Shocking! Positively shocking! (An all purpose 007 thread)

[Brundle-Fly]

I saw a bit of Goldeneye on the telly the other day, and there's a bit where he's having a car chase with some fit bird in a car. This is the music that is playing during the scene: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7CNGN0bWlU&list=PLYZ4DQq9Vj5k2ZPzd3tdUUtzldOT4p4C5

Are they taking the piss? It genuinely sounds like something from Vic Reeves Big Night Out.

That's frightful, but my least favourite Bond car chase music is this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OstFSgoBuM

from Bill 'Rocky Theme' Conti. It's far better than the Serra thing though, I will stress.

No doubt, I'm going to be told it's a slice of joyous Eighties cheese with its rock guitar licks, but as a teenager I hated it.The title song was reedy enough but A Drive In The Country sounded like the fucking A Team, so small and not the John Barry quality I had grown accustomed to. The three non-Barry 007 OSTS were also leagues above the FYEO O.S.T..

Looking back, it's hilarious my conservatism about stuff, age fifteen. i.e. Tristan Farnon was all wrong for The Doctor,  too many synths were spoiling pop music and The Fox And The Hound wasn't in the same league as The Rescuers.

[Kane Jones]

That's frightful, but my least favourite Bond car chase music is this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OstFSgoBuM

from Bill 'Rocky Theme' Conti. It's far better than the Serra thing though, I will stress.

Ha ha, I always loved Bill Conti's FYEO soundtrack, and that piece is my favourite.  I love the music for the ski chase, too.  Also, I think it's the best version of the gun barrel intro as there's a really funky cowbell on it.  And yes, I like it mainly because it's a slice of joyous Eighties cheese.

[kidsick5000]

That's frightful, but my least favourite Bond car chase music is this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OstFSgoBuM

from Bill 'Rocky Theme' Conti. It's far better than the Serra thing though, I will stress.

All it makes me think of is The Brian Rogers Connection[nb]am I right, kids?[/nb].
But to read the YouTube comments, you'd think that this was the greatest Bond score ever

[gmoney]

I can vaguely recommend the James Bonding podcast. It's part of the Nerdist group of business.

I can recommend one half of it. Matt Gourley rules, Matt Mira drools.

[CaledonianGonzo]

Splooge!

Spoiler alert

Morocco, Rome, Austria

[close]

http://badassdigest.com/2014/07/23/bond-24-locations-leaked/

Spoiler alert

Ski chase?

[close]

Splooge!

[popcorn]

If I've got a problem with Skyfall, it's that Bond is (fittingly, of course, for the fiftieth anniversary) painted as this worn and aged figure, about ready to pack it in, which jars with the fact that this version of the Bond universe has only seen the man on two cinematic outings, with the second set minutes after the first. It just puts Craig's Bond on unsteady ground, for me. He's not that old, is he?

It's because it isn't really Daniel Craig's Bond that's old, it's the James Bond character, the legend, the franchise. That's what Skyfall's about, it's about Bond the legend and the franchise examining itself, taking stock, having a think.

Why does Bond have the Aston Martin in his garage? Because he won it in Casino Royale? Then why is it rigged with Q gadgets? Even if there IS some "proper" explanation I've forgotten, it doesn't matter, because the actual top-level message here is that James Bond has the Aston Martin full of gadgets because he is the same James Bond in Goldfinger, now reincarted (not literally but metaphorically) as a time lord. Or, to look at it another way, he's the metaphorical son of that James Bond, and the car is his inheritance. People made jokes about the old Scottish bloke in the house, the bloke who taught James how to use a gun or whatever, was Sean Connery, but I don't think that was "just" a joke. That's what that character was a stand-in for.

When the Skyfall house is getting shot to shit, Bond doesn't give a damn. Stuff's getting blown up left right and centre, and it barely registers for him emotionally, even though in this universe, canon-wise, it's his childhood home. (He even says something like "I always hated this place"). But when the baddies blow up the Aston Martin, then he's really pissed! Why? Because he knows that Aston Martin is his real childhood.

Honestly, Skyfall is the most postmodern movie blockbuster I can think of off the top of my head. It has stuff in it that made me rub my eyes and look around at the audience in the cinema and go, wait, am I the only person seeing this? This is nuts! This is bananas! This is completely ruddy snooker loopy! It's great!

[greenman]

LTK has dated in a specifically 1980s way to the pint that - as oft-mentioned - it sometimes resembles an episode of Miami Vice.  Why that's worse than, say, the way the 1970s movies have dated I'm not sure, but it kind of is.

I'd tend to agree, Bond's main appear has for me always been a certain "joyfulness" in the film making that LTK just seems to be lacking in.

I'v always far preferred The Living Daylights which whilst it doesn't really have anything outstanding in it besides maybe the Daltonator himself just comes across as an effective "greatest hits" of the 80's Moore Bonds without any of the overly silly or dull sections.

[greenman]

For me theres a pretty massive gulf between Goldeneye and Brosnans other Bonds. Partly just in the superior plot/cast/locations but also because Brosnan being such an obvious meger of previous Bonds plays into the theme that Bond himself maybe outdated.

[Johnny Textface]

He has the best hair in Goldeneye an all.

[CaledonianGonzo]

I'v always far preferred The Living Daylights which whilst it doesn't really have anything outstanding in it besides maybe the Daltonator himself just comes across as an effective "greatest hits" of the 80's Moore Bonds without any of the overly silly or dull sections.

The Living Daylights is one of my favourites.  It suffers from the lack of a memorable villian, but it has a strong story, a nice sense of romatic grandeur to it and some great sequences - when Bond deliberately fudges the assassination, the fight on the plane over Afghanistan.

Also, it's not as humourless as some claim:

"We're free!"

"Kara, we're inside a Russian air base in the middle of Afghanistan!"

[greenman]

The Living Daylights is one of my favourites.  It suffers from the lack of a memorable villian, but it has a strong story, a nice sense of romatic grandeur to it and some great sequences - when Bond deliberately fudges the assassination, the fight on the plane over Afghanistan.

Also, it's not as humourless as some claim:

"We're free!"

"Kara, we're inside a Russian air base in the middle of Afghanistan!"

Strangely I actually felt the humour worked a lot better here than in the previous few Moore Bonds Glen directed, especially Koscoff being such a fop. Count me as someone who loved camp 70's Bonds but the early 80's Moore ones(well post Moonraker) were for me more films that had decent serious plots with largely unsuccessful camp shoehorned into them.

As a Palace supporter I love Man With a Golden Gun all the more due to Hai Fat(far eastern businessman/villian Chris Lee double crosses) looking/acting much like Vincent Tan.

[CaledonianGonzo]

BAFTA-nominated cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema has been turning heads ever since his stunning work in the stylish Swedish horror film "Let the Right One In" crossed the Atlantic six years ago. And lately, he's just getting all the good gigs, having stepped in for Spike Jonze regular Lance Acord on last year's "Her" and for Christopher Nolan's right hand man Wally Pfister on the upcoming "Interstellar." Well, you can add another big pair of shoes for the talented director of photography to fill. With Roger Deakins exiting the James Bond franchise after 2012's "Skyfall," we can confirm that director Sam Mendes has tapped van Hoytema to shoot the still untitled 24th installment of the series.

Losing Deakins was a blow, but this is good news - shows that they're committed to chasing serious talent.

http://www.hitfix.com/in-contention/her-cinematographer-hoyte-van-hoytema-to-fill-roger-deakins-shoes-on-sam-mendes-bond-24

[popcorn]

The Living Daylights is one of my favourites.  It suffers from the lack of a memorable villian, but it has a strong story, a nice sense of romatic grandeur to it and some great sequences - when Bond deliberately fudges the assassination, the fight on the plane over Afghanistan.

Also, it's not as humourless as some claim:

"We're free!"

"Kara, we're inside a Russian air base in the middle of Afghanistan!"

That seems amazingly Partridge-esque now.

[Orias]

Haven't read Solo, but Ian Fleming himself is a major character in William Boyd's fantastic faux memoir, Any Human Heart.

[Bad Ambassador]

A new Young Bond novel, Shoot to Kill by Steven Cole, is out in November.

The next 'proper' novel is out in August next year, with the author having been announced as Anthony Horowitz.

[Mark Steels Stockbroker]

Fleming was certainly a fine thriller writer, his main literary problem, apart from the cardinal sin of being popular, are his novels admit no great moral issues, the good guys, us and U.S., are good and the baddies are baddies are bad and Soviet.

But Bond does wonder about such things: during his convalescence in Casino Royale, and at the start of From Russia With Love, and in Quantum Of Solace we hear that he sympathises with the Cuban rebels.

[CaledonianGonzo]

In Casino Royale the novel, Bond wonders about it only for Mathis to step in and simplify his thinking for him.

And then in the Quantum of Solace movie they gave those lines to Mathis, "betraying" what Fleming intended (or something)

[CaledonianGonzo]

Also: Daniel Craig Bond is a confirmed Italophile

http://badassdigest.com/2014/10/06/bond-24-is-in-rome/

[Frazer]

I've finally begun to catch up with the Craig era (courtesy of CeX cheapies). I thought Casino Royal was okay when it ended, except it hadn't ended - it kept on going for another half hour, "Someone give the projectionist a nudge, he's forgotten to stop the tape!" I would've shouted if I hadn't been watching it at home.

Quantum of Solace was just bad, the jump cuts were dizzying. At one point I started counting the length of each shot, it went like this "One pink elephant, one pink ele-, one pink el-, one pink elephant two p-, one p-, one pink, one..." and so on. Ridiculous. There's a massive difference between lean and rushed.

If Skyfall is also in the quid-quid fifty region I may complete the hat-trick, we'll see.

[CaledonianGonzo]

And....Lea Seydoux?

[Talulah, really!]

And....Lea Seydoux?

Yay! Always assuming they remember to actually write a character this time round.

[kidsick5000]

I've finally begun to catch up with the Craig era (courtesy of CeX cheapies).

How do you pronounce CeX cheapies? And when you vocally tell people you have been using CeX cheapies, what look do they give you?

[Thomas]

And....Lea Seydoux?

First time I saw Lea Seydoux was last year, when in France. Not in person, but on the front of a magazine. I bought the magazine.

Actually, boring version, it was in Midnight in Paris. Forgot about that.

[Jim_MacLaine]

A question for any Bond soundtrack aficionados. 

What's that track that sounds like it's from a porn film, features female spoken vocals and includes the line "and take it slow". I thought it might be a Bill Conti (For Your Eyes Only) or Michel Legrand (Never Say Never Again) but's on neither. I've also ruled out Octopussy, A View To A Kill and The Living Daylights and am pretty sure it's not from one of the first four Connery's.

I'm stumped[nb]pleased to meet you[/nb].

[SavageHedgehog]

This one?

[Jim_MacLaine]

Yeah that's the one, thanks. I must have missed it on the youtube.

Hilariously unsubtle.

[Rolf Lundgren]

Watched Licence to Kill today and it really is a cold, hard film. Compared with A View To A Kill only 4 years previous it's like they come from two completely different eras. I like the story and the realism but it really could have done with a few scenes in a different location. They need a trip somewhere else (that job in Turkey Bond refuses to take?) to give the film a jolt and stop it dragging.

Dalton's portrayal of Bond is absolutely brilliant though. I know his inspiration was the Bond of the novels but he deserves all the credit for putting his own stamp on a character that had been defined so clearly in two different ways and if he hadn't I suspect the following actors would have been doing Connery/Moore impressions. He was the right Bond at the wrong time and it's a shame all those legal issues stopped him appearing in at least one more, namely Goldeneye around 1991.

[the midnight watch baboon]

One time my brother snuck up on me and shouted BOO! just after I'd eaten an USB stick of the Dalton Bond films... scared The Living Daylights out of me!!!!!1!!

[Blumf]

He was the right Bond at the wrong time and it's a shame all those legal issues stopped him appearing in at least one more, namely Goldeneye around 1991.

What was that about? (never really paid Dalton/Brosnan Bond films much attention)

One time my brother snuck up on me and shouted BOO! just after I'd eaten stuck an USB stick of the Dalton Bond films [up my arse]... scared The Living Daylights out of me!!!!!1!!

FTFY

[El Unicornio, mang]

What was that about? (never really paid Dalton/Brosnan Bond films much attention)

It was mostly just a lot of legal rights stuff between MGM and United Artists. Dalton was officially still Bond until 1994, when he gave up the role, probably sick of sitting around waiting for a film that was supposed to have been released in 1991 (and maybe as he turned 50 that year, not that it stopped Roger Moore). A godsend for Brosnan, who was supposed to be Bond back in 1987 anyway but couldn't because of Remington Steele snatching him away at the last minute (ironically, because him being announced as the new Bond increased interest in the show and enabled them to renew for another season).