Skyfall: Bond #23

actually to be honest I could've accepted all the "hacking!!111" if the film hadn't been premised on the theft of a comprehensive MI6 cover list that was unaccountably on a laptop hard drive that was then transported to another country.

xp heh i'm sure actual brutal murderers nudge each other and say much the same thing during the fight scenes, whaddayagonnado

ps what the hell ever happened the big important fuckin list of names, they kinda dropped that ball huh

M. ejector seat gag was great tho

(wish it had actually been used)

watching dame judy fly above the highlands shrieking wd. have been a crowning achievement of action cinema

doesn't Rafe Fiennes actually say at one point, "why do you have a fucking hard drive full of cover names?" and Judi Dench is all "suck it"

i dunno has it been said but she's been p bad at her job throughout her stint as m

Srsly she went through three different 007s, should've been fired years ago tbqf

"I mean look it costs a lot to train these, can you keep it under control for a bit?"

who was third bond?

someone who died before craig's recruitment i guess

someone otm upthread, this pic weighed down heavily by the spectre of christopher nolan. if only nolan and peter jackson could find themselves a writer/editor or two between them, what great work they could do

nothing wrong with Jackson that a 9 hour trilogy of Meet the Feebles wdn't put right

i tihnk he's fucking makin it is the problem

always felt the hippo's back story needed elaborating

tim burton to write in daddy issues, gillia offering the 'accountants can't judge me' angle, good collaboration imo

i like to think that the wackiness of the hacking scenes in this was a wink to how ridiculous the technology scenes in the pierce brosnans bons were (srsly that shit has aged so poorly) but prob not

i like to think the "rule Britannia" shite was satire but prob not

outside of UK i thought it played ironic/funny/kind of sad

Actually the thing that freaked me out a bit was when things started going into the Underground sequence and I started wondering if there was going to be a bomb or the like, just because of 2005. Very glad that they didn't go that route, obv.

there was an explosion that derailed a train wasnt there? i was surprised they went there actually

yeah, but it was conspicuously empty

I like how in this movie encryption is just, like, this thick metal bar that you can bend if you're a bad enough dude.

M's password was probably "password"

That actually happened in Spooks. I love Spooks.

I like how Vaio paid big product placement bucks to show their computers getting repeatedly hacked

Or Heineken so that James Bond is seen covering the label with his hand, while drinking himself to death.

There's only been one 007 I think - they retire the numbers.

Talking of product placement bucks, virtually every single ad before the film was Bond-related, some even including appearances by Daniel Craig. Really shameless stuff, even considering how nakedly commercial the films have been for a long time now. I wonder what proportion of the budget was raised through tie-ins? Wouldn't be surprised if they turned a profit even before they started shooting.

The lingering close-up of Bond's watch during the otherwise breathless opening chase scene got a major lol from me.

and yet, what does it matter. if movies get made cos some rich ppl still think marketing so obviously works, what harm.

Most obvious markets was ' MACALLAN 15 YR I HEAR IT'S FUCKIN YUMMY' but i mean, it is fuckin yummy, cheekless ghoul otm and i'd expect bond to know it's fuckin yummy ppl like stuff and like to be seen liking the right stuff even (especially?) pyscho ubernationalist killer playboys

and obviously the books are full of relentless lifestyle porn, what he drinks, what he wears, what he smokes etc etc

ahah, yeah, the commercials were pretty fun. especially since they were saying where the shops were nearby the theater (I watched it on champs elysees) !
yet, since I don't care about cars, watches, hi-tech or else, the only thing I wanted after the movie was... a glass of whisky !

Well, it matters to me in that I find it distracting when characters stop what they're doing to deliver a pitch for a product. The last couple of seasons of Fringe stick in my mind for having the most horribly obvious shilling for phones and cars, for example, which did annoy the fuck out of me. If it means the difference between the show, or others like it, being made then I guess I'd rather they did it but it doesn't mean I can't find it horribly crass or think it's the thin edge of a wedge which will force even more distracting ads into narratives where they don't naturally fit.

In the case of Bond, it's less of an issue to me because the series has always been an aspirational jet-set fantasy and it's doesn't seem unrealistic for these characters to compare their money-dicks by extolling the virtues of expensive stuff. It did seem notable that the commercial sponsorships bled from the film itself into nearly all of the ads beforehand too, simply because I don't think I've ever seen that level of blanket tie-in advertising before.

xxp, obv

all fair enough. I found myself distracted more by the fact than M hadn't been sacked ten minutes in, or that bond hadn't been killed falling shot through the chest off've a mountain, etc etc. The rest, i think you take going in as v much part of the knowing wink-wink bond franchise lifestyle porn that, as NV says, is directly transferred from the books

i mean, the car, the watch, the drink, the tailor- i think that a good writer or director can use these products as very apt and telling shorthand for the character- with bond lately it's hard to tell where the shill becomes the knowing reference becomes the scathing comment and back to shill again.

If the next bond was just a docustyle following of craig in character on bond's day offshopping in the high-end parts of london at what stage would it become satire of the whole job lot?

about M being sacked, it's also weird that Fiennes tells her they decided to let her go, she says no, and they just say ok you can stay !
I also thought that a younger fiennes would have been a nice bond.

I think it's more "If you go now you can go quietly please go quietly", and she doesn't so it gets dragged out in a tribunal.

Also good to see Norn Iron is still providing a proving ground for British officers of a certain age.

There's only been one 007 I think - they retire the numbers.

― Andrew Farrell, Wednesday, November 14, 2012 6:03 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Yeah, I was making a bad joke based on past casting changes. Although "Casino Royale" kind of screws up any kind of continuity by establishing that Bond acquired 00 status with his second kill in the Czech Republic; I.e. some time after 1993.

Oh surely there's something in the 60s that ties it to then - you'd go mad trying to keep it all in step.

yeah, also why would moneypenny appear now when she was already there in the 60s !

The Bond Ouroboros

about M being sacked, it's also weird that Fiennes tells her they decided to let her go, she says no, and they just say ok you can stay !

ha ha yes. "Just kidding! Of course you can still run MI6"

Samantha Bond played Moneypenny during the Brosnan years, which means there was already a Moneypenny during Judi Dench's time as M.

xp

so is moneypenny like a codename like M ?

I don't think I have thought/discussed so much about a bond movie !

I... guess so? Maybe? There's really no logical way to make the franchise hang together as a cohesive whole, fun as it is to try.

Maybe they should have a Crisis on Infinite Bonds movie where Connery, Lazenby, Moore, Dalton, Brosnan and Craig are forced to team up to fight a secret evil hellbent on rewriting reality. Then reboot the whole thing with Milla Jovovich as Bond. Directed by Paul WS Anderson.

ahah, that would be brilliant (the all bonds together) !
and there would be CGI versions of young connery, moore... and they would meet their old self !

I guess it depends on whether, when Naomie Harris says she is Eve Moneypenny, you think she is saying "I am M's secretary now"

I would watch the living shit out of an Anderson/Jovovich Bond.

Doesn't she talk about being given a desk job? If they were trying to give any impression other than "I am M's secretary now" I think they failed.

I'd watch a Bond / Resident Evil crossover for the lulz.