1017 replies to this topic

[Dustin]

For the time being it doesn't mean zilch, apart from the fact it figures into Eon's preference for established working relationships. Could be spot on...and then again it could be just another product from the rumour mill. How much say the distributors have in the scheme of things you can gather from the Sony leaks.

[plankattack]

 

And if someone wants to knock John Glen, please put any of his films against "Spectre" and reconsider.

I think Spectre's not just a great Bond movie, but also a great movie... Riiiiiiiight up to the inexplicably lame final act in London.

 

But i'll take that over the artless efforts of the 80s; Carry On Octopussy; A View To Cynical Who Cares If It's Dull Lets Make Some More Cash OAP Kill; The Living In A Bond Movie With No Discernible Villains Daylights; A TV License To Kill...

 

There's a reason why the audience loved Goldeneye so - because the franchise had become so boringly stale.

 

(I'm really gonna get it the neck now   )

 

You're not going to get it in the neck from me but......I'm going to mount an "accidental" defense of John Glen while we're all assessing the "worthiness" of the whoever the next director might be.

 

Bonds until, well, maybe through CR, have always been producer films, with the director the manager of the assembly line rather than any kind of visionary. 80s Bonds in particular were clearly the end result of a pre-patterned recipie - big start,, Q scene, gadget or too, "funny" minor characters. It's only in the last couple where it feels - and I say feels as what do I know? - that the director (and to a lesser extent the writers) have been given a certain amount of license to be more selective as to what ingredients they take or omit from the traditional formula.

 

I don't think it's a case of whether or not the director is an "auteur" (all of a sudden a dirty word it would appear) but whether or not EON will be granting the director, any director, a certain amount of leeway. I do believe how one sees the director debate depends on what one wants. If you want a "Bond" film, then the choice of director shouldn't be of too great a consequence - until very recently (QoS) EON weren't in the business of their films being the "vision" of their director. But, now I'm going to get in the neck, 'cos I like QoS, if you want something that doesn't fit neatly onto the shelf, then yes, who is in the director's chair is of great interest.

 

It's why I was disappointed with SP - an "auteur" director plucking from the house recipie - if SP had been directed by, oooh, Roger Spottiswode, I probably wouldn't have felt so underwhelmed.

[sharpshooter]

I think Spectre's not just a great Bond movie, but also a great movie... Riiiiiiiight up to the inexplicably lame final act in London.

I got sick of hearing it during the early SPECTRE reviews, but I finally agreed that SPECTRE simply isn't as good as Skyfall. I'm not a SPECTRE hater by any stretch, but Skyfall had added spark and purpose. It had the better villain, better set pieces and better cinematography. 

[Odd Jobbies]

The 80s were not exactly the franchise's finest hour. Certainly not its most stylish.

I'll take a string of high highs and low lows over a string of mediocre movies.

Me too.

 

On a different tack: how much input did Sony have on the choice of director from CR to SP? Does the McGuigan rumour mean that the distributors really won't have much creative say on Bond 25?

McGuigan certainly seems more like the calibre of director they sought pre-Craig, rather than the Oscar associated directors like Forster and Mendes.

 

If the rumour is true it suggests to me that Eon want to return to directors they have more control over, rather than those with their own vision. That's more in line with the family business.

[sharpshooter]

A director is important. But ultimately, it all comes down to the story and the actors who bring it to life. You need something to work with. 

[Dustin]

It's certainly not bad if a director brings the story he/she wants to tell - for the story. It depends whether the story suits to Bond. And I'm absolutely not sold Mendes did have a story to tell when he came to 007. To me it looks a great deal as if that just turned out favourably in SKYFALL and not so much in SPECTRE. From Eon's perspective though I suppose they were still happy enough to hand Mendes BOND 25, too. One might say from their point of view any entry that doesn't actually break the mould and still remain profitable is fine enough, be that 'auteur' or handiman.

[MISALA1994]

A bit of snobbery going on here, isn't there, because McGuigan isn't a fancy-pants?

What's wrong with John Glen, anyway? He directed every Bond film of the '80s.

Nothing, best Bond decade for me...

[Odd Jobbies]

A director is important. But ultimately, it all comes down to the story and the actors who bring it to life. You need something to work with. 

Filmmaking is a unique art form in that there's so many people involved and each of them needs to be on their game or it fails; from Producer to sound man/woman.

 

Of course if the script is poor there's little to be done afterwards except damage control. But assuming the script works, then every tier of production after that has to keep up that standard or, like a house of cards it all comes crashing down.

 

That includes the story and actors, as well as the director, as well as the DP, the sound department, the stunt dep., the composer and of course the editor. It's only as good as it's weakest link, so none of these roles are, strictly speaking more important than the others.

 

But, having said that, the person on shoot with the responsibility that all of these roles are delivering is the Director. And responsible for picking and making sure all of the talent from script to screen are delivering is the Producer.

 

Sorry about the egg sucking lecture, but it's far from down to the story and actor.

[SecretAgentFan]

Agreed.

 

In the end, in my humble opinion, the distinction between journeyman-director and auteur is quite hazy anway and caused by critics who enjoy themselves putting talents in those boxes.

 

Sure, there still are the consumate filmmakers who only tell either personally motivated stories or stories which they can relate to personnally and therefore add their own particular obsession to it.  Scorsese comes to mind, Paul Thomas Anderson.  But apart from those examples, in the current climate of financing films those guys can hardly put together just their projects anymore and therefore take on films they neveer would have touched.  That´s why Mendes took on Bond.

 

By the way, Mendes is a marvelous theatre director.  That´s what sets him apart.  Then he got courted for AMERICAN BEAUTY and got Roger Deakins and a stellar cast to garner huge acclaim.  And carte blanche for a follow-up.  Which got Tom Hanks at the height of his power, getting pretty good reviews and big box office again.  Mendes seemed to be the golden boy who couldn´t do anything wrong.  Then JARHEAD tanked.  Then AWAY WITH YOU.  And RESERVATION ROAD - and even the critics weren´t impressed anymore.

 

Then Bond came.  And, of course, Mendes grabbed that opportunity.  And again he brought Deakins with him and courted Bardem... and obviously gave everything he got.  The biggest box office for a Bond ever was the result.  And Mendes probably said: okay, that´s it, now I have the power to greenlight my stories again, at least for awhile.  But since studios remain fickle, they probably said: yeah, well, it was a Bond film and therefore a huge success. Mendes still is not a safe director for us.  And since he wanted to go back to the theatre one can assume that there just was no immediate project he would have latched onto.  Possibly because right now, Hollywood mainly greenlights franchises.  And when nothing else came along, he took on what he previously said he did not want to do: another Bond film.  And in conjunction with all the troubles that befell that production, I think one could see that Mendes´ heart wasn´t really in it.  It was basically a replay of the greatest hits of SKYFALL coupled with a meandering story which felt rewritten too often, up to a point at which everything interesting went out the window and creatve band-aids were put over all the throbbing sores.

 

Is Mendes an auteur?  I would say: no.  Was Marc Forster an auteur?  No, again.  But they were directors who mainly worked for arthouse movies.  This alone, however, does not guarantee art.

 

In a way, even Mendes and Forster are journeyman directors - because they go to the project they like, instead of using films to re-create their obsessions.

 

And again I would like to say: artistic obsessions are not what a Bond films needs.  I love Brian de Palma´s style.  He truly is an auteur.  But I don´t think that his style would be good or right for Bond.  Neither would be Scorsese´s.  And so on.

 

Bond is the star.  The film must service him, not the other way around.  SKYFALL worked for me because the personal angle was integrated and not shoved into the foreground like in SPECTRE (without actually dealing with it then).  And a journeyman director who does not come from the arthouse but concentrates on fast-paced action entertainment always will make a better Bond film.  

 

Maybe the arthouse director will make an interesting, unusual one.  But Bond is a mass audience enterprise.  They don´t go to a Bond film because they want to see an interesting style or an unusual perspective.  They want something they have gotten before, just feeling a little fresher.

[Pussfeller]

https://twitter.com/Bond25Film reports that Syncopy Films (Christopher Nolan's production company) is now listing Bond 25 as a project in development. I don't know how reliable this is, but I thought I'd mention it. 

[Dustin]

Hear, hear...

[Harmsway]

https://twitter.com/Bond25Film reports that Syncopy Films (Christopher Nolan's production company) is now listing Bond 25 as a project in development. I don't know how reliable this is, but I thought I'd mention it.

Hmmmmmm

[Orion]

I mark this under too good to be true HOWEVER given Dunkirks release date he would be available if he went straight from post into Bond 25

[DavidJones]

I hope that is wrong. The Dark Knight is one of the worst films I've ever seen.

[Orion]

Interesting that it's impb pro as you do have to pay to use that, does anyone want to troll THAT badly?

[SecretAgentFan]

Major weird.  But imdb.com is far from reliable.  Would be a major surprise if EON allowed Nolan´s production company to co-produce.  Just the opposite of the McGuigan-rumour which rather alludes to EON getting more control of the film again.

[plankattack]

I too am a bit leery of the "unofficial" twitter of Bond 25. Frankly, it could be one of us trying to troll, well, us....!!  

[Orion]

It's the fact that it's Imdb pro that's weird to me. Why would you pay to troll when you could just use normal imdb or Reddit and tabloids would print it. 

[Harmsway]

There's probably nothing to the rumor. Still, fun to speculate. EON's pre-SPECTRE meeting with Nolan apparently went well, so it's not ridiculous to think that they'd consider him again.

[Orion]

Small thing I just just remembered, Syncopy is based at WB so if (and thats a big if) this is true, it answers the studio debate. 

[Odd Jobbies]

 

I think Spectre's not just a great Bond movie, but also a great movie... Riiiiiiiight up to the inexplicably lame final act in London.

I got sick of hearing it during the early SPECTRE reviews, but I finally agreed that SPECTRE simply isn't as good as Skyfall. I'm not a SPECTRE hater by any stretch, but Skyfall had added spark and purpose. It had the better villain, better set pieces and better cinematography. 

 

Oh, definitely! SF is a wonderful Bond movie - right near the top of the canon. Apart from a few lazy plot contrivances and a couple of painfully lame gags it's a masterpiece.

I'm going to get in the neck, 'cos I like QoS, if you want something that doesn't fit neatly onto the shelf, then yes, who is in the director's chair is of great interest.

Me too - QoS is great IMO, apart from the messy plane chase/freefall set piece, in which Forster shows how out of his element he is in big set-peices (although he fixed that  with WWZ; crumby in many ways, but the action set pieces were fairly solid if i recall).

 

And i certainly don't require Bond movies to fit neatly on the shelf - maybe every other Bond movie!

They want something they have gotten before, just feeling a little fresher.

That nails it, really! Sounds deceptively simple, but is actually the hardest trick of all to pull off.

 

Different is different and the same is, well, the same. The Same but different - old, but new. If only i could bottle that!

[Odd Jobbies]

https://twitter.com/Bond25Film reports that Syncopy Films (Christopher Nolan's production company) is now listing Bond 25 as a project in development. I don't know how reliable this is, but I thought I'd mention it. 

Sweet Christmas!

[Matt_13]

I'm good with either. A Scandal in Belgravia is my favorite episode of any TV show, so I'd welcome McGuigan into the fold. Both he and Nolan are big fans of the franchise so I think both would be exciting directors for Bond 25.

[sharpshooter]

https://twitter.com/Bond25Film reports that Syncopy Films (Christopher Nolan's production company) is now listing Bond 25 as a project in development. I don't know how reliable this is, but I thought I'd mention it. 

Things keep getting more interesting. I'm holding out hope there's an announcement confirming all the details later in the year. 

[Harmsway]

IDMBPro is claiming that the news about Syncopy is correct.

 

Christopher Nolan for Bond 25 may just be a real thing.

[Dustin]

Well...

[sharpshooter]

IDMBPro is claiming that the news about Syncopy is correct.

 

Christopher Nolan for Bond 25 may just be a real thing.

Wow. 

[Tiin007]

I'm confused. Can't it be Nolan's production company with a different director?

[Harmsway]

I'm confused. Can't it be Nolan's production company with a different director?

In theory. But why would that be the case?

[Tiin007]

 

I'm confused. Can't it be Nolan's production company with a different director?

In theory. But why would that be the case?

 

 

I don't know. The thought of Nolan doing a Bond movie right now (after Mendes and SP, with all the baggage, as the final Craig entry, having to maybe tie up all the loose ends) seems unlikely to me.

 

If there is any truth to this rumor, I'm trying to figure out a way that it would make the most sense.

 

(I'd much sooner believe Nolan would direct Bond 26.)