[small]First effort at a review here, forgive the wall of text nature of the writing but it is copy/pasted from another website and on which text formatting isn't possible and beyond a certain point I couldn't be bothered editing this thing...[/small]
[HEADING=1]James Bond 007: Spectre[/HEADING]
"It's half price day!" I rejoiced, the one day of the week when a trip to the cinema is just about worth the trouble, and it was quickly determined that a movie would be viewed at some point in these golden 24 hours. I believed it was either going to be Bridge of Spies or Spectre and as BoS was not screening for a couple of hours I decided to view the last Dan Craig Bond film which, apparently, was the best.
And so once again those familiar Bond tropes started parading out. I observed in a recent review of The Martian that derivation - indeed, derivation to the exclusion of any innovation - is acceptable in certain brands of film, and obviously no film series approaches the nostalgic audio and visual hot spots of the Bond offerings other than, perhaps, Star Wars or Indiana Jones.
What's your favorite signature Bond micro-theme? The one after he shoots at the screen during the little intro walk-across scene? The one where everything's a bit chill and he's about to infiltrate a place? The one where he's presumed dead only to re-emerge from an unexpected location?
For me it might be the trumpet or saxophone fanfare that greets his opening extra-zaney effort. In Tomorrow Never Dies it is when he flies through the fiery explosion of the terrorist arms bazaar post-cruise missile hit in an aircraft he commandeered just moments earlier, in The World is Not Enough it happens at some point in his boat chase through the Thames of London, and in this film it occurs at some point during a deadly stalk through the Day of the Dead in Mexico City. I can't quite remember, but if it isn't when he bails on a hot chick to use her balcony as access to a rooftop then it is when he's single handedly beating up two people whilst arresting a plummeting helicopter from crashing into a crowd.
And this little discussion neatly summarizes what you expect and what you get from this Bond Film - you expect tropes, you get them, in Craig fashion you expect slightly more cringe factor than you would have found in previous films and that is what you get. It's not all a parade of the predictable though: Collateral damage is limited, women are treated a bit better - even if Monica Bellucci barely exists despite undoubtedly appearing, I was glad that they didn't chuck her cleavage at us like The Matrix did - and things just don't get quite as bleak in this film as they have in other recent offerings. For this I, for one, am grateful.
Basically speaking, a new super villain who is even more pervasive and undeniable than anyone else in the series to date (honestly who can they possible conceive of in the next film to top this guy? Freaking Galactus?), and he is assaulting James on all fronts. A puppet is undermining the international intelligence community, bad guy is tracking Bond and his love affairs with prejudice, and in an obligatory bone-shatteringly seedy and depressing scene a cold German ***** casually tells an uncaring international crime organization about systematic cruelty on an unimaginable scale while an African man discusses efforts to undermine disease control and humanitarian efforts up the Heart of Darkness. It's all very dire, but good ol' bulldog Bond transcends his ageing designation and tactical role to set things more or less to rights.
I'll avoid spoilers, but I do have to mention a couple of things that are just impossible to overlook and, considering the public availability of cast lists, not really spoilers. Namely, while I gave this film a ton of leeway I just cannot forgive what is a string of godawful casting decisions.
Fiennes is good as M. An ethnic (for lack of a better word coming to mind) Moneypenny is a scene stealer whenever she appears. But things get a little crappy when you start to move through the other obligatory characters. Firstly, I detest the new Q. He's not so new now, of course, but I detested him in previous showings and I detest him still. I don't like the actor's snippy way of speaking, his micro-expressions that are used to communicate what his toneless line delivery fails to. Other people will like him, I'm sure, but not I.
That's nothing though, because the casting of villains in this film is just awful. With the exception of a kind of future Oddjob spy-hunter villain who doesn't say a line all movie, and as such can't really screw up (though what might be his gimmick - steel thumbnails - only makes one useless appearance)
I instantly raged to my partner on the decision to make Christopher Waltz the lead villain of the flick. Why? Because this role is all Waltz EVER seems to play - even when he's being a 'good guy' in Django Unchained he's still basically the same character - and it MASSACRES any chance the film has of generating any kind of immersion. Half the time I was watching him on screen I straight up forgot that I was watching Spectre. Honestly, I seriously didn't remember where I was for seconds at a time because his god damn unchanging face and tone completely phased me out.
Let me elucidate this just a bit more. When this criminal is actually revealed to us, we only see a bit of his face, a face with shadows cast across it and through a crowd of shoulders - confusingly, he basically says "nice to see you again James" as if we've seen him before (as far as I know we haven't seen him in the series to date), and because we instantly recognize who the f*ck he is and what he usually does in any kind of criminal role the entire villain plot is at once introduced, communicated and undeniably resolved in that single instant. The rest almost feels like filler.
And then we move on to the secondary antagonist, the infuriating C, played by an actor who is basically only known to anyone for his role as Moriarty in Sherlock. The guy has made being a cocky pom asshole an artform and, simply enough, completely lives up to what you expect from him. Good job, asshole. Again, immersion is immersed and drowned to death in a fetid pool of bad, recycled acting and dialogue. These two awful casting calls are just utterly debilitating to my experience of the film.
The scenery is a mixed bag. The acting is good on the part of the good guys and bad on the part of the bad guys. The Craig-era seediness is there but mercifully toned down to the benefit of the rest of the film. The villain is hate'able but only because I hate the actor and the villain IS the actor. The set piece action is pretty good - an alpine aircraft chase might be one of the best sequences since the (good) Brosnan days. And the actual movement of the good guys on screen is well scripted, well plotted and generally well good, bruv. Even that twitchy bastard Q is forced to tone down his performance by the reality of a more mature script and role for him.
I like this film because it has a good balance between light hearted fun, suave humor and desperate situations without ever losing sight of the idea that Bond is meant to be the good guy that we all like. In these ways it outstrips it's recent predecessors, though I still think my favorite Bond film since Goldeneye was either Goldeneye or Tomorrow Never dies. Watch Spectre if it's half price day and you feel like a bit of fun.
7/10
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[HEADING=1]James Bond 007: Spectre[/HEADING]
"It's half price day!" I rejoiced, the one day of the week when a trip to the cinema is just about worth the trouble, and it was quickly determined that a movie would be viewed at some point in these golden 24 hours. I believed it was either going to be Bridge of Spies or Spectre and as BoS was not screening for a couple of hours I decided to view the last Dan Craig Bond film which, apparently, was the best.
And so once again those familiar Bond tropes started parading out. I observed in a recent review of The Martian that derivation - indeed, derivation to the exclusion of any innovation - is acceptable in certain brands of film, and obviously no film series approaches the nostalgic audio and visual hot spots of the Bond offerings other than, perhaps, Star Wars or Indiana Jones.
What's your favorite signature Bond micro-theme? The one after he shoots at the screen during the little intro walk-across scene? The one where everything's a bit chill and he's about to infiltrate a place? The one where he's presumed dead only to re-emerge from an unexpected location?
For me it might be the trumpet or saxophone fanfare that greets his opening extra-zaney effort. In Tomorrow Never Dies it is when he flies through the fiery explosion of the terrorist arms bazaar post-cruise missile hit in an aircraft he commandeered just moments earlier, in The World is Not Enough it happens at some point in his boat chase through the Thames of London, and in this film it occurs at some point during a deadly stalk through the Day of the Dead in Mexico City. I can't quite remember, but if it isn't when he bails on a hot chick to use her balcony as access to a rooftop then it is when he's single handedly beating up two people whilst arresting a plummeting helicopter from crashing into a crowd.
And this little discussion neatly summarizes what you expect and what you get from this Bond Film - you expect tropes, you get them, in Craig fashion you expect slightly more cringe factor than you would have found in previous films and that is what you get. It's not all a parade of the predictable though: Collateral damage is limited, women are treated a bit better - even if Monica Bellucci barely exists despite undoubtedly appearing, I was glad that they didn't chuck her cleavage at us like The Matrix did - and things just don't get quite as bleak in this film as they have in other recent offerings. For this I, for one, am grateful.
Basically speaking, a new super villain who is even more pervasive and undeniable than anyone else in the series to date (honestly who can they possible conceive of in the next film to top this guy? Freaking Galactus?), and he is assaulting James on all fronts. A puppet is undermining the international intelligence community, bad guy is tracking Bond and his love affairs with prejudice, and in an obligatory bone-shatteringly seedy and depressing scene a cold German ***** casually tells an uncaring international crime organization about systematic cruelty on an unimaginable scale while an African man discusses efforts to undermine disease control and humanitarian efforts up the Heart of Darkness. It's all very dire, but good ol' bulldog Bond transcends his ageing designation and tactical role to set things more or less to rights.
I'll avoid spoilers, but I do have to mention a couple of things that are just impossible to overlook and, considering the public availability of cast lists, not really spoilers. Namely, while I gave this film a ton of leeway I just cannot forgive what is a string of godawful casting decisions.
Fiennes is good as M. An ethnic (for lack of a better word coming to mind) Moneypenny is a scene stealer whenever she appears. But things get a little crappy when you start to move through the other obligatory characters. Firstly, I detest the new Q. He's not so new now, of course, but I detested him in previous showings and I detest him still. I don't like the actor's snippy way of speaking, his micro-expressions that are used to communicate what his toneless line delivery fails to. Other people will like him, I'm sure, but not I.
That's nothing though, because the casting of villains in this film is just awful. With the exception of a kind of future Oddjob spy-hunter villain who doesn't say a line all movie, and as such can't really screw up (though what might be his gimmick - steel thumbnails - only makes one useless appearance)
I instantly raged to my partner on the decision to make Christopher Waltz the lead villain of the flick. Why? Because this role is all Waltz EVER seems to play - even when he's being a 'good guy' in Django Unchained he's still basically the same character - and it MASSACRES any chance the film has of generating any kind of immersion. Half the time I was watching him on screen I straight up forgot that I was watching Spectre. Honestly, I seriously didn't remember where I was for seconds at a time because his god damn unchanging face and tone completely phased me out.
Let me elucidate this just a bit more. When this criminal is actually revealed to us, we only see a bit of his face, a face with shadows cast across it and through a crowd of shoulders - confusingly, he basically says "nice to see you again James" as if we've seen him before (as far as I know we haven't seen him in the series to date), and because we instantly recognize who the f*ck he is and what he usually does in any kind of criminal role the entire villain plot is at once introduced, communicated and undeniably resolved in that single instant. The rest almost feels like filler.
And then we move on to the secondary antagonist, the infuriating C, played by an actor who is basically only known to anyone for his role as Moriarty in Sherlock. The guy has made being a cocky pom asshole an artform and, simply enough, completely lives up to what you expect from him. Good job, asshole. Again, immersion is immersed and drowned to death in a fetid pool of bad, recycled acting and dialogue. These two awful casting calls are just utterly debilitating to my experience of the film.
The scenery is a mixed bag. The acting is good on the part of the good guys and bad on the part of the bad guys. The Craig-era seediness is there but mercifully toned down to the benefit of the rest of the film. The villain is hate'able but only because I hate the actor and the villain IS the actor. The set piece action is pretty good - an alpine aircraft chase might be one of the best sequences since the (good) Brosnan days. And the actual movement of the good guys on screen is well scripted, well plotted and generally well good, bruv. Even that twitchy bastard Q is forced to tone down his performance by the reality of a more mature script and role for him.
I like this film because it has a good balance between light hearted fun, suave humor and desperate situations without ever losing sight of the idea that Bond is meant to be the good guy that we all like. In these ways it outstrips it's recent predecessors, though I still think my favorite Bond film since Goldeneye was either Goldeneye or Tomorrow Never dies. Watch Spectre if it's half price day and you feel like a bit of fun.
7/10
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