Thank you for sharing. I disagree with a lot, but your opinion is worth reading. And I'm a big fan of the whole series anyway. I was exposed early on in my life, and pretty much simultaneously, to Connery, Lazenby, Moore and Brosnan films (and a few years later to Dalton). That has to shape one's opinions and preferences.
ONE: His films were a real "shock to the system" in terms of the directness of the film's sexual hook-ups AND Bond's amoral willingness to kill (he had a LICENSE to kill). This was a BIG leap from traditional Hollywood stories. Key: Bond movies didn't end with Bond marrying the woman and having children. It was on to the NEXT sexual liaison -- and more than one of them.
Not having lived through the sixties, it took me some time to become aware of this. These films do symbolize a change in explicitness and attitude.
I've seen every James Bond movie on release, every year they came out in my lifetime, and its been quite a ride. But the Craig version simply has no connection or relevance to what James Bond was meant to be about.
I know what you mean. These recent films are, as you said earlier, "emotionally different" than before.
The Craig films are less about "pure fun" and more about taking the elements of the Bond formula and pushing them to their "logical", "realistic" extremes. If we know Bond can bleed and get hurt, now we see it in a more intense, unnerving way. If we know Bond can hook up with women, now we see him fall in love, and his job will get in the way with bad consequences (we got that already with Lazenby, but that story was cut short, and now they've followed through). The villains are scarier, more unsettling in their madness. You get the idea.
I haven't read the novels but I do know plenty of this comes from the books, so in a way they are honoring them. And I can understand enjoying these new films less for the reasons I stated. Luckily for me, I have been able to enjoy them. It's entertainment of a different kind, for sure, but entertainment nonetheless. Also, I felt the last two films added some much-missed humor. Two of Craig's films (Quantum of Solace and Skyfall) are my least favorite Bond films in general, because I feel they are too serious. I still like them, but the other three he did had more humor, and that goes a long way. I really enjoyed Spectre, and I thought this latest one was probably the best one since Casino Royale.
And now Craig is leaving the role, so we're probably on the verge of another change in the style and tone of these films. More lighthearted would seem like the logical way to go.
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
Thank you for sharing. I disagree with a lot,
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As well you can -- and should!
Truth be told, I myself rather disagree with certain things in that post myself -- I wrote as a "once over lightly" on the Bond series, without filling in a lot of detail that makes for a more nuanced approach. And I still doubt I can do that here.
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but your opinion is worth reading.
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Thank you for reading. I consider many opinions around here worth reading, including, here, yours.
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And I'm a big fan of the whole series anyway.
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Oh, me too. I always dutifully showed up -- usually in Week One of release "for the new Bond." It is a dependable a series as we've had and frankly -- other genre characters like Sherlock Holmes and Tarzan don't do the same thing for me: the action thing (and for a fairly long time, the sexy romance thing. Not to mention the "cool suave hero with gadgets thing.")
I also recall this: I would "lose interest" in the Bond franchise for a few episodes and then suddenly an interest would return. The Roger Moore ones got progressively silly -- but when Timothy Dalton turned up, suddenly they felt like "real" competitive action pictures again (recall, License to Kill came out the same summer as the first Tim Burton Batman film.)
I think I am correct on this, too: a few times in the history of Bond, the producers considered just ending the series entirely. During the Moore years. And there was a six year break between License to Kill and Goldeneye (SIX YEARS) in which we all kinda forgot all about Bond, and he almost didn't come back THAT time either.
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
I was exposed early on in my life, and pretty much simultaneously, to Connery, Lazenby, Moore and Brosnan films (and a few years later to Dalton). That has to shape one's opinions and preferences.
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A benefit of moviechat (among many) is that we can perhaps "compare generations" and how these films came about.
In my case, I "lived" each new James Bond movie as they came forward...and watched as each new Bond took the screen.
In your case...you got them all pretty much at the same time and could compare and contrast (the Connery ones have the irony of the best Bond -- the superstar, the "sexy sadist" -- in movies that can now barely compete as action movies at all (Maybe the climax of You Only Live Twice and the snow action in OHMSS, Thunderball was the biggest of them all, but it is awfully overlong and slow now.)
I'm always astonished to meet people for whom Roger Moore is "the one." They grew up on him in the 70's and 80s. I again note that the Bond series almost turned into a "spoof of other movies" on Moore's watch. Shaft(Live and Let Die), Enter the Dragon(The Man With the Golden Gun); Jaws (The Spy Who Loved Me -- with the villain Jaws, natch), Moonraker(Star Wars) WE knew that these were gag movies in the main -- the Bond folks try to go "back to basics" with the stripped down "For Your Eyes Only" and it ended up looking too cheap for a Bond movie (with a "nothing" climax.)
That said, a lot of money was put into "The Spy Who Loved Me" to make it a competitive summer blockbuster. It was and "Nobody Does it Better" was a hit radio song , and "Jaws"(the toothy bad guy) made a hit -- but HE was silly too - remember how he ended up with a giant "Pippi Longstocking girlfriend" in Moonraker?
The series needed to make changes, and it did.
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
ecarle wrote:
But the Craig version simply has no connection or relevance to what James Bond was meant to be about.
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you responded:
I know what you mean. These recent films are, as you said earlier, "emotionally different" than before.
The Craig films are less about "pure fun" and more about taking the elements of the Bond formula and pushing them to their "logical", "realistic" extremes. If we know Bond can bleed and get hurt, now we see it in a more intense, unnerving way.
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Absolutely. This was clear with Casino Royale (which -- very interestingly -- managed to "re-boot the series with an origin story from the original book -- which had been made first as that wacky 1967 spoof film.) We were told that The Bourne Identity inspired THIS Bond and that it was actually somewhat of a return to Ian Fleming's books and characters.
Yes to Bourne...maybe to Fleming...but certainly NO to the 1960's "sex and violence" formula that helped end the Hays Code. Again, MOST movies ended the romantic couple married, maybe with a baby on the way or in view. BOND snuggled with one woman at the end of From Russia With Love...and went off to the next one in Goldfinger...and snuggled with HER at the end of Goldfinger...and went on to the next one in Thunderball. It was a fantasy of escape for husbands with children; and for their wives (Connery had a lot of ladies going nuts over him back then, I can testify from my readings.)
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If we know Bond can hook up with women, now we see him fall in love, and his job will get in the way with bad consequences (we got that already with Lazenby, but that story was cut short, and now they've followed through).
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Lazenby did the marriage and tragedy thing "that one time." Something about Lazenby only doing that once made the movie seem a bit more "real." (Though Connery returned at the openign of the next one seeking revenge on Blofeld.) And yes, the Craigs rather emulated OMHSS...especially with Vesper.
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
The villains are scarier, more unsettling in their madness. You get the idea.
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Agreed. I'd offer this.
Though no Bond film has ever been "allowed" (by the producers) to produce an R rating, the coming of the R rating in the late 60s/70s brought us so MANY truly cruel and evil baddies(Scorpio in Dirty Harry, Oliver's Nazi dentist in Marathon Man) that eventually Bond was able to work that level of evil into those films. Probably well before Craig -- I'll offer the drug lord(Robert Davi) in License to Kill (remember the guy put in the pressure device til his head exploded?)
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Back briefly to the silliness of at least the early Moore films.
It was one thing to have a Southern Good Ol' Boy Sheriff in the Everglades in Live and Let Die -- he was silly enough there with Bond -- but then they went ahead on dropped him "on vacation" in the Orient in the next Bond film ("The Man With The Golden Gun.") No rhyme or reason -- he worked once, he'd work twice, the 70's Bond makers simply didn't care about rooting the characters (or some of them) in any reality. This somewhat repeated with Jaws and his big girlfriend (and switch , as I recall, to the good guys) in Moonraker.
That sheriff, by the way, came four years before the Jackie Gleason character in Smokey and the Bandit, but was actually "based" on an American car company commercial from , as I recall, the late 60's/early 70s.
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
I haven't read the novels but I do know plenty of this comes from the books, so in a way they are honoring them.
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Yes. Casino Royale, I would suppose, was pretty dead on. Its been years since I've read what few I DID read, and I recall that Bond was still a pretty carnal fellow in the books, but certainly "serious."
The series was so "weird" in the Connery incarnation. Connery himself emanated a kind of sexy sadism (on the side of GOOD) that made his fights more vicious, his killings more murderous(before Craig came along in the opening scene of Casnio Royale) and his sexual conquests more... "conquest." And yet the Connerys at times were rather shallow and aimed at "kids audience" as much as to adults. CONNERY made them more adult.
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And I can understand enjoying these new films less for the reasons I stated. Luckily for me, I have been able to enjoy them. It's entertainment of a different kind, for sure, but entertainment nonetheless.
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Well, the owners are still the offspring of the original team (at least ONE of the original team) but they "loosened the handcuffs" so as to bring in prestige directors (Sam Mendes) and Oscar winning villians (Bardem, the guy in No Time to Die) . I recall reading -- perhaps in the Dalton era -- that this "family business" did NOT WANT interlopers like Spielberg to make the films, or to cast expensive and major stars (let alone Oscar winners) as the villains. Though I suppose Christopher Walken, way back at the end of Moore(A View to a Kill) started the Oscar casting...
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
Also, I felt the last two films added some much-missed humor. Two of Craig's films (Quantum of Solace and Skyfall) are my least favorite Bond films in general, because I feel they are too serious.
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I recall Quantum of Solace feeling like it was going nowhere...and it got there. Not much of a villain, either, as I recall. A writers' strike or something gummed that up.
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The others are fine for their time. I try to avoid "get off my lawn" syndrome, but its like I can barely remember the action in these later films -- except for a bunch of CGI. A scene with Komodo dragons in one of them was good -- I can't even remember which one. Sigh. They are for a new generation.
By the way, I accept the fact that modernly we've had a female M, a gay Q, a black Moneypenny, the times have changed and that's where we are. But the issue remains: is the thriller good AS a thriller, or more to the point, as a Bond thriller?
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I still like them, but the other three he did had more humor, and that goes a long way. I really enjoyed Spectre, and I thought this latest one was probably the best one since Casino Royale.
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It was pretty good. Some nice action up front, the scene with Ana de Arma was sexy(her, even though she didn't do Bond); action packed(THERE's another slight woman beating the hell out of men) and with a nice plot twist about what happens at that SPECTRE party.
To repeat: I've seen every James Bond film (first run) and I will continue to do so until..I can't.
I'd say from the Daltons through the Brosnans through the Craigs, they have been competent and exciting big budget action fare...the silliness of Moore is over and the "sexist" macho of Connery is impossible.
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ecarle (14979)
3 years ago
And now Craig is leaving the role, so we're probably on the verge of another change in the style and tone of these films. More lighthearted would seem like the logical way to go.
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Yes...perhaps not back to Moore's silliness, but with his spirit (wit) and occasional commitment to REAL toughness(he killed a few bad guys with extreme prejudice.)
COVID evidently really killed the gross of No Time To Die. It will evidently be the highest grossing film of 2021 and still lose maybe $100 million-- not because of box office trouble but because of all the delays and marketing costs over two years (almost) over COVID.
Consequently, I daresay we may be waiting as long for the "next Bond" as we are for the "final" (10th) Tarantino movie. They'll all wait until the market can truly support the product
....
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