At the start of Skyfall, after a perfunctory chase scene and a cliche fight atop a train, James Bond is “killed” by friendly fire and falls hundreds of feet to his “death” in the water below.
Later, of course, we find him using his false demise to take a vacation from the spy grind, living in a beach bungalow, drinking, and making love to a beautiful woman – but unlike every Bond we’ve ever known before, this Bond looks utterly miserable. Leave it to Daniel Craig to find a way to grit his teeth while getting laid. But see, it’s only cuz he’s really deep. He’s got a lot on his mind. He’s full of psychological pain.
Oooooh.
That one short sequence sums up everything wrong with the Craig era of 007.
The “Old Bond”, the one who became a cinematic legend – who enjoyed his dangerous work and its life or death excitement, who grabbed pleasure in heaping doses whenever he could, and truly loved the company of women… He’s dead, evidently. At least while Craig, the scowling robot, is here.
The fact he was shot by one of his allies is a perfect metaphor as well; because it is the completely inept and clueless Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson, who have spent most of their tenure as producers of the franchise flailing hopelessly from one bad decision to another, who are his worst enemy.
Right about now you’re probably asking… Uhm, Frank? Isn’t it 2013? Didn’t this film come out, like, a year ago? And wasn’t it, like, the most ginormous success ever in the history of the series?
Yes, yes, and yes.
The sad thing is I’ve been meaning to write this for a year. I just dreaded it.
I posted my suspicions before Skyfall opened (here – I was wrong about some specifics, but unfortunately right in the main), but I planned on writing a full review after I actually saw it. I figured my dire predictions would most likely seem overblown in hindsight and I would end up enjoying it despite myself, probably eat some crow. At the very least, I would find some elements of the movie I really liked and revel in those parts. That’s what I had done with both Casino Royale and Quantum Of Solace. That’s what lifelong fans do. But this time, the truth is, I was so depressed and disgusted I couldn’t write a single word. It was sort of a final straw for me. And maybe, a good thing. I clearly needed to forget about it for a while and move on. The fact that it got almost universal acclaim from critics and audiences and went on to break a billion dollars at the box office just drilled the point home even further. It was so inexplicable to me, I was forced to realize how out of step I was with what people seem to want now.
But this time, the truth is, I was so depressed and disgusted I couldn’t write a single word. It was sort of a final straw for me. And maybe, a good thing. I clearly needed to forget about it for a while and move on. The fact that it got almost universal acclaim from critics and audiences and went on to break a billion dollars at the box office just drilled the point home even further. It was so inexplicable to me, I was forced to realize how out of step I was with what people seem to want now.
The fact that it got almost universal acclaim from critics and audiences and went on to break a billion dollars at the box office just drilled the point home even further. It was so inexplicable to me that I was forced to realize how out of step I was with what people seem to want now.
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| Which one of these is not like the others? |
I realize how melodramatic this sounds. It’s only a damn movie franchise, after all.
It’s only a damn movie franchise, after all.
But like a fan of a baseball team that never wins, it was actually stressing me out and I needed to let it go, to just cool off and get some perspective. I stopped going to the Bond fan sites online for the same reason. What was the point in constantly pissing on the parade? Shouting into the wind? Or pissing into the wind and shouting at a parade, whichever one is the most pointless.
So, I just kept putting it off. I’ll review it when the movie is released on DVD and Blu-ray, I thought. That came and went. I’ll do it when I force myself to sit down and watch it again all the way through. Never happened. And then, finally, a couple weeks ago, it was announced Sam Mendes will be returning as director, along with writer John Logan, to bring us Bond 24 in 2015. The winning
The winning Skyfall team was back together and promising more of the same! Yay! John Logan says we’ll get to see even more “layers” to Bond. Woo-hoo! And here I was just hoping for a half-decent action set-piece!
Okay. Here’s my review. Ready?
Skyfall is derivative, pretentious, boring, unpleasant, contrived, nonsensical, claustrophobic, repetitive, witless, mean-spirited, lazy, bloated, cheap in feel, mind-numbingly stupid and pathetically maudlin.
Annnnnnd I think that pretty much covers it.
More? You want more?
It’s not a Bond movie. It’s the anti-Bond. Woody Allen was a better Bond than Craig. It makes Timothy Dalton’s movies look like On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. It makes On Her Majesty’s Secret Service look like Citizen Kane. It makes ME look like Sean Connery. Uhm…
Did I mention it is mind-numbingly stupid? Oh I did. Okay.
I’m not going to go into detail, for the sake of my sanity and yours, and if I did, once I started I’m afraid I’d never be able to stop. There are so many lapses in logic and wrongheaded choices made… This YouTube video is a funny intro, but barely scratches the surface…
I hate Skyfall with the white-hot intensity of a thousand suns.
Thank you, The End.
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| Fugly Bond does a lot of staring pensively into the middle distance – like a catalog model with a traumatic brain injury. Notice the wide variety of expressions. |
Oh, c’mon, Frank, lighten up. It was a hit! That’s good, right? Aren’t you glad that 007 has been refreshed in people’s imagination and is back at the forefront of modern pop culture?
I would be if it was a 007 I vaguely recognized. If he hadn’t been systematically stripped of his defining qualities and turned into just another B-movie muscle-monkey with a chip on his shoulder.
I have no idea what movie the rest of the world saw, but I have to call it as I see it on this one lonely page and speak truth to crazy, as it were. To call this the BEST BOND FILM EVER, as so many have, can only be explained by some kind of mass hypnosis on a global scale. (Blofeld, is that you??)
Speaking of OHMSS… It just so happens it was the first Bond film I ever saw, at age 7, and I loved it long before it became the fashionable fanboy thing. Even in the face of the jokes that were made for years at its expense.
Then, slowly but surely, the geek world came around to realizing that, even with the somewhat limited but underrated George Lazenby as Bond, it was probably the single greatest balance of story, action and Bondian cool in the whole franchise.
So, it may be someday I’m not a minority of one and people see Skyfall for the shined-up turd it really is.
One can hope.
I find it hard to believe that people will rewatch this plodding, dry, downbeat and loooong 2 1/2 hour “Story Of M” the same way they did earlier Bonds, which were, you know, actually exhilarating and fun.
But what do I know?
For me, Bond has died for a while. I’m at peace with that. These films, this actor, this director…they’re not for me. They are obviously for a different set of younger newer fans. Which is fine.
I have no doubt the Bond I know “will return” at some point. The pendulum always swings back.
There, all done.
I think I handled that with great restraint and maturity, don’t you?
