133 replies to this topic

[MISALA1994]

Either way, I think Bond 25 will be a long game.

I put my money on 2019 with new Bond actor.

[0024]

Personally, I'd rather Mendes not return. I thought SP was mostly a lifeless mess with a few high points, one being Daniel's performance. I really do not want Newman to return. He does not "get" Bond at all in my book.

 

This is my understanding as well.

[Dustin]

Just to be clear on this: there is up to now no solid information supporting a return of Mendes, merely the fact he dropped out of a lined up project. This may mean a thousand different things, none of them necessarily connected to Bond.

[Orion]

He dropped it because a documentary covering the same subject was released and made the film redundant. Mendes returning to Bond was added by tabloids who thought "film dropped due to documentary" is not as interesting as "Mendes returning to Bond?"

[Dustin]

Just so.

[KHergerscheimer]

Any guesses on what Daniel Craig and Sam Mendes' idea might be for B25? I know they toyed with putting Irma Bunt in SPECTRE, perhaps the story involves introducing that character? Could also tie in elements of YOLT the novel, would love to see Shatterhand finally make it to the screen.

[Odd Jobbies]

...Could also tie in elements of YOLT the novel, would love to see Shatterhand finally make it to the screen.

The thunder may have been stolen on that front. P&W's action-spy script for The Avenging Silence  is being made by Nicholas Winding Refn.

 

It's set in Japan, involves spys and a crazy villain as well as doubtless being a little 'trippy' and rediculously violent, since it's Refn.

 

Refn has had some stick lately for his overtly artistic indulgences, but when he's given a more traditional framework he's an outstanding filmmaker (eg. Drive).

 

I'm not a fan of P&W's hackneyed Bond scripts, but that kind of by-the-numbers screenwriting may be just the ticket to give Refn something tangible to adhere to and hang his obsessions on in the shoot and the edit.

 

If he does get the art/storytelling balance right on this movie, as he did with Drive, it'll be a hit, making news of Eon producing a new version of YOLT (probably entitled Shatterhand  for a little distance from Connery's version) seem a little old hat with big Refn shoes to fill. A shame because Shatterhand  is obviously the right direction for Craig's next, likely final instalment.

 

I'd wager that this P&W script is something Eon rejected as an adaptation of YOLT; they've reworked it for Refn letting rip with the violence and existentialism. Hopefully for them those blinkers being removed will allow them to finally blossom as nuanced, interesting writers.

[KHergerscheimer]

Fascinating, wasn't aware of that, great build. Shame about Shatterhand, think all Bond nerds would really love that to happen, and gotta believe Mendes and Craig fall into that camp. Next best thing would be a Colonel Sun adaption or a riff off of Per Fine Ounce, although the former would have to go out of its way not to offend China (not to mention its material has been used extensively in other films) and the later only has fragments of a story "approved by Fleming" but never published. Anyway, let's hope they delight us with something that works for mainstream audiences but also delights true Bond geeks.

[SecretAgentFan]

 

...Could also tie in elements of YOLT the novel, would love to see Shatterhand finally make it to the screen.

The thunder may have been stolen on that front. P&W's action-spy script for The Avenging Silence  is being made by Nicholas Winding Refn.

 

It's set in Japan, involves spys and a crazy villain as well as doubtless being a little 'trippy' and rediculously violent, since it's Refn.

 

Refn has had some stick lately for his overtly artistic indulgences, but when he's given a more traditional framework he's an outstanding filmmaker (eg. Drive).

 

I'm not a fan of P&W's hackneyed Bond scripts, but that kind of by-the-numbers screenwriting may be just the ticket to give Refn something tangible to adhere to and hang his obsessions on in the shoot and the edit.

 

If he does get the art/storytelling balance right on this movie, as he did with Drive, it'll be a hit, making news of Eon producing a new version of YOLT (probably entitled Shatterhand  for a little distance from Connery's version) seem a little old hat with big Refn shoes to fill. A shame because Shatterhand  is obviously the right direction for Craig's next, likely final instalment.

 

I'd wager that this P&W script is something Eon rejected as an adaptation of YOLT; they've reworked it for Refn letting rip with the violence and existentialism. Hopefully for them those blinkers being removed will allow them to finally blossom as nuanced, interesting writers.

 

 

Interesting.  Haven´t read anything about that P&W script and Refn´s involvement.  Do you have any more intel on that?

 

It´s clear, however, that any script that P&W have written for EON will be owned by EON automatically and therefore cannot be reworked for another production company - unless P&W wrote it on spec and only showed it to EON.  But it´s unlikely that P&W wrote anything similar to Fleming´s story because that would trigger a copyright violation suit.  Just setting it in Japan and having a crazy villain neither makes it too Flemingian nor too close for BOND 25 to follow the YOLT template.

[Toxteth_OGrady]

Doesn't sound like P&W have been working on a script for Bond 25...

https://hmssweblog.w...ting-007-films/

[Matt_13]

Thanks for posting that, the insight into the bridge ending is genuinely interesting.

[Dustin]

Doesn't sound like P&W have been working on a script for Bond 25...

https://hmssweblog.w...ting-007-films/

Moreover, it doesn't even sound as if they were terribly excited if the chalice came to them...

Taking everything into account, lack of actual news, sound bites from recent articles, evidence in the business - all that looks as if by now BOND 25 is still a considerable time in the future. The actual players nearly unanimously seem occupied with more pressing business and nobody gives the impression of being in a hurry to do another Bond film. Even looking at it optimistically - which is a seldom seen conviction today - 2019 would probably be the earliest year for BOND 25.

Could be much later though...

[Tiin007]

Sadly, I've already come to accept the notion that the Craig era will be forever marred by unnecessarily long gaps between films. So I'm less bothered by this than I should be.

 

What matters most to me, at this point, is that Bond #7's era return to a regular schedule (ideally, every other year, just like the olden days). I don't care if the new Bond actor debuts in Bond 25, 26, or 27 (one can dream), but his films cannot be as sporadic as Craig's are. I feel that could lead to the end of the franchise for MANY years to come. 

[Matt_13]

I very much want to see Craig return for one more go, but then I think it'll be time to hit the reset button. Once a new actor has been cast and they finally have the stability to potentially crank one of these out every couple of years, they'll need to put together an arc for the series that's a bit more cohesive than the patch job we got this time around. The current run's effort to show Bond's personal journey in episodic fashion, while conceptually neat, has been horribly executed, due largely to the fact that it probably wasn't the plan from the start. They either need to put together a multi-film narrative that has a definitive end point that they have in mind and build the series around that, or have a list of stand alone ideas in place that they gradually work on over the years as each film gets produced. The current run has been fairly reactionary from the start, from the gritty Batman Begins style of Casino, to the self conscious Bourne influence of Quantum, to the more confident but still Dark Knight influenced Skyfall, and ending with the lighter, almost Marvel-fied romp that is Spectre. Bond needs to figure out what it wants to be, and the producers need to execute it on their own terms. Bond has always had a tendency to imitate whatever is working in pop culture at any given point in time, but it'd be nice to see the franchise set the trend going forward, and to work toward creating new iconography as opposed to consistently leaning on the past.

[sharpshooter]

Sadly, I've already come to accept the notion that the Craig era will be forever marred by unnecessarily long gaps between films. So I'm less bothered by this than I should be.

It can be an enthusiasm killer. It's a real shame because as a child of the 90s, Bond was a regular fixture in my life. We had three films out in a five year period. Die Another Day was another three years, but we basically all knew it was coming. The video games were coming out on a regular basis, and I had a ball playing them. But now? The franchise has dried up, save for the comics and a movie and book every so often. I love the 24 other films, but it's sometimes hard to keep the magic alive. 

[Napoleon Solo]

 

Doesn't sound like P&W have been working on a script for Bond 25...

https://hmssweblog.w...ting-007-films/

Moreover, it doesn't even sound as if they were terribly excited if the chalice came to them...

Taking everything into account, lack of actual news, sound bites from recent articles, evidence in the business - all that looks as if by now BOND 25 is still a considerable time in the future. The actual players nearly unanimously seem occupied with more pressing business and nobody gives the impression of being in a hurry to do another Bond film. Even looking at it optimistically - which is a seldom seen conviction today - 2019 would probably be the earliest year for BOND 25.

Could be much later though...

 

@Dustin. Here's another post contrasting what was happening 10 months before Skyfall began filming.

https://hmssweblog.w...g-is-happening/

 

Caveat: No two films in a series are alike, etc. Still, if Bond 25 were really coming out in fall 2018, you would think there'd be more news happening by now. 

We'll see.

[Dustin]

Absolutely.

I suppose there is also just a general feeling of more serious matters around.

[SecretAgentFan]

Interesting that P&W were going for another ending on the bridge (would have made more sense to me).  And they, of course, had to use setpieces and locations, having to rush in and deliver a hodgepodge script so that the production could begin as planned at all.

 

The silence surrounding BOND 25 - with BB reportedly focussed on another film right now - might be a factual one or a political one (ongoing negotiations with distributors, Craig replacements etc.)

 

But I agree - it seems that EON is just not interested in moving forward with BOND right now.  

 

And that´s a shame for, well, me, as a fan who wants another film and an assurance of more films in a distinct time rhythm.

 

Once again I point to the main actor who always has to be persuaded to return, not in a Sir Roger "let´s talk about my fee"-way but in a "I need time off and don´t know whether I want another one"-manner.

 

The next actor, please, please, please, shall not be an artist but a contract player who loves to be Bond and who wants to do as many films as possible.

[Ytadel]

The huge gaps between films are particularly odd and a shame because not since Goldfinger/Thunderball in the 60s had the iron been hotter for them to really crank the Bond machine and start pumping out product than after Skyfall.

Billion-dollar box office (7th highest grossing film of all time at the time!), huge critical acclaim, won Oscars, reignited public interest in Bond - like everyone I knew saw Skyfall; it remains the only Bond movie that my mother has ever bought on DVD - that was THE MOMENT for the series. We were teetering on the edge of the resurrection of full-blown 60s Bondmania if EON played their cards right.

Instead we got a big gap, a vastly more middlingly received followup film, a grumpy star, now apparently another possibly even bigger gap looming before us, and producers and writers who seem focused on other stuff (and not even any Bond video games since 2012). Bond is rapidly fading in the minds of average moviegoers by now.

What a missed opportunity. I was trembling with excitement about the future of the series back in November 2012 walking out of the theater after the last scene of Skyfall. Now I'm just going "Please, for the love of god, just make a damn film!"

In my fantasy world we would have gotten Bond 24 in 2014, Bond 25 just last November a couple months ago, and the Bond 26 machine would already be quietly rumbling to life for a November 2018 release date. But sadly the operative word there is fantasy.

[Dustin]

The fact P&W had a different outcome for the symbolic bridge scene - which was then scrapped in favour of the one we got - points to there already being a sense of finale during the production of SPECTRE. Maybe if SPECTRE had met with a similar reaction by the critics as SKYFALL that might have sparked enthusiasm to get going again as fast possible. But the whole atmosphere in the weeks around SPECTRE's premiere was entirely different from its predecessor. And like often in the business people may have felt early on the magic was missing, also on the MGM side.

I doubt anybody would have bet on them taking so long for securing what is essentially their only lifeline, a distributor deal. But it's entirely possible insiders already guessed it would become tricky and this is something they can do without. When SPECTRE's box office then didn't help to get a deal settled quickly the players obviously all decided to look busy elsewhere. It's now maybe more a matter of MGM's own investors and how things develop in other fields.

[SecretAgentFan]

True.

 

But SPECTRE, while not as profitable as SKYFALL, was nevertheless a huge success - and Bond is an established brand with a licence to print money...

 

.. and still distributors aren´t lining up, as if SPECTRE had been LICENCE TO KILL.

 

Maybe MGM is offering an even worse distribution deal than before, thinking: HEY, WE GOT BOND - AND IF YOU WANT TO PARTICIPATE TAKE THE CRUMBLES?

 

I can´t imagine that any studio would not want to be involved with Bond if the returns were at least what SONY got.  Especially not in this climate in which established franchises are practically the only thing that any studio wants.

 

So that only leaves EON´s unwillingness to move forward.  A creative impasse again.  Either due to Daniel Craig´s wish to be just a high profile actor or BB´s fatigue with just oiling the Bond machine year after year.

 

In the late 80´s Bond seemed to have run his course - the excitement for new films vanished, also because other action franchises caught the audiences´ imagination.

 

In the 90´´s  EON knew that Bond films had to be delivered at a tight pace to keep the new momentum - but they also could rely on nostalgia for the past Bond decades.

 

In the second half of the 00´s  EON restarted with new vigour and fought successfully against the "Bourne"-films to reestablish a new take on Bond.  

 

But in the 10´s it´s a stop and go process that might be completely out of touch with today´s audiences´ expectations.  Every other big franchise offers installments year after year, Marvel even offers two a year.  Because they know: the attention span is shorter, the expectation is: deliver now or I move on to something else.

 

My question is: how long will BOND still be relevant in this market?  Us hardcore fans will stay with it, but many of the older fans already have lost their enthusiasm, enjoying the previous eras much more than the Craig era.  And the young fans who came to Bond via Craig will certainly ask now: hey, no Bond film must mean Bond is over, right?  Will they keep on being fans when another actor will take over in - well, at least two or three years from now?  Until then, Marvel will probably still go strong, as will the Star Wars bonanza.  Cameron is gearing up with three or four more AVATARs.  And the market will be saturated with many other things as well.

 

Will Bond become like Sherlock Holmes, going away for years or decades before it will return?

 

My crystal ball says: Don´t wait too long now, EON.  Push for a faster turnout and give the market film after film again.  And if you don´t want to or feel like it anymore, hand the creative reins to someone else.

[Harmsway]

The fact P&W had a different outcome for the symbolic bridge scene - which was then scrapped in favour of the one we got - points to there already being a sense of finale during the production of SPECTRE.

In rewriting the ending, P&W went against what Mendes had been working on with Logan since the start of SPECTRE's development. In that frantic rewriting period, there was a lot of second-guessing stuff, and I imagine their rewrite was part of that.

The majority of the drafts ended with Bond walking away from the service.

[SecretAgentFan]

I wonder why Mendes definitely wanted to end the film on Bond leaving the service.

 

It makes no sense at all since we all know Bond will come back.  So it´s a sacrifice without sacrificing anything, a "shock" ending knowing full well that it won´t last.  Unless SPECTRE really is the last Bond film ever.  Or at least Craig´s last film.  Which might have been the idea - but again, it would only have made an impact if Craig had said at that time: this is it, my tenure closes with SPECTRE.

[Dustin]

True.

But SPECTRE, while not as profitable as SKYFALL, was nevertheless a huge success - and Bond is an established brand with a licence to print money...

.. and still distributors aren´t lining up, as if SPECTRE had been LICENCE TO KILL.

Maybe MGM is offering an even worse distribution deal than before, thinking: HEY, WE GOT BOND - AND IF YOU WANT TO PARTICIPATE TAKE THE CRUMBLES?

I can´t imagine that any studio would not want to be involved with Bond if the returns were at least what SONY got. Especially not in this climate in which established franchises are practically the only thing that any studio wants.

...




My question is: how long will BOND still be relevant in this market? Us hardcore fans will stay with it, but many of the older fans already have lost their enthusiasm, enjoying the previous eras much more than the Craig era. And the young fans who came to Bond via Craig will certainly ask now: hey, no Bond film must mean Bond is over, right? Will they keep on being fans when another actor will take over in - well, at least two or three years from now? Until then, Marvel will probably still go strong, as will the Star Wars bonanza. Cameron is gearing up with three or four more AVATARs. And the market will be saturated with many other things as well.

Will Bond become like Sherlock Holmes, going away for years or decades before it will return?

My crystal ball says: Don´t wait too long now, EON. Push for a faster turnout and give the market film after film again. And if you don´t want to or feel like it anymore, hand the creative reins to someone else.

Well, we have been down that road before. If only a number of small details had been different...

Just say SPECTRE had been met with frantic enthusiasm with the critics. I think then even a bigger gap in the b/o to SKYFALL would not have mattered much. Hell, Craig most likely wouldn't even have been asked that stupid 'When will you return to Bond?' question - simply because he'd have been so proud that you could see him ooze eagerness to pull another masterstroke from every pore of his face. He'd have done a Bond film with Ed Wood - and it would have been a success!

Right now the situation is very different. Purvis and Wade already hinted at it, so I'll go where CBn normally doesn't go: the product of James Bond 007 ™ © is a worldwide commodity, and therefore has been a worldwide success. People in Africa, in South America, in India, in China watch his films in droves. And they love them. This is what makes these films universal box office hits, earning money around the globe.

Now this product has become potentially charged with political meaning.

A. Very. Difficult. Situation.

I can tell you exactly why currently nobody is eager to pick up the pen and sign a multi-million-dollar contract with an ailing Hollywood 'studio' - they simply all want to see how this situation affects other tentpole productions first. Will vehicles like the Marvel films suffer for it on the China market? Will the worldwide box office of Hollywood productions see a decline? Or just a little dent?

Cinema audiences are not necessarily given to making political statements. But it's obvious that certain films lend themselves to just that - especially since there are literally countless ways to watch them without going to a theatre. Mind you, this is not something that will stop Hollywood dead in its tracks. But it comes at a time when things are shifting anyway and any potential partner of MGM will want to see in which direction this could be developing.

Two years from now, people will have a better idea of that. By then things could actually move forward.

But at the moment I don't see anybody sticking out his neck.

[SecretAgentFan]

Interesting point.  

 

While things right now are shaky and unpredictable at best, I don´t think, however, that any studio is waiting to spend money on tentpoles right now.  China, of course, was a major new market Hollywood was most eager to conquer - but even if that will be closed again due to a trade war that might or might not happen, the overseas market is still big enough.  In fact, established franchises and tentpoles will exactly be the kind of project that will still be produced, even in times of crisis.

 

My take: the financiers right now would love to get another surefire investment like BOND 25 going.  And a film with a hero like that will be exactly what audiences are eating up.

 

But what you say definitely does apply big time to the creative side of things.  Which story right now would work for BOND in a world like ours?  Sure, BOND 25 could just focus on a continuation of the Bond-Blofeld relationship and mainly forget about the real world problems.  But is this what EON/Craig feel like doing?  Maybe they will rather wait a few years, and who knows how administrations will then look like, here and abroad?

[Tiin007]

Considering I never found the Bond-Madeline relationship particularly convincing, I'd have much preferred P&W's ending. Leaving for Madeline made very little sense, and the whole "how long can you continue doing this?" was already done better in CR (and arguably SF as well). Had Bond chosen MI6 instead, then Madeline would be nothing more than a blip on the Bond girls radar, rather than some "second chance at happiness" as they've currently presented her. It also could've provided nice symmetry for the Craig era-- Bond leaves the service for a woman in CR, but by SP has turned into the Bond we all know and love and won't make that mistake again. It would be a real character arc. 

 

Thanks, Mendes. 

[Dustin]

I think we mustn't underestimate the influence of a kind of general goodwill towards 'the West' as a whole in terms of the universal success of western 'lifestyle' and the entertainment that comes with it; Bond in particular here.

For decades you could ask people in far-away countries, half a world - and centuries - away from Piccadilly Circus and Times Square for 'James Bond' and they would immediately come up with '007' or 'kisskissbangbang' or some such cultural shorthand for the cinema hero Bond impersonates. According to people knowing better than I do this was even - astonishingly - the case during the high time of the Cold War. Why? Simply because Bond was 'one of the good guys', regardless which flag he was flying under from the top of a mountain cliff.

This is a huge element in the success of this character, that fans from both sides could embrace him since they saw him at the core as a good guy working for the benefit of them all (even though their governments behind the iron curtain of course damned 007 as western propaganda).

Now we face a situation where Bond is still at the core the good guy - but with the danger that his films are greeted with scorn and hostility in an environment ever more marked by current events. This can quickly backfire badly, resulting in a much worse box office. If that basic goodwill towards Bond's 'cause' crumbles away, and be that only gradually, that would make a Bond film a much riskier venture.

I agree that studios probably would have loved to have a Bond film at theatres last November. But I suspect they will be happy to wait another twelve months now until it's clearer how Bond might fare in this 'new' age...

[Napoleon Solo]

Two scattered thoughts in reaction to various points made above:

--Madeline was supposed to be the second coming of Tracy. The Dec. 1, 2014 draft (one week before filming began) even ended with Bond saying, "We have all the time in the world." She never impressed me she was at Tracy's level. Personal opinion.

--I think a number of would-be distributors have their issues now. Sony is a mess. It hoped Ghostbusters would be a new franchise but it didn't turn out that way. The New York Post last week reported that Sony Corp. in Japan is entertaining bids for the movie and TV unit. Paramount was adversely affected by the Viacom soap opera. Warner Bros.' parent company is being acquired by AT&T. Of the ones who've been mentioned, Fox is the most stable. Anyway, all of that may have affected things. Also, everybody knows Sony had a bad deal the past two movies (half of the costs, only 25% of the profits). 

 

[Dustin]

The former Sony deal is a no-go for all studios. Since smaller genre films and franchises have shown a better return of investment margin with smaller budgets studios are sure to insist on a bigger slice of the cake for BOND 25. There is no way they carry half the financial risk for a quarter of the profits. They will aim for a more flexible deal that guarantees them something around 35 percent - and probably more if they break the billion dollar wall.

Which is of course not MGM's idea since they cannot touch Eon's share and need Bond for their own survival. Tricky.

[SecretAgentFan]

I wonder - with CraigBond set up to be an agent who does what he considers is right, with little regard for his superiors, would a future Bond be even more torn between his obligations and his own views of the world?  Loyalty to Her Majesty probably only can happen in little promo films for the Olympics.  The Bond of this age seems to be cut out for going on missions and then disregarding everything he thinks is bollocks.

 

This might be a way to present Bond to the outside world.  Might not sit well with the Brexit-nationalists, but it sure would be realistic to show Bond in conflict with the goals he is fighting for.