Bond #24: SPECTRE

it's a lot less corny & there are no pigeon doubletakes

wonder if oberhauser will have a cat

i hope he has a hamster

FYEO alpine chase was okay but I kept comparing it to TLD alpine chase which was just more exciting and again better at convincing you that Dalton was on that cello case dodging those guys. Whereas the things they have Moore's stuntman doing are just so clashingly different from the way Moore (then 54 but feeling ten or fifteen years older) walks and moves... it just didn't work. I was also really struggling to keep track of who was even chasing him and why at that point. Or why he didn't just call the cops on the guy trying to kill him, who is a recognized star triathlete presumably recognizable by everybody in town and visibly sniping people in broad daylight by a heavily-populated ski jump.

fyeo easily one of the top roger moore bonds imo, plus the theme obv a classic

FYEO has one of the most amazing OTT Bill Conti scores ever. I got the OST album just for the chase tracks - do we still say "that shit is ridic?"

the piano octave hits during the ski jump bits - I wish my whole life sounded like that

"Ski... Shoot... Jump."
Good work with the titles there Mr. Conti!
It's like you were given a really terrible set of storyboards and a note that said "tension + excitement" and just decided to include all the ethnic percussion from the old steamer trunk, as a means to try and knit together 4 or 5 half-baked ideas you've had for other scores but never ended up using. And then the guys were like what do we put on top of the sheet music? And you said "Make something up!" and threw the storyboards at them, and they did what you said.

score is rad, it is true

am v happy that FYEO has fellow admirers! <3

I still don't think Dalton was right for the part? He should've played a villain

that was kinda what i liked about dalton in the role - he always comes across an immensely charming shithead which makes him a great villain but is also a totally valid take on bond

btw Clifton James, who played the 'southern sheriff,' is a solid Actors Studio guy and still alive at 94. I saw him off-Broadway in American Buffalo with Pacino in '81.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifton_James

still a chance for him to reprise the key 'southern sheriff' role, then :D

amazingly, there's been no speculation about how SPECTRE might be rebooting the southern sheriff, but it'd be great if they could have clifton james appear as his moonshine-peddling pappy or something. a similar idea worked out great in maverick!

and yeah, the undercurrent of diesel-scented menace from dalton is the best part of his bond. if it means the soft, gentle romance bits don't quite work, it does also mean you 100% buy it while he's faking a romance to try and get information out of the cellist.

meanwhile, we started watching never say never again last night. i'm stoked to pick it back up - - - connery seems to have a MUCH stronger take than moore on hwo a 50+-year-old action spy might act, and he actually does his own falls and punches and stuff. plus, count on irvin kershner to at least think about where he's putting the camera and the lights and shit, it never looks like i'm watching the Tea-Time Proggrame on the BBC which all the non-action scenes in most Moore flicks really feel like. and that's with mister bean showing up! also -- so far at least -- it feels far less flabby than thunderball. a few confusing things have happened but my only real gripe is that they're just slightly overplaying all the wink-wink stuff in the script about bond being old but still good, and M being turned into this sniffy health food junkie who doesn't listen to any of 007's ideas, cuz it's the 80s. also the ridiiiiiculous video game omg.

They're doing a Southern Sheriff origin trilogy before they integrate him back into the main series. The tone will be gritty.

*spits chaw all over desk*

Trivia

* Clifton James played a similar, loud mouthed sheriff, reminiscent of J.W. Pepper in the 1980 film Superman II. All three films were partly written by Tom Mankiewicz

* There is a sheet music company named J.W. Pepper

Clifton James specialized in Southern lawmen. He is from Spokane.

Clifton James played a similar, loud mouthed sheriff, reminiscent of J.W. Pepper in the 1980 film Superman II. All three films were partly written by Tom Mankiewicz

"Wayne. Ya gotta learn to kick ass if you wanna be a peacemaker."

am v happy that FYEO has fellow admirers! <3

It was my first Bond -- I remember ads on TV for Moonraker but I couldn't escape FYEO's theme song (and didn't want to -- perfect OTT melodrama, give Sheena that), and when it finally hit cable I must have watched it a slew of times. That it was Moore's one 'gritty' Bond as such -- however haphazardly -- probably helped, but I still retain a certain nostalgia for it. Connery's Bond in contrast was always an after the fact thing. But TLD would have been the first one I actually saw in the theater. (Now that I think about it, I've *only* seen five on first run -- TLD, License to Kill and the three Craigs.)

I think I've watched every Bond since Daylights in the cinema.

i think For Your Eyes Only is the bond film that's aged the absolute worst, i watched it earlier this year and got so bored during the endless stunt double ski chase scene that i almost just turned it off. it's all style no substance way moreso even than the average bond, and without the laugh factor of e.g. Moonraker to fall back on.

not for your eyes, anymore

also i could swear there was another bond film that had a really similar rock climbing sequence, can someone confirm/deny this?

Opening of TLD involves rock climbing.

got so bored during the endless stunt double ski chase scene that i almost just turned it off.

I felt similarly about the diving sequences in Thunderball last time I watched it.

Robert Sellers' book about the whole Thunderball/Kevin McClory saga is far more entertaining than the film itself

I felt similarly about the diving sequences in Thunderball last time I watched it.

I think Thunderball underwater sequences were semi-unprecedented at the time, which is why they've aged badly.

thunderball underwater sequences reminded me of that feeling as a kid when I'd tune in to Wonderful World of Disney only to find some kind of nature documentary & you would just sit & watch in sullen boredom hoping someone would get attacked

I think Thunderball underwater sequences were semi-unprecedented at the time

I remember catching some of some godawful James Mason film about Atlantis on TV one afternoon, which had far longer and drearier underwater sequences than Thunderball, and which I reckon might have come first - got the impression it was late 50s. can't be bothered to google right now.

lol veg

next for Craig: Iago!

http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/oct/19/david-oyelowo-daniel-craig-othello-shakespeare-new-york

chap, you BEST not be talkin' bout Mason's splendid Nemo for Disney.

Brit newspapers are raving about this although I'm pissed Seydoux seems to have been given a role with fuck all to do.

Also as dumb as this sounds I don't really trust reviewers with Bond.

LOL at the pull-quotes from the "fresh" reviews on RT:

It's easy to enjoy but hard to care about.

James Bond is ridiculous again in this disappointing (but still fun) outing.

Bond's 24th outing delivers handsomely in action set pieces and crowd-pleasing moments, but is let down by a weird mix of tone, a lack of plot and poorly defined characters.

A wealth of iconography - both incidental and integral - from the series' founding chapters is revived here, making "Spectre" a particular treat for 007 nerds, and a businesslike blast for everyone else.

It's easy to enjoy but hard to care about.

James Bond is ridiculous again in this disappointing (but still fun) outing.

Bond's 24th outing delivers handsomely in action set pieces and crowd-pleasing moments, but is let down by a weird mix of tone, a lack of plot and poorly defined characters.

All three of these statements could be applied to basically every Bond movie, just change the number in the last one.

and Bowie albums

apparently it starts in Mexico City w/ a 5-min unbroken shot

mayb Captain Quinlan will cameo

Found via HOOS on Twitter: http://www.redbulletin.com/us/us/culture/daniel-craig-tells-us-what-he-really-thinks-of-bond

Speaking of women, many men admire Bond for his way with the ladies …

But let’s not forget that he’s actually a misogynist. A lot of women are drawn to him chiefly because he embodies
a certain kind of danger and never sticks around for too long.

What about you? Are you the kind of guy who sticks around?

Well, I’ve been married for four years.

. . . And this time you’ve gone one better, showing 007 succumbing to the charms of an older woman.

I think you mean the charms of a woman his own age.

niiice

<3 u DC

that "well, i've been married for four years" sounds kind of ominous in reply, coming from a man in his late 40s

prob similar to what W Beatty wd've said 4 years into his marriage

I still feel bad for Darren Aronofsky tbh

lol, i was coming here to post LITERALLY the same pull quote.
anyway, score one for Daniel Craig

SPOILER ALERT

Just saw it. First half was p bad - Mexico, Rome, what even happened? Who cares. The moment he finds White it gets great. Who knew that what the world needed was slow, fever-dream Bond? But it did. Scene with the plane in the mountains satisfyingly awkward and physical and I loved how they didn't explain how Bond even got it. Scene with the mouse is all time. FANTASTIC fight on the train, every move utterly legible, held me so tight in its grip I didn't even see the classic twist coming which had been telegraphed from a mile away. I love that she got drunk and didn't fuck him. I loved the old spy shit locked away in the hidden room. I loved the villain's lair. But then, well, we get Waltz Waltzin it up. The drill sequence somehow both too much and not enough. Everything after had a slightly dutiful feeling, that the plot had set these plates spinning and now they had to be taken down, or, well, exploded dramatically, one by one. So sick of Q hacking into things. Was a bit shit that Bond's like "I'll protect her I promise" and then is like "o well lates", then appears surprised that she's in danger. Also there was a distinct lack of Bellucci. She's in the movie for like 40 seconds.

SPOILER ALERT CONCLUDED

lalalalala unbookmark

S.P.O.I.L.E.R.E

sorry dudes :/

trace did you like skyfall?