Jump to content


This is a read only archive of the old forums
The new CBn forums are located at https://quarterdeck.commanderbond.net/

 
Photo

The fourth film - and then?


12 replies to this topic

#1 SecretAgentFan

SecretAgentFan

    Commander

  • Commanding Officers
  • PipPipPipPip
  • 9055 posts
  • Location:Germany

Posted 11 November 2015 - 12:56 PM

The Bond films continually are confronted with the same problem: the need to top themselves.

 

That need merely might be caused by the studio who wants to make more money on the next film.  Or by audiences who expect every new Bond film to deliver more excitement.

 

In any event, this problem seems to manifest itself in every fourth film of an actor´s tenure.

 

The first film always has to meet the challenge of introducing a new actor - but with Connery, Lazenby, Moore, Dalton, Brosnan and Craig, the first film can be considered a success.  At that point, everybody is highly motivated to establish the new tone.

 

The second film can build on that and often experiments.  This can deepen the impact of the actor (Connery, Brosnan, Craig) or cause problems with the audience (Moore, Dalton).

 

The third film can feature the actor in his most assured portrayal (Connery, Moore, Craig) or falter (Brosnan) - in both cases the "we have to top everything"-syndrome already can be felt but still is kept under control.

 

It´s the fourth film that naturally has the tendency to set itself apart from the previous ones, going for MORE and ending up not hitting the mark completely.  Connery´s THUNDERBALL has a lot going for it - but the excess stifles it.  Moore´s MOONRAKER is great fun - but the excess turns it into parody, like Brosnan´s DIE ANOTHER DAY does.

 

SPECTRE walks the tightrope between seriousness and excess, and it might be the first one within the series´ history to not fall down on either side.  

 

Still, one can feel its wobbly legs.

 

The Connery era went even further with the fifth film while Moore´s tenure scaled down.  Will the Craig era - should he return - go back to its lean beginnings or do a YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE (the film - not the novel, although...)?



#2 Professor Pi

Professor Pi

    Lt. Commander

  • Veterans
  • PipPipPip
  • 1430 posts

Posted 11 November 2015 - 01:26 PM

I mentioned this in another thread.  EON is at a crossroads here.  Scale down like FYEO or go over the top like YOLT?  If they get a new distributor, I think they'll opt for the latter.  While SPECTRE is getting hammered in reviews, its box office is performing as expected.  If Sony keeps it, I think they'll scale back, having learned some lessons with script development, the cyber hack, spiraling costs, Spiderman.  I'm not a Tarantino fan, but I think he could pull off a great Garden of Death story at this point and recharge the franchise.  And I don't think they'll call it 'Shatterhand', nor do I want them to anymore.  After the Oberhauser reveal, they couldn't do another pseudonym identity twist, not that they were successful at it this time.

 

SPECTRE had to be TB/YOLT/OHMSS for Craig.  Now it's time for some gardening!



#3 Dustin

Dustin

    Commander

  • Commanding Officers
  • PipPipPipPip
  • 5786 posts

Posted 11 November 2015 - 03:46 PM

I would say, regardless how the distribution deal pans out, Eon will try to attract another director with Academy Award aspirations and likely give her/him more leeway with the story, provided they come up with one they can produce on a tighter budget. The EW article about SPECTRE's third act (http://www.ew.com/ar.../spectre-ending) would be an outrageous idea, starting the next film right at the top of the torture scene. Too far out there, too many problems from a story POV to casting, too unconventional for the studio execs. But I could see somebody like Danny Boyle giving this a try, making BOND 25 in fact the real last act of SPECTRE.

#4 byline

byline

    Lt. Commander

  • Veterans
  • PipPipPip
  • 1218 posts
  • Location:Canada

Posted 11 November 2015 - 04:02 PM

The second film can build on that and often experiments.  This can deepen the impact of the actor (Connery, Brosnan, Craig) or cause problems with the audience (Moore, Dalton).

Some might argue Craig's second film caused problems with the audience. I'm not one of them, as I like Quantum of Solace. But despite it faring quite well at the box office, there was a lot of grumbling about it not being a satisfying followup to Casino Royale.

 

Dustin, I agree with you. I can't imagine them going the route suggested by that EW article. It would be brave, but I think too risky and outlandish for the Bond world.



#5 bond_azoozbond

bond_azoozbond

    Sub-Lieutenant

  • Crew
  • Pip
  • 383 posts
  • Location:Portland,OR

Posted 11 November 2015 - 06:38 PM

I would say, regardless how the distribution deal pans out, Eon will try to attract another director with Academy Award aspirations and likely give her/him more leeway with the story, provided they come up with one they can produce on a tighter budget. The EW article about SPECTRE's third act (http://www.ew.com/ar.../spectre-ending) would be an outrageous idea, starting the next film right at the top of the torture scene. Too far out there, too many problems from a story POV to casting, too unconventional for the studio execs. But I could see somebody like Danny Boyle giving this a try, making BOND 25 in fact the real last act of SPECTRE.


I didnt understand this article and whats about the torture scene? Can you explain more on that :)

#6 Dustin

Dustin

    Commander

  • Commanding Officers
  • PipPipPipPip
  • 5786 posts

Posted 11 November 2015 - 07:50 PM

Not really much to explain, the premise is that - due to the all-too-easy escape from Oberhauser's torture chair, the very generic superhero action afterwards and the illogical sequence of events in London - SPECTRE's last act consists not in fact of real events but is the dream of the dying or severely injured Bond. It's a fantastical fan idea, but of course nothing Eon or the studio would dare actually touch.

#7 hoagy

hoagy

    Sub-Lieutenant

  • Crew
  • Pip
  • 230 posts

Posted 11 November 2015 - 08:52 PM

If you have not yet seen SPECTRE this thread already is full of SPOILERS but just in case here it is before you continue:  SPOILER ALERT !!!!!!!!     but moreso, really, Explanation --

 

Did you all not see Terry Gilliam's Brazil ?

 

It is clear that what happened is that Bond died in the torture scene, and the rest occurred only in his mind as he sat there, dying.  The series is over, pending another actor and reboot.  Craig's Bond died but with the illusion, in his mind in his dying moments, of success, revenge, maturation in the course of revenge, and a happy-ever-after.  What next ?  Perhaps a film in which Madeleine Swann -- picking up at the torture scene -- escapes, and becomes a new agent...and certainly not for SPECTRE, because her father already left SPECTRE with good reason, SPECTRE murdered her father (radiation poisoning leading to his suicide before he was to die anyway), and murdered her new beloved.  So she'll pick up with HMSS, and favorite traditions will continue, including the flirting and the "did they or did they not" scenes with Moneypenny.  Madeleine will wear Blue in mourning...cuz she's got the blues and cuz it is the warmest color.



#8 Hitmonk

Hitmonk

    Sub-Lieutenant

  • Crew
  • Pip
  • 107 posts
  • Location:Manchester, UK

Posted 11 November 2015 - 09:38 PM

Really can't wait for the appearance of DCI Gene Hunt in the next one!

#9 Professor Pi

Professor Pi

    Lt. Commander

  • Veterans
  • PipPipPip
  • 1430 posts

Posted 13 November 2015 - 12:03 PM

Not really much to explain, the premise is that - due to the all-too-easy escape from Oberhauser's torture chair, the very generic superhero action afterwards and the illogical sequence of events in London - SPECTRE's last act consists not in fact of real events but is the dream of the dying or severely injured Bond. It's a fantastical fan idea, but of course nothing Eon or the studio would dare actually touch.

 

Except Christopher Nolan would love this idea!

 

Now I'm thinking the rest of the other twenty Bond films are dreams in Craig's head.  SPECTRE leads into Doctor No (which Mendes says was the setup at the end of Skyfall.)  Then all the callbacks in Craig's Bond tenure become part of his dreams in subsequent movie adventures (the Aston Martin DB5, Blofeld's leg injury crawl recalling Mr. White's, the cat, Jill Masterson's death his way of remembering Agent Field's oily demise, M's incarnations--Mallory to Messervy to Mawdsley, Trevelyan is Silva, crater becomes volcano in YOLT, MI6 attack in TWINE, etc. etc etc.) with all other continuity issues now conveniently explained in this Matrix-like dreamworld!  The Codename Theory is even explained away.

 

So it's not that SPECTRE retcons the reboot, it's that the reboot retcons the rest of the Bond canon.  Conspiracy theorists could argue this was Nolan's pitch to EON before Mendes came back, but set it up Inception-like for Nolan to do Bond 25.  It's crazy, but I really like this idea.  You can even make NSNA and CR67, and CR54 for that matter, all fit into this notion.



#10 Guy Haines

Guy Haines

    Commander

  • Veterans
  • PipPipPipPip
  • 3075 posts
  • Location:"Special envoy" no more. As of 7/5/15 elected to office somewhere in Nottinghamshire, England.

Posted 13 November 2015 - 12:28 PM

Nolan might love it but I can't see the film makers touching it with a bargepole.

The Guardian's film reviewer Peter Bradshaw wrote about Daniel Craig in CR that his Bond worked because he in part reminded one of Patrick McGoohan's defiant number 6 in "The Prisoner". Fans of the series - I am one - will know there is a surreal dream like quality to it - well, more nightmarish, actually.

Craig may remind one reviewer of McGoohan but I cannot envisage a Bond production team producing a final Craig movie in which at some point the audience is told "he dreamt the last part of SPECTRE - and probably most of this movie too." Older viewers like me remember the ridiculous final episode of one of the Dallas series from the 1980s in which Bobby Ewing - having been killed off earlier - miraculously re-appears because his wife Pam had "dreamt" all the episodes of Bobby being killed and the aftermath.

We've already had controversy about the supposed link between 007 and ESB - although for me it worked better than I thought it would. Imagine the outcry if we're told to accept that part of a Bond adventure was all in 007's mind.

(Though having said that - some mind manipulation in an otherwise "real" adventure might occur in future if the producers decide to use the opening scene from the novel TMWTGG.)

#11 hoagy

hoagy

    Sub-Lieutenant

  • Crew
  • Pip
  • 230 posts

Posted 13 November 2015 - 06:54 PM

It all happened in the 3D glasses worn by "Pierce's Moneypenny"

There is no Bond

He's a computer program, programmable to fit the 50s, 60s, 70s, etc.  Adjustments for "serious" or "flippant", more or less tough, more or less smooth, hairy or hairless, eye color, etc.

If this program and headset ever goes on sale it'll make a fortune.



#12 Pierceuhhh

Pierceuhhh

    Sub-Lieutenant

  • Crew
  • Pip
  • 109 posts

Posted 13 November 2015 - 09:03 PM

He already died quite definitively at the start of You Only Live Twice - watch it again, watch every character's reaction to his death, and try to argue! So really the whole rest of the series is a dream.

#13 Mr. Arlington Beech

Mr. Arlington Beech

    Lt. Commander

  • Veterans
  • PipPipPip
  • 1112 posts

Posted 14 November 2015 - 07:18 AM

I would say, regardless how the distribution deal pans out, Eon will try to attract another director with Academy Award aspirations and likely give her/him more leeway with the story, provided they come up with one they can produce on a tighter budget. The EW article about SPECTRE's third act (http://www.ew.com/ar.../spectre-ending) would be an outrageous idea, starting the next film right at the top of the torture scene. Too far out there, too many problems from a story POV to casting, too unconventional for the studio execs. But I could see somebody like Danny Boyle giving this a try, making BOND 25 in fact the real last act of SPECTRE.

I read the article, and I liked that idea.... The next film could begin with Bond brainwashed after the torture, and then connect with the start of the novel "The Man With The Golden Gun".