Bond 23 - Skyfall

I'll be honest, I love Craig as bond, but so far have hated every bond film he's done. Sure they've had moments but the co-star and villains have been very lack luster and the stories never intrigued me. I got bored enough by it that I was lost half way through the movie. To this day I can't recollect the story of any of his films. All I remember is the hot girls.

I really hope they bring something back. With Q it's a bit promising. I love James Bond, but they really have to up their game and bring something back.
 
By the way, for any blu-ray collectors Best Buy is selling their Bond blu-rays with a 10 dollar credit towards a Skyfall ticket. The price for these blu-rays right now (in Canada at least) is 10 dollars, so you're getting one free movie either way you look at it.
 
This movie was fantastic. Mendes didn't disappoint. Deakin's work was beautiful...so much playing in the "shadows." Craig was wonderful yet again and Bardem was a GREAT villain. This takes what people enjoyed about Casino Royale and does it even better in my opinion.

Favorite Bond movie ever.
 
It was an interesting movie. Almost felt too serious, dramatic to be a Bond movie. Felt more like a Sam Mendes movie than a Bond movie.
 
Can't say I was overly impressed with the film. Loved Casino Royale but what did this Bond villian want?

Maybe I missed it but his ambitions seemed pretty weak to me. Then again, the film did sort of make fun of the "old time" conventions of the previous films i.e. world domination, exploding pens, ejector seats and such.

Perhaps a villian with simpler ambitions was the point.
 
Thank god I'm not the only one underwhelmed by this. The opening sequence was fantastic. Javier Bardem was great. Roger Deakins work was stellar. Other than that I didn't find it much better that Quantum of Solace. I guess I'm just not a Craig fan. He's a good enough actor I just don't think he's that fun to watch, and more than anything they've taken the fun out of Bond. Other than the opening, the action lacked scale, with the finale turning into Home Alone with bullets. I realize Bond has to evolve beyond the formula, but if I had to choose between formulaic, outlandishly fun cheese, and this joyless Bond, I'd rather have the cheese.
 
Yeah I'm in agreement. When I saw the rating at well over 90% this afternoon on Rotten Tomatoes, I decided to cut a couple hours from work and go check it out. Was kinda surprised, the action for the first half hour was pretty good, but after that it got really small scale / low budgetesque... hard to describe. Honestly, I loved Casino Royale far more than this... This is James Bond for crying out loud... it's suppose to be cheese, fun, over-the-top action. Overall it was decent film, but I wish I had waited until I could watch it at home as a rental / download.
 
if you read all/most of the posts in this thread, you can't really blame the writes for not trying. they don't have to. the fans of any classic era bond will still go to the theater to see the movie.
 
Wow I'm surprised by the comments I'm reading.

SPOILERS BELOW.

What did the villain want? To kill M of course. Why? She left him for dead first. Seems pretty simple to me. Add to that his physical mutilation, mental torture, etc. and you have a pretty clear cut bad guy who's more then complex enough to best the old cheeseball Bond movies and instead rises to the likes of GoldenEye and a few others. Casino Royale's villain was weak (a guy who wants money to save his own arse) but the rest of the film made it enjoyable. I can't believe you guys think it felt low budget toward the end lol. It was big and bold to me. Even Casino Royale's ending wasn't that huge. A building collapses and stuff in Venice but it's still a confined space. This Bond movie was all over the place dashing from here to there escaping one time, not another. They went all over the map on this one. There was little bits of cheese here/there and I loved them playing on old gags like the ejector seat and others. I also loved seeing where Bond came from and why he became who he is. I was so glad they even went there...

If I want a cheesier less serious Bond I know where to go find it. I'm very glad they're going for a more emotionally rounded character not a superhero who just bangs chicks and gets the bad guy every once in a while. Those have their place but it's been beaten to death. I want to see Bond as a more real and flawed man who's damn good at what he does but pays for it internally. That's what Casino Royale did so well that I thought people loved? Skyfall did that for me but even better.

Still holding my love for the movie...not sure why you guys don't like it. Can't please everybody I guess. I don't mind being the odd man out on this one! :)
 
So; I have to ask. Given that we are now rushing headlong towards a 4K world, and given that Skyfall was shot on a 2K camera; did anyone find the resolution lacking in some way in the cinema? (BTW, I'm not being contentious here; I am genuinely interested if a big budget famous movie like this that is going to be shown on big screens can pass this litmus test or not)? If a lot of people are screaming that the new Bond movie looks like crap, then this will really help the drive to 4K cinema. If not; then what does that say?
 
If I want a cheesier less serious Bond I know where to go find it. I'm very glad they're going for a more emotionally rounded character not a superhero who just bangs chicks and gets the bad guy every once in a while. Those have their place but it's been beaten to death. I want to see Bond as a more real and flawed man who's damn good at what he does but pays for it internally. That's what Casino Royale did so well that I thought people loved? Skyfall did that for me but even better.

I'm not saying I WANTED a cheesier Bond, I was just saying if I had to choose between a cheesy one and the bland version I got here, I'd prefer cheesy. I really didn't see an emotionally rounded character. I still feel like they are just dangling their toe into waters of character depth, without supplying any genuine depth. If they are going to break from the formula...then they should really go all out. Give him real character flaws, real pain, real internal obstacles, as Nolan did with Batman, instead of scratching the surface. As is he's still enough of the old Bond that it only reminds me he's not as entertaining as the old Bond. Some of that is the writing. Some of it is Daniel Craig's limitations as an actor. He's a good actor but not an especially emotive or dimensional one...I really wanted to like this. After the opening sequence I was like, this is going to be awesome, but then the rest just wasn't.
 
So; I have to ask. Given that we are now rushing headlong towards a 4K world, and given that Skyfall was shot on a 2K camera; did anyone find the resolution lacking in some way in the cinema? (BTW, I'm not being contentious here; I am genuinely interested if a big budget famous movie like this that is going to be shown on big screens can pass this litmus test or not)? If a lot of people are screaming that the new Bond movie looks like crap, then this will really help the drive to 4K cinema. If not; then what does that say?

It was filmed using the ALEXA in ARRI RAW which is 2.8K. In IMAX the film looked fantastic. No complaints about resolution here, and I've seen a lot of IMAX. :)
 
Bond is a character, first and foremost. Charming, witty, womanizer, British, with a sense of humor. that's what defines Bond, makes him unique. without that, he's generic.to balance the equation, the villains and love interests are also light hearted, comical, to an extreme level. and you can't go half way with comical or light hearted, or the entire production looks mediocre.and exotic locations makes the movies an adventure ride, a simple lighthearted adventure.action sequences took a very small portion of the bond equation, something to progress the movie, something that only takes a small portion of the movie. bond's back-story is not important, M is not important, it's a figure/metaphor not a real character.the newer bond films are fundamentally wrong.
 
It was filmed using the ALEXA in ARRI RAW which is 2.8K. In IMAX the film looked fantastic. No complaints about resolution here, and I've seen a lot of IMAX. :)

Yeah, I saw it in a regular theater and had no quibbles with the image. It's a great looking film.
 
Bond is a character, first and foremost. Charming, witty, womanizer, British, with a sense of humor. that's what defines Bond, makes him unique. without that, he's generic.to balance the equation, the villains and love interests are also light hearted, comical, to an extreme level. and you can't go half way with comical or light hearted, or the entire production looks mediocre.and exotic locations makes the movies an adventure ride, a simple lighthearted adventure.action sequences took a very small portion of the bond equation, something to progress the movie, something that only takes a small portion of the movie. bond's back-story is not important, M is not important, it's a figure/metaphor not a real character.the newer bond films are fundamentally wrong.

If you saw the film (and read a few articles) you should know that they've now after Skyfall setup a way to start doing what the old Bond movies did which is tell a completely different story each time without worry of timeline...in other words very episodic. Expect in the next installments to see things get back to the more typical formula. They wanted (and IMO needed and I enjoyed it anyway so I don't care) to get things rebooted into the modern day which they've done, we now have a new Moneypenny (with a history as you gathered re: the old movies), we have a new M (Judi Dench wasn't getting any younger), etc. The film ended just the way it needed to...setting us up to see Bond go on what many of you seem like you want to see, another episodic rip roaring Bond adventure WITHOUT any strings attached.

That's my take...
 
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