trash80
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- Dec 14, 2018
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Oh, so you know things about Donald Trump.
When you have time, you may want to watch the Dave Chappelle skit about the whole R Kelly thing.
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Welcome Back to Digital Pinball Fans - please read this first
The Random Thought Thread
- Thread starter Jeff Strong
- Start date
Oh, so you know things about Donald Trump.
When you have time, you may want to watch the Dave Chappelle skit about the whole R Kelly thing.
ZREXMike2
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- Oct 22, 2018
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Tommorow Never Dies: pretty cool opening scene with a jet, the hokey old Aston Martin left behind for a modern Beemer, i think it was a 4door tho. i loved the bike chase scene, the bike being a Beemer that was some German guy's idea of a cruiser. the climactic scene inside the vilain's big boat, machinegun fire flying around that woulda really had everybody dead in a few seconds bouncing off the inside of the hull. props to the karate lady, added some action to the movie.
- Mar 14, 2012
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I'm working on my final write-up, but for me Tomorrow Never Dies is probably my fave of all the Bond movies, as it strikes just the right balance and has no dull moments. Plus Michelle Yeoh is pure awesome as we finally get a real martial artist in a Bond film. As for Denise Richards, she might look good but her acting was atrocious, especially in comparison to Sophie's in the same movie. I mean nobody, nobody took Denise seriously as a nuclear physisist.
- Mar 14, 2012
- 7,334
- 0
This is it, the end of my 21 film Bond binge. Whew! Fortunately the four Brosnan era films were actually rather enjoyable to sit through, and I wasn’t nearly jotting down as many snarky notes as I did for the others, often finding myself sitting back and enjoying entire sequences before realizing I might want to write something down as a reminder. Without a doubt the first 3 are the best photographed of all prior films, 1and then there’s the last one. Production design is better, special effects are way better (except again with the 4th), title design, music, just across the board a better viewing experience. I’ll sum up my thoughts on the entire experience of the binge in one last post.
GOLDENEYE (1995)
What a fantastic opening, arguably the best of any Bond. Starts with a bungee jump off a very large dam, into an interior infiltration of a Russian base with 006. For once there’s some competency with enemy troops and Brosnan wastes no time in establishing the tone of his Bond, because his very first line is a pithy quip, but then he gets down to serious business. 006 is held at gunpoint, Bond uses propane tanks as cover that the Russians wisely don’t want to shoot, they execute 006 and Bond shoots open a hatch that releases a cascade of barrels, looking like a soda machine gone haywire. As the interior explodes, Bond makes his way outside, sees a propellar plane going down the runway, which happens to end at a cliff. Bond gets on the plane, tussles with the pilot, both fall out of the plane as it heads toward the cliff. Bond hops on a motorcycle, guns it for the edge and essentially base jumps off the bike, over the cliff, and then skydives into the open door on the side of the plane, to then just in the nick of time pull it out of a freefall dive toward the ground. Very exciting stuff, Brosnan shows true urgency in the face of danger, with just the right amount of cool calm. What an introduction to a new Bond era.
The main titles get an update from the very tired silhouettes of naked girls and guns to some slick Soviet iconography with dancing girls and guns by Dan Kleinmen. He honors the old tried and true but hints at what the thread of the movie is about, a style he’ll repeat with each subsequent film. The film is directed by Martin Campbell, as each subsequent film is directed by different directors of much higher profile than any of the Bonds in the past. Again, there seems to be a real effort to pump new blood into the franchise. As Bond tells his latest conquest in bed, “enjoy it while it lasts”.
Basic plot is the Russians have a secret program going on with an orbiting satellite that can essentially cause an EMP blast anywhere they want, from outer space called Goldeneye. It’s the typical we built it, it’s probably bad and we shouldn’t use it, nefarious bad guy steals it all to use for his own evil purposes. We meet Xenia Onatoppa who kills men while having sex by squeezing them to death with her thighs. Sex kills, be safe! The way she’s portrayed, it’s safe to say the only way she can orgasm is in the act of killing or causing great pain. She steals a super special helicopter right under Bond’s nose, thus setting off the chain of events that get him involved. We have a new Moneypenny who seems this close to calling HR on Bond, as well as a new M, played by Judy Dench.
You don’t hire Dench and then just have her tell Bond he’s late for his meeting. Instead she gives the briefing you’d expect and all the exposition that comes with it, rather than Bond always being the smartest person in the room who has to explain everything to everyone else despite not being briefed on the latest goings on. M is now a real ballbuster and wastes no time telling Bond “you are a sexist, misogynistic, a dinosaur, a relic of the cold war who’s boyish British charms are wasted on” her. Kinda nice seeing Bond put into place and realizing he actually does have superiors he has to report to in more than name only. The rest of MI6 isn’t too keen on this new M either though, as most think she’s just a glorified accountant.
Q meanwhile is the same as ever, doing his usual “now pay attention Bond” line. It’s sad really, as everything else was feeling fresh and then his whole scene is dropped in like a leftover from 7 years back. Also, actor Llewellyn is so obviously reading off cue cards it’s painful. What is new is Bond gets a 4 door BMW 750i to drive. Terribly dull car for a super spy. It’s not even a good color, just a shade of grey or champaign or whatever. Last new introduction to the series is that gone is CIA Felix and the many actors that played him, in is Jack Wade who like to call Bond Jimmy and Jimbo, which I found amusing.
So Boris and Natalia (I’m guessing Natasha would’ve been too on the nose) work as programmers at the secret russky base, Boris being a bit full of himself in a super nerd way. Base gets destroyed by Goldeneye, but Boris was outside and apparently fled without anyone noticing, while Natalia winds up being the sole survivor. The brits figure this out thanks to a live satellite feed over the area, so Bond goes to investigate. But first he has to go for a swim in a Russian bath house, where Xenia tries to sex kill him. Meanwhile Natalia having made her way to a city, goes into an IBM store where apparently top of the line computers came with a 14.4 modem. Let’s hear it for ‘95 everybody! She contacts Boris, figures out he was actually in on the Goldeneye plot. Bond finds out 006 isn’t dead, that his execution was fake, but because Bond had changed the countdown timer from 6 minutes to 3 during his escape, he very nearly did kill 006, who by the way is played by Sean Bean so you know he’s gonna die, as he does in everything he stars in. Also he wants revenge on the Brits as he’s really comes from Russian heritage that was done wrong, blah blah blah, overcomplicated execution of Bond and Natalia places them in stolen helicopter rigged to explode, but not before Bond ejects them into the sky ala Die Hard 2, overhead shot with explosion beneath and everything.
Signature moment of the whole film comes with Bond using a Russian tank to chase and be chased in. There’s some great destruction that takes place, and it’s in this moment that Brosnan as Bond really shines. You can see the twinkle in his eye of causing tank mayhem, but he also is very present in the situation and the dangers therein. It all winds up with a tank versus armored train game of chicken. We get Bond revealing that sex is standard operating procedure with the Secret Service. Some would call it a perk?
Baddies are chased to Cuba where a second antenna array setup for communicating with Goldeneye is, hidden under a lake, in our first good look at what can be done with miniatures now. The interior is classic giant set that shall go boom, but again here’s where new production designers and proper photography really set things apart from films of the past. Also, Bond shows he knows how to properly shoot a gun by actually looking down its sights. There’s a brilliant bit of action on top of the antenna array, with Bond falling below it and just managing to hang on, as if he were Luke below Bespin waiting for the Falcon to pick him up. Fight ensues, 006 plummets to his presumed death, Bond gets away just in time as the entire antenna explodes as if it were made of dynamite and not steel. As it’s falling down, we see 006 isn’t dead yet, but then thousands of tons of antenna lands on him. Double death!!
Like I said, my notes weren’t very detailed as I really did enjoy watching instead. I also had a whole mess of N64 flashbacks as the video game for Goldeneye was the thing to play back then. I did note that once again things were not shot at Pinewood, but instead Leavesden Aerodrome.
TOMORROW NEVER DIES (1997)
Or as I like to think of it, the one with Michelle Yeoh. Yet another very strong opening sequence that starts with Bond crashing an arms swap meet in the mountains and ends with him in a jet fighter dogfight where he ejects his bad guy copilot up into the opposing jet. Before I get going here, I noticed in the opening title sequence that Vic Armstrong was responsible for stunt sequences. This guy has a legendary list of credits, so I immediately perked up.
Media mogul Carver has CMGN, Carver Media Group Network, and is intent on being the world’s leading source for news in all formats. We know he’s evil because he has giant pictures of his face, looking menacing as if he was Big Brother, everywhere. Also because he stages an international incident that sinks a British war ship carrying nukes that he steals. Remnants of Thunderball, anyone? While watching, all I could think was “now THIS is fake news!”, if only because it’s being manufactured. Anyway, his wife Paris is a former love of Bond’s. Like they were all hot and heavy until one day Bond said I’ll be right back and then never returned. Nice. Bond crashes some even Carver is hosting, posing as a banker. The fact Carver doesn’t know who Bond is, especially with how wired in he is to world events, is a bit of a stretch. When one of his men does a deeper search, all he comes up with is too perfect credentials for being a banker. I mean c’mon. Doesn’t matter much though, as Carver figures out the Bond/Paris connection and proceeds to have her killed.
By the way, have you ever noticed that the first woman Bond sleeps with proper in the movie tends to either be bad or killed soon after? The good Bond girl then has to wait her turn till either right before the final action segment or after.
Oh, at this shindig that Bond crashes, we get introduced to Michelle’s character Wai Lin, essentially the Chinese’s answer to Bond. See the Chinese are being blamed for sinking the British ship, but they know it wasn’t them. Both her and Bond break into Carver’s headquarters unbeknownst to each other, but then **** hits the fan and they briefly encounter each other, thus realizing neither is who they say they are. It’s during this bit that I noticed composer David Arnold’s mastery of Bond music. Rather than just throwing the familiar tune at us, he actually uses different instruments at different moments to key us into what’s going on. Like when Bond is being clever and stealthy, he just uses a twangy guitar to play the theme, but then when big action moments happen it switches to blaring horns. His handling of the music over the next movies is quite awesome and truly enjoyable to hear.
Bond shows off his new BMW’s tricks, chief among them being that it can be driven via remote control from his phone. Much like the tank scene in Goldeneye, there are moments of pure joy writ across Bond’s face. Things do get a bit too convenient though when a steal cable is strung across the car’s path and with the push of a button, a wire cutting saw emerges out the front hood. I mean talk about having exactly the right tool at the right time. The other thing, and this is a huge annoyance to me that is evident in many movies for the next several years that feature a high end car specifically featured in a movie, the car takes next to no damage. Yes, windows can be blown out, but god forbid we see a dent on the car or it loses its shine. The car chase ends when Bond crashes it through the concrete wall of a parking structure, but the front end is no worse than had it smashed through a bit of balsa wood.
Bond wants to go investigate the sunken boat, now that they know where it probably is. Problem is it’s in Vietnamese waters and he has to be sneaky with getting there so as to not cause another international ruckus. Enter Wade, and it’s the same actor. Yay! Turns out there are a bunch of side characters that these four films continue to use the same actors for. Finally, some continuity. Anyway, Wade makes it possible for Bond to do a HALO jump into the area, and again I start thinking that Tom Cruise and company looked at a lot of Bond stunts and went, we can top that, mainly by having Tom do it for real! Wonder if I should binge all the Mission: Impossible films next? Hmmmmm. Anyway, Wai Lin turns up investigating the boat also, but their exit strategy is spoiled by Carver’s big bleach haired henchman, Stamper. They get brought to Carver who hilariously is doing this one handed typing on a wireless keyboard without looking at it. Clearly this is to show how adept at writing a story he is, as he’s always tweaking the headline he wants to use for tomorrow. I just know whatever he actually typed looked more like this…
‘Lkamsdjf ojawe’rl,n ]0=9VU A]W3K5NCJ09*XC
:lsmF
O’J
Q[foph a=4968um\
He tells Bond that Stamper is practiced in the ways of extended torture, and Stamper is looking to beat the record of his mentor who once tortured a man for 50+ hours before finally dying. I guess that’s a good enough reason to not immediately kill Bond and Wai Lin? Doesn’t matter though as Bond immediately goes for the escape, problem being he’s handcuffed to Wai. Here’s where Vic Armstrong shows his stuff as stunt director. It’s a big sequence that starts with the pair jumping off a skyscraper using the giant banner that hangs on the side of the building, which of course is Carver’s evil mug. This leads to a motorcycle chase that has Michelle doing all sorts of stunts on as the handcuffs don’t make for easy doubles riding. It all ends with a helicopter chasing them down the streets, blades tilted forward chopping everything up in front of them. It looks cool and all, but that’s simply not how helicopters fly. Especially with how slow it was going, you know it was just a crane holding the tail and moving it forward. And the rotor blades of any helicopter are meant to break off with contact of hard surfaces, so that too was a bit of a stretch for what it was doing here. It’s the one bit of this movie that took it too far.
At the end of the chase, handcuffs off, Bond puts on the charm and Wai Lin totally shuts him down and walks away. The look on Bond’s face is one of abject confusion. Them being separated though allows for Wai Lin to have a true martial arts fight, the likes of which no Bond has ever actually had. This is because Michelle Yeoh is a badass and an asian stunt team is brought in to fight against her. It also only taps into a smidgeon of her talent, just go watch Crouching Tiger or Wing Chun to see what she’s truly capable of. Bond catches back up with her post fight, and her hideout is the Chinese version of Q’s lab. The producers could have so easily done a spinoff with Wai Lin and it’s a shame they didn’t.
So Carver has a big stealth boat, and he’s setting up all these international incidents so he can be first on the news scene, thus getting all the ratings. Yeah, that’s his plan, to get ratings. Him and Trump would be peas in a pod. This brings something up about a lot of Bond villains. The amount of money they must spend to build their lairs or giant boats, to staff them, to fund the tech that makes it all work, it can’t possibly be worth the end result, can it? I mean I get they are power mad psychos, but the fact they never did a cost analysis is amazing. Anyway, big boat means bit interior set, and this clearly is a one-up to The Spy Who Loved Me’s big boat set. The henchmen once again show competency at handling weapons in this new era of film, but Bond is just that much better. Carver dies sooner than Stamper, which is the norm for mastermind and henchman. Bond and Wai Lin escape as the entire boat goes boom. They climb up on some floating debri, and now it’s time for post action sequence sex. Amongst a burning wreckage. A rescue boat comes searching, but they want sex now and choose not to be rescued instead. I’m sure that’ll seem like a good idea come morning and the realization they’re not anywhere close to land.
All in all, despite the little quibbles, this will wind up being my favorite Bond film of the 21 watched. Brosnan really embodies Bond well, the movie didn’t drag at all despite the 2 hour 15 minute run time, and the action sequences were thought out really well. Considering it used elements from my other 2 top contenders, Thunderball and Spy Who Loved Me, this shouldn’t be a surprise.
THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH (1999)
After two really good Bond films that had shed a lot of the problems that plagued the prior generation of films, some start to seep back in with this one. The opening is a slower paced affair to start, and then it gets a bit ridiculous with Bond launching a jet boat out of Q’s lab a couple of stories above the water of the Thames. The chase itself is good, especially since Brosnan is clearly visible for a lot of it, as he tries running down a female assassin. The collateral damage that Bond causes though is a bit hard to justify, and there’s a moment where he more or less drives his boat down a street because you know, it’s a jet boat. One key result of this chase though is Bond actually gets injured. After the opening titles, Bond has to sleep with his doctor to have her clear him for duty. What a man whore.
The plot of this one is a bit convoluted. Elektra King is the daughter of an oil baron, she had been kidnapped by a terrorist named Renard, her dad had asked M to help with the ransom demands, but M used Elektra as bait to flush out Renard, who now is seeking revenge, as the ransom money was recovered as well as Elektra being freed. Dad gets blown up, Elektra takes over the family business to finish the oil pipeline dad was building that is in direct competition with what the Russians are doing. Whew!
Bond convinces M to let him look out for Elektra, and she being personally involved with this family, tells Bond the equivalent of “stay away from my daughter!” knowing Bond’s history with pretty women. He visits Q who introduces his new replacement, Monty Python’s John Cleese. Bond wonders if that makes the new guy R. This script has Bond drop a LOT of bad puns for one liners by the way. Bond gets a new convertible BMW that we all know is not long for the world. He and the car are shipped off to some slavic region I don’t remember, but it’s where Elektra’s pipeline is as well as the former KGB agent now casino owner and caviar seller we met in Goldeneye. Bond accompanies Elektra on a pipeline inspection, which for some reason needs to be done on skis. She asks Bond if he knows how to ski, which made me laugh considering all the times we’ve seen him do it in other films. They get attacked by flying snow mobiles, because apparently the bad guys know just how well Bond can ski and need an advantage. Well Bond and Elektra do escape, leading her to trying to seduce Bond, who fights with every instinct he has to not accept, visions of a little M sitting on his shoulder telling him no. It only takes a few scenes inbetween before Bond does what Bond does.
Renard has plans of stealing a warhead from a site where nukes are being decommissioned by physicist Christmas Jones. In a case of ludicrous casting, she is played by Denise Richards who is so out of her depth here, especially when Sophie Marceau is playing Elektra like gangbusters. So now Bond gets paired with the #2 girl, and if trends in these movies tells us anything, that means Elektra is either soon to be dead or bad. If you chose option two, you win! Yep, Elektra not only got a serious case of Stockholm syndrome, she turned the tables and made Renard her *****, er henchman. See Elektra’s mom was the one with the money, not dad. She’s angry at M for using her and dad not paying up the ransom sooner, and it was her that actually planned good ol’ dad’s death. Also she has a plan of setting off the equivalent of a nuke via exploding submarine that will cripple the Russian’s oil pipeline dream, making hers the only choice. Told you the plot was convoluted. For the first time though, we get a female masterminding the whole evil plot, which is refreshing.
The movie continues the trend of having some good quality action with top notch effects work that doesn’t betray if Bond is acting in front of a green screen or not. Brosnan looks like he’s right in the thick of it all all times. There’s a sequence with helicopters that have these giant saw blades for trimming forest trees, and they proceed to shred a warehouse to pieces and cut Bond’s BMW in half. It’s a bit over the top, but fun all the same. We also get a really good sequence inside the submarine as it floods, Bond fighting Renard, the sub’s reactor core about to go nuclear. At the end of it all, Bond gets with Jones despite them having zero chemistry and her showing no interest in him. This of course leads to the doozy line from Bond, “I thought Christmas only comes once a year”. Good lord, just stop.
Overall this movie has more positives than negatives. I really like that M has more to do in these films than just sit behind a desk, her character actually getting fleshed out a bit. Had they cast someone other than Denise Richards, I think that would have vastly elevated the film. Instead it’s like when they put Tanya Roberts in View To A Kill, all looks and zero substance. While the action is verging on going too over the top, it still fits the tone of these new Bond films. Unfortunately the next one goes right into the toilet.
DIE ANOTHER DAY (2002)
This movie marks the 20th official Bond film (remember, Never Say Never was not part of this) and the 50th year of the franchise. There’s a bunch of homages to the past scattered about the flick, but the worst being a drop in visual and script quality with logic and real world physics being tossed out the window during action sequences. I mean the first thing we see in the movie are what I’d describe as surf ninjas, dressed in head to toe black, surfing North Shore size waves into the shoreline near North Korea. I mean, these waves never crash and just go and go thanks to trick editing. It’s not a good sign when I’m rolling my eyes in the first 2 minutes. One of the surfers is Bond (what can’t he do!) who then meets up with a North Korean military guy who looks only a few years removed from boot camp, to sell him conflict diamonds. Except Bond rigged it with C4 for some reason. He pretends to be someone he’s not, only this time henchman Zao figures this out with a simple internet search. Okay it turns out there’s an insider at MI6 who spills the beans to him, but still, about freakin’ time his lame ways of going undercover with only a fake name gets him in trouble. Well things take a turn, diamonds explode in Zao’s face, giving him the most expensive face tattoo ever, and a chase on hovercraft over the minefields of the DMZ happens. Some semi dodgy green screen effects work happens during this, as well as action that makes you go “oh c’mon” like how Bond spots a mine in the field, while driving a hovercraft fairly fast, and shoots it to make it explode. What? The end result is bad guy goes over a waterfall to his death, Bond being spared a similar fate having grabbed onto a giant ceremonial bell, leading him to quip “saved by the bell”. Ugh. A moment later Bond gets captured by the bad guy’s Korean general dad.
During the opening credit sequence we get flashes of Bond being tortured and being a POW, all to the techno beat of a Madonna song. Where all prior and future Bond title songs are co written by the films composer to properly integrate with Bond themes, no such luck here. That means it sticks out like a sore thumb and isn’t used again at any point of the entire movie. It’s not that the song is terrible, it just has no place here. We come to find out that Bond has been captive for 14 months, with a beard to match. Nobody has come to his rescue, which is odd as it’s the very sort of mission it seems MI6 is always sending their double 0’s out on. Somebody has been watching too many Mission: Impossible movies and forgot which was which! Well Bond gets traded for Zao, who did some bad things in the interim before getting caught himself, much to the displeasure of M. Like she’s genuinely pissed they had to give Zao up for Bond. Turns out the North Korean got some info that only Bond could have known, and therefore him being in captivity was now a liability.
Bond is essentially in medical prison at an MI6 facility, until he fakes a heart attack by slowing his pulse to nothing, a technique he apparently learned as a coping method as a POW. I’m rolling my eyes so hard at this point I can see behind me. Bond escapes, flees to a nearby Chinese hotel where he gets all cleaned up once more. A knock on the door reveals a masseuse courtesy of the hotel, who’s name is Peaceful Fountains of Desire. Wow. Bond denies her offer of more than a massage, saying he’s “not that kind of customer”. In truth I think it’s just because he knew there were people trying to film him from behind a two way mirror and he’s got a rep to uphold. Also this is pretty impressive as he’s gone without getting any for a year and a half now.
Bond heads to Cuba chasing down a lead, where he meets Halley Berry’s Jinx. Unbeknownst to him, she is an NSA agent working for Mr Blond (Michael Madson). He promptly sleeps with her, because duh. Just off shore there is a small ‘health’ island that actually is a cutting edge facility where you can have your DNA replaced, thus turning you into someone else. Cuba, come for the cigars, stay for the uber impressive medical facilities found nowhere else in the world. Turns out Zao is here, halfway through the process of being turned into a white european guy. Except he’s keeping the diamonds in his face, cuz they’re sooo hard to remove. Meanwhile over in London, we meet Gustav Graves and his undercover assistant Miranda Frost. Gustav has an ego that would embarrass Trump, is incredibly wealthy having discovered diamonds in Iceland, and is also a philanthropist. In other words, hello bad guy. He and Bond get into a dick measuring contest at the local fencing club, with what starts out with a civil fencing match and accelerates fast into a full blown brawl with broadswords. The swordmaster of the facility? Madonna. Why? Even Bond doesn’t wanna sleep with her.
Back in good graces with MI6, Bond visits Q who didn’t keep the R name, for a visit down prop memory lane, including a new Aston Martin that can turn invisible. I mean at this point the movie has gone right off the rails and is heading fast toward Moonraker territory. Action moves to Iceland where Graves wants to show off his new toy in space that can create sunlight anywhere, which seems like a weird want. The event takes place in an ice hotel, and if you can’t put 2 and 2 together as to whether the sun toy is going to melt the ice castle, you haven’t been paying attention. There are a litany of wrongs from this point forward, so let’s list them!
Graves turns out to be the presumed dead Korean guy, having gone through the DNA replacement and turning him into a German. Talk about white washing. So we are to actually believe that in the timeline established by how long Bond was a POW, 14 months, plus a month or two more, that this guy was rescued, sent to Cuba for an Extreme Makeover, set up a foolproof cover story, established himself as being super wealthy, and had super scientists design, build, and launch his space toy? At one point Miranda says she’s been undercover for 3 years with Graves, and we do find out she was the mole who sold Bond out, so how does any of this track?
While snooping around and getting into predicaments, Bond cuts a hole in the ice, dives in wearing slacks and a sweater, swims into the secret facility, and suffers no hypothermia in the least. He then gets into a fight where Jinx is strapped to a table with friggin’ lasers shooting all over the place. Bond and a henchman named Kill (jeezus) fight amongst the randomly firing laser beams, during which I had to ask what their purpose even was for. This is what happens when people throw ideas at the wall but have no good reason for keeping them other than that it might be cool.
Sun toy can actually focus into a single beam, which chases down Bond like a kid holding a magnifying glass to an ant. Graves wears a Nintendo Power Glove with built in tazer to control the thing. The beam chases Bond who is using a jet powered ice sled to get away, but finds himself dangling over the edge of the massive ice shelf. The beam causes the whole shelf to break off into the ocean, tsunami wave created. In what many in the visual effects community love to point out as terrible, Bond parasails the wave, dodging mini icebergs, before landing back on the shelf in safety. It is the most ludicrous piece of action, at least for the next few minutes. Bond gets his to his invisicar, and Zao chases him in his own weapons filled Jaguar. They proceed to have a car battle the likes of which probably inspired Fast & Furious 8. And 6 and 7 for that matter. Best (worst) part? Despite slamming into ice pillars within the melting ice hotel that Jinx is trapped in and drowning (the logic, the logic!), zero damage to the cars. Also the whole interior of the hotel is apparently designed like a parking garage with one circular ramp leading up the floors.
While Bond rescues Jinx, the baddies flee in their getaway cargo plane. Among the things they take? A ferrari or two. Jinx and Bond get on the plane via the landing gear and this sets up the stupidest piece of action possibly in any Bond film. Graves now has a whole Power Glove suit to wear, making him look like one of the gladiators in The Running Man. He hasn’t turned off the sun beam yet, as he’s trying to impress his General daddy. Things happen, Jinx gets paired off for a fight with Miranda who now wears bad girl attire. Bond gets into his own skirmish with super tazer hands. The plane gets diverted straight for the sun beam and passes through it, causing a lot of the plane's outer skin to melt away and catch fire. Bond manages to send Graves through one of the jet turbines, and the plane is on it’s way to crashing. How the sun beam didn’t cause the entire plane to explode by super heating the fully fueled vehicle is beyond me. We see the entire wing ablaze, no explosion. Remember those Ferraris? Bond opens the back cargo door and sends them plummeting, where later we see they landed in a bog or something, nose first, but of course they look pristine with not so much a crack in the windshield. Jinx and him get into the helicopter that was in the cargo hold, slide out the back, and then fly away to safety. Only then does the plane finally explode.
Oh, and Moneypenny finally gets to get busy with Bond, thanks to a VR program Q has developed. I guess that’s fan service? All the good will the previously 3 movies built up was tossed aside for a movie that felt and looked more like Roger Moore era Bond. I don’t even know who to blame it on, as the same writers on this were the same for the previous 2 movies, and would go on to write the next 4 with Daniel Craig. I don’t blame Brosnan, though it seems he might have been the fall guy as this was his last go despite wanting to continue. Oh, and the whole thing ends with a remixed version of the Madonna song. Terrible movie.
GOLDENEYE (1995)
What a fantastic opening, arguably the best of any Bond. Starts with a bungee jump off a very large dam, into an interior infiltration of a Russian base with 006. For once there’s some competency with enemy troops and Brosnan wastes no time in establishing the tone of his Bond, because his very first line is a pithy quip, but then he gets down to serious business. 006 is held at gunpoint, Bond uses propane tanks as cover that the Russians wisely don’t want to shoot, they execute 006 and Bond shoots open a hatch that releases a cascade of barrels, looking like a soda machine gone haywire. As the interior explodes, Bond makes his way outside, sees a propellar plane going down the runway, which happens to end at a cliff. Bond gets on the plane, tussles with the pilot, both fall out of the plane as it heads toward the cliff. Bond hops on a motorcycle, guns it for the edge and essentially base jumps off the bike, over the cliff, and then skydives into the open door on the side of the plane, to then just in the nick of time pull it out of a freefall dive toward the ground. Very exciting stuff, Brosnan shows true urgency in the face of danger, with just the right amount of cool calm. What an introduction to a new Bond era.
The main titles get an update from the very tired silhouettes of naked girls and guns to some slick Soviet iconography with dancing girls and guns by Dan Kleinmen. He honors the old tried and true but hints at what the thread of the movie is about, a style he’ll repeat with each subsequent film. The film is directed by Martin Campbell, as each subsequent film is directed by different directors of much higher profile than any of the Bonds in the past. Again, there seems to be a real effort to pump new blood into the franchise. As Bond tells his latest conquest in bed, “enjoy it while it lasts”.
Basic plot is the Russians have a secret program going on with an orbiting satellite that can essentially cause an EMP blast anywhere they want, from outer space called Goldeneye. It’s the typical we built it, it’s probably bad and we shouldn’t use it, nefarious bad guy steals it all to use for his own evil purposes. We meet Xenia Onatoppa who kills men while having sex by squeezing them to death with her thighs. Sex kills, be safe! The way she’s portrayed, it’s safe to say the only way she can orgasm is in the act of killing or causing great pain. She steals a super special helicopter right under Bond’s nose, thus setting off the chain of events that get him involved. We have a new Moneypenny who seems this close to calling HR on Bond, as well as a new M, played by Judy Dench.
You don’t hire Dench and then just have her tell Bond he’s late for his meeting. Instead she gives the briefing you’d expect and all the exposition that comes with it, rather than Bond always being the smartest person in the room who has to explain everything to everyone else despite not being briefed on the latest goings on. M is now a real ballbuster and wastes no time telling Bond “you are a sexist, misogynistic, a dinosaur, a relic of the cold war who’s boyish British charms are wasted on” her. Kinda nice seeing Bond put into place and realizing he actually does have superiors he has to report to in more than name only. The rest of MI6 isn’t too keen on this new M either though, as most think she’s just a glorified accountant.
Q meanwhile is the same as ever, doing his usual “now pay attention Bond” line. It’s sad really, as everything else was feeling fresh and then his whole scene is dropped in like a leftover from 7 years back. Also, actor Llewellyn is so obviously reading off cue cards it’s painful. What is new is Bond gets a 4 door BMW 750i to drive. Terribly dull car for a super spy. It’s not even a good color, just a shade of grey or champaign or whatever. Last new introduction to the series is that gone is CIA Felix and the many actors that played him, in is Jack Wade who like to call Bond Jimmy and Jimbo, which I found amusing.
So Boris and Natalia (I’m guessing Natasha would’ve been too on the nose) work as programmers at the secret russky base, Boris being a bit full of himself in a super nerd way. Base gets destroyed by Goldeneye, but Boris was outside and apparently fled without anyone noticing, while Natalia winds up being the sole survivor. The brits figure this out thanks to a live satellite feed over the area, so Bond goes to investigate. But first he has to go for a swim in a Russian bath house, where Xenia tries to sex kill him. Meanwhile Natalia having made her way to a city, goes into an IBM store where apparently top of the line computers came with a 14.4 modem. Let’s hear it for ‘95 everybody! She contacts Boris, figures out he was actually in on the Goldeneye plot. Bond finds out 006 isn’t dead, that his execution was fake, but because Bond had changed the countdown timer from 6 minutes to 3 during his escape, he very nearly did kill 006, who by the way is played by Sean Bean so you know he’s gonna die, as he does in everything he stars in. Also he wants revenge on the Brits as he’s really comes from Russian heritage that was done wrong, blah blah blah, overcomplicated execution of Bond and Natalia places them in stolen helicopter rigged to explode, but not before Bond ejects them into the sky ala Die Hard 2, overhead shot with explosion beneath and everything.
Signature moment of the whole film comes with Bond using a Russian tank to chase and be chased in. There’s some great destruction that takes place, and it’s in this moment that Brosnan as Bond really shines. You can see the twinkle in his eye of causing tank mayhem, but he also is very present in the situation and the dangers therein. It all winds up with a tank versus armored train game of chicken. We get Bond revealing that sex is standard operating procedure with the Secret Service. Some would call it a perk?
Baddies are chased to Cuba where a second antenna array setup for communicating with Goldeneye is, hidden under a lake, in our first good look at what can be done with miniatures now. The interior is classic giant set that shall go boom, but again here’s where new production designers and proper photography really set things apart from films of the past. Also, Bond shows he knows how to properly shoot a gun by actually looking down its sights. There’s a brilliant bit of action on top of the antenna array, with Bond falling below it and just managing to hang on, as if he were Luke below Bespin waiting for the Falcon to pick him up. Fight ensues, 006 plummets to his presumed death, Bond gets away just in time as the entire antenna explodes as if it were made of dynamite and not steel. As it’s falling down, we see 006 isn’t dead yet, but then thousands of tons of antenna lands on him. Double death!!
Like I said, my notes weren’t very detailed as I really did enjoy watching instead. I also had a whole mess of N64 flashbacks as the video game for Goldeneye was the thing to play back then. I did note that once again things were not shot at Pinewood, but instead Leavesden Aerodrome.
TOMORROW NEVER DIES (1997)
Or as I like to think of it, the one with Michelle Yeoh. Yet another very strong opening sequence that starts with Bond crashing an arms swap meet in the mountains and ends with him in a jet fighter dogfight where he ejects his bad guy copilot up into the opposing jet. Before I get going here, I noticed in the opening title sequence that Vic Armstrong was responsible for stunt sequences. This guy has a legendary list of credits, so I immediately perked up.
Media mogul Carver has CMGN, Carver Media Group Network, and is intent on being the world’s leading source for news in all formats. We know he’s evil because he has giant pictures of his face, looking menacing as if he was Big Brother, everywhere. Also because he stages an international incident that sinks a British war ship carrying nukes that he steals. Remnants of Thunderball, anyone? While watching, all I could think was “now THIS is fake news!”, if only because it’s being manufactured. Anyway, his wife Paris is a former love of Bond’s. Like they were all hot and heavy until one day Bond said I’ll be right back and then never returned. Nice. Bond crashes some even Carver is hosting, posing as a banker. The fact Carver doesn’t know who Bond is, especially with how wired in he is to world events, is a bit of a stretch. When one of his men does a deeper search, all he comes up with is too perfect credentials for being a banker. I mean c’mon. Doesn’t matter much though, as Carver figures out the Bond/Paris connection and proceeds to have her killed.
By the way, have you ever noticed that the first woman Bond sleeps with proper in the movie tends to either be bad or killed soon after? The good Bond girl then has to wait her turn till either right before the final action segment or after.
Oh, at this shindig that Bond crashes, we get introduced to Michelle’s character Wai Lin, essentially the Chinese’s answer to Bond. See the Chinese are being blamed for sinking the British ship, but they know it wasn’t them. Both her and Bond break into Carver’s headquarters unbeknownst to each other, but then **** hits the fan and they briefly encounter each other, thus realizing neither is who they say they are. It’s during this bit that I noticed composer David Arnold’s mastery of Bond music. Rather than just throwing the familiar tune at us, he actually uses different instruments at different moments to key us into what’s going on. Like when Bond is being clever and stealthy, he just uses a twangy guitar to play the theme, but then when big action moments happen it switches to blaring horns. His handling of the music over the next movies is quite awesome and truly enjoyable to hear.
Bond shows off his new BMW’s tricks, chief among them being that it can be driven via remote control from his phone. Much like the tank scene in Goldeneye, there are moments of pure joy writ across Bond’s face. Things do get a bit too convenient though when a steal cable is strung across the car’s path and with the push of a button, a wire cutting saw emerges out the front hood. I mean talk about having exactly the right tool at the right time. The other thing, and this is a huge annoyance to me that is evident in many movies for the next several years that feature a high end car specifically featured in a movie, the car takes next to no damage. Yes, windows can be blown out, but god forbid we see a dent on the car or it loses its shine. The car chase ends when Bond crashes it through the concrete wall of a parking structure, but the front end is no worse than had it smashed through a bit of balsa wood.
Bond wants to go investigate the sunken boat, now that they know where it probably is. Problem is it’s in Vietnamese waters and he has to be sneaky with getting there so as to not cause another international ruckus. Enter Wade, and it’s the same actor. Yay! Turns out there are a bunch of side characters that these four films continue to use the same actors for. Finally, some continuity. Anyway, Wade makes it possible for Bond to do a HALO jump into the area, and again I start thinking that Tom Cruise and company looked at a lot of Bond stunts and went, we can top that, mainly by having Tom do it for real! Wonder if I should binge all the Mission: Impossible films next? Hmmmmm. Anyway, Wai Lin turns up investigating the boat also, but their exit strategy is spoiled by Carver’s big bleach haired henchman, Stamper. They get brought to Carver who hilariously is doing this one handed typing on a wireless keyboard without looking at it. Clearly this is to show how adept at writing a story he is, as he’s always tweaking the headline he wants to use for tomorrow. I just know whatever he actually typed looked more like this…
‘Lkamsdjf ojawe’rl,n ]0=9VU A]W3K5NCJ09*XC
:lsmF
O’J
Q[foph a=4968um\
He tells Bond that Stamper is practiced in the ways of extended torture, and Stamper is looking to beat the record of his mentor who once tortured a man for 50+ hours before finally dying. I guess that’s a good enough reason to not immediately kill Bond and Wai Lin? Doesn’t matter though as Bond immediately goes for the escape, problem being he’s handcuffed to Wai. Here’s where Vic Armstrong shows his stuff as stunt director. It’s a big sequence that starts with the pair jumping off a skyscraper using the giant banner that hangs on the side of the building, which of course is Carver’s evil mug. This leads to a motorcycle chase that has Michelle doing all sorts of stunts on as the handcuffs don’t make for easy doubles riding. It all ends with a helicopter chasing them down the streets, blades tilted forward chopping everything up in front of them. It looks cool and all, but that’s simply not how helicopters fly. Especially with how slow it was going, you know it was just a crane holding the tail and moving it forward. And the rotor blades of any helicopter are meant to break off with contact of hard surfaces, so that too was a bit of a stretch for what it was doing here. It’s the one bit of this movie that took it too far.
At the end of the chase, handcuffs off, Bond puts on the charm and Wai Lin totally shuts him down and walks away. The look on Bond’s face is one of abject confusion. Them being separated though allows for Wai Lin to have a true martial arts fight, the likes of which no Bond has ever actually had. This is because Michelle Yeoh is a badass and an asian stunt team is brought in to fight against her. It also only taps into a smidgeon of her talent, just go watch Crouching Tiger or Wing Chun to see what she’s truly capable of. Bond catches back up with her post fight, and her hideout is the Chinese version of Q’s lab. The producers could have so easily done a spinoff with Wai Lin and it’s a shame they didn’t.
So Carver has a big stealth boat, and he’s setting up all these international incidents so he can be first on the news scene, thus getting all the ratings. Yeah, that’s his plan, to get ratings. Him and Trump would be peas in a pod. This brings something up about a lot of Bond villains. The amount of money they must spend to build their lairs or giant boats, to staff them, to fund the tech that makes it all work, it can’t possibly be worth the end result, can it? I mean I get they are power mad psychos, but the fact they never did a cost analysis is amazing. Anyway, big boat means bit interior set, and this clearly is a one-up to The Spy Who Loved Me’s big boat set. The henchmen once again show competency at handling weapons in this new era of film, but Bond is just that much better. Carver dies sooner than Stamper, which is the norm for mastermind and henchman. Bond and Wai Lin escape as the entire boat goes boom. They climb up on some floating debri, and now it’s time for post action sequence sex. Amongst a burning wreckage. A rescue boat comes searching, but they want sex now and choose not to be rescued instead. I’m sure that’ll seem like a good idea come morning and the realization they’re not anywhere close to land.
All in all, despite the little quibbles, this will wind up being my favorite Bond film of the 21 watched. Brosnan really embodies Bond well, the movie didn’t drag at all despite the 2 hour 15 minute run time, and the action sequences were thought out really well. Considering it used elements from my other 2 top contenders, Thunderball and Spy Who Loved Me, this shouldn’t be a surprise.
THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH (1999)
After two really good Bond films that had shed a lot of the problems that plagued the prior generation of films, some start to seep back in with this one. The opening is a slower paced affair to start, and then it gets a bit ridiculous with Bond launching a jet boat out of Q’s lab a couple of stories above the water of the Thames. The chase itself is good, especially since Brosnan is clearly visible for a lot of it, as he tries running down a female assassin. The collateral damage that Bond causes though is a bit hard to justify, and there’s a moment where he more or less drives his boat down a street because you know, it’s a jet boat. One key result of this chase though is Bond actually gets injured. After the opening titles, Bond has to sleep with his doctor to have her clear him for duty. What a man whore.
The plot of this one is a bit convoluted. Elektra King is the daughter of an oil baron, she had been kidnapped by a terrorist named Renard, her dad had asked M to help with the ransom demands, but M used Elektra as bait to flush out Renard, who now is seeking revenge, as the ransom money was recovered as well as Elektra being freed. Dad gets blown up, Elektra takes over the family business to finish the oil pipeline dad was building that is in direct competition with what the Russians are doing. Whew!
Bond convinces M to let him look out for Elektra, and she being personally involved with this family, tells Bond the equivalent of “stay away from my daughter!” knowing Bond’s history with pretty women. He visits Q who introduces his new replacement, Monty Python’s John Cleese. Bond wonders if that makes the new guy R. This script has Bond drop a LOT of bad puns for one liners by the way. Bond gets a new convertible BMW that we all know is not long for the world. He and the car are shipped off to some slavic region I don’t remember, but it’s where Elektra’s pipeline is as well as the former KGB agent now casino owner and caviar seller we met in Goldeneye. Bond accompanies Elektra on a pipeline inspection, which for some reason needs to be done on skis. She asks Bond if he knows how to ski, which made me laugh considering all the times we’ve seen him do it in other films. They get attacked by flying snow mobiles, because apparently the bad guys know just how well Bond can ski and need an advantage. Well Bond and Elektra do escape, leading her to trying to seduce Bond, who fights with every instinct he has to not accept, visions of a little M sitting on his shoulder telling him no. It only takes a few scenes inbetween before Bond does what Bond does.
Renard has plans of stealing a warhead from a site where nukes are being decommissioned by physicist Christmas Jones. In a case of ludicrous casting, she is played by Denise Richards who is so out of her depth here, especially when Sophie Marceau is playing Elektra like gangbusters. So now Bond gets paired with the #2 girl, and if trends in these movies tells us anything, that means Elektra is either soon to be dead or bad. If you chose option two, you win! Yep, Elektra not only got a serious case of Stockholm syndrome, she turned the tables and made Renard her *****, er henchman. See Elektra’s mom was the one with the money, not dad. She’s angry at M for using her and dad not paying up the ransom sooner, and it was her that actually planned good ol’ dad’s death. Also she has a plan of setting off the equivalent of a nuke via exploding submarine that will cripple the Russian’s oil pipeline dream, making hers the only choice. Told you the plot was convoluted. For the first time though, we get a female masterminding the whole evil plot, which is refreshing.
The movie continues the trend of having some good quality action with top notch effects work that doesn’t betray if Bond is acting in front of a green screen or not. Brosnan looks like he’s right in the thick of it all all times. There’s a sequence with helicopters that have these giant saw blades for trimming forest trees, and they proceed to shred a warehouse to pieces and cut Bond’s BMW in half. It’s a bit over the top, but fun all the same. We also get a really good sequence inside the submarine as it floods, Bond fighting Renard, the sub’s reactor core about to go nuclear. At the end of it all, Bond gets with Jones despite them having zero chemistry and her showing no interest in him. This of course leads to the doozy line from Bond, “I thought Christmas only comes once a year”. Good lord, just stop.
Overall this movie has more positives than negatives. I really like that M has more to do in these films than just sit behind a desk, her character actually getting fleshed out a bit. Had they cast someone other than Denise Richards, I think that would have vastly elevated the film. Instead it’s like when they put Tanya Roberts in View To A Kill, all looks and zero substance. While the action is verging on going too over the top, it still fits the tone of these new Bond films. Unfortunately the next one goes right into the toilet.
DIE ANOTHER DAY (2002)
This movie marks the 20th official Bond film (remember, Never Say Never was not part of this) and the 50th year of the franchise. There’s a bunch of homages to the past scattered about the flick, but the worst being a drop in visual and script quality with logic and real world physics being tossed out the window during action sequences. I mean the first thing we see in the movie are what I’d describe as surf ninjas, dressed in head to toe black, surfing North Shore size waves into the shoreline near North Korea. I mean, these waves never crash and just go and go thanks to trick editing. It’s not a good sign when I’m rolling my eyes in the first 2 minutes. One of the surfers is Bond (what can’t he do!) who then meets up with a North Korean military guy who looks only a few years removed from boot camp, to sell him conflict diamonds. Except Bond rigged it with C4 for some reason. He pretends to be someone he’s not, only this time henchman Zao figures this out with a simple internet search. Okay it turns out there’s an insider at MI6 who spills the beans to him, but still, about freakin’ time his lame ways of going undercover with only a fake name gets him in trouble. Well things take a turn, diamonds explode in Zao’s face, giving him the most expensive face tattoo ever, and a chase on hovercraft over the minefields of the DMZ happens. Some semi dodgy green screen effects work happens during this, as well as action that makes you go “oh c’mon” like how Bond spots a mine in the field, while driving a hovercraft fairly fast, and shoots it to make it explode. What? The end result is bad guy goes over a waterfall to his death, Bond being spared a similar fate having grabbed onto a giant ceremonial bell, leading him to quip “saved by the bell”. Ugh. A moment later Bond gets captured by the bad guy’s Korean general dad.
During the opening credit sequence we get flashes of Bond being tortured and being a POW, all to the techno beat of a Madonna song. Where all prior and future Bond title songs are co written by the films composer to properly integrate with Bond themes, no such luck here. That means it sticks out like a sore thumb and isn’t used again at any point of the entire movie. It’s not that the song is terrible, it just has no place here. We come to find out that Bond has been captive for 14 months, with a beard to match. Nobody has come to his rescue, which is odd as it’s the very sort of mission it seems MI6 is always sending their double 0’s out on. Somebody has been watching too many Mission: Impossible movies and forgot which was which! Well Bond gets traded for Zao, who did some bad things in the interim before getting caught himself, much to the displeasure of M. Like she’s genuinely pissed they had to give Zao up for Bond. Turns out the North Korean got some info that only Bond could have known, and therefore him being in captivity was now a liability.
Bond is essentially in medical prison at an MI6 facility, until he fakes a heart attack by slowing his pulse to nothing, a technique he apparently learned as a coping method as a POW. I’m rolling my eyes so hard at this point I can see behind me. Bond escapes, flees to a nearby Chinese hotel where he gets all cleaned up once more. A knock on the door reveals a masseuse courtesy of the hotel, who’s name is Peaceful Fountains of Desire. Wow. Bond denies her offer of more than a massage, saying he’s “not that kind of customer”. In truth I think it’s just because he knew there were people trying to film him from behind a two way mirror and he’s got a rep to uphold. Also this is pretty impressive as he’s gone without getting any for a year and a half now.
Bond heads to Cuba chasing down a lead, where he meets Halley Berry’s Jinx. Unbeknownst to him, she is an NSA agent working for Mr Blond (Michael Madson). He promptly sleeps with her, because duh. Just off shore there is a small ‘health’ island that actually is a cutting edge facility where you can have your DNA replaced, thus turning you into someone else. Cuba, come for the cigars, stay for the uber impressive medical facilities found nowhere else in the world. Turns out Zao is here, halfway through the process of being turned into a white european guy. Except he’s keeping the diamonds in his face, cuz they’re sooo hard to remove. Meanwhile over in London, we meet Gustav Graves and his undercover assistant Miranda Frost. Gustav has an ego that would embarrass Trump, is incredibly wealthy having discovered diamonds in Iceland, and is also a philanthropist. In other words, hello bad guy. He and Bond get into a dick measuring contest at the local fencing club, with what starts out with a civil fencing match and accelerates fast into a full blown brawl with broadswords. The swordmaster of the facility? Madonna. Why? Even Bond doesn’t wanna sleep with her.
Back in good graces with MI6, Bond visits Q who didn’t keep the R name, for a visit down prop memory lane, including a new Aston Martin that can turn invisible. I mean at this point the movie has gone right off the rails and is heading fast toward Moonraker territory. Action moves to Iceland where Graves wants to show off his new toy in space that can create sunlight anywhere, which seems like a weird want. The event takes place in an ice hotel, and if you can’t put 2 and 2 together as to whether the sun toy is going to melt the ice castle, you haven’t been paying attention. There are a litany of wrongs from this point forward, so let’s list them!
Graves turns out to be the presumed dead Korean guy, having gone through the DNA replacement and turning him into a German. Talk about white washing. So we are to actually believe that in the timeline established by how long Bond was a POW, 14 months, plus a month or two more, that this guy was rescued, sent to Cuba for an Extreme Makeover, set up a foolproof cover story, established himself as being super wealthy, and had super scientists design, build, and launch his space toy? At one point Miranda says she’s been undercover for 3 years with Graves, and we do find out she was the mole who sold Bond out, so how does any of this track?
While snooping around and getting into predicaments, Bond cuts a hole in the ice, dives in wearing slacks and a sweater, swims into the secret facility, and suffers no hypothermia in the least. He then gets into a fight where Jinx is strapped to a table with friggin’ lasers shooting all over the place. Bond and a henchman named Kill (jeezus) fight amongst the randomly firing laser beams, during which I had to ask what their purpose even was for. This is what happens when people throw ideas at the wall but have no good reason for keeping them other than that it might be cool.
Sun toy can actually focus into a single beam, which chases down Bond like a kid holding a magnifying glass to an ant. Graves wears a Nintendo Power Glove with built in tazer to control the thing. The beam chases Bond who is using a jet powered ice sled to get away, but finds himself dangling over the edge of the massive ice shelf. The beam causes the whole shelf to break off into the ocean, tsunami wave created. In what many in the visual effects community love to point out as terrible, Bond parasails the wave, dodging mini icebergs, before landing back on the shelf in safety. It is the most ludicrous piece of action, at least for the next few minutes. Bond gets his to his invisicar, and Zao chases him in his own weapons filled Jaguar. They proceed to have a car battle the likes of which probably inspired Fast & Furious 8. And 6 and 7 for that matter. Best (worst) part? Despite slamming into ice pillars within the melting ice hotel that Jinx is trapped in and drowning (the logic, the logic!), zero damage to the cars. Also the whole interior of the hotel is apparently designed like a parking garage with one circular ramp leading up the floors.
While Bond rescues Jinx, the baddies flee in their getaway cargo plane. Among the things they take? A ferrari or two. Jinx and Bond get on the plane via the landing gear and this sets up the stupidest piece of action possibly in any Bond film. Graves now has a whole Power Glove suit to wear, making him look like one of the gladiators in The Running Man. He hasn’t turned off the sun beam yet, as he’s trying to impress his General daddy. Things happen, Jinx gets paired off for a fight with Miranda who now wears bad girl attire. Bond gets into his own skirmish with super tazer hands. The plane gets diverted straight for the sun beam and passes through it, causing a lot of the plane's outer skin to melt away and catch fire. Bond manages to send Graves through one of the jet turbines, and the plane is on it’s way to crashing. How the sun beam didn’t cause the entire plane to explode by super heating the fully fueled vehicle is beyond me. We see the entire wing ablaze, no explosion. Remember those Ferraris? Bond opens the back cargo door and sends them plummeting, where later we see they landed in a bog or something, nose first, but of course they look pristine with not so much a crack in the windshield. Jinx and him get into the helicopter that was in the cargo hold, slide out the back, and then fly away to safety. Only then does the plane finally explode.
Oh, and Moneypenny finally gets to get busy with Bond, thanks to a VR program Q has developed. I guess that’s fan service? All the good will the previously 3 movies built up was tossed aside for a movie that felt and looked more like Roger Moore era Bond. I don’t even know who to blame it on, as the same writers on this were the same for the previous 2 movies, and would go on to write the next 4 with Daniel Craig. I don’t blame Brosnan, though it seems he might have been the fall guy as this was his last go despite wanting to continue. Oh, and the whole thing ends with a remixed version of the Madonna song. Terrible movie.
wolfson
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- May 24, 2013
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well done shutyertrap , mate you put in a lot of work .finished All or Nothing the Philadelphia Eagles ,was that good . fell in love in love with Brandon Graham No. 55 , he always had a smile on his face and was always cheeky . when his wife was at the sink he was folding the kids clothes , tough bastard but a heart of gold .the meaning of Philadelphia says Brotherly Love , not quite , close but .Phila is Love , Delphia is Brother and Sister . if they used Delphos then it would be Brother , Delphi is Sister .now i`m onto All or Nothing the Michigan Wolverines , just started , looking good so far , it`s so good getting the behind the scenes for a season , opens your eyes what really goes on , you appreciate sports people much better .
ZREXMike2
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- Oct 22, 2018
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great essay on the Brosnan Bonds trap! nothing to add, i did like the modern Aston Martin in the last one, James finally got a cool car. even tho the movie was crap, seeing Halle as a Bond Girl was cool. Moneypenny having a makeout scene with a simulated Bond seemed like autoerotic masturbation, but go Moneypenny! i still enjoyed the flick even as i realized it was way over the top ridiculous.
edit: i thought they wanted Brosnan for a 5th movie but he was busy doing that hokey Remington Steele tv show?
edit: i thought they wanted Brosnan for a 5th movie but he was busy doing that hokey Remington Steele tv show?
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- Mar 14, 2012
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Brosnan didn’t turn it down, the studio wouldn’t release him from his contract. Show was on the bubble for getting picked up the next season, soon as they heard he might become Bond they figured they had a hot commodity and green kit the next season. If memory serves, that season got canceled midway through. It’s sort of like what happened when Tom Seleck was up for Indiana Jones but he was under contract for Magnum P.I., but that show ran for quite a few years more.
Citizen
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- Oct 5, 2017
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Ah, thanks for the correction. Stuff like that is always pretty interesting. I did a little more reading on it, and apparently Albert Broccoli also didn't want an active TV actor, so he rescinded his offer after Steele was uncanceled (they had apparently officially canceled the show at one point). So Brosnan was double screwed. And then yeah, the final season wasn't even a full one.
- Mar 14, 2012
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Glad I had it mostly right! I was only 14 or 15 when that all went down, was pretty obsessed with entertainment news, so I’m quite impressed with myself for even remembering all these years later.
trash80
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- Dec 14, 2018
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Bloodshot - nice special effects, i liked it.
Bloodshot was pretty cool, but I'm thinking Vin Diesel's one-dimensional delivery can't carry an action movie anymore. It almost seemed like unironic self parody at times. Though, I did happen to watch Bloodshot right after Hobbs & Shaw (similar over the top action flick) and the Rock is really so much better in these types of roles compared to Vin so that probably influenced my take on the film.
Citizen
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- Oct 5, 2017
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[MENTION=3]Jeff Strong[/MENTION]
Did you see that they released a Double Dragon/Kunio-Kun bundle?
They went with the NES Double Dragons which sucks BUT it has 15 Kunio games (including River City Ransom), 11 of which have never previously been officially released outside of Japan. It's got a mix of the beat 'em ups and the sports titles.
Did you see that they released a Double Dragon/Kunio-Kun bundle?
They went with the NES Double Dragons which sucks BUT it has 15 Kunio games (including River City Ransom), 11 of which have never previously been officially released outside of Japan. It's got a mix of the beat 'em ups and the sports titles.