Spectre
21/11/15 Filed in: Cinema
Having waited for the crowds to die down a bit, yesterday we saw Spectre. All Bond films are 'must see' for me, having read all the books when I was younger and seen all the films. I still regard Sean Connery as the archetypal Bond (showing my age) but must say that Daniel Craig has reinvigorated the genre after some pretty lean years. This latest instalment of the franchise is, quite frankly, stupendous.
The opening sequences to these films have become a look-forward-to feature, each one seemingly outdoing the previous ones in terms of action and incredulity. For Spectre they have pulled everything out of the bag. How on earth they produce effects such as these is testament to the technical advances in cinematography and computer simulation. This opening sequence is going to be very hard to better.
Meanwhile the rest of the film doesn't disappoint. The story line is strong, the 'girls' are more than just eye candy and the villain is a worthy adversary for 007. It seems our hero has a soft spot for French actresses. Eva Green as Vesper Lynd captured his heart in Casino Royale and in the latest outing he finds himself somewhat captivated by Léa Seydoux as Dr. Madeleine Swann. I can fully understand why this should be the case.
The villain turns out to be Ernst Stavro Blofeld, a name from the earlier Bond films and, of course, from the original novels. The twist is that said Blofeld has a connection to Bond that comes as a bit of a surprise. This film thus reintroduces some of the original villainy and links it to story lines of the more recent films. The bits of the puzzle coming together, if you like.
The opening sequences to these films have become a look-forward-to feature, each one seemingly outdoing the previous ones in terms of action and incredulity. For Spectre they have pulled everything out of the bag. How on earth they produce effects such as these is testament to the technical advances in cinematography and computer simulation. This opening sequence is going to be very hard to better.
Meanwhile the rest of the film doesn't disappoint. The story line is strong, the 'girls' are more than just eye candy and the villain is a worthy adversary for 007. It seems our hero has a soft spot for French actresses. Eva Green as Vesper Lynd captured his heart in Casino Royale and in the latest outing he finds himself somewhat captivated by Léa Seydoux as Dr. Madeleine Swann. I can fully understand why this should be the case.
The villain turns out to be Ernst Stavro Blofeld, a name from the earlier Bond films and, of course, from the original novels. The twist is that said Blofeld has a connection to Bond that comes as a bit of a surprise. This film thus reintroduces some of the original villainy and links it to story lines of the more recent films. The bits of the puzzle coming together, if you like.
The gadget count is very conservative, amounting to a car (but what a car!) and a watch. The action, however, is far from pedestrian. The 'incident' on the train brings back memories of another in-train encounter, while the aerial stunts are almost unbelievable.
I couldn't really fault this film. It will be interesting, however, to see what comes next. Seemingly all of the loose ends have been tidied up and our hero has apparently forsaken killing for love. But, as always, at the end of the credits we read that:
I couldn't really fault this film. It will be interesting, however, to see what comes next. Seemingly all of the loose ends have been tidied up and our hero has apparently forsaken killing for love. But, as always, at the end of the credits we read that:
"Bond will be back"