60 replies to this topic

[Scottlee]

A nice '8' from me. Would have been a 9 but for the horrible Vietnam bike chase.

[Marquis]

8 from me too. TND is easily my favourite Brosnan era film and were it not for a rather lacking final

[Bond fan since March 2000]

Ok, so I'm reviewing all 21 Bond films & started with my least favorite working my way to #1! Enjoy!

#8 Tomorrow Never Dies, 1997

After successfully reviving the Bond franchise 2 years earlier with Goldeneye, producers Michael G. Wilson & Barbara Broccoli along with director Roger Spottiswoode & actor Pierce Brosnan brought Tomorrow Never Dies, another Bond classic that although not as good as Goldeneye still puts all of the elements of the Bond formula to full use.

In a story ripped from the headlines, media mogul Elliot Carver (Jonathan Pryce) uses a stealth boat to sink a British ship & destroy a Chinese fighter plane. Now, both countries are about to go to war & it's up to James Bond (Pierce Brosnan) a Chinese agent, Wai-Lin (Michelle Yeoh) to stop Carver from starting World War III.

There are two elements about Tomorrow Never Dies that are better than Goldeneye. The 1st is Pierce Brosnan, who has gotten rid of any jitters he had in Goldeneye & creates a strongly memorable presence. The other is Michelle Yeoh as the main Bond girl & is truly Bond's equal, but is also sexy & can believably kick Bond's . Here's how to explain the quality of the rest of the film:If an element of Goldeneye was a 10, then it's probably an 8 or a 9 here & it's sometimes noticable that Goldeneye is the better film.

However, Tomorrow Never Dies is very well edited being the 1st Bond film in decades to be under 2 hours & includes some very strong villains. Jonathan Pryce's Elliot Carver steals his scenes with great dialogue & is truly quite insane. Gotz Otto is Stamper, the main henchmen & with his big muscles follows in the classic Bond henchmen tradition of being the muscle to the main villain's smarts. Also notable is a cameo by the late Vincent Schavelli as a hitman who is an expert at torture. The only weakness here is Teri Hatcher as the villain's wife who is supposed to make Bond show emotion but comes across as rather bland, but thankfully her screen time is limited.

If there's one area where Tomorrow Never Dies delivers, it's with some great action scenes. The pre-title sequence is entertaining & has you on the edge of your seat & is hard to top. But the filmakers try with well-excuted action scenes with Bond in the backseat of a car during a car chase in a parking structure, a chase between a motorcycle & a helicopter & the finale on the stealth boat has lots of explosions & guns being fired & is very well paced.

In terms of genuine suspense & excitement, Tomorrow Never Dies ranks very high among the Bond films. Add in a great lead actor with a strong Bond girl & juicy villains & this one ranks with the classic Bonds.

[PlayItBogart]

I gave it a nine. It's not just about Bond. Elliot Carver's a pretty memorable modern-day villain, David Arnold's score was nothing short of amazing, the girls didn't just outright submit to him, perhaps the most spectacular display of Bond's car at work, and memorable action scenes.

For me, it was the last great Bond film of the "old" era. It's almost a Connery Bond film with a modern facelift.

[Qwerty]

A nice '8' from me. Would have been a 9 but for the horrible Vietnam bike chase.

While I don't mind the Vietnam bike chase, I think it unfortunately pales quite a bit in following the BMW chase, which is just one of those scenes that never fails to entertain.

[Keir]

I gave it a 7. Living in this polluted cesspool that is Beijing, I can only hail a film that offers the promise of it being nuked. But of course the gadgets do more to detract from that noble pursuit than enhance it. Every gadget comes in useful, no matter how singular. Why on earth did Q branch see the need for just the type of gadget that cuts through steel wire at exactly the right height, or a watch that allows one to copy fingerprints when that is exactly the way Carter locks up his safe?
And where the hell can one fly in an helicopter strafing passersby and blowing up public buildings without concern? Certainly not here in China. The Chinese agent just waited in her "hideout" doing nothing before being attacked by weaponless goons while having a stash of hidden weapons left unused? Why would the Yanks be that concerned about the Vietnamese finding Bond in US gear when the Chinese doing so would be the far greater threat as they claimed neutrality? Aaaaarrrrrrrgh!

[Keir]

Oh, isn't it lucky that the man responsible for initiating WWIII has a wife who just happened to read the obituaries every day for Bond's name? That makes resolving war with China simpler...

[BoogieBond]

An Average 5. Perhaps a little generous
I know a lot of people love this film... But.

The PTS to me is uninspiring. I like the scenes with Q and the car chase, and the HALO jump is great.

But.... Paris ... Why ... I felt the character was flat, and it was meant to be meaningful, and Bond cared for her But I couldn't invest in her character, its too short, compare her to Vesper, there's no comparison, felt flat. And the melodrama when she dies and Kaufman appears and we get the whole Pierce hard man thing. No.

Elliot Carver is OK. Pierce is fine as Bond.
Wai Lin is uninteresting to me. And I think the whole film just feels terribly generic IMO and there is no suspense for me at all, or surprise, or any real thrills, and the action scenes sort of feel flat. You fire a machine gun so many times and you just feel OK, then rocket launchers and explosions OK. Where's the original and clever action sequences, that's part of what James Bond films are all about to me. I want to see Bond do something clever, or to see something clever on screen. I know others will see it, but I didn't get it.
Just not my cup of tea. I know these criticisms above of TND could be levelled at a number of other JB film by others, including some of my favourites.

Edited by BoogieBond, 15 May 2008 - 11:18 PM.

[Aris007]

I gave it an 8. It entertains you well, but it's not the Bond film that doesn't let you go to the toilet!

[DaveBond21]

A nice '8' from me. Would have been a 9 but for the horrible Vietnam bike chase.

While I don't mind the Vietnam bike chase, I think it unfortunately pales quite a bit in following the BMW chase, which is just one of those scenes that never fails to entertain.

I am a fan of the bike chase and I do enjoy TND. However, it has gone down my list a little in recent times. I loved it when I first saw it in January 1998 as a worth follow-up to Goldeneye. Since then it has fluctuated. I loved it when I watched it drunk in 2006 but when I watched it sober in late 2007, it didn't seem as good. The ending is too dark, artificial-looking and features too many guns and explosions. But I do love Carver's demise!

It's a 7 for me these days.

[Safari Suit]

It used to be my least favourite, but I enjoyed it a lot more the last time I saw it. It's definitely better than TWINE, and maybe better than Goldeneye. I think Price is a great villain and the parallels to Murdoch and Maxwell are fun. The debriefing scene in the car was a nice example of putting a new spin on the M-Bond exchanges without dragging it out to redundancy. But it's a little too flabby to be the kickass action flick it wants to be.

[ChrissBond007]

6/10

Disappointed after the splendid Goldeneye. A poor peformance from the cast, Jonathan Pryce as Elliot Carver is one of the weakest villians in the series, Michelle Yeoh as Wai Lin is a irritation, Stamper is a standard film villian, Brosnan peformance isn't that good and the plot is just OK, not great.

I really like the first half a lot, some good action scenes and funny moments. But I hate some moments in the second half, Bond who is swaying with machine guns looks more like Rambo and I really dislike the last scenes on the stealschip.

But still, I can enyoy TND, but it's not a great Bondmovie and along with DAF, LTK and DAD my least favourite in the series.

[the villain's architect]

9 For me. One of my favourites with a great PTS, that great Arnold score, some almost classy scenes (e.g. everything in the hotel room) and good locations.
The only things I didn't like were the obvious Devonshire underwater model and the showdown in the interiors of the stealth ship. The rest was great.

[sharpshooter]

I give TND a solid 8. By no means among the worst, it's one of the best in the series and an excellent follow up to GoldenEye. After watching it, I feel like I could go around again.

[danielcraigisjamesbond007]

My review might be a little bit biased because I think that TND was the first Bond film I'd ever seen as a kid. But, I'll give a little review. I think that Tomorrow Never Dies was a good film (gave it 8/10). There was plenty of action scenes that weren't TOTALLY unbelievable (like the remote control car, or the motorbike scene). The villain, however, was just ridiculous (remember his karate yells on the stealth boat? Anyone?) and stupid. So was that henchman (haven't we seen him already with Red Grant and that guy from YOLT?). The worst henchman I've ever seen since May Day or Wint and Kidd. However, Michelle Yeoh's character was very good to see. She pulled off some pretty amazing stunts. Brosnan was okay in the role, although the film was primarily action based.
The title sequence was good, as well as the Sheryl Crow song. I LOVED David Arnold's score for the film.
My favourite action scene in the film was a tie between the pretitle sequence (the airplane) and the motorbike scene (lot of fun)! So, overall, it's a good solid acion film, but that's really all there is to this movie: just action. 8/10 for me.

Edited by danielcraigisjamesbond007, 11 February 2009 - 12:08 AM.

[staveoffzombies]

I give it a four. A terrible villain, weak plot, boring henchman, overly long action scenes and a completely wasted opportunity with Paris. My least favorite Bond film.

[Daddy Bond]

You know, I actually like TND quite a bit. It has one of the best PTS's in a series. I like Q's bit with Bond. The car chase in the garage is one of my favorites, and the motorcycle chase is pretty decent. The Bond girls are excellent. However, I agree, the plot and the villains are weak. I give it a 6.5 or 10.

[broadshoulder]

The decline of the Brosnan years starts here.

I'm not convinced that Babs and Wilson have got a grip on Bond yet. Its a generic plot with so implausible fields of logic and a tedios climax.Its the most formulaic of the films - world destroying plot. Tick. Feisty equal Bond girl. Tick. Ranting madman villain.Tick. Atrocious oneliners. Tick.

The casting seems skewed with this one. Michelle Yeoh is attractive but she is basiclally Anya Amasova for the Chinese secret service. Her "trading quips" with Brosnan has been done before with Barbara Bach and even Honor Blackman. And without any background or shades of character she comes across as a cartoon. Jonathan Pryce is simply awful. I dont know whether he was told to ham it up so much or just thought thats what you did with Bond villains but he has all the menace of Pepe La Pew. The karate scene aboard the stealth boat has my vote for the worst Bond villain scene in 22 films.

Pierce Brosnan seems to have woken up and there are some good action scenes.But the last half hour (the curse of the Brosnan films) seems to regress into generic Hollywood action movie fodder with plenty of shoot-ups and explosians in a cut price "Liparus" environment. But it does have an excellent David Arnold score and most people would argue that the Dr Kaufman scene is the best Brosnan was given in his four films. Plus KD Langs 'Surrender' at the end is a belter. The only real reason to sit through the last ten minutes of the film.

Generic, formulaic and beginning to show the casting decisions which would cripple the Brosnan era TND rates a 5 out of ten.

The epitome of average.

[Nicolas Suszczyk]

The second best Brosnan film after GoldenEye. Johnatan Pryce makes a memorable Elliot Carver, and the plot is great, though it's rare that a profesional 00 is send to investigate a media baron. The action sometimes is useless, but the soundtrack and the script are great. It's an excellent Bond film, although, it's one of those "spectacular" Bond films one shouldn't take as "a spy thriller"

9/10

[DAN LIGHTER]

I gave it a 5. The baddy played by Jonathan Pryce was one of my all time worst baddies.

Although I loved the scene where Bond is about to be killed in the hotel bedroom by Dr. Kaufman played by Vincent Schiavelli whilst his men are trying to get into Bonds BMW. One of my favorite Bond scenes ever. Just class

[chrisno1]

In 2008 I watched all the Bond movies and wrote a series of reviews for another site. The aim was to watch them in order in the run up to the premiere of QOS. I succeeded and the reviews were well received.
However, subsequently, I have re-read my reviews and re-watched a number of the movies (the BFI had a whole 007 season earlier this year and I saw quite a few on the big screen again!).
This is my updated review for Tomorrow Never Dies.

TOMORROW NEVER DIES
REVISED 18/1/10

James Bond is back to his brilliant best. If Tomorrow Never Dies has faults, and there are several, they are papered over with the splendid staging of set piece after set piece. Not even a Schwarzeneggar-ish climax and a dodgy theme song can dilute the thrills and spills on show here.

Having got the retro-ironic comedy out of the way in Goldeneye, writer Bruce Feirstein has chosen to piece together all the classic ingredients of a Bond movie and, with director Roger Spottiswoode, has probably created the most complete 007 adventure since For Your Eyes Only.

The plot is very simple: a media mogul has ideas of grandeur and is using nuclear terrorists and an expensively constructed stealth boat to pervert a war between China and Britain. The result will be world domination – of total media rights. It’s an amusing concept that doesn’t bear close scrutiny. The events surrounding it are first class.

Jonathon Pryce is the said mogul, Elliot Carver, and he is clearly based on Rupert Murdoch. He’s a sleek, charmless villain given to bursts of anger and moments of pithy pleasantries. He has a strong arm man Stamper (Gotz Otto), the by now requisite blond psycho, a computer genius Henry Gupta (Ricky Jay) and a trophy wife, Paris (Teri Hatcher), who betrays him. All three meet suitable deaths.

Hatcher’s undoing isn’t shown on screen, but she is executed by the peculiar assassin Dr Kaufman, who has an outstanding contretemps with Bond. It’s a well written interlude, being alternately tense and trifling. Kaufman is clearly a little weird and this makes him all the more believable as a dedicated killer. “I am an outstanding pistol marksman,” he says, “Take my word for it.” We do. He even congratulates himself: “I am especially good at the celebratory overdose.” Vincent Schiavelli is memorably eccentric.

There is a romantic history between Paris Carver and Bond, but her treachery and demise appear overtly conscious decisions, as if the only way she can escape her husband is by death. The love scene between Brosnan and Hatcher is poor not only because we don’t accept it but because composer David Arnold introduces a stirring melodramatic love theme. Here he overplays his baton hand.

The main Bond girl is Chinese agent Wai Lin, a karate kicking Michelle Yeoh, who has as many gadgets as Bond and doesn’t fall so easily for his obvious smooth talk. She’s a good foil for him, whether effortlessly handcuffing him to a water pipe or escaping from a secret laboratory with infinite ease. Bond of course has to shoot and fight his way out. He receives better help from Q who provides lots of little boxes of tricks and Jake Wade, who returns, but is used as nothing more than a Q substitute. They are both amusing little cameos.

The fun though isn’t with the eager actors or the witty dialogue, it’s with the action and there is plenty of it. The film hardly breaks step, from its gripping teaser sequence at a terrorist weapons bazaar to the destruction of Carver’s stealth boat, each set piece trying to top the other. Bond fights four strong men in a soundproof booth; he and Wai Lin both infiltrate Carver’s printing presses and narrowly avoid capture in an exciting chase where they dodge bullets as well as each other; Bond uses his touch pad remote control to drive his new BMW around a hotel car park; Bond commits a HALO jump, another piece of wonderfully vertigous filming; Bond and Wai Lin escape Carver’s clutches in Vietnam by leaping from a skyscraper and stealing a motorcycle, only to be chased through the streets of Saigon by cars and then a helicopter. These are all a cut above the usual chaos because the stunts are palpably real and the editing, from Dominique Fortin and Michel Arcand, stimulates the pace with sharpness and restraint. The accompanying music is fiercely high speed.

Tomorrow Never Dies had a troubled production history, but you wouldn’t notice it from watching the results on screen. Like the outstanding example of the formula, Thunderball, we aren’t given time to follow the narrative, as the film delivers the traditional James Bond elements of beautiful people, in exotic surroundings with stunning action. Ian Fleming’s hero, however, is completely lost amongst it all, but when movie making (and James Bond making) is this good it hardly seems to matter.

RATING 7 from 10.

[elizabeth]

5 because of the you-know-what oxford scene at the beginning. and that's all i got to say about that.

[Red Barchetta]

I gave it a 6. It wasn't my favorite Pierce outing as 007, but it did have some good scenes.

[blueman]

Interesting that TND inverted character work from GE: scenes with M were all really silly in TND, in contrast with GE's rather more mature M scenes. The villain scenes however are much stronger in TND than GE, the whole 006 plotline never held up for me, while the Price/Carver/Bond triangle was nicely done IMO. There are probably more individual moments I like in GE, but TND's tight plotting wins me over in comparison (plus there are fewer cringe-worthy bits in TND, big help that ).

Agree with comments, TND is like TSWLM with a facelift. To add: GE is like the rough draft of CR.

[ChristopherZ22]

I give it a 5.

or

* * 1/2 out of 4 stars.


Although Tomorrow Never Dies is an improvement over the dreary and tired GoldenEye, it has its problems too. Brosnan and Price are good and it is generally entertaining. My problems with the film are that it starts to get uninteresting and lazy during its second half, the relationship between Bond and Wai Lin is not well developed, and there is too much action. There are so many action scenes that the story and characters are not given the time and space to develop.

[Lachesis]

This film scores a 6 for me, its a film I certainly enjoy but after GE it seemed a much more bland and frivolous experience. I also have some issues with Pierce Brosnan in this one, he looks rather bored through much of it and I feel absolutely no chemistry between him and his supposed ex-love. Far better is Michelle Yeoh's, Wai Ling someone acutlly deserving that oft-rumoured spin off imho.

[Pierce James Bond]

I gave this one a 10. It has plenty of Bond action, girls, gadgets and gizmo's and all the likings of what a 007 film should be. Best Bond girls are of course Wai Lin and Paris Carver thanks to the roles played by Michelle Yeoh and Teri Hatcher. (respectiveally) And just an all out cast of good acting. It was by far a good 007 film.

[SecretAgentFan]

Re-watched it.

After GE I was able to see TND in a press screening back then. And since I had loved GE I was strangely disappointed in TND. I can´t really remember why. Maybe I hadn´t been in a Bond mood that day. After a few years I watched it again when it was on TV and I liked it much more.

Now, another few years later and during my "I re-watch every Bond film"-phase, I gave TND anothe chance and must say... I LOVED IT! Yes, it´s lots of action. Yes, the climax is a bit too much shooting and exploding. And yes, Michelle Yeoh, for my taste, is not sexy at all and has no chemistry with Brosnan.

But - the film has a great villain, a truly menacing henchman, fantastic action scenes - and a much, much, much better pace than GE. It´s one of the fastest moving films of the series. And it also does not feel to me as forced as GE. Instead, it is always conveying the sense of fun that is one of the best Bondian traits. This is also due to the great one-liners in this film. One of my favorites: "They´ll print anything these days."

Brosnan is stepping up his game and IMO feels right at home in the role. People often don´t give him credit for this but I think in TND he really shows a wonderfully cruel side of Bond whenever he disposes of a villain. From the look of his face at those times I totally get the disdain for his opponents. And he effortlessly can get sarcastic and amused in the next moment. That, my friends, is not an easy acting accomplishment.

Also, I think Spottiswoode directs much more fluid than Campbell (oooh, sacrilege?) and the action scenes are better directed (second unit?) as well.

And I love Sheryl Crow´s title song, by the way.

So - to me, TND is one of the best Bond films and only gets a slight point subtraction due to the climax.

9 out of 10.

[chrisno1]

I'd second most of that SecretAgentFan!
TND gets a bumrap from a lot of fans & I have never understood why (but then I also like TB and it gets similar treatment). I think it's because both films lack "significant depth". I don't mind that at all. TND is fast, furious and fun and that's what I like about it. Everything looks real snd feels tense. The laboured efforts that pre- and suc- ceeded it woefully lack anything like the excitement of the stunts and fights in this one. Despite all that the story is original while still harking back to the grand era of Barry-Maibaum-Adam.
I gave it a 7. But then I am very hard to please.

[SecretAgentFan]

chrisno1 - I love your re-watch reviews and thank you for your kind remarks. I consider re-watching the films to be very interesting. It can reveal one´s own development, not only the films´ enduring power.