The
movie starts off great. Daniel Graig’s face, while running, channels focused
vigor. You don’t see him open-mouthed, sucking air. Ten minute sprint across
variable terrain? James Bond is not even winded! Got shot in the lung? You get
a grunt from James Bond. He shakes it off. You cannot hamper this man! Graig’s performance
perfectly syncs with the beautiful, smooth, visuals. You feel fresh watching
him work. Like you've never been tired in your life. Then at the end of this
sequence, some new agent, presumably new as nothing is said but she lacks the
control of James, takes a wild shot and hits our boy. But we’re told it’s James’
fault because he’s old!? What!? HE HAD THAT GUY!
(Also,
Bond is shot, TWICE, falls about a mile into water, landing on the back of his
head, then appears to drown as his body is kicked down river. How did he survive
that? Other times, when James has been “killed”, an explanation was provided.
Special chemical from Q to mimic death. Fake bullets. Something. Did I miss
it?)
Now,
the film isn't shy about the idea of Bond being old. It comes right out and
asks. Then it reminds you with a very subtle metaphor about an old warship
being towed away for scrap. Then it asks again. All the action of the film has stopped, by the
way. The film wants you to take this idea very seriously and is giving you a
lot of time to mull it over. Then the film comes right out and calls James old.
Keeps calling him old. Ect. Evidence? Hanging from an elevator that goes up God
Knows how many floors, James’ grip slips for a moment. The constant questioning of Bond’s ability doesn't make me take the idea any more serious. I got irritated the question went no further and denied anything else being said. Nothing shown convinced me. The harping only dragged the
middle of the film way down.
The bit
of espionage James is working on is, if I can be honest, more than a little
embarrassing. Technology is treated like it is too complicated to understand. Like the audience is
mystified by its real workings. Remember all the action films made in the 90's
when the villain hacker would speedily hit every key on the keyboard and launch
every missile in the world or whatever? Same here. And it’s always so easy. “Few
key strokes”. Ok, I don’t know how to hack NORAD but I know you don’t start
pounding keys in DOS. Doesn't matter though! For all the threats of being able
to alter reality with a laptop, nothing comes of it. Portable radios end up
being the heavy guns. I was never sure of what Skyfall was saying. Are we mocking new technology? Is old or young
better than the other? Should I be rooting for something or just taking a new
perspective?
What I
am God Damn sure of is that Skyfall
was fucking stunning to look at. Skyfall
nailed globetrotting. NAILED. Lots of
times I can’t tell what city I’m looking at with world spanning films. Skyfall always had a beautiful local
quirk in every shot. The location was made critical to the action, it could
happen nowhere else. Inventive! I felt I had seen a real piece of Shanghai.
Understood a small aspect of the culture there. Marveled at what the rest of
the world had accomplished while I had no idea! The use of light in every scene
was so striking that even a film novice, myself, couldn’t miss it. This is
where the film speaks. So eloquently. Beautifully. The final scene was a work
of art and I am not using an ounce of hyperbole. That final scene can stand on
its own to just be admired. Put it on loop and it would fit,
comfortably, with authority, and rightly, in any museum of art.
That’s
what sustains the film until Javier Bardem,
as Silva, comes through to own it. He seems goofy at first. You’ll laugh at
him. Then he tells an amazing story that I’m sure will be repeated as often as The Dark Knight’s “die a hero or live
long enough to see yourself become the villain”. His shifting from creepy to
scary to funny and back is sublime. There is no hesitation in his performance. He
comes out fearless and the audience has to play catch-up. Daniel Craig seems to
appreciate him as much; their scenes together bring out the best James Bond
Craig has, the one we saw in the torture scene in Casino Royale. I got absorbed. No more thoughts of how much the
ticket cost me. I was there and living it. Silva throwing a train at James
slaps the audience awake. Finally there is noise, breathing, life, again! M
finally answers the question about Bond being old! I loved Bérénice Marlohe’s
Sévérine.
Intriguing from the first, she does not need to speak to communicate with the
audience. I knew, just from the way
she walked, that she was the one who ordered the hit when James first meets
her. Just the way she stood there looking at James I knew she was a big deal in a criminal empire. Just before James
comments that she’s nervous I felt it.
Reading her performance was a joy. I felt like James Bond decoding her. Was
that a lie she just said? Why is she walking over there? Why sit like that?
What’s her game? While I’m questioning the metaphysics of this movie, she pulls
me in, getting me to enjoy it again.
I can only shrug at “James
Bond is old”. It’s forgotten in the end. Graig is tireless again. Dead-on
accurate again. Fights a man under a frozen lake without ever losing the
upper-hand. Again, was this a serious question? I appreciate the focus on Bond
as a person. The slow exploration of Bond’s character is unique in the fiction
world. After 20-odd movies, now we’re asking “yes, but how’d he do that? Why?”.
It’s wonderful to account for the total spectrum of the character in each of
these new films. Graig is able to balance all the outlandish, charming, and deadly
parts of James Bond’s history. To pay off years worth of audience investment
with nods, smiles, jokes, and homages. He knows. He knows we know. That
invitation alone makes Craig one of the strongest Bond’s. The shame of the
fumbled middle story elements is only so great because of the heights the rest
of the film achieves. So egregious because the middle is the meat of the
experience. You can’t really love a movie if the middle sucks. That interruption.
High marks still accorded. The prospects for the next film are still exciting.
I still love James Bond.
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