Bond is back for the 50th time on celluloid.
The plot
The plot is already out due to the non-uniform releasing of the movie across the world… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyfall
Bond is human …
Daniel Craig’s James Bond shows transitions to “being human” (Salman Khan would be grinning with pride at this!) . All the way from the death of the woman he loves in Casino Royale (2006) to the death of Judi Dench’s M in in the current one, Skyfall.
Not to mention a tad more escapism of Bond, depicting him to be taking a vacation after being presumed dead and trying to live life like a normal person (for a while of course, before he decides to start saving asses,err .. I mean, arses !)
There are further teeny weeny anecdotes like infinitesimally subtle humour, sometimes even at Bond’s expense.
One more personal touch is the climax where the final battle happens in Scotland at Bond’s family estate called Skyfall ! There ..the title has been explicitly justified …
The title
No! Pardon the author’s skyfalling attempts at comedy. The whole title the author guesses, is based on the theme of agents going rouge! So the ‘skyfall’ here is referring to the realistic depiction of traumatized agents getting back at their organization (in this case, MI6)
Current bond vs the rest
Skyfall is a more realistic depiction of the trials and tribulations of her majesty’s secret service, as compared to the more super-hero like James Bond portrayed by Pierce Brosnan who keeps saving the planet from incredibly “out of the world” schemes! (That said doesn’t take away anything from Brosnan’s Bond who , in spite of digressing away from the original characterization of Ian Fleming‘s spy, is still perhaps the most popular Bond and the most stylish bond )
In a private screening of the movie, Roger Moore (who was also Bond) said that the best Bond was Sean Connery, but Skyfall might change that. Check out the interview here
But yes! It needs to be said that bringing the whole James Bond franchise to the Skyfall type of story telling does make it shift away from the recently seen Bond-ness . But it also makes it like any other “non-JamesBond spy movie” 😦
But despite that, perhaps, the brand-power of James Bond (the character, not Daniel Craig) will end up scoring above other standalone spy movies! Hmm …
Bardem: romantic to psychotic
The villain is Mr.Silver , former agent turned madman, who is back to wreck havoc on MI-6 agents and kill the MI6 boss M (Judi Dench), who he believes betrayed him. Fabulously played by Javier Bardem, with his metro-sexual portrayal of the bad guy.
For many of you who might not know, Bardem is a popular Spanish hero who is married to the awesome Penelope Cruz. He often gets to romance different hot ladies on screen (as seen in Vicky Cristina Barcelona) . Anyway took a while for me to finally realize it was him in Skyfall , what with all the blonde wig and effeminate crazy-man acting !
Changing the boss
Judi Dench the original M looks old, probably is retiring from movies. The whole I am the madame I am the boss aura about her made legendary in Goldeneye, Tomorrow never dies, etc seemed to have faded a bit.
Anyway, it gives a Ralph Fiennes fan immense delight when the latter becomes the new M at the end of Skyfall ! Honestly, the director Sam Mendes keeping his role to a minimum, 3 scenes and a few dialogues to be precise, is a good thing. Why ? Because , there are people in this world who believe RF can steal the thunder even from Daniel Craig if the former gets too much airtime 😉
The Bond girl …
Berenice Marlohe is the Bond girl who is perhaps just there to keep the whole casanova image of bond alive.Beyond that, she had a role which is useless compared to the previous Bond girls (they were somehow part of a story, this current bond girl’s character is relatively not!)
But well ..on second thoughts, maybe not! When the villain Mr.Silver (Bardem) kills her, there is no evidence of sorrow on Bond’s face (considering he has had a night full of romance in a boat with her the previous night before she is shot). From this little observation, we can certainly say there is an attempt to depict Bond as becoming more and more thick skinned !
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All in all , its a good movie.
Some might even predict that this is the Bond movie that is capable of winning major awards for acting. Nope..unless filming standards fall globally, not too sure about that prediction!
But nonetheless, definitely a good entertainer of a movie.
Et tu, Ghost-Runner 