OVP: Knives Out (2019)

Film: Knives Out (2019)
Stars: Daniel Craig, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Shannon, Don Johnson, Toni Collette, Lakeith Stanfield, Christopher Plummer
Director: Rian Johnson
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Original Screenplay)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

I love Clue.  I know that like everyone loves Clue, but I LOVE Clue.  I like everything about Clue, and not just the movie (which I've seen more than any other film, once watched with my brother I think every day for a month-for two cinephile brothers, I think that's the only film we ever did something like that with, and that includes Disney films, and have a poster of it in my basement).  I collect Clue board games; I have 20 versions of the game in my hobby room closet, as well as three knockoff mystery games (13 Dead End Drive, I see you), and am hoping to make it 21 this Christmas as I have "Clue Guess Who" prominently featured at the top of my Christmas list.  I've read all of the Clue books, watched the Clue VCR game, have the Clue Christmas ornament, I buy the Clue board game chocolate every year that Target has it...I love Clue.  And as a result, I'm about as good of a candidate for something like Knives Out as you can find-a silly murder mystery with a large, talented ensemble cast is exactly what gets me to a movie theater.  Even with a plethora of more plausible Oscar contenders out (though kudos on the trio of Globe nominations!), I couldn't resist last week when I had a two hour window to go and catch Rian Johnson's latest in theaters.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film is not, of course, Clue, but it's obvious that Johnson has had a similar adoration for the franchise.  We start with Harlan Thrombey (Plummer), a wealthy mystery novelist, dying of what appears to be suicide in the opening moments of the film.  He had just finished celebrating his birthday party, one that had quite a bit of calamity with his family, and this opened the door for Benoit Blanc (Craig, sporting a ridiculous Southern accent), a noted detective, to be hired by an anonymous figure to investigate what could be a murder.  The film hosts a variety of suspects, from driven businesswoman Linda (Curtis), Harlan's favorite child, to her husband Richard (Johnson), who is having an affair, to his less successful son Walt (Shannon) who is mad that his father is driving him out of the business.  Add in a failed "Goop"-style guru daughter-in-law Joni (Collette) and a spoiled playboy grandson Ransom (Evans), and about the only person you don't suspect is Marta (de Armas), Harlan's nurse & caretaker.  Which means, of course, that Marta is both guilty and we're about to find out why she's guilty.

The best parts of Knives Out are arguably the parts I liked the least while watching it, because I am a mystery fan at heart, and love figuring out the clues as I'm going along.  We find out about a third of the way through what "actually" happened (it's a mystery-there's going to be a twist eventually) with Marta mixing up the morphine vile with Harlan's medication, thus accidentally killing him, and depriving her of her inheritance (Harlan decided to leave all of the money to his caretaker, cutting his family out of the will as a result).  We then see the steps that Marta will take to keep Benoit from finding out, knowing that if she had anything to do with Harlan's death, she'll lose the fortune which will go to Harlan's greedy & unworthy family.  As a result, this becomes more of a thriller than a mystery, as we're meant to take on the role of Marta as an audience rather than Benoit.

Upon reflection, this change in format generally works.  Johnson upends the mystery genre by giving us what we think is the answer, in the process showing what it's like to be an unreliable narrator, but in doing so the ending and the humor don't really resonate by putting someone as morally upstanding as Marta so central to the story.  The movie's best parts should be Curtis, Stanfield, and Collette, all having a blast with their characters, but they're forced into the sidelines to focus on sweet-as-pie Marta and over-acting Benoit, and since the only character whom we spend enough time with and is dynamic enough to be the eventual culprit is Evans' Ransom, we know eventually that it'll be revealed that he's the killer (by switching the labels on the bottles).

The film is fun, no question, but the entire time I saw it I kept thinking "this should be more fun."  It runs too long, isn't snappy enough outside of the initial interrogation sequences, and because it takes away the enjoyment of solving the mystery, it doesn't make us vested into the stories of the eccentric relatives.  As a result, we get relatively two-dimensional performances from people capable of so much more, and while de Armas has ability, she's kind of boring as Marta when you keep wanting to go back to the fun promised in the trailer & the movie's opening chapters.

Logan Lucky (2017)

Film: Logan Lucky (2017)
Stars: Channing Tatum, Adam Driver, Daniel Craig, Riley Keough, Katie Holmes
Director: Steven Soderbergh
Oscar History: Soderbergh had a really big 2000, but otherwise really was never Oscar's cup-of-tea...doubtful this changes things.
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

I always find it amusing, if a bit reassuring, that actors or directors who claim they are "retiring" almost always renege on their intentions to retire within a couple of years.  Yes, there are a couple of cases like Gene Hackman or Sean Connery where it seems to have stuck, but by-and-large, particularly when they're under seventy, famous figures in cinema almost always turn their back on that retirement within a few years, clearly meaning they wanted a break more so than anything else.  Steven Soderbergh is the most recent example of this, after claiming that he was retiring from the movies but then quickly returning.  Logan Lucky is his first feature-film in four years, and the director who is perhaps most well-known for loving ensemble casts at the expense of star vehicles, has lost little of his visual skill even if Logan Lucky is a bit of a trifle, albeit a tasty one.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film centers around the Logan Brothers, Jimmy (Tatum) and Clyde (Driver), two men who are down-on-their-luck, a theory that Clyde connects to their genetics.  Clyde lost his arm in Iraq, and Jimmy is recently unemployed and worried that his daughter will be leaving him as his ex-wife Bobbie Jo (Holmes) wants to move due to her successful husband getting a new job.  Jimmy decides that he wants to end his life of mediocrity and better provide for his daughter, and in the process get back at the company that fired him by robbing from the stadium he worked construction.  His plan goes array when what was initially intended to be a small-time gig turns into him being forced to rob the Coca-Cola 600, one of the biggest in the NASCAR series.  He recruits an explosives expert appropriately-named Joe Bang (Craig...and do all Soderbergh films have characters that sound like they've been plucked out of a Tarantino picture & I've just never noticed or is this unique to Logan Lucky?), and along with the Logans' sister Mellie (Keough), they orchestrate a robbery, with of course unintended consequences.

Heist movies are one of my favorite cinematic genres, as I love seeing the mechanics of how a con is put into action, and this is hardly Soderbergh's first time at the rodeo (his highest-grossing films being the Ocean's franchise), so this works well.  The film is surprisingly brisk for a picture that at first feels very slow, to the point where I thought my audience (who were not getting the deeply dry humor coming from Driver at all) might start walking out, but once the film gets into more consistent molds, it entered the territory of crowd-pleaser while maintaining an abstractness that makes the picture unique.  Soderbergh is so good at assembling strong ensembles, and while occasionally his choices don't work (Seth MacFarlane is a bit too cartoonish as a rude British businessman seems like the weakest link of the picture), the chemistry between the three siblings in particular is excellent.  Keough is an actress that I wasn't really familiar with, but I liked her breeziness with Mellie, and the way she's positioned as a "screw-up" to someone like her former sister-in-law and yet clearly the most responsible and level-headed of the Logan siblings.  She's had bit parts now in Magic Mike and Mad Max: Fury Road, as well as winning a handful of plaudits for American Honey, but I'm hoping she soon gets a star vehicle as she's clearly capable of carrying one.

The movie's ending might be a bit hard to get-your-head-around, and honestly it was a little hard for me to figure out what was happening even as it was being spelled out (the plotting feels like it missed one crucial scene toward the end, perhaps something a bit more expository for the audience), but by-and-large this is a genuinely funny and amusing movie, and well worth Soderbergh's return to the screen.  No, it doesn't rank amongst his very best pictures (which I'd wager is Magic Mike, but would buy Traffic if you argued hard-enough), but it's a lot of fun in a filmic summer that was lacking in that attribute.

Those are my thoughts on the picture-how about yours?  If you've seen it, share some of your theories, particularly over whether Sebastian Stan or Hilary Swank was your favorite cameo (my thought was it was the latter, who totally sold her by-the-book FBI agent), and if not-who do you hope Soderbergh reunites with next from his close-knit cavalcade of frequent actors?

OVP: Spectre (2015)

Film: Spectre (2015)
Stars: Daniel Craig, Christoph Waltz, Lea Seydoux, Ben Whishaw, Naomi Harris, Monica Bellucci, Ralph Fiennes
Director: Sam Mendes
Oscar History: 1 nomination/1 win (Best Original Song-"Writing's on the Wall"*)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

Grading a James Bond movie always feels a little odd, since we all know how this song-and-dance turns out.  We know we’ll get ridiculously elaborate action sequences, set pieces that feel plucked out of a Louis Vuitton add, music and babes and cars that make you wish you were a ridiculously attractive straight British man, even if that’s not a wish you’ve ever really had.  Bond films are so formulaic and such fun that it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what makes one of them the wild ride that is Skyfall and which ones are the ones that fall short, which Spectre, feeling bloated, tired, and repetitive, clearly is doing in this motion picture.

(Spoilers Ahead) Perhaps the main reason for this “meh” reaction is that we are once again enduring a Bond origin story.  After Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, and in particular the epic Skyfall haven’t we sat through enough past scenes of Bond’s beginnings?  After all, at some point the purpose of the stories is that we can continue into the world of Ian Fleming and we’ve known this iteration of Bond long enough that we want to see him grow, rather than just learn more tidbits from his past.  This is particularly frustrating in this film, as the retreads are less about the far past and more about reimagining films we saw right before our eyes.  Our new villain Oberhauser (Waltz) is intended to be the mastermind, the man who was responsible for the creations that came before played by Mads Mikkelsen and Javier Bardem far more memorably, even though we've never heard of him until now.  This is a huge problem in the script because Waltz, all staggered delivery and hammy line readings, is a considerably weaker antagonist that, say Javier Bardem’s Silva and will be quickly forgotten in the Bond pantheon.  Considering the film is predicated on him being the “greatest of them all,” the film already starts out with an unfulfilled promise to the viewers.

This is true of a lot of the characters in the film, quite frankly.  Daniel Craig’s Bond is still stuck on the series hitting far too great of heights in Casino Royale and Skyfall, with another romantic relationship on the heels of Eva Green (and, let’s face it, the emotionally jarring moments of having Judi Dench fall into the background of the movies after her untimely death as M) falling short.  I hated the fact that, despite quite liking Lea Seydoux, we saw so little of Monica Bellucci, who has the kind of stardom where I was actually stunned when she was first announced for Spectre that she had never been a Bond girl (who dropped the ball on that one?) and here she is relegated to little more than one scene.  It would have been a welcome change of pace to have a woman Bond’s age (admittedly an ageless, ridiculously gorgeous woman Bond’s age) play his love interest (or, let’s be honest here, his love interest/nemesis); that would have been a wonderful shakeup to the series and Bellucci’s scenes are almost certainly the best in the film, in my opinion, as they exude a mystery that is lacking in the rest of the picture.

That being said, the Craig years are still marked by welcome inclusions to the Bond world, and even the worst (which this isn’t-Quantum still takes that cake) can host select joys such as the great opening scene, an opening in Mexico City which manages to somehow rival Skyfall’s masterful Turkish Bazaar chase sequence.  There’s also arguably the best car of the Craig Bond years here, a sleek Aston Martin DB10 so ridiculously lush that you’ll consider selling your house (and then realize this costs more).  These sorts of posh touches, though, are more about the sustainability of the Bond franchise than anything special going on in Spectre, which is one of those movies that will quietly fade into the back of the TNT marathons, not getting a primetime spot on the lineup.

Those were my thoughts on the latest Bond installment-what are yours?  Where does this rank amongst the Daniel Craig years and do you want him back for a fifth movie or are you ready for a change?  Is anyone else sick-to-death of the Bond origin story trope?  And what woman would you like to see play a Bond girl (hopefully villain) next?  Share your thoughts below!

OVP: Defiance (2008)

Film: Defiance (2008)
Stars: Daniel Craig, Liev Schreiber, Jamie Bell, George MacKay, Alexa Davalos, Mark Feuerstein, Mia Wasikowska
Director: Edward Zwick
Oscar History: 1 nomination (Best Original Score)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 1/5 stars

Not all important subjects mean we get important movies, I think is a lesson we learn nearly every single year at the cinema.  Each year there's a number of films, some where critics are in on the joke (The Monuments Men) some where they sadly aren't (The Imitation Game) where a big, serious topic is brought to screen with absolutely no life in it.  We get neutered versions of real-life human beings and only a smattering of story about a person who deserved better.  This was surely true for the Bielski brothers, a band of four men that lived in a forest in Belarus during World War II, saving hundreds of Jews from the concentration camps.  What should have been a dramatic and fascinating look at survival instead became a cookie cutter, hyper-masculine, and boring movie that lacks any sort of style or individual stamp.

(Spoilers Ahead, though this is real life so, you know, you should know the spoilers) The film, as I stated above, is about the Bielski brothers, a group of men whose parents are killed by the Germans during World War II.  The four brothers vow revenge and head into the forest, where they are joined increasingly by a number of Jewish refugees.  The eldest brother Tuvia (Craig) finds himself at odds with his younger brother Zus (Schreiber), as Zus wants to take a more militant approach to the Germans and to surrounding farms (willing to kill for food), while Tuvia doesn't like the risk.  Zus eventually abandons them to join a Russian military group while Tuvia fights it out in the forest.  After a rough winter, the two are reconnected when the Germans are attacking (it's one of those "all is lost" moments where the cavalry comes charging in like we're in an old John Ford western).  The film ends with stories of what happened to the brothers after the war.

The story is pretty paint-by-numbers even if living it clearly was a harrowing experience.  I don't know why we didn't get more into the behind-the-scenes of the camp style sequences as a result.  We see little outside of the brothers, who are obviously in a weird position of power in the camp as they are the ones making most decisions and who frequently are on the military frontline (they're also the movie stars, so we know that they won't be dying, at least not until the end of the film).  I would have loved to have learned more about, say Mark Feuerstein's intellectual and what he thought of the warring brothers, or about any of the women (there's a recurring commentary about "forest brides" that becomes a little hippie commune that would have been fascinating to learn more about).  Women in this film, it's worth noting are treated particularly appallingly by the screenwriters.  Basically the only women that remotely get any interest from the writers or director are women that might sleep with one of the brothers.  I don't blame the women for wanting to sleep with them (Jamie Bell, y'all!), but this sort of derivative treatment of women is appalling.  It might be the 1940's in the movie, but it's 21st Century when you're making it.  Try and tell a bit of these women's stories that doesn't involve wanting one of the Bielski brothers.

The performances are not great, it's also worth noting.  I'm starting to realize that I don't really like Liev Schreiber as an actor.  His accent is thick and fine, but the rest of the performance is too calculated, constantly trying to "be in the moment" of a scene without creating the moment, and his character becomes too easy to spot in terms of anger and not letting the script (which is great) do its job.  Craig isn't much better.  I generally like his James Bond, but he finds no shading in his main character.  Jamie Bell is the actor I like the most of these three, and occasionally it feels like he might be doing something interesting (balancing hormones, anger, resentment, and two brothers with completely opposite world views, he might be the most promising character), but the script abandons him after his wedding to a then-unknown Mia Wasikowska, and we're left with the huffing of Craig and Schreiber instead.

The film received one Oscar nomination, which was for Best Score, and while I get it and James Newton Howard is an Academy favorite, of course, I think they could have tried harder.  There's nothing iconic here-this could easily be any number of other Newton Howard scores, and while it's very pretty, you should expect more than just pretty from an Oscar-nominated score.

Overall I left bored and felt bad that this is probably the definitive story of the Bielskis.  What were your thoughts on this movie?  Were you like me and wanting more?  Do you also find yourself wondering how directors can turn exciting stories into boring ones?  Which Bielski brother/actor is your favorite?  Share your thoughts in the comments!

I Wish I Were a Broadway Baby

With my class that I’ve been taking this fall (got an A on my midterm-huzzah!), I won’t be doing my twice annual trip to New York this fall, and that means that I am not getting my Broadway fix.  I did see Wicked two weeks ago with the touring company (I’ve got buckets of ideas for posts at the moment but little to no time, so I cannot promise I’ll review it, but it’s on the list!), but it’s just not the same.  I’m hungry for Shubert Alley and for signed playbills and for mesmerizing moments in a darkened Manhattan auditorium.  By all accounts I should be avoiding Broadway World and Playbill websites and just focusing on my April journey.

But I’m a masochist, and decided to look at the shows that I would have seen had I gone.  I usually pick by selecting the Top 7 shows that I want to see and then asking my travelling companions what 4-5 they want to see.  Since I’m not going with anyone, I’m going to do all of the ranking.  Here are my choices:

7. Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (playing the Stephen Sondheim)

I normally don’t sign onto jukebox musicals (they’re never as good as a true original or a revival), but put Jessie Mueller’s name in the cast and that’s enough for me.  Mueller was dynamite in The Mystery of Edwin Drood a while back and received a Tony nod for On a Clear Day… in 2012 and her getting a lead role is something I fully support.

6. The Snow Geese (playing the Samuel J. Friedman)

Mary-Louise Parker has through the years enjoyed great success in bit film roles and major success with television series like Weeds and The West Wing.  The theater, however, has also been very good to her; she got a Tony nod for both Prelude to a Kiss and Reckless and won every theater award known to man for her turn in Proof.  I’ve never had the pleasure of seeing her on the stage, and this play (the plot of which sounds intriguing-I love melancholy in my theater) should be a great showcase for her talents.

5. A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder (playing the Walter Kerr)

I’ve only had the pleasure of seeing Jefferson Mays, who also won every award known to man for I Am My Own Wife, once on stage, and in a supporting role (Gore Vidal’s The Best Man) so I would want to see what he can do with a spry, game book, which this musical about murder (always a great topic for a musical) seems to be.

4. Twelfth Night/Richard III (playing the Belasco)

Seeing Mark Rylance on stage is a thing of wonder.  I have never seen a performance I was so enthralled by than his work as Rooster in Jerusalem, and I’ve heard he’s absolutely aces when it comes to Shakespeare, and for those lucky enough to see it, this is the first time he’s done the Bard on Broadway.  Of the two, I’d be most excited to see Twelfth Night, if only to see Tony nominee Samuel Barnett as Viola (the casts will feature all men).

3. The Glass Menagerie (playing the Booth)

Ever since his murderous turn on AHS: Asylum, I have been very drawn to Zachary Quinto as an actor (as a person, I still can’t get over that anyone would breakup with Jon Groff-CRAZY!!!).  Add to that this is an iconic Tennessee Williams play and that if anyone can breathe life into the role every “actress of a certain age” plays at some point in her career, it’s Cherry Jones as Amanda Wingfield, and I’m onboard.

2. Betrayal (playing the Ethel Barrymore)

I could pretend to be ultra-sophisticated and talk about what a profound effect Harold Pinter has had on the theater, but I’ve never read anything by Harold Pinter.  Sometimes Broadway is all about seeing a movie star live, and when you have real-life couple Daniel Craig and Oscar-Winner Rachel Weisz tackling the boards, you simply have to get excited.

1. Big Fish (playing the Neil Simon)

Norbert Leo Butz.  In a musical.  This is all you need for number one.  I heart Freddy.

Those are my Broadway productions I would be most excited about if I was better at money management-if you’ve seen any, share in the comments!  And what Broadway productions are you most excited for for the fall?

OVP: Skyfall (2012)

Film: Skyfall (2012)
Stars: Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Berenice Marlohe, Ben Whishaw, Albert Finney
Director: Sam Mendes
Oscar History: 5 nominations/2 wins (Best Sound Editing*, Sound Mixing, Cinematography, Original Score, Original Song-"Skyfall"*)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

I must admit freely that, because of my Millennial background, that even with my love of classic film, the first Bond that comes to my mind is Daniel Craig.  He wasn't the first Bond I was introduced to in theaters (that would be the tail-end of the Brosnan years), but for me, when I think Bond I go to Daniel Craig in Casino Royale (let's be honest, I think of him emerging from the water in those blue swim trunks, but that's an entirely different matter).

(With high-profile movies, I consider everything about the film a spoiler, so I'll just give you a head's up that we're hitting spoilers both light and heavy soon, so proceed at your own risk) It's important to note this, as I go in with none of the prejudices against him because he's blond or tougher or a little sexually androgynous (more on that later), and can just dive right into the film at hand, which is a doozy.  We open with Bond trying to run down a man in Instanbul (along with the comely Naomie Harris, a mysterious agent with MI6, and one of two "Bond girls" in the film), we get to see one of the best action sequences in years, complete with motorcycling across the Grand Bazaar and a train being cut in half, and Bond inexplicably going over a waterfall, presumed dead, with the bad guy getting away, and remarkably none of the cavalcade of bullets reaching their target.  As his body enters the water, the iconic typography starts to roll across the screen and Adele pronounces, "this is the end..." and little do we know that she's truly speaking about a major character in the film and that she's giving away some rather large plot points, albeit ambiguously.  Then again, it's Adele, so really you're just so wrapped up in the buttery silk of her voice that it's hard to focus on the actual lyrics.

As the film continues, we get confirmation that the target of this film, and indeed the primary focus of this film, is going to be M, giving Judi Dench a chance to shine in the movie.  We also see that, of course, James Bond has not perished after being shot and thrown down a waterfall (because who could that ever kill?), and once MI6 headquarters is attacked, Bond reappears either out of duty or out of his devotion to M, something not clear at the time, though it appears to be more the latter as the film continues.

This leads Bond to Shanghai, where Craig is given yet another exotic locale to do stunning acrobatics.  In this film we get a nod to the slightly aging (but still sexy as hell) Daniel Craig, as he doesn't pass his physical field tests to get back to work as an agent, but M puts him out there anyway.  A telling nod to this is when Bond is hanging on to the bottom of an elevator and can barely hang on.  I will note that for me, who has a nasty fear of high, open spaces, this sequence was probably the most "turn-away-from-the-screen," and this is a film that includes a man pulling a bullet from his body.  Watching Bond sail up that open elevator shaft, 100 stories from the ground, was a great action visual, as well as a bit nauseating.

Before this feat of daring, we are also briefly introduced to the new Q, the hauntingly beautiful Ben Whishaw, who has a fun way of playing with Bond's head, continually perpetuating the age-issue by being considerably younger than Bond, and constantly messing with him about his seniority.

After killing the assassin, in true Bond fashion, he also finds a woman, the beautiful Severine, and we get perhaps the only good pickup scene in a movie where Bond is fairly celibate, compared to his usual outings.  Marlohe, unlike say Eva Green a few years back, doesn't get enough time or enough depth to showcase any sort of acting talent, other than the ability to make her nails both alluring and look like daggers.  In his pursuit of Marlohe, who will lead her to her captor, Raoul Silva, Bond gets a hilarious sequence with a pair of komodo dragons, and then he is invited to Silva's private island in the middle of presumably the South China Sea (it's a little hard to tell, considering it seems like you're going through an entire season of Anthony Bourdain locales in one movie during a Bond film).  Of course, before he goes into the island, Bond seduces Severine in the shower, because he is of course James Bond.

And this is where we finally meet Javier Bardem's Silva.  Silva is a villain in the classic sense of the film, one that could rank alongside Goldfinger in terms of grand scale ruthlessness and hambone theatrics.  In their introduction scene, we get the scene that everyone will be talking about coming out of the film, the scene where Bardem, after revealing part of his plan to Bond (a former agent at MI6, he clearly loathes and obsesses over M, and wants to see her destroyed), he does some heavy flirting with Bond, playing with his chest and face, and insinuates that there's a "first time for everything," meaning indulging in the love that dare not speak its name, to which Bond replies, "what makes you think it's my first time?" It's a clever way to the end the scene, but it begs the question of if there was a Bond boy mixed in with the multitude of Bond girls?

The film progresses from there, with Silva seemingly always ahead of Bond, and having the cunning and flamboyant malice of a Batman villain.  We see M crucified by the press for not being able to handle the situation, and even before a Minister of the British government (played by Helen McCrory in a bit part, and I have to say the entire time that I was thinking "Cherie Blair is in Parliament!") it is questioned whether or not MI6 serves a purpose anymore in a post-Cold War world.  This is followed by a round of bullets coming from Silva's men on the committee hearing, which of course answers the question with a resounding "yes!" better than anything M ever could say.

The film finally reaches its conclusion (though its pacing is brisk and you never really notice the length, the film is over two hours long) at Skyfall, the manor of Bond's boyhood, where we are treated to Albert Finney in a fun cameo as the gameskeeper of the estate (though wouldn't you have loved to have seen Connery take on the role, considering the 50th anniversary implications?), who, along with M and Bond, build a fortress out of this building and sustain Silva's attacks for quite a while, before the estate bursts into flames.  M is shot in the film, and in the penultimate scene of the movie, she dies in Bond's arms (Silva having already gotten a knife in the back from Bond, the "old-fashioned" way), and we are eventually introduced to the new M (Ralph Fiennes, always sturdy in the film, getting just enough wryness out of his character to ensure that he'll make a solid future leader for MI6).


Clearly after devoting 1000-words to the film, I must admit to liking it, and I did.  Though it's not quite as good as Casino Royale was six years ago (that may perch next to Goldfinger in the "untouchable" Bond film excellence category), it's a brisk and taut action thriller.  Craig, a fine actor on top of being dead sexy and "just-enough-of-a-bad-boy" to fill the Bond shoes, is once again top-notch after his novocaine-headache of a performance in Quantum of Solace four years ago.  Both Bardem and Dench sink their teeth into their respective roles, with Bardem clearly having a blast as Silva and Dench making an indelible mark as one of the best performers in the Bond series.  The movie's action sequences are sublime, though there are some other marks that fall a little short, particularly the complete lack of interest in the two Bond girls in the final half of the movie.  The movie also seems to borrow a bit from the Dark Knight franchise, not necessarily a bad thing, but you don't want Bond to get into the orphaned child story or the constant search for a parental figure too deeply.  You want him armed with sleek guns, bodacious babes (of either gender, apparently), and exotic locales.  But these are very minor quibbles in an otherwise excellent movie, and the entire film has me raring to go for the next 50 years of England's deadliest weapon.

And I shall now hand it over to you with food for thought-what did you think of Skyfall?  Where does it rank on your personal Bond list?  And with several of the Bond staples recast (Q, M, Moneypenny), who are you hoping will become the next villain, love interest, and Bond theme-singer for the next movie?

Olympics Image of the Day (Day 1)

Day 1: I'm aware that it's already Day 3, but I've been busy, well, watching the Olympics.  I love the Olympics as much as I love movies and politics, though I don't get to talk about it more than once every two years, so I'm going to indulge with a picture each day.  I'll be picking my favorite picture/moment of each day throughout (expect a lot of the swimmers-my favorite event).  Since this combined three of my personal passions (the Royals, the cinema, and the Olympics), it seemed like a no brainer.  Danny Boyle, well done.