- Roger Moore is a bit of a legend;
- Sheriff J W Pepper in Live and Let Die is hilarious;
- Goldeneye (although easily the best of the Brosnan era) isn't nearly as good as everyone thinks it is;
- Never Say Never Again was the best Bond movie of the 1980s (for example look at this amazing video game sequence...unfortunately I think their estimate of how much Spain was worth was eerily prescient). This was in spite of the best efforts of a young Rowan Atkinson, who had clearly not yet finished his training at clown school when he made the film, to ruin the whole thing with his 2 minute cameo. Watch Sean Connery's face during their scenes together. He is clearly giving serious thought to the prospect of repeatedly clubbing the rubber faced young goon round the back of the head with a golf club; and
- A View to a Kill was the second best Bond movie of the 1980s, even though the quiche baking, Werthers Originals chewing Roger Moore was so creaky by the time he made it that he would have been thrown out of the Expendables (or, if I am being brutally honest, the cast of Last of the Summer Wine) for being too decrepit.
My reason for hoping to dislike the film was that having long had the ambition of dusting off/resuscitating my dormant blog with a review (or rather a series of loosely connected tangential ramblings cunningly disguised as a review...which I promise will remain more or less spoiler free) of Skyfall, I thought that having a controversial take on the film might increase my readership more than if I simply went with the flow of extremely positive reviews.
Besides, I did not want to be in the position of prematurely shooting my mouth off with fulsome praise and then changing my mind a few months down the line, as has so often happened to me in the past with Mr Bond. I vividly remember coming out of The World is Not Enough when I was fifteen and confidently declaring it the best Bond film ever made. But then again I think it is fair to say that back in those days I was not the sophisticated connisseur of cinema than I am today, as is evidenced by the fact that I went to see Will Smith's Wild Wild West (a film that I think is nowadays only shown in North Korean prisons as a form of torture) in the cinema...twice.
Unfortunately my view of the film, which for once I am pretty confident that I won't row back from on a second viewing, is disappointingly conventional, although I think that some of the more hyperbolic comments from journalists might be overegging the cake somewhat, having recently encountered articles with titles such as "Is this the best Bond film ever?" (no, although it's probably in the top 5), "Has Daniel Craig eclipsed Sean Connery as 007?" (no, but he's now a solid and comfortable second...sorry Rog, Pierce, Tim and....well, I don't think any apology to George is really necessary, at least not until he apologises to me for the quality of his performance) "Is Javier Bardem the best Bond villain ever?" (actually...he might be).
Skyfall is terrific, a high octane, witty, sophisticated blast from the pre-credits sequence to the very last scene (which the fans of "Classic Bond" will adore btw). The film opens in Istanbul, with a fantastic chase sequence complete with entertaining running commentary by Naomie Harris as Bond's fellow field agent Eve, who is communicating with M and co at MI6 HQ throughout the chase: "yes...007 is now chasing the assassin across the roofs of Istanbul with a motorbike...now he's ridden the motorbike off a bridge and onto the roof of a moving train (as one does)...yup, and now he's torn the train in half with a massive digger".
Then of course Bond is shot, marking the second time in the franchise's fifty year history that our hero is seemingly bumped off before the opening credits. This time, however, unlike in You Only Live Twice, he actually takes a bit of time to recover from what to most people would constitute quite a serious injury, amusing himself with bumming around in bars playing drinking games involving scorpions and watching Huw Edwards on the telly. You can tell he's supposed to be out of condition because he stops shaving, a state of affairs which persists for an unnerving amount of the film's hefty running time (come on man, you're James Bond, not Rab C Nesbitt).
Adele's "Skyfall" is a worthy addition to the canon of Bond's opening credit songs, even though it does seem to have been composed by Vitalstatistix the Gaul (special thanks are due to Shappi Khorsandi here, from whose cradle I snatched that joke before it was even twenty four hours old). After the drab excuses for music that we unfortunate viewers have been forced to endure in recent years (Madonna's Die Another Day is so ghastly that it could be used to curdle milk, while I can't even remember the theme to Quantum of Solace, as it was so instantly forgettable that I have managed to half persuade myself that it was in fact set to the theme tune for Dawn French's "Murder Most Horrid", with the words "Quantum of Solace" being substituted for "Murder Most Horrid", obviously), my expectations were not high, but it certainly holds its own with some of the classics of the Connery/Moore eras.
The plot is more focussed on MI6 and its personnel themselves than any of the films have been before, with Judi Dench, having come more and more into her own as M over the years with an increasingly meaty role in the proceedings as befits an actress of her status, taking centre stage as never before. This time the hitherto infallible spymistress is in deep trouble, having lost a hard drive with the names and secret identities of undercover agents around the world. Enquiries have been set up, and M is being urged to take early retirement by Mallory, who is played by a terrific Ralph Fiennes, mastering the admittedly somewhat predictable transition during the film from "stuffed shirt bureaucrat" to "a bit of a legend" (the one that pretty much all of Jack Bauer's bosses went through at some point during the series, usually over the course of a couple of hours) with characteristic aplomb - I especially enjoyed one particularly scathing putdown to Helen McCrory's smug, pen pushing minister, the smoothest and politest variation of "shut the f**k up" that I have heard for a long while. It has fallen into the hands of former agent turned full blown psycho Silva (Bardem, sporting a set of false teeth so disgusting that even my late grandfather would have been appalled), who has taken over a deserted island off the coast of Shanghai.
Silva means business, MI6 is blown up, Q branch (now run by a mellifluous voiced Ben Whishaw, channelling the spirit of Moss from the IT Crowd) is forced to relocate, and Bond sobers up and gets himself back on the case. Having a Q who is significantly younger than Bond is a new direction for the series, but it works, especially in the context of one of the film's core themes, namely "is there a place for old fashioned field agents like Bond in the 21st century world of sophisticated IT"...you may be able to guess what conclusion the film comes to on this. The first encounter between Bond and Q is extremely entertaining, with both Craig and Whishaw enjoying some nice one liners involving exploding pens and the like (you can tell the poor little lamb hasn't been working there very long in that he actually asks Bond to bring back his equipment undamaged...obviously the late Desmond Llewelyn's handover notes left something to be desired).
One liners, and wit in general, is something Skyfall has in spades, which is most welcome. I am not suggesting that the franchise should return to the double taking pigeon shenanigans of the Moore era, but after the gloomy, Bournesque tone of Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace, a lighter touch was clearly required. Sam Mendes and the writers clearly have a better sense of what Bond is than the franchise's creative teams have had for a while. Don't get me wrong, I liked Casino Royale and thought it was exactly the breath of fresh air that the franchise needed at the time (it's just a shame that it was followed up by the turgid blast of public lavatory stench that was Quantum of Solace). I just thought that it might have been nice if Craig cracked a smile every once in a while. He's not Jack Bauer, after all, dammit! Craig may be the first Bond since Connery who looks like he could actually handle himself in a fight, and I think it's no bad thing that he has chosen to emphasise the thuggish bruiser side of Bond rather than the debonair louche aspect that Moore and Brosnan chose to emphasise, but he can DO humour, albeit perhaps not quite as well as Sean or Roger. It's just than up until now, the writers haven't really let him.
But it's not just him. The film has unquestionably got the most talented cast ever gathered together for a Bond film (the possible exception being the original 1967 Casino Royale, which nevertheless ended up being one of the most garishly edited train wrecks ever committed to celluloid). Ironically though, it is not Craig, Bardem, Fiennes, Dench, Harris, Whishaw or Albert Finney who has the best line in the film, although all of them get at least a couple of zingers. No, for my money, the best line is saved up for a random old geezer watching Bond leap onto the back of a moving tube train during a particularly exhilarating chase sequence. "He's in a hurry to go home" he remarks to his wife.
And interestingly enough Bond does go home soon enough, taking his old Aston Martin (which got a massive cheer at the cinema) and heading north for the film's climax (think Home Alone cross-bred with Monarch of the Glen, directed by Michael Bay) set in the Bond family's ancestral Scottish home, which is, of course, called "Skyfall". In JB's absence the old pile has been looked after by an elderly, bearded, sarcastic scottish retainer, Kincade. Kincade is in fact played by the fabulous Albert Finney, but I rather shushpect that the role was offered to shomeone elshe firsht. We can only dream of how amazing that would have been, but if you can't get Connery, who better to hire instead than the man who once interrogated him in Murder on the Orient Express (I suspect that the antipathy between Finney's Poirot and Connery's Colonel Arbuthnot in that film had less to do with the murdered man in the next cabin and more to do with straightforward moustache envy!)
I will give no more away about how the film ends, but although it stays true to the series formula, unusually for Bond, there is more than one surprise in store. The whole thing from beginning to end feels like a Bond film made by Bond fans, for Bond fans. I don't mean that it is inaccessible to newcomers to the franchise, but it shows an understanding of the character's history which delighted me. I think that the Broccolis could do worse than lock Sam Mendes in for another few films, and Craig certainly has enough vim and verve in him for at least another two or three films (he may be craggy faced but he still has a few years in him before he turns into Sid James). His banter with Naomie Harris' Eve is particularly sparkling (the other Bond girl, Berenice Marlohe, was also perfectly fine but somewhat underused...to be honest at some points in the film I felt that the "real" Bond girl was Dame Judi).
Particular praise has to be reserved for Javier Bardem's villain though. The last few Bond villains have been lacklustre, to say the least. C'mon, Oddjob used to kill people with a steel rimmed bowler hat, Jaws used to bite people to death with his steel teeth and Le Chiffre...cries blood. Not quite in the same league, is it? Nor was Jonathan Pryce's slightly less evil version of Rupert Murdoch in Tomorrow Never Dies or that Korean bloke who plastic surgerifies himself into Toby Stephens in the risible Die Another Day. But Bardem as Silva is a revelation, playing a hypnotically charismatic, wickedly funny and extremely complex chessmaster who is constantly at least two steps ahead of Bond for most of the film in the same way that Blofeld and Goldfinger used to be. As viewers, we are simultaneously charmed by him and terrified of him. And he is also outrageously camp, taking the unconventional step of flirting with Bond rather than torturing him. Even more remarkably, Bond responds in kind. "What makes you think this is my first time?" he quips. One can only conclude that the two henchmen in Diamonds are Forever got closer to Bond than we thought. "If at first you don't succeed, Mr Kidd..." "Try, try, try again, Mr Wint!"
The film is not perfect. It is a little overlong for one thing, and for another, where did all that swearing suddenly come from? I am no prude, in fact my main criticism of the fourth Die Hard was that it didn't have enough swearing in it (as an aside, how can they keep making films in that franchise without taking the opportunity to call one of them "Old Habits Die Hard"...perhaps that one could be set in a nunnery with the tagline "Yippee Kiy Yay Mother Superior" and Bruce exchanging quips with rogue nun Miriam Margolyes...I'd watch it).
But this isn't Die Hard, it's Bond. I don't mind a bit of mild cursing here and there (Timothy Dalton used to snarl "bloody bastards" at random moments every once in a while, it was obviously something he needed to get out of his system and that was fine). I appreciate that it was about time that someone pointed out that Bond is in fact a "jumped up little shit" (because he is), and that Judi Dench dropping the F-bomb is always entertaining. As swearers go Dame Judi is up there with the best of them, and when she really gets going it is almost as good as Angela Lansbury's Tarantino-esque four letter rant in the uncut version of Bedknobs and Broomsticks. If you think Joe Pesci's "You think I'm funny" speech in Goodfellas was well delivered, just imagine Dench doing it. But I grew up watching the Sean/Roger films on ITV on a Sunday afternoon (there's nothing better than a good piece of family entertainment with a nice high bodycount). I just can't see the broadcasters allowing any of the Craig era Bond films to show pre-watershed, which is a shame. Of course this is nothing a bit of clever editing can't sort out (see here how they handled the swearing in The Big Lebowski for TV audiences), and if this is the worst I can find to say about the film I think it is an unequivocal sign of a job well done. I liked it. And I'm glad I liked it!
Right, that is all I have to say on that, but I quite enjoyed writing it, so the blog is officially back up and running. Reviews of The Hobbit and Les Mis will follow in due course, and there will be more posts in between if I can think of anything suitably interesting to ramble on about.
