviously pleasant scenes like Bond and Lucia, the PTS, and Bond and Madeleine on the train. However, there are also scenes in which Bond rediscovers his humanity, and his confidence in love. The night spent in the hotel room in ‘l Américain is sensual and powerful, with a half-drunk Bond obviously caring for Madeleine the way he does. Madeleine is a beacon of light for Bond, and though some have branded their relationship “uncomfortable” because Léa is 16 years younger than Craig in real life, I’d say it’s one of the finer and more sincere relationships in the series. In other words, I believe their love. SP isn’t the happiest or warmest Bond film we have, but whatever happiness or warmth delicately leak into its story, play as honest and genuine.
Yes, the climax could have been stronger, the foster brother plot is weak in concept and even weaker in execution, but the entire mood and tone of the film, as well as the interpersonal relationships, make me a happy SP fan. Despite its many imperfections, it’s my second favorite of the Craig Bonds.
I'm also reluctant to characterize Bond and Lucias scene or the PTS as "pleasant".
I found your interpretation intriguing but cannot really agree with much of it in truth. I'm grateful just to say that at least we both enjoyed it. Albeit for apparently vastly differing reasons.
I loved NTTD upon release and now more than ever. It was different to the usual formula which is why it it appeals. Just means non Bond affionados are going to query why there can be another Bond film!
Great comment! Indeed Bond is unusually alone in this movie: one of my very elements of Spectre is how much time is spent with him trying to persuade people of varying levels of reluctance to ally with him. He has the ghost of M, but Moneypenny, Q, Lucia, Mr White, and Madeleine are all hostile, some quite so.
The film is appropriately populated too...aside from Mexico City, the cable car looks as busy as it should, as does Tangier. I'm not sure what people expect remote desert or Alpine cabins to look like? Or even the non-commercial areas of Rome and London in the middle of the night?
Yeah, SF was the perfect ending for Craig's Bond. SP's ending was the real end of Craig's Bond run and EON knows it. Let's just say Barbara wasn't ready to imagine a Bond world without Craig's Bond at the time.
Yeah, definitely...from SF one could say he looked like a Bond with 3 more films in film. Just that SF had that perfect ending, that it looked like something we would have looked back on and said it was good for him.
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I understand that in Craig's version of Bond, emotions and relationships are much more important. However, overusing these themes makes them much less effective. Bond falling in love and leaving mi6 should be something special and not something that happens in almost every movie. The diverse relationships between main characters (Bond / Safin / Blofeld / Madeleine) also make the Bond universe very small. As if the whole story was just one big family tragedy.
I still think that's the right decision. Audiences like being emotionally involved with their characters: it's why CR was such a hit. Removing that would be a mistake I think.
Which is something you can easily point at OHMSS: indeed the relationships involved in that are very similar. And Bond just happens to bump into the daughter of the biggest crime boss in Europe whilst on holiday?
I get that you're saying it's the repetition of those themes which are the problem, but then you'll also see a lot of fans wishing that DAF had been a direct sequel to OHMSS, carrying on the personal story rather than just ignoring it and returning to being a normal Bond adventure.
Definitely. I've said this loads of times, CR/Qos/SF worked fine as a 'Bond begins' trilogy, and that last scene of Skyfall bought everything back to the classic, traditional Bond. They could have gone on to feature craig or any other actor in stand-alone adventures, like we had in the golden era.
That is a good point. This is probably also the reason why I like OHMSS as a standalone film. I think the frachise has survived over all the years because it has hardly had any continuity. In my eyes this kind of continuity works best in a sequal or in a trilogy (like Star Wars, LOTR, Batman) but what comes afterwards. Would that mean thats the frachise needs to be rebooted every time a new Bond actor is hired?
I had more or less the opposite impression entirely. Namely, Bond is never on his own in this film until he is, a fact the direction, narrative, and cinematography would seem to reflect. Blofeld plainly states he's been watching Bond the entire time he's otherwise been absent from his life. Q turns up in Austria unprompted and as if by magic. M has died yet still finds a way to give him direction from beyond the grave.
Bond even has an unnamed companion for his surveillance of Sciarra and is able to reach Moneypenny in the middle of the night in the midst of a car chase. He tells Lucia to contact Felix Leiter after he has concluded his liaison with her; his help taken for granted.
Narratively there is an otherwise somewhat out of context scene right before the Hinx fight on the train where Q and Moneypenny find M having a nightcap. This concludes with M ordering them to delete the smart blood files - the smart blood being an obvious plot element that diminished enormously through the making of the film - and concluding "he's on his own".
It seems as if this was a demarcation point of the story, and the empty streets cinematography follow this scene as a subtle indication of the fact Bond now finds himself for the first time without the possibility of help from his allies.
It's all very detailed stuff. And perhaps more than any other film in the series I would like to see a directors or extended cut of Spectre. To Gods ears.
This seems like a rather strained reading for the sake of being contrary. Sure, Bond has a sex partner with him in Mexico City, and he's given smart blood as a controlling mechanism, but he is without allies at the start of the film and has to persuade a series of increasingly hostile people to change that. Blofeld does not plainly state he's been watching Bond the entire time, and Q shows up (not magically, he knows where Bond is) to stop Bond. But you are right that he is never literally physically alone with no other humans around him.
Blofeld casually shows Bond live footage of Bonds workplace, then tells Bond "It seems you're on your own". He then mentions every adversary in the Bond Craig era, and takes credit for the deaths of Vesper Lynn and M.
He then states "Me. It was all me James. It's always been me; the author of all your pain."
If this isn't Blofeld plainly revealing his long term and extensive surveillance of Bond I don't really know what is.
Q is revealed to be on a time schedule; and with his own work to do. Yet with no narrative prompting or explanation he appears at the clinic. Very much as if by magic.
In the final scene in the booby trapped headquarters Bond runs around with the photographs of Vesper, Le Chiffre, M and others for company. Even here he is with his ghosts. Even here he isn't truly alone.
I'm a little taken aback by your somewhat blithe accusation of contrarianism for the sake of it. I feel as though I've supported my statements through enough viewings and citations of the film to well and truly receive the benefit of the doubt. Indeed, if I may be so bold, your back handed criticism comes across as more than a little sour grapes on your part. My sincere apologies to you if it wasn't intended that way, but it doesn't read as a particularly generous assessment or of a genuine intellectual curiosity around others views on the film.
There's a scene in Spectre where M calls Q to ask if Bond is in London, "because if he isn't, you're in deep shit." Q, who has the means to find out exactly where Bond is, is surprised and distressed to discover that Bond is in Austria. In his next scene, Q is in Austria relaying his distress to Bond and pleading for him to return to London. You characterize this moment as having "no narrative prompting", and I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about.
Your theory that Blofeld has performed "long term and extensive surveillance of Bond" just doesn't follow at all from your evidence. It's a complete non sequitur. It's hard to know what to say about it, and it's the first time I've ever heard such a novel interpretation.
Bond has virtually no willing allies in this movie, and Madeleine even points out that he's "always alone". Bond weakly objects, but at the end of the movie he follows her prescribed course of action because she's right. He's clearly on his own, more so than usual, and it's only been brought up here to justify the relatively unpopulated times and places depicted in much of the movie. Your extremely weird interpretations I refer to above, as well as the notion that Bond isn't alone because he's surrounded by photocopies, video recordings, and memories, is the sort of strain I was referring to, and it just seems to be in service of being contrary for its own sake. Surely you don't see Harry Caul in The Conversation, surrounded by his audio recordings, and think, "Oh, there's a social butterfly."
For example, I've detailed all the touches that reveal Blofeld has extensive ongoing knowledge of Bond. Yet you reject them on an entirely non-factual basis. You've then written "sure he has a sex partner with him in Mexico City" when you have no factual basis for that at all. He's with a companion in Mexico City. Is she a random girl, a fellow intelligence agent, his Mexican mistress?
Bizarre.
Bond has allies throughout the entire movie, something again I have extensively detailed. You ignore this, then in another post - incorrectly - point out that Bond is never on his own in Spectre. (He is on his own running around booby trapped headquarters actually.) Your stated views have vacillated wildly, just on this point alone. Your view, if it's possible to articulate logically, seems to be stating that Bond is alone, even though he's never alone, even though factually he is actually alone at times. But he's alone. Very alone. Even when he's not alone.
It's just arrogant, confusing and patronizing nonsense in truth. I do look forward to more amusingly intriguing and unique takes on what seem straightforward plot elements from you. I shan't waste my time responding to them however. Good day to you.
You haven't. Blofeld knows that Bond has intervened in several of his plots over time, and considers himself to have been victorious somehow in those enounters. That's it. There's no hint whatsoever of ongoing surveillance. Blofeld doesn't suggest it, the film doesn't show it, and the film shows things that more or less preclude such a thing. (If you wish to imply that your villain has been surveilling your hero, and then you have that villain display pictures from the hero's past, you are going to use survellance pictures that include the hero.) This is not that different to the people suggesting Bond survived NTTD.
I don't mean to be confusing--I aim to be as straightforward and easy to understand as Q's reasons for showing up in Austria, or the nature of Bond's relationship with the girl in Mexico. ;-) Bond does attain allies in this film, but they are generally reluctant, often extremely so, and have to be won. And again, the central relationship arc is with someone who calls him out for being "always alone", and the film takes her side on it.
It's always fun to concoct pretentious subtext for a story, but at least take a look at the actual text from time to time.
That's a very curious way to look at it. It's really not a massive leap of logic from one to the other: it's very clear that he's been following Bond's progression, "author of all of your pain" suggests intent, not accident. We don't need a photograph to have that redundantly spoonfed to us on top. If they'd done it I wouldn't have been upset, but it's still all there laid out for us to piece together, bearing in mind the whole story is about watching people and malevolent surveillance (not much piece-ing needed! :) ).
Anyway, one thing I hadn't noticed until now (and I'm surprised I haven't and I'm sure many have) is that Fleming's original history of Blofeld's rise to power had him gain influence through working through the Polish Ministry of Posts and Telegraphs and working in a sensitive comms position, and then using and selling secure and top secret communications to earn himself money and move up in the world, eventually selling information to both sides in WW2. So the whole Nine Eyes thing and the basis of the plot in the surveillance being used for the wrong means actually does have a root in Fleming's character sketch for Blofeld, and makes him the right villain for this story.
No, it's a leap. Blofeld is taking credit for the consequences of Bond interfering with him. To assume from that that he has been exercising "extensive surveillance" "the entire time he's otherwise been absent from his life" is a non sequitur. Similar to the folks who think Blofeld started Spectre to get back at Bond because of another weirdly misinterpreted line.
Are you saying then that Blofeld has been exercising extensive surveillance on Bond for a couple of decades and the audience is meant to believe this? I don't know, maybe a lot of people think so!
(By the way, no, photographs wouldn't be necessary, but if you want the audience to understand that Blofeld has been surveilling Bond for decades, and you're going to have Blofeld show Bond pictures of his past anyway, it's an odd choice to have portraits and not something more intimate.)
I noticed this the last time I read Thunderball and really appreciated it. Having said that, I'd still love to see a version of this story in something for real, as it's a highlight of that novel.
The plot is literally about people being watched without their permission and having that used against them and Blofeld is the one doing it; Blofeld shows intimate knowledge of Bond's past, uses photos of his enemies and loved ones to taunt him, and claims to have been the author of all of his pain. And yes, we see him watching Bond's colleagues live on TV in their private space. He even knows Bond has infiltrated a secret meeting. That's quite a pile of evidence to dismiss.
It's quite hard to be the author of someone's pain without knowing what they're up to(!) - are you saying he somehow did all of that without keeping any tabs on Bond?
There's no leap required: evil guy who uses surveillance claims to have been ruining our hero's life for at least the last ten years. Considering that his main weapon as shown in the film is surveillance and intelligence... hmm I wonder how he did it.
It's a bit like hearing that Scaramanga killed someone and saying 'but there's no reason to think he used his golden gun- we didn't actually see the gun being fired'. It's storytelling. Here's how this character does their things, they did the thing; there's no leap involved in assuming they did that thing using the method they always do that thing. If you're giving the audience that information they can piece the two together, and indeed would be surprised if they didn't go together. 'Scaramanga assassinated that guy by hitting him with a moped? Oh, that's disappointing. Why did you tell me about the golden gun then?'
Bond came to Blofeld every time. Including in Spectre. There's no hint that Blofeld was actively keeping track of Bond at all. He has been ruining Bond's life every time Bond proactively comes across him. Blofeld points this out moments before boasting of being the author of Bond's pain. Do you also think that the film means for us to think that Blofeld actively caused the death of, say Vesper (who committed suicide), or are we meant to recognize that he is goading Bond and trying to get into his head, as he does with almost every line he utters?
But okay, that's two votes for "Blofeld has been extensively surveilling Bond for decades"! Maybe other people also didn't know why Q showed up at the clinic?
It doesn't really matter- do I buy it as a convincing bit of retroactive plotting? Of course not. But Blofeld's weapon is surveillance and intelligence: the film is telling us, screaming at us, that he's used that against Bond and continues to use it against his friends literally as we watch. That is the message of the film: that these are weapons which are used in the wrong hands and can wreck lives. For him not to use the golden gun would be pointless and dilute the message.
If he's lying about it it doesn't matter because if he is we never find out about it, and it would undermine the story the film is trying to tell if he were. Was it because Bond stumbled upon his plans first? Maybe, but again- it doesn't matter: it's the nature of the weapon being used, not who fired the first shot. "You interfered in my world, I destroyed yours".
I've never had an issue with it. His explanation seems fine: he's trying to get 007 to return home with him in order to save his career. He obviously knows where Bond is because he can track him.
It isn't, though. Blofeld doesn't surveil Bond at any point in this film, nor does he reveal knowledge of private information, nor do we see things one expects to see in a film where the villain is surveilling the hero. It's unlikely the screenwriters want us to think Blofeld made Vesper kill herself, and even less likely that they want us to think that he did it with his weapon of surveillance. Just as when Kananga tells Bond he's been a "minor inconvenience", neither Bond nor a reasonable audience thinks that is the case.
So here it is: You interfered in my world, so I destroyed yours (M, for example) with my weapon of surveillance. :)) You kept messing up my plans, so I kept surveilling you, and that caused your women to die. :)) No, he's not saying that, the screenwriters don't mean for him to be saying that, Bond doesn't hear it that way, it's ridiculous.
I'm relieved to hear that! :))