Saturday, November 15, 2008

Bond. James Bond.

Holy crap was Quantum of Solace the bomb diggity shizznit! It you liked what they've done to Batman, you'll love what they've done to 007.

He was using that licence to kill like it was earning him frequent flier miles.

Eleanor Ringel, pinko film critic for the Atlanta Urinal Constipation, once reviewed a James Bond movie (View To A Kill, a particularly cheesy example of the breed) by stating that "Going to a James Bond movie is like going to the zoo; either you're happy to see the giraffes again, or you're not."

Well let me tell you that the zoo now has carnivorous killer robot ninja giraffes, and they rock.

EDIT: As noted in comments, if you thought that Roger Moore phoning it in through lame plots like Octopussy and View To A Kill was the height of Bondness, you're going to loathe this movie. If, on the other hand, you're more into You Only Live Twice or From Russia With Love, you'll dig it.

24 comments:

Divemedic said...

The odd part is that I read an article where Roger Moore was saying how he hated the movie.

Of course, Roger Moore is an anti-gun pacifist, so there you go.

Tam said...

Roger Moore is practically the anti-James Bond.

I'd hate the movie if it exposed my best efforts for the campy kitsch that they were, too. ;)

Anonymous said...

The movie fucking sucked. It was a poor attempt at becoming a Bourne film, which ended up going very badly and being nothing like a bond film.

Anonymous said...

the movie is a disgrace to 007

Tam said...

You're right! It was missing Roger Moore miming driving a boat in front of a rear-projection screen while people off-camera splashed water at him.

Anonymous said...

Is this new Bond anti-gun also?

Rob K said...

Dr. No was my favorite Bond movie, so I have high hopes for this, but it'll be years before I get to see it. I still haven't seen Casino Royale.

CAPTCHA: "packeyn" -- wasn't that one of Roger Moore's Bond girls?

Anonymous said...

Your edit intrigues me. I haven't seen any of the recent Bond films, but You Only Live Twice is still my favorite.

perlhaqr said...

I agree. I went to see it yesterday. I was particularly pleased that the bad guys were a bunch of environinnies.

Tam said...

"Is this new Bond anti-gun also?"

Hollywood is anti-gun.

If you want to maintain your ideological purity, you'll need to stay out of theaters.

Anonymous said...

anon @9:22 -- does this count?

“I hate handguns,” said Daniel Craig, Agent.007 in the latest movie based on Ian Fleming’s hero. “Handguns are used to shoot people and as long as they are around, people will shoot each other. That’s a simple fact.”

Anonymous said...

He was back to the PPk, which I don't personally cotton to it as a gun, is the James Bond gun.

That made me happy.

I went and shot steel, and then came home and headed out to go see some bond. It was awesome.

Matt G said...

Roger Moore was about gadgets and sight gags and lame humor. You never felt that he would get down and dirty, ever. "Oh, I say-- in assailling that rapscallion, I have appeared to have soiled my tunic!"

And the Bourne thing, while well done in some ways, is irritating beyond belief in others. We hear Matt Damon go on about his training off-screen in fighting and shooting. Then we are subjected to wildly changing, several-camera-views-per-second editing which is to show you just how fast their [pretty] boy is, while letting us see nothing of technique. It's like a dry hump on a cactus; it's stimulating, but annoying.

Ken said...

Roger Moore is practically the anti-James Bond.

That statement is demonstrably true. The proof is an oft-overlooked movie called fFolkes, in which he pretty much played the anti-James Bond. Both Moore and the movie were made of awesome.

Anonymous said...

So, it doesn't have "Jaws", then? Humanity is safe?

Hooray.

Frank W. James said...

Let's see Sean Connery was anti-gun. (He campaigned against the possession of handguns in the UK after the Dunblane disaster.) Roger Moore is anti-gun. Now Daniel Craig is admittedly anti-gun.

Name me one actor who has played Bond....James Bond, who was PRO-gun?

All The Best,
Frank W. James

alex. said...

Per Tam it sounds like a good movie, so I'll probably pick it up in a year or two from the discount bin at Wally World. Other than that, who gives a rat's rear end if the actor who is playing 007 is pro-gun, anti-gun, pro-recycling, anti-penguin, pro-midget porn, anti-squirrel wrestling? He's an actor, dammit! I don't need to get some sort of personal affirmation from some fool on the big screen. Hell, he probably doesn't even smoke the same brand of cigars that I do, the bastard.

Unknown said...

I don't give a free flyin' f###, er rat's a##, umm, anyway...Casino Royale was a great film, one of the best Bond films EVAR. If Q of S is 80% as good, I'm one happy motherscooter. I dork like that, distinctly remember seeing "Octopussy" in the theater and enjoying it, so I'm not exactly the most critical dude.

Anonymous said...

If there is copious amounts of violence and large explosions I am sure I will get a giggle out of it.

word verification: RORCH - the noise I made when I lost my lunch after seeing a recent photo of Amy Crackhouse. To quote someone much funnier than I "Kill it! Kill it with fire!"

Anonymous said...

"Name me one actor who has played Bond....James Bond, who was PRO-gun?"

I believe I'd go with David Niven, a Sandhurst graduate and member of the Phantom Reconnaissance Regiment, and George Lazenby, a martial arts instructor in the Australian army.

Craig offers the character a nuderection, and I'll believe that old harridan is M when I see her bite through a pipe stem.

--A quietly retired civil servant.

The Captain said...

Q of S gets a thumbs up from me. Saw it just hours ago and I left the theater entertained. What more can one expect from a movie?

Chaz said...

Saw the new Bond film Friday, then saw it again Saturday. You're right, it's GREAT! The same high production values that started in 'Casino Royale' continue in this film, and there's none of that candy-ass Roger Moore silliness anywhere to be found. Daniel Craig portrays Bond as the borderline sociopath that Fleming created him to be, and he's superb in the fight scenes. It's hard-edged, fast and savage - love it!
Gets a bit silly at the last in the hotel in the dunes, more like the hijinks in the older movies then, but it comes through in the end. I wasn't sure what I thought of Judy Dench as 'M' when they first cast her some time back, but they're giving her more to work with now and her skills are showing.

phlegmfatale said...

I'm coming out of the closet: I LOVE A View To A Kill as it is as fine a time-capsule of mid eighties cheese as was ever squoze out any orifice at the Velveeta factory.

Tanya Roberts is the most useless Bond female I can think of, and yet she has a degree in geology? Fabulous! Okay. I'm buying it. No one screams "James!" like our dim little Tanya.
Love.
Her.

I am in ecstasies every time I see Tom Selleck walk through the foreground in that scene in the market by the bay in San Francisco, and I'm not even a Tom Selleck fan.

Crazy Chris Walken as that crazy wünderkind gone crazy? Get it? He's crazy! Delicious.

Every time I'm in a bubble bath, I HAVE to say "detente can be beautiful." Call me Natasha.

But for me, the high point of the film is Chris Walken wallowing around in some sort of full-contact martial art practice with wildwoman Grace Jones. I have no words for that, but I like what it does to me.

Anyway, yeah, AVTAK totally sucks and I love every minute of it. I blame Duran Duran.

Anonymous said...

I liked Craig in Q of S, overall. Despite his real life view of guns, his Bond character knows that some people just need killin', and he's more than happy to oblige. I also think Judi Dench is great in this; I always thought she was stunt casting back in the Brosnan days, but I'm really liking her now, even though her role here is pretty much asking 007 to please not kill everyone they need info from.
Only complaint is the camera work, the director needs to be given the Clockwork Orange treatment with every Hong Kong action movie ever made, until he can lay out the space and movement of an action scene properly.