Mind you, "QUANTUM OF SOLACE" had its flaws (uneven pacing in the first half and . But the story, at least for me, was the right follow-up to the semi-tragic ending of "CASINO ROYALE".
It looks like this thread has been dormant for ....... a while, but it fits what I'm posting about. Earlier today I watched Calvin Dyson's video about the TWINE's 25th anniversary. He mentioned the back and forth during editing of TWINE if the Bilbao sequence should be the whole PTS or the London scenes should also be in front of the title sequence. It struck me that there is no real need for the Bilbao scenes. There are some good lines ad an underwhelming stunt, but that's all. The action in London is far more impressive. Bilbao isn't really needed for the plot either. Start the PTS with Bond walking into M's office with the suitcase full of money, Perhaps ad a line or two and it would've worked better than what we got. The PTS would've been closer to the length of most PTS' too.
Yes I don’t entirely disagree. If it were a good sequence I’d save it, but it’s all so dreary with nothing stylish about it and some pretty horrible dialogue. I still can’t believe that’s the set they used in the first scene of a Bond film too: a boring, small office.
And why on Earth isn’t it set in Switzerland??
Just for a change you could have had a fun scene with Moneypenny ticking him off about complaints about some ridiculous sequence of stunts he pulled whilst getting the money but which we're only hearing about for once.
Moneypenny or M could ask him, and 007 would make a quip. Anything the audience imagined would probably be better than what we got. Cutting the Bilbao would be more effective. I think the scene was shot in Bilbao and not Switzerland because of the Guggenheim Museum we see for a few seconds.
The minutes saved by cutting the Bilbao stuff could instead be used on fleshing out the Christmas Jones character and the relationship between Renard and Elektra, and possibly Elektra and Bond.
While I appreciate his portrayal and the new direction of the films, I find Craig's Bond films largely unenjoyable - apart from the excellent QoS. CR wallows and has dated, Skyfall is not a Bond film, Spectre is trash and NTTD is....blah.
Moonraker is the first totally polished and flawless Bond film from an editing, cinematography, continuity, score and production stand point.
FYEO is criminally underrated and gets better with time.
Goldeneye is brilliant in the final 20 minutes but meanders way too slowly before it.
The Bond films are some of the most rewatchable movies but the third acts really suffer. The worst third act is Goldfinger, the best is The World Is Not Enough (the submarine section is excellent).
TND gets better with age and its manipulation of truth plot is a major reason for that.
The DB5 is totally overused and should never have made it past the PTS in Thunderball.
Lazenby is the best fighter and best looking Bond in a suit.
Desmond L's Q is best in the Brosnan films, worst in Dalton's.
TSWLM's Bond is the best example of Bond 'saving the world' and being the on-screen hero we all want to be, no Bond film comes close to matching it.
If point 1 throws you for a loop, point 2 should explain where I’m coming from:
“Dr. No” is the best Bond film, they never improved upon the original formula. Even the movie poster is the best.
Indirectly a controversial Bond opinion, but my favorite spy film isn’t a Bond film, it’s “Funeral in Berlin”. That movie feels like a documentary, like what you’re watching actually happened.
I heard recently that Quentin Tarantino might write novelizations of his Reservoir Dogs and True Romance scripts. I would like to see some of the old Bond stories get a similar treatment. As I've said before on other sites, Everything or Nothing, Bloodstone and Skyfall would be the best candidates for this treatment. If Roald Dahl would have had permission, he could have written his own novelization of YOLT, akin to Christopher Wood and his two novelizations. As I've also said before, the entire DC era, (including his two video games) would make for a BIG, but worthwhile novelization. The two main movies that I think could benefit from this format are FYEO and OP. Some great in-depth passages could be done for both! I think it could be a way for IFP and EON to start getting along again.
Also, we know that Raymond Benson tried to adapt the CR novel for the stage. I think someone should try that again. The time period should be the 50’s, but I wouldn’t mind a possible modern day version again. Another set of Bond stories that belong on the stage is the entire novel of Octopussy and the Living Daylights. They could be done realistically (and faithfully) on the stage as well. Honorable mention for the novel Moonraker, as there aren’t a lot of sets and it is fairly realistic. Too bad that the movie kind of destroyed its realistic style reputation.
The only Bond material that I ever want Purvis and Wade again to write is a novelization of their Jinx spin-off script. With the assumption that Amazon wants spin-offs (and they have a say with IFP), I think it would be a great way for them to go out on a high. A foreword by Halle Berry would be worth the price alone.
Richard Maibaum was overused for writing. He was too full of himself. And regularly criticized others, for various unfair reasons. He didn't realize that a screenplay is a blueprint, not the Bible. And everyone views a screenplay differently.
I like the idea of Bond spin-offs in the literary world, not the cinema world. Blofeld, Goldfinger, Trevelyan and their second hand muscle deserve a full book to themselves. It should set as modern day as possible, as it would be more of a creative risk.
Blofeld needs to be reintroduced as much as Bond himself. It’ll be hard to keep an actor quiet from the internet now nowadays.
Ralph Fiennes should stay on as M. He can now play Sir Miles.
M’s death at the end of SF feels like a tribute to Judi Dench herself, over M. Her M made a lot of poor decisions (thanks to the writing), and we're supposed to sympathize with her? No thank you, good riddance to her.
Martin Campbell shouldn’t come back. He got lucky, because he directed the series when it was at a low point.
Adam West should have played Bond in Diamonds Are Forever. The movie is basically a giant Batman ‘66 episode, inside a Bond movie.
For those of you who thought that Bond and Blofeld shouldn’t have been brothers, here’s a shocker. I think that John Logan’s idea of making Blofeld a woman was worse.
Carte Blanche now feels like a missed opportunity. Either Jeffery Deaver or another writer could have continued its clearly set up sequel. Maybe a short story one day.
It seems that TND is getting more and more recognized as a Bond film ahead of its time. It may be an example that EON could look back on for the future. In particular, it’s M subplot. She may be put down by her superiors, but she doesn’t take it out on Bond. EON has done M putting Bond down way too much in recent years. Then, she says he is the best. Bond then says he never left MI6. M should give Bond his assignment and be done. It might make the character more sympathetic. It seems that EON sees M as important of a character as Bond.
I’m surprised that the these three games didn’t get a Nintendo 64 adaptation in the console’s lifetime: Tomorrow Never Dies (like or not like the PS1 version), James Bond 007 for the GameBoy, it calls for a bigger story on a bigger console. Most controversially, 007 Racing, considering how many racing games were on the N64. Based on the success of Goldeneye 007, I’m surprised that Nintendo didn’t try for more Bond other than The World is Not Enough. Maybe it was legal issues, or GE’s surprise success.
Molly Peters (namely her dubbing voice actress, Barbara Jefford). That reading of "James, James, where are you going?" makes me cringe, even as I'm writing it.
In general wish that Felix Leiter wasn't turned into Jack Wade.
Also, most of the time, the actors are fine, it's the writing that hurts them: Christoph Waltz, any Guy Hamilton and Tom Mankiewicz Bond Woman, and even (shocker) both Tanya Roberts and Denise Richards.
Amazon should try filming the next two movies back to back. They have the money and crew, even if the story isn't a two-parter.
Forgive me for the long rant. Happy to join the site!
Roger Moore looked great in AVTAK. Had Dalton still not been available after NBC pulled Pierce away, Moore would've been fine to return an 8th time. Based on HAPPY ANNIVERSARY OO7, he might've looked even better than in AVTAK.
Bond ranking videos are fun, but constantly seeing CASINO ROYALE placed at number 1 is beginning to appear with the tedious inevitability of an unloved season. Quite predictable. I'd love to see somebody place THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS or DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER in first place for a change.
I have more fun with NSNA than many of the later Eon entries. I think NSNA is superb.
Robert Brown was an excellent M. Superb chemistry with both Moore and Dalton. I wish we could have seen more films with his M.
Sadly, the Craig era has become my least favorite. An amazing start which lead to years of wasted time between entries. Also it led to the demise of the Eon franchise. This leads to my controversial opinion on the future: attempting to reinvent Bond is foolish. Bond as a character never needs reinvention. An actor's individual performance takes care of that. Give Bond an intriguing assignment, interesting characters, with a great villain, and it will all fall into place.
I'd say Bond needs reinvention in because Bond died in NTTD. New actors require some course correction in style. Not much reinvetion is needed beyond that. They can do more, but it's not required.
Excellent point. However, I wonder if NTTD could be the least seen Bond film? Most casual film goers I speak to aren't aware of this ending until I spoil it for them. By the time B26 is underway I imagine most will have forgotten about the last film regardless.
I would prefer a Bond film that does not include any personal backstory.
A film focused solely on Bond's mission.
Bond receives his briefing from M and proceeds to his assignment.
Additionally, I would like to see Bond undergoing training for a mission, similar to the depiction in Live and Let Die (the novel), where he enhances his endurance through running, swimming, and canoeing prior to embarking on his mission.
I think the big budget Bond film format should also be replaced with a more realistic and grittier film. It should be concise...direct, and not exceed 1 hour and 30 minutes.
1980's 'The Hard Way' starring Patrick McGoohan is the perfect example of this kind of film.
I would prefer it if bond's backstory was treated like it was before CR. Bond cutting the conversation short if anyone starts talking about Vesper or Trevelyn mentioning that they're both orphans. The story should not be about his past, but we can get small nuggets of information that is woven into the conversation or plot.
Comments
#1.TLD 2.LTK 3.TND 4.GF 5.YOLT 6.DAF 7.TMWTGG 8.TWINE 9.DN 10.SP
On a related controversial note, I think the Dench-Craig relationship is the best M-Bond relationship in the entire series.
It looks like this thread has been dormant for ....... a while, but it fits what I'm posting about. Earlier today I watched Calvin Dyson's video about the TWINE's 25th anniversary. He mentioned the back and forth during editing of TWINE if the Bilbao sequence should be the whole PTS or the London scenes should also be in front of the title sequence. It struck me that there is no real need for the Bilbao scenes. There are some good lines ad an underwhelming stunt, but that's all. The action in London is far more impressive. Bilbao isn't really needed for the plot either. Start the PTS with Bond walking into M's office with the suitcase full of money, Perhaps ad a line or two and it would've worked better than what we got. The PTS would've been closer to the length of most PTS' too.
Yes I don’t entirely disagree. If it were a good sequence I’d save it, but it’s all so dreary with nothing stylish about it and some pretty horrible dialogue. I still can’t believe that’s the set they used in the first scene of a Bond film too: a boring, small office.
And why on Earth isn’t it set in Switzerland??
Just for a change you could have had a fun scene with Moneypenny ticking him off about complaints about some ridiculous sequence of stunts he pulled whilst getting the money but which we're only hearing about for once.
Moneypenny or M could ask him, and 007 would make a quip. Anything the audience imagined would probably be better than what we got. Cutting the Bilbao would be more effective. I think the scene was shot in Bilbao and not Switzerland because of the Guggenheim Museum we see for a few seconds.
The minutes saved by cutting the Bilbao stuff could instead be used on fleshing out the Christmas Jones character and the relationship between Renard and Elektra, and possibly Elektra and Bond.
The Man with the Golden Gun and A View to a Kill are good films.
8. SF 9. NTTD 10. AVtaK 11. TMwtGG 12. LtK 13. TSWLM 14. TND
15. GF 16. MR 17. YOLT 18. LaLD 19. SP 20. DAD 21. TWiNE
22. DN 23. TB 24. QoS 25. DaF
Heres one for you: The films are mostly crap! Original IF books is where it's at. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!!
-Mr Arlington Beech
"Better make that two."
If point 1 throws you for a loop, point 2 should explain where I’m coming from:
Some of my controversial opinions.
I heard recently that Quentin Tarantino might write novelizations of his Reservoir Dogs and True Romance scripts. I would like to see some of the old Bond stories get a similar treatment. As I've said before on other sites, Everything or Nothing, Bloodstone and Skyfall would be the best candidates for this treatment. If Roald Dahl would have had permission, he could have written his own novelization of YOLT, akin to Christopher Wood and his two novelizations. As I've also said before, the entire DC era, (including his two video games) would make for a BIG, but worthwhile novelization. The two main movies that I think could benefit from this format are FYEO and OP. Some great in-depth passages could be done for both! I think it could be a way for IFP and EON to start getting along again.
Also, we know that Raymond Benson tried to adapt the CR novel for the stage. I think someone should try that again. The time period should be the 50’s, but I wouldn’t mind a possible modern day version again. Another set of Bond stories that belong on the stage is the entire novel of Octopussy and the Living Daylights. They could be done realistically (and faithfully) on the stage as well. Honorable mention for the novel Moonraker, as there aren’t a lot of sets and it is fairly realistic. Too bad that the movie kind of destroyed its realistic style reputation.
The only Bond material that I ever want Purvis and Wade again to write is a novelization of their Jinx spin-off script. With the assumption that Amazon wants spin-offs (and they have a say with IFP), I think it would be a great way for them to go out on a high. A foreword by Halle Berry would be worth the price alone.
Richard Maibaum was overused for writing. He was too full of himself. And regularly criticized others, for various unfair reasons. He didn't realize that a screenplay is a blueprint, not the Bible. And everyone views a screenplay differently.
I like the idea of Bond spin-offs in the literary world, not the cinema world. Blofeld, Goldfinger, Trevelyan and their second hand muscle deserve a full book to themselves. It should set as modern day as possible, as it would be more of a creative risk.
Blofeld needs to be reintroduced as much as Bond himself. It’ll be hard to keep an actor quiet from the internet now nowadays.
Ralph Fiennes should stay on as M. He can now play Sir Miles.
M’s death at the end of SF feels like a tribute to Judi Dench herself, over M. Her M made a lot of poor decisions (thanks to the writing), and we're supposed to sympathize with her? No thank you, good riddance to her.
Martin Campbell shouldn’t come back. He got lucky, because he directed the series when it was at a low point.
Adam West should have played Bond in Diamonds Are Forever. The movie is basically a giant Batman ‘66 episode, inside a Bond movie.
For those of you who thought that Bond and Blofeld shouldn’t have been brothers, here’s a shocker. I think that John Logan’s idea of making Blofeld a woman was worse.
Carte Blanche now feels like a missed opportunity. Either Jeffery Deaver or another writer could have continued its clearly set up sequel. Maybe a short story one day.
It seems that TND is getting more and more recognized as a Bond film ahead of its time. It may be an example that EON could look back on for the future. In particular, it’s M subplot. She may be put down by her superiors, but she doesn’t take it out on Bond. EON has done M putting Bond down way too much in recent years. Then, she says he is the best. Bond then says he never left MI6. M should give Bond his assignment and be done. It might make the character more sympathetic. It seems that EON sees M as important of a character as Bond.
I’m surprised that the these three games didn’t get a Nintendo 64 adaptation in the console’s lifetime: Tomorrow Never Dies (like or not like the PS1 version), James Bond 007 for the GameBoy, it calls for a bigger story on a bigger console. Most controversially, 007 Racing, considering how many racing games were on the N64. Based on the success of Goldeneye 007, I’m surprised that Nintendo didn’t try for more Bond other than The World is Not Enough. Maybe it was legal issues, or GE’s surprise success.
Molly Peters (namely her dubbing voice actress, Barbara Jefford). That reading of "James, James, where are you going?" makes me cringe, even as I'm writing it.
In general wish that Felix Leiter wasn't turned into Jack Wade.
Also, most of the time, the actors are fine, it's the writing that hurts them: Christoph Waltz, any Guy Hamilton and Tom Mankiewicz Bond Woman, and even (shocker) both Tanya Roberts and Denise Richards.
Amazon should try filming the next two movies back to back. They have the money and crew, even if the story isn't a two-parter.
Forgive me for the long rant. Happy to join the site!
Welcome!
That’s an interesting list @DrMaxMGold I agree with one or two of them 😁
Welcome to the site, I hope you stay and post more on the threads.
I agree with 90% of this.
I doubt Amazon will make spin-offs about characters who were created by EON such as Alec Trevelyan, or at least not the "modern" ones.
Thank you both for the warm welcomes!
Welcome @DrMaxMGold Good to have you here.
🍷
Bloody hell @DrMaxMGold that's a list and a half ! 😃
Thank you @The Red Kind for the warm welcome.
I know that the list is long, @chrisno1 it's actually a collection of various posts from other Bond sites, over the years.
Here's some of my controversial opinions:
Roger Moore looked great in AVTAK. Had Dalton still not been available after NBC pulled Pierce away, Moore would've been fine to return an 8th time. Based on HAPPY ANNIVERSARY OO7, he might've looked even better than in AVTAK.
Bond ranking videos are fun, but constantly seeing CASINO ROYALE placed at number 1 is beginning to appear with the tedious inevitability of an unloved season. Quite predictable. I'd love to see somebody place THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS or DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER in first place for a change.
I have more fun with NSNA than many of the later Eon entries. I think NSNA is superb.
Robert Brown was an excellent M. Superb chemistry with both Moore and Dalton. I wish we could have seen more films with his M.
Sadly, the Craig era has become my least favorite. An amazing start which lead to years of wasted time between entries. Also it led to the demise of the Eon franchise. This leads to my controversial opinion on the future: attempting to reinvent Bond is foolish. Bond as a character never needs reinvention. An actor's individual performance takes care of that. Give Bond an intriguing assignment, interesting characters, with a great villain, and it will all fall into place.
That last point 100% with neon lights flashing and bells ringing.
Okay, those last 2 points. And the 2nd (nicely phrased) one as well. And maybe the 1st, just maybe.
I'd say Bond needs reinvention in because Bond died in NTTD. New actors require some course correction in style. Not much reinvetion is needed beyond that. They can do more, but it's not required.
Excellent point. However, I wonder if NTTD could be the least seen Bond film? Most casual film goers I speak to aren't aware of this ending until I spoil it for them. By the time B26 is underway I imagine most will have forgotten about the last film regardless.
I would prefer a Bond film that does not include any personal backstory.
A film focused solely on Bond's mission.
Bond receives his briefing from M and proceeds to his assignment.
Additionally, I would like to see Bond undergoing training for a mission, similar to the depiction in Live and Let Die (the novel), where he enhances his endurance through running, swimming, and canoeing prior to embarking on his mission.
I think the big budget Bond film format should also be replaced with a more realistic and grittier film. It should be concise...direct, and not exceed 1 hour and 30 minutes.
1980's 'The Hard Way' starring Patrick McGoohan is the perfect example of this kind of film.
I would prefer it if bond's backstory was treated like it was before CR. Bond cutting the conversation short if anyone starts talking about Vesper or Trevelyn mentioning that they're both orphans. The story should not be about his past, but we can get small nuggets of information that is woven into the conversation or plot.