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The James Bond Thread: RIP Robbie Coltrane


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In your opinion Mr. Arnold. But it was good. Very good, and helped erase the horrors of the Pierce Brosnan era.

Tell you what Arnold, if it'll make you happy - now that the movie's been out for a month, I'll gladly remove Skyfall from the thread title and keep it to just James Bond. ;)

The most common list I can find is the 2011 totals which puts Goldfinger at $912 257 512 but the totals I've been posting I found on the CBn forums and were worked out for 2012 dollar values. I've been taking those as more accurate since Skyfall will, of course, apply to 2012 values. Of course, it's hard to get exact numbers. Still, the most important thing to get out of the box office is that Skyfall is the biggest Bond since Connery and the height of Bond's popularity in the sixties. Very impressive and word of mouth keeps making it exceed box office expectations.

I too found a new appreciation for some of the Moore films after re-watching them recently. I thought I hated The Man With The Golden Gun, but I really enjoyed it. It could have been done better but taking it for what it is, it's a fun movie.

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It is a fun movie. I will see how I feel about A View to a Kill when I get to it.

Take out Skyfall all you want, it is still a great movie. Skyfall pretty much proves that people want Bond and they want him back. I just hope they have learned their lessons from previous Bond films.

They were quick to point out that OHMSS's underwhelming performance was due to George Lazenby's casting. I do not blame it entirely since YOLT grossed considerably less than Thunderball. I think people were getting Bond fatigue. That happened again with AVTK and The Dalton films. They are the lowest grossing Bond films. The Brosnan films were fun but they were predictable so nobody bothered. DAD made so much because they hyped it with the 40th. Skyfall is Bond's 50th so there was hype, but they didn't expect it to be this successful.

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I've been getting into Bond lately. Before this year all I had seen was a handful of Roger Moore flicks and the Lazenby one. Maybe I saw The Living Daylights, I don't remember for sure. No Sean Connery films though.

So I saw From Russia a few weeks ago. Then I bought it and Dr. No on Blu Ray. After 50 years I think the history of the franchise is kind of intriguing. Comparing films, comparing the various Bonds, that sort of thing. And how Connery came back as Bond not once but twice. I want to read up on the backstory there. I'm sure I will eventually buy the entire series on Blu Ray, one by one.

Today I saw Skyfall. It was fun, yes, but a little too over the top. There were parts where I just totally lost my suspension of disbelief, both for how over the top things were and in what the characters did. The choice was between Skyfall and The Seven Psychopaths, which to be honest I think would be more my kind of movie.

Edited by KBear
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I would skip Never Say Never Again since it is like 100 bucks on Blu Ray.

Isn't suspension of disbelief the point of the Bond films? The point of cinema in general?

Great you are getting into the Bond films though. On Her Majesty's Secert Service (The one with Lazenby) is my favorite. It was not a perfect movie, I think they tried too hard to make Lazenby like Connery, it is when he was un-Connery when he was at his best. He was in my opinion the genesis of the Bond perfected by Timothy Dalton and Daniel Craig.

The Connery backstory is interesting. He grew tired of the role and wanted out. George Lazenby walked out of the role so they cast an American named John Gavin, someone decided to take a dive and ask Connery if he wanted to do a film. He said yes, was paid a huge amount of money which he used to find Scottish education and agreed to do two films for United Artist. The other was a non Bond film. He never played Bond for EON again. He played Bond unofficially in 1983 mostly because his career was in decline so he needed a boost.

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I would skip Never Say Never Again since it is like 100 bucks on Blu Ray.

Isn't suspension of disbelief the point of the Bond films? The point of cinema in general?

Probably. Which is why it sucks to lose it.

The part that sticks out ot me now, and there were a few others I'm sure, is when they were in the subway tunnel and Silva was going up the ladder. Bond had bascially caught him and could shoot him no problem before Silva bascially goes up into the building and murders God knows how many people. For some reason though he just lets Silva put into action his booby trap and escape. Not to mention the booby trap itself was completely preposterous. Maybe I'm expecting too much from an action flick, and that is why, even though I like them, I prefer slower suspense movies.

Thanks for the backstory summary on Connery.

I won't pay $100 for NSNA! Guess I'll be short a movie. I take it then that film is not included in the box set, which would make sense given it was a one-off, released and likely owned to this day by another company.

Edited by KBear
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Never Say Never Again isn't even an official Bond film. It is a remake of Thunderball. Thunderball was written mostly by Ian Flemming but I think the script rights went to another guy who sued and won the filmming rights.

I thought about that too, but that is typical in every Bond movie. Also Bond would likely miss Silva if he fired. PPK's are more accurate at a much closer range.

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Even though I tend to prefer the more realistic Bond films, I'd never want the films to completely lose the element of fantasy. That's part of the charm and escapism of Bond. I look at Bond films as a combination of adventure, thriller, and action. None of the films are quite as action-filled as a typical Stallone/Arnold kind of action movie (it almost got there with Brosnan though), but they also aren't totally thriller oriented, and the fantasy comes from the escapism and adventure in the films.

I mentioned before I think Skyfall was a nice combination of classic Bond and Craig's Bond without either side suffering.

KBear, Georgy's right. Don't even bother with Never Say Never Again unless you find it cheap at a local store. eBay and Amazon prices are ridiculous (makes it tempting to sell my own copy :lol:). MGM does own the rights after all these years, but it was originally made by Kevin McClory as the result of a long lawsuit in which he won the film rights to the Thunderball novel. It lacks the EON trademarks (Bond theme, gun barrel, etc...) and even though Connery is pretty good, much of the film is mess. It wasn't in the Bond 50 box set as it's still considered an "unofficial" film.

I agree on the Eyes score. I have a soft spot for the gun barrel cue but most of it is horrible and feels like it should be in a seventies B-movie and not in Bond. Some of the cues are okay but not a patch on Conti's work for Rocky where the style complemented the style of the film. Ironically, Barry was the one who recommended Conti.

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Never Say Never Again is like the ugly cousin of the Eon films.

Barry ended up composing a dated yet superior score for the The Living Daylights. Conti just wasn't right for the film. Barry returned and knocked it out of the park for the last three films he did. I have to listen to Thomas Newman's score for Skyfall but David Arnold never really stood out for me.

Die Another Day probably would pass for an Arnold/Stalone film.

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I love The Living Daylights score. You're right, he really brought it for the last three films he did. He was supposed to do License to Kill but he was battling cancer at the time so he stepped out. Even though the sequenced bass and drums horribly dates the score, it's a lot of fun and the action themes are great.

After the poor reception of Eric Serra's GoldenEye score (in which they called in John Altman to score the archives and tank chase), Barry actually recommended David Arnold to the producers. I liked Arnold's scores, save for Die Another Day which was mostly a techno-infused mess. He was really good at finding a main theme like Barry would do, though some of his action cues were a little busy at times.

I really dig Newman's score. It fit the movie - a blend of the old with the new, just like the film itself. I wouldn't object to him returning, but would happily welcome Arnold back too. Newman's orchestral cues are great and his more techno-inspired cues are more refined than what Arnold had tried to do (but thankfully abandoned almost entirely for his Casino and Quantum scores - his two best in my opinion).

Interestingly, they licensed Arnold's arrangement of the Bond theme from the end of Casino Royale. Newman uses it for the track "Breadcrumbs" (the unveiling of the Aston), and Arnold's original recording is used for the credits.

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I wouldn't mind Hans Zimmer or James Newton Howard. That was cool of Newman to use Arnold's work.

I didn't think Eric Serra's score was that bad but then again I thought the archives and tank chase was by him.

What was up with Falco in DAD?

Edited by Georgy Zhukov
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I don't think Serra's music is all that bad - I do enjoy listening to the GoldenEye score. It just didn't really fit with the movie. Listen to those lush strings during the casino scene - not a bad piece of music but totally wrong for the true introduction to the new Bond (ordering his drink, saying the famous lines, etc...) - the scene should have been a return to form. His music drags the pace of the film rather than add to it.

I'm all for trying something different, but I can only imagine the disappointed Bond music enthusiasts when the first new Bond movie in six years hits the screen and the Bond theme isn't even used for the gun barrel. Okay, it's a weird re-working of it, but you can barely hear the melody line on the timpani.

Only cues I really dig are "The GoldenEye Overture" (pre-title sequence) and "Run, Shoot & Jump" (the action theme used when Bond and Natalya first escape Ourumov and later during the early stages of the antenna battle).

The John Altman cues start when Bond and Natalya are being chased through the attic of the archives with Ourumov and his men shooting up at them, and then the tank chase. It was a last minute choice when media response to some early screenings were very negative about the score. Michael and Barbara felt they needed at least one rousing rendition of the Bond theme.

Oh, and Falco - just one of the many underdeveloped elements of Die Another Day. He lies to M about Bond torching the clinic and fails to let MI6 know that Frost knew Moon which might have helped them target her as an insider sooner. All we get is a very minor exchange between the two (M and Falco) before Bond and Jinx head off to the plane. Doesn't really resolve anything.

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At least they get an opening. I hope the next Bond film opens with a gun barrel.

I can't wait to watch GoldenEye again. It is too bad none of Brosnans live up to it. I also look forward to Tomorrow Never Dies since it has been years since I've seen it.

He easily could have been cut from the film.

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I didn't mind the lack of a gun barrel for Casino Royale. It worked and it was cool for something different. It being at the end of Quantum was just one of the many things out of place with the money. There's some people who defend it saying the opening shot wouldn't have worked. The opening shot fades in from black. The gun barrel could have easily opened up to the exact same shot.

Sam Mendes said he had every intention of putting it back to the beginning but they hadn't filmed an establishing shot of Istanbul and he thought it looked awkward opening up on that shot of Bond walking down the hallway, so he stuck it at the end. I guess it worked, especially considering what the last scene is. Still, I hope it's back at the beginning next time. Fun fact: Bond is wearing the gray suit from Istanbul in Skyfall's gun barrel, which shows Mendes had the beginning in mind.

Tomorrow Never Dies is fun. The pre-title sequence is very good. If there's one thing the Brosnan era got right, it was the pre-titles.

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The fade in Skyfall was pretty cool. Seems like Sam Mendes has a lot of respect for the films which says a lot because he is a well known director, probably the most high profile director ever to do a James Bond film yet not a touch of ego throughout the film. He has proved himself worthy.

The Brosnan pre-titles were spectacular but they also proved a weakness since the rest of the films wouldn't hold up. Especially for The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day. Tomorrow Never Dies had the car and motorcycle chase and that skyscraper dive.

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