Opinions on 007 - No Time to Die

[Federica-C]

So I've watched the movie last week and it was good, but not 007ly good if you know what I mean. The screenplay was a bit meh. 

The biggest disappointment for me was that...

Spoiler

No one, except a security officer, gave him the chance to introduce himself properly and say "I'm Bond. [pause] James Bond." A security office, can you believe it? Then his successor 007 appeared, and she already knew who he was, so she didn't bother ask... 

Disappointing nevertheless. 😒

The film opens in Italy, where Bond looks like he's having the best time of his life in a boring vintage car... But the idyllic holiday soon gets spoiled by a mysterious enemy from the past - whose past it is, you'd need to watch the movie to find out. 😄 And I have underestimated the vintage car - it can do pretty amazing things!

There are chemical weapons involved, but that part was made a bit too complex IMO. As talented as Rami Malek is, I think they could have picked someone best suited for the role - I didn't totally buy his villain performance. 

In case you're wondering, yes, the damsel in distress is still there, but she comes with a dark side - I liked that. As usual, the film is packed with beautiful and talented women, but this time someone new will give Bond no time to die...  

Finally, what a finale. I can only describe it as... BOOM!! CRASH!! KA BOOM! 😆

I'd give it ⭐⭐⭐

Do you agree?

[TimmyBGood]

@Federica-C 

Bond movies have always been rubbish: the franchise is sustained by an audience willingness to suspend any normal standards of judgement with regards to character, plot, acting, cinematography, editing, directing and just about every other aspect of the art and craft of film making.  To be fair though, Fleming applied similarly low standards to his books: they were always high-volume pulp products with no pretence to being literature...

[Skull+Treaty]

@Federica-C 

Added as a spoiler, and just my thoughts!

Spoiler

I thought it was a good film and a great send off for Daniel Craig, though I didn't really enjoy the second half of the story.

It was really well made, great pace and engaging but they took too many things too far for my liking. Separating Bond and 007 was fair enough and makes sense to me, opportunity missed to designate Bond 7777 but that was a bit of fan service I wanted.  It's a shame Blofeld died the way he did but that's OK, I think it was too far for Bond to have a kid and to die though.

My concern is that they continue the franchise following 007 and not recast James Bond. I am OK with them doing that but I don't want to watch a film about 007, I want to watch a film about an old school misogynistic British James Bond (that's just me though). I really liked the first half, all the fight scenes were great and so was the score. So many throw backs too. Poison garden is right out of You Only Live Twice, so many Dr No references, non stop references to OHMSS but the whole film kind of paralleled that.

I could not pick a lot but I do think it was a solid film. Better than Spectre but not as good as Craig's others. I suspect that will be a controversial opinion but that's where I stand for the moment 😄

[Chodley]

DB5 a "boring vintage car"? You do know the history of that car in the Bond frachise?

[TimmyBGood]

@Chodley 

Not to mention a 1930 4½ Litre Bentley coupé in battleship grey with the Amherst-Villiers supercharger...

People forget just how old the source material is: the 'real' Commander Bond ( RNR and veteran of WWII ) would have fairly recently celebrated his hundredth birthday*.

*Always assuming the 60-90 units of alcohol a week, 100-a-day strong Turkish cigarette habit, love of rich French cuisine and occasional fugu fish toxin poisoning didn't get him first ; )

[Federica-C]

---

@Chodley wrote:

DB5 a "boring vintage car"? You do know the history of that car in the Bond frachise?

---

😄  It certainly has a history, but I prefer more high-tech cars and contemporary designs like the DB9/10... 

via GIPHY

[Skull+Treaty]

---

@Federica-C wrote:

---

@Chodley wrote:

DB5 a "boring vintage car"? You do know the history of that car in the Bond frachise?

---

😄  It certainly has a history, but I prefer more high-tech cars and contemporary designs like the DB9/10... 

---

I was happy to see the return of the AMV8, to me, a beautiful car 😄

[Federica-C]

---

@TimmyBGood wrote:

@Federica-C 

Bond movies have always been rubbish: the franchise is sustained by an audience willingness to suspend any normal standards of judgement with regards to character, plot, acting, cinematography, editing, directing and just about every other aspect of the art and craft of film making.  To be fair though, Fleming applied similarly low standards to his books: they were always high-volume pulp products with no pretence to being literature...

---

I won't say always, but you're right, blockbusters aren't meant to have meaningful scripts and great art & craft, but mainly spectacular CGI and good-looking characters. I think with action movies viewers expect to see more and more sophisticated special effects, something out of the ordinary capable to amaze them and keep their mind off everyday issued and worries for an hour and a half or so. 

[Federica-C]

@Skull+Treaty I must watch one of the previous films you mentioned!

[Chodley]

@TimmyBGood Haha. Indeed.

I do think there's still room for the old misogynistic Bond but it was done too uncritically the first time round. He was seen as an amusing role model when I was a kid rather than a deeply flawed sociopath trapped in an impossible situation. I've never read the books but suspect the movies reflected Fleming's writing.

The gender (and race) balancing we saw in the last 5 movies was overdue.

I do think Craig being awarded the same honour as the fictitious character is embarassing populist nonsense.

[TimmyBGood]

---

@Chodley wrote:

I do think Craig being awarded the same honour as the fictitious character is embarassing populist nonsense.

---

I've never understood the worship he seems to engender in the role: being rather less embarrassingly awful than all the others who have portrayed the character isn't really a great accolade.

Layer Cake, on the other hand, is a really good film ; )

[merv60]

  I honestly can't remember the last Bond film I watched, it may have been a Pierce Brosnan one, or I might be getting confused with playing one of the video games based on his Bond. Anyway, due to my complete & utter apathy when it comes to JB I haven't seen a single Daniel Craig JB film, even though I think he's a good actor ( I recall really enjoying Our Friends In The North some time ago ).  I have seen Connery, Lazenby & Moore ( & maybe Dalton? ) when they first came out, but I never watch reruns on TV. I simply don't like them.

  Mission Impossible, however......

  

[TimmyBGood]

---

@merv60 wrote:

 I might be getting confused with playing one of the video games based on his Bond.

---

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierce_Brosnan#Video_games 

Only 'Everything or Nothing' had him as a voice actor: in the classic N64 outing* 'GoldenEye 007' he was rather more recognisable on the box than in the game ; )

*and third best-selling title of all time on that platform

[TimmyBGood]

---

@merv60 wrote:

 I have seen Connery, Lazenby & Moore ( & maybe Dalton? ) when they first came out

---

Everyone forgets David Niven ; (

The content immediately above is provided by YouTube, which may be using cookies and other technologies. To show you this content, we need your permission to use cookies. You can amend your preferences to enable or disable YouTube cookies at any time via the Privacy options link at the bottom of any community page.

Allow YouTube Cookies

[Skull+Treaty]

---

@TimmyBGood wrote:Everyone forgets David Niven ; (

---

A classic and was on yesterday or the day before, I'm sure.