Gendo. 2024.

[Gendo]

45. Escape Room (2017) - The one by Will Wernick, not the other one from the same year with the same title (the other one is also often listed as 2018, because that's when it was released in the US). And not the 2019 better-known one. Yeah it's confusing... Anyway, this movie was pretty bad, but I had a lot of fun watching it. All the characters were extremely unlikeable, seemingly intentionally so, and the actors really played into that that; they were enjoyable over-the-top. The biggest issue was the weird anticlimactic ending. They were building up to what would have been a really dumb twist, but then instead you just get a weird "there is no twist" type thing that doesn't make any sense.

46. Skylark (1993) - The sequel to Sarah, Plain and Tall. Better than the first one, I think. The story was more impactful, and you really felt the hardships that they had to endure. I liked the overall theme of not wanting to give up on the land due to your passion for it even in the face of much easier choices. And Glenn Close was fantastic.

[Gendo]

R16. X-Men: Days of Future Past - The last good X-Men movie, not counting Logan or Deadpool that is. Watched The Rogue Cut for what it's worth. In general going on a side-quest to rescue Rogue was a dumb thing that really hurt the overall pacing, but it did lead to a great scene of intercutting the 2 time periods. As a whole this is a good movie that holds up. They actually managed to make the sentinels intimidating, which was cool. And as with most X-Men movies, there's a lot of good non-action stuff with the characters and dialogue. The action itself was ok, but especially good when Magneto was doing his stuff. And of course that Quicksilver scene.

[Gendo]

47. Finding Dory (2016) - Still beautiful to look at and overall well made. But the story never had much of a chance at holding up to the stakes of a father trying to find his lost son. But my biggest issue was the lack of realism... maybe silly thing to say about a movie about talking fish, but in the first movie, it felt like the most unrealistic thing that happened, physicality-wise, was the fish at the end pushing their plastic bags out the window. In this movie, halfway though I found myself noticing how the fish were doing so much more ridiculously impossible physical feats in terms of getting around outside the ocean. And that was before the climax where an octopus literally drives a car down the highway. Sure things like that can happen in cartoons, but Finding Nemo was never the sort of cartoon where something like that would feel in place. Albert Brooks was great again, as was Ed O'Neill.

48. Dil Se.. (1998) - Fantastic film. The music numbers were all extremely enjoyable with a lot of really beautiful shots. As a whole there was a lot of beautiful sets and great cinematography. The story was quite deep with a likeable protagonist. Really it was like watching 2 very different films back-to-back, though they also made sense together. Before the intermission, we get a quirky and lighthearted love story about a guy pursuing a woman that he's fallen in love with, and trying to unravel her mysterious past while getting her to open up. Filled with music numbers that show the love through dance. Then after the intermission, we get an action thriller about trying to stop a group of terrorists from blowing up a parade. And it all connects together in a way that makes sense. It is a pretty sudden tonal shift, and I preferred the first half, but that's ok.

[Gendo]

49. Sarah, Plain & Tall: Winter's End (1999) - The final installment (of the movies, anyway; there were a couple more books after this). This one was still well done, but a bit weird because it really didn't seem to fit the themes of the other ones. The whole thing was about the singular event of Walken's father suddenly showing up after having left his family when Walken was a kid. It's was pretty irrelevant that they were farmers in the early 1900s in the middle of nowhere. The first ones were both all about the struggles of that type of lifestyle back then. Here, the same plot could have taken place anywhere at any time. Jack Palance was pretty great, and it was heartwarming enough.

[Gendo]

50. The Long Kiss Goodnight (1996) - Lots of fun. Shane Black really is the master of action-comedy. which is one of my favorite genres. The actual action itself was fairly typical 90s stuff, but the dialog and characters were great.

R17. Avengers: Endgame (2019) - 5 years later, and yeah I still love it. In my defense, I only watched it again as something to put on the background to help fall asleep. What stood out most to me this time was Silvestri's score. Pretty sure he's my second-favorite after Horner. Also, the way the film so perfectly wraps up an entire 22-film saga actually makes me mad that the MCU kept going after that. Even though there have been some good films among all the mediocre one in the past 5 years, I'd rather those films have been their own thing having nothing to do with these 22 films. They had the perfect ending and then just didn't know when to stop. Kind of like Scrubs not ending after season 8.

[Gendo]

R18. Panic Room (2002) - Definitely one of the best home invasion movies out there, though it's not exactly a field filled with tough competition. Generally just good suspense and an interesting plot. I never realized before this time around that that was Jared Leto.

51. Spartacus (1960) - Very impressive. Several scenes that were just so massive in scope; especially the marching of the troops before the final battle. Kirk Douglas was great, as were all the actors. My only real complaint was that it dragged on a bit after the final battle; lost some of its momentum when it went back to politics again. Also, as great as the "I'm Spartacus" scene was, it's overall impact was lessened a bit when he's captured and discovered just the same. But still, a pretty great movie as a whole.

[Gendo]

Finished M*A*S*H last night. Under 5 months for all 11 seasons. As a whole, quite a good show, but not one of my all-time favorites. I think Trapper was a better character than BJ, except in the few episodes where they actually focused on BJ. But most of the time, he was just pointless, and felt weird that they felt the need to actually directly 1:1 replace Trapper. Similar with Frank vs Charles. I don't like what they did with Frank... for a moment it seemed like he was getting some good character growth, and then in his last couple seasons he just slid way downhill in terms of how well-written he was. Charles got some great character growth, and the episodes where he was "good" were some of the best. Though it was inconsistent; he didn't get gradually better, he just bounced between being good and bad. Finally, I'm mad about Radar leaving. He was by far my favorite character.

[Gendo]

52. Mr. Imperium (1951) - Pretty charming, but nothing special. The leads had good chemistry and the singing was quite good.

[Gendo]

53. People Are Funny (1946) - Based on the radio/television game show. Pretty amusing, with some great musical acts and physical comedy. But not a whole lot to the story, characters, or dialogue. Overall an ok film.

So tonight marked the beginning of Bond-a-Thon; an event I originally planned over 4 years ago (it would have been in 2020 if not for COVID). I've only ever seen the Brosnan Bonds along with the first couple Craig ones, so lots of new movies will get watched over the next month. I'll try to do write-ups after each film so that I don't get them mixed up in my mind when writing about them.

54. Dr. No (1962) - Quite good! An interesting and intricate plot, an overall mysterious and suspenseful atmosphere, and some great charm and one-liners from Connery. The theme music was great, though a bit overused when it just always started playing whenever Bond was walking around. It had a fun style to the whole thing. I was surprised at the lack of gadgetry, as that's what I always associated James Bond with. He doesn't use any spy tools whatsoever here. I guess that evolves later. Similar with big action setpieces. Much more grounded than the Brosnan ones.

[Gendo]

55. From Russia with Love (1963) - Overall a solid follow-up to the last one. Kind of a weird combination of more grounded and less grounded. The plot itself was more grounded, being a more straight-forward spy thriller, while it started to introduce the crazy gadgets and bigger action. It was nice to see his supernatural ability to charm any woman actually work towards the plot this time (whereas him seducing Sylvia Trench had basically no effect on the plot). Robert Shaw felt a bit wasted, he was built up as a great antagonist but then basically didn't do anything. The attack on the gypsy camp and the fight in the train car were both particularly good.

[Gendo]

56. Goldfinger (1964) - I really liked it. Quite a surprising shift in tone though. I knew that it would get more ridiculous and less grounded than what I saw in the first two, but I thought it would be a more gradual slope. Instead, they kind of just go all out right away. Goldfinger and Oddjob both make great villains, and Goldfinger's scheme was interestingly unique. Though Bond does spend a lot of the film in captivity, which isn't exactly exciting. And him seducing Pussy Galore to save the whole day was a pretty bad deus ex machina. I really liked the music though, and the visuals as a whole were good.

[Gendo]

57. Thunderball (1965) - Still good, but not as good as the rest so far. It lost a lot of the silliness of Goldfinger, which makes sense given that it went back to the original director. It starts with him using a literal jetpack, and then never has anything nearly that silly afterwards. The climax was quite good; from the men parachuting out of the plane to the epic underwater battle. But once the battle ended, the ending felt very rushed. Bad guy dies, and it's almost instantly roll credits. The biggest issue it had was the lack of memorable characters. The villain was just fine, and I liked the scene of Spectre's status briefing meeting. But no one had as much personality as Dr. No or Goldfinger, or the sidekicks that Bond got in the first 2.

[Raxivace]

Thunderball is where I think the Connery era kinda falls off, though its interesting that it lead to that weird legal nonsense that lead to the movie being remade more or less as Never Say Never Again.

[Gendo]

So my event doesn't include Never Say Never Again or Casino Royale (Niven). 25 official Eon films only. Some day I'll get around to the others probably, but they aren't in my collection currently.

[Gendo]

58. You Only Live Twice (1967) - Really liked this one, possibly my favorite so far. I do think the villains were still nowhere near as good as in Goldfinger, but the overall story and action were great. A lot of really impressive sets and action sequences. And some really insane behind the scenes stuff. We watched "Inside You Only Live Twice" right after, a 30 minute documentary that came with my DVD bonus features. A lot of amazing (and tragic) stories about the making of the film. I do wish it had a bit more humor as a whole.

[Gendo]

59. On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) - Didn't really like this one for the most part. The biggest issue was the overall cinematography... there was a lot of really awkward camera work; especially during the fight scenes. It was often hard to even tell which character was which in the one-on-one fights, and a lot of very rapid cutting combined with confusing angles made them pretty bad. On top of that, the sound editing during the fights made it seem like one of those old low-budget kung fu movies. The story wasn't bad, but not great either. Bond spent way too much time just undercover at the treatment center; pretty boring stuff there. I've seen people refer to the movie as "non-stop action", and really wonder if they watched the same film I just did. The stuff with Tracy and her dad was interesting but also weird. On the positive side, the scenes of the mountains and the action scenes with the skiing and the luges were all really pretty and impressive.

I read up a bit on other opinions, and it seems that in recent years, more people have been saying that they love this film and it's one of their favorite Bonds, if not their actual favorite. I see Maz said that it's his favorite, and Eva put it at #4. But I also know I'm not just crazy, the 3 people I just watched it with shared my criticisms.

[Gendo]

60. Diamonds Are Forever (1971) - I think it was just fine. The action/fights were a noticeable improvement over the previous one, even if the plot was a bit more boring heist film.. up until the last act, anyway. The multiple Blofelds thing was silly but fun. It was a somewhat strange transition from the cold opening of him hunting down Blofeld to the rest of the film, with a pretty big shift in tone. I do think Connery was too old here. Even though it was only 4 years after his last outing, he appears to have aged more than that in between, and it shows in both appearance and physicality.

[Lord_Lyndon]

60. Diamonds Are Forever (1971) - I think it was just fine. The action/fights were a noticeable improvement over the previous one, even if the plot was a bit more boring heist film.. up until the last act, anyway. The multiple Blofelds thing was silly but fun. It was a somewhat strange transition from the cold opening of him hunting down Blofeld to the rest of the film, with a pretty big shift in tone. I do think Connery was too old here. Even though it was only 4 years after his last outing, he appears to have aged more than that in between, and it shows in both appearance and physicality.

I was waiting till you get to this one so I could say something. Diamonds Are Forever (1971) was franzkabuki's favourite Bond film. His second favourite was Live and Let Die (1973). I found this on the list of his favourite films. I will post this list here so we can remember him by this.
From his imdb profile:

Top 10

Scarface
Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas
INLAND EMPIRE
Barton Fink
Lost Highway
The Shining
Taxi Driver
Days Of Heaven
Mulholland Dr
Apocalypse Now

11 - 25
The Big Lebowski
Dog Day Afternoon
Barry Lyndon
Brazil
Eyes Wide Shut
Jackie Brown
Fire Walk With Me
Zerkalo
Rosemary`s Baby
Diamonds Are Forever
Short Cuts
Miami Vice
The Tenant
Vertigo
Badlands

26-49
Last Year At Marienbad
Nosferatu: Phantom der Nacht
Who`s Afraid Of Virgina Woolf?
Blade Runner
Fargo
Blue Velvet
Prince Of The City
Boogie Nights
Out Of The Past
The Godfather Part 2
The Long Goodbye
The Hudsucker Proxy
Live And Let Die
Delicatessen
Point Blank
Blood Simple
The Player
Don`t Look Now
Sunset Blvd
My Son My Son What Have Ye Done
Night Moves
Glengarry Glen Ross
The Passenger
Klute

[Gendo]

I don't think I knew him, but it is comforting to see that I'm not the only one who prefers Diamonds are Forever to On Her Majesty's Secret Service. I also see that he put Jackie Brown above Pulp Fiction, as I did (assuming he saw Pulp Fiction, anyway).

[Lord_Lyndon]

I don't think I knew him, but it is comforting to see that I'm not the only one who prefers Diamonds are Forever to On Her Majesty's Secret Service. I also see that he put Jackie Brown above Pulp Fiction, as I did (assuming he saw Pulp Fiction, anyway).

He saw Pulp Fiction and he loved it. It was his second favourite Tarantino film. He saw much more films than me in his life. He saw at least 500 more films than me.

[Gendo]

Well Bond will return on Wednesday. Until then...

R19. 2012 (2009) - The effects are overall terrible, and the main characters are extremely cliché. But I still like it. I like that it's mostly about humanity, moreso than other disaster films. It's not about how we deal with or prevent the disaster; it's about how we face it. It's just basic over-the-top fun that you expect from Emmerich. I'd say as a whole The Day After Tomorrow is a better film, but they somehow manage to be different enough that there's room for both. Mostly in that 2012 just goes way bigger. I also really like how global it is, in terms of not having the United States or its government be the focus.

[Gendo]

3 things I forgot to mention with 2012. I also liked the general commentary on class warfare and the special privileges of the rich. Not deep or insightful or anything, but I thought it worked well. Danny Glover was pretty terrible as the president. And Woody Harrelson was excellent.

[Gendo]

R20. Stranger than Fiction (2006) - One of the best comedies out there. Super original, heartwarming, interesting, and excellent cast. Emma Thompson is especially great, but everyone is excellent.

61. Live and Let Die (1973) - I quite enjoyed this overall. The funniest Bond film so far, and really only the second one to really lean into the silliness. I do think it lacked some of the intensity and importance that many of the other films have had; it felt more like a general silly and over-the-top action movie than a spy movie. Not sure how to judge Roger Moore... I think he was fine overall, but definitely leaned more into Bond's silly side. Connery's bond felt more capable of actually being a top-notch spy. I never knew before now that the song Live and Let Die was made for a Bond movie. Probably the only Bond song that went on to general fame? All of the villains really looked like they were having a blast. Not quite as interesting as Odd Job, but it was just a lot of fun to watch them have fun. The whole boat chase and Louisiana sheriff thing was a bit too long, and aside from some good stunts as part of the boat chase, the movie probably could have just been shortened to not include the cops at all.

[Faustus5]

61. Live and Let Die (1973) - I quite enjoyed this overall.

This was the first Bond film I ever saw, at a drive in when I was a kid. I had never heard of Bond by this point and had zero expectations, but I was blown away and instantly became a fanatic Bond fan.

I don't know if you've covered The Man With the Golden Gun yet, but I had the privilege of writing the RPG module for that one, which financed me moving out on my own in my late teen years. I got sent an official copy of the script, which was pretty cool. (When I was young it was my favorite in the series, but. . .well, my feelings have changed.)

[Raxivace]

It's a shame Man With a Golden Gun isn't better because Bond vs. Christopher Lee should be a killer premise for a movie.

[Gendo]

I don't know if you've covered The Man With the Golden Gun yet, but I had the privilege of writing the RPG module for that one, which financed me moving out on my own in my late teen years. I got sent an official copy of the script, which was pretty cool. (When I was young it was my favorite in the series, but. . .well, my feelings have changed.)

That's really cool! The Man with the Golden Gun is tomorrow night.

[Gendo]

62. The Man with the Golden Gun (1974) - Not terrible, but mostly boring. The wackiness of the last film was gone, but it wasn't replaced with any sort of good serious spy stuff either. Nothing felt important or interesting here. I like the idea of a villain who simply seems himself and Bond as being the same, and Christopher Lee was fine at doing that. Goodnight was just terrible; a pointless Bond girl who was just a really lame attempt at comic relief I guess. I've been generally avoiding reading other reviews of these until after I watch them and write up my thoughts, but I did read Rax's post already this time; and I definitely agree that Sheriff Pepper didn't need to return. Although he's a fun character for a certain type of movie; a James Bond movie isn't it.

[Gendo]

63. The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) - Compared to the last film, at least this wasn't as boring and it felt more like an actual Bond film. But it was pretty stupid and not all that well made. Some poor effects and really lame jokes. The playing of the Lawrence of Arabia theme did make me laugh, but then it also felt almost like an insult to reference such a great movie. The subplot of XXX wanting to get revenge for her boyfriend's death was completely mishandled, to the point that by the time it gets to the scene where the discovered Bond was his killer, I had completely forgotten that she had a dead boyfriend that she had sworn revenge for. I'm mixed on Jaws... he was a neat villain, but not all that interesting. The extremely 70s disco music was kind of distracting. I had no idea that Nobody Does it Better was a Bond song, though; making it the second Bond song that I knew as just a regular song, but didn't know it was from a Bond film. But as a whole, it was fun, and as a whole I think I'm preferring the ones that lean into the fun and silly side, while also still missing the better-made films such as the first two.

[Gendo]

64. Moonraker (1979) - Pretty lame. Goofy but not funny. Terrible effects, forgettable story. Also sort of the same story as the last one. Jaws' sudden turn to goo felt forced. I did appreciate the Close Encounters of the Third Kind musical easter egg. But The Magnificent Seven one just made it seem like a lame modern-day parody film. Some of the action like the hang gliding and parachuting was neat enough.

[Gendo]

R21. Happy Gilmore (1996) - Not Bond, but it does have Jaws in it! A pretty good movie that mostly holds up. Definitely a product of its time; I don't think it would be a big hit if made today. But it has some great quotable lines, and Sandler is overall charming. His anger outbursts are mostly dumb and not good comedy, but what works is his kind-heartedness and innocence. Like how he immediately thinks of offering the homeless guy the job as his caddy. Stuff like that just makes you really want to root for him.

65. For Your Eyes Only (1981) - Not sure if it's the movie's fault or if it's just a dozen Bond films in a row, but this is probably the least memorable one so far. I thought the music was a really weird fit for the most part, but I did really like the Bond theme mix that was used in the submarine scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22FbOhG2l_w. And yeah I'm talking about the music because I don't have much else to say. It was just all over the place in terms of story and tone. I did like Topol, not just for Topol but also for his character.

And the cold opening... that was really something else. Ridiculously goofy to the point of parody; I thought it was establishing the tone for the film.. but it wasn't at all. I was so confused as to why Blofeld was brought back for that single scene so I had to look it up... and it's a pretty great story. Basically that wasn't technically Blofeld, because they didn't have the rights to Blofeld or Spectre. Kevin McClory had won those rights in the whole Thunderball legal battle thing, and was at the time working on producing his own Never Say Never Again version of Thunderball. So this opening scene was apparently put into For Your Eyes Only purely as a big FU to McClory; to say "hey we don't need you or your Blofeld to make our Bond movies".

[Gendo]

66. Octopussy (1983) - Fairly hit-or-miss. Some of the action and humor was great, but it also had plenty of bad writing. The climax, from chasing down a plane on a horse to hanging onto the outside of a plane in mid-flight, is probably the most ridiculously impossible thing Bond's done so far. The cold opening with the mini-plane was pretty great, and it also had other various fun gadgets, like the fake crocodile. Also notable was the diegetic Bond theme. Roger Moore is for sure showing his age at this point; also he seemed to be hamming it up more than usual (which was already a lot).

Interesting is that in the same year, Connery Connery played Bond in Never Say Never Again, and I read that that movie has several references to how he's clearly too old (he was already too old 12 years prior). And yet... Roger Moore was 3 years older than Sean Connery!

[Gendo]

67. A View to a Kill (1985) - Not very good, but what stands out is just how not Bond it felt. It was just like any random low-budget cheesy 80s action flick. Roger Moore is ridiculously old now (as he said so himself about this film). I should have known Christopher Walken would be a Bond villain at some point, but I didn't actually know he was until now. He wasn't that great in it, either. I think older Walken would have done better. So ends the age of Moore. As a whole he was ok, just not suave enough.

[Gendo]

68. The Living Daylights (1987) - Overall much better than the last film. It felt more like Bond, it had an interesting plot and good music. But Bond himself was a very different character than we've seen so far. Apparently Dalton's Bond is actually more accurate to the character from Flemming's original books. But it's hard to get used to after seeing this other Bond for so long. Also a more grounded story, and overall not a lot of humor. It was nice to see the awesome car stuff back again; it had been several films now where it was all planes or boats.

And some interesting backstory to it; Pierce Brosnan was actually offered the part, and due to the his popularity from him being the new Bond, his show Remington Steele was un-canceled. But then he was let go as Bond because the show was un-canceled. And then the show was re-canceled was he was no longer popular. Only to finally come back and be the new Bond 8 years later. Also Sam Neill was almost offered the role. I could have definitely seen a younger Sam Neill as Bond.

[Raxivace]

Dalton's Bond and movies are underrated IMO.

I've heard that about Brosnan before but it makes me wonder why there were so many years between License to Kill and GoldenEye.

[Gendo]

Yeah in general I’m curious what happened after License that suddenly went from Bond every 2 years since 1962 to suddenly a 6 year gap.

[Gendo]

69. Licence to Kill (1989) - Surprisingly good. A much darker film than any of the others so far (unless you count the very ending scene in OHMSS). I liked Dalton more here; a wider range of emotion and some real humanity in the performance. A bit more charming, though still far from the happy-go-lucky Bond from all the other films. The plot was a very straight-forward revenge tale, which is a pretty big departure from Bond (again, if you exclude the very beginning of DAF). But the overall writing and filmmaking felt like Bond. It was also really nice to see Q get some more importance to the plot.

So ends the very short run of Timothy Dalton's Bond. I wish he had gotten more; especially if he'd taken over Roger Moore before his last couple. Coming up is several films that I've technically seen before, though the only one I remember very well is Die Another Day (you might notice it's the only one I've written up here; since it's the only once I've seen since 2016).

[Gendo]

R22. Punch-Drunk Love (2002) - Man I love this film. Just everything about it. There's just a crazy energy in the performances and camera work. Some beautiful long takes in there too. The story is weird, but when it's romantic, it's really romantic.

R23. GoldenEye (1995) - Solid Bond entry, though as a whole not quite as fun as I remembered.The tank chase scene was great, and I wish it had more stuff like that. The ending climax at the satellite was really well done also. Weirdly, the Bond theme was very lacking in use... the tank scene was the only place it came out at all. Some earlier movies I found they overused the theme, but it definitely felt underused here. An overall dark tone also; I think I would have liked to see Dalton take this one on.

[Gendo]

R24. Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) - I'm gonna be probably controversial and say I liked this better than GoldenEye. Jonathan Pryce gave us one of the best main villains in a long time, with the charisma and over-the-top plan. Brosnan played a more rounded Bond that felt a bit more like the Connery and Moore days. I really only remembered the remote control car scene and the motorcycle chase scene; the rest was like watching a new movie. Michelle Yeoh was of course great, and it had quite a supporting cast. Vincent Schiavelli, Terri Hatcher, Joe Don Baker back again. Oh and Gerard Butler, I kid you not! His second ever movie, with 1 whole speaking line.

[Raxivace]

I don't think its better than GoldenEye, but I do think Tomorrow Never Dies is pretty underrated. Pryce is one of the better modern character actors out there.

[Gendo]

70. Of Mice and Men (1992) - Excellent. Gary Sinise and John Malkovich were both wonderful; though I admit to some bias as a fan of both of them. Also, I always love Ray Walston, but I especially loved him here. But really it was the story of friendship and hope; juxtaposed against the almost constant threat of it all falling apart. Hard to describe how much I just really wanted these two friends to get to get their happy ending, while also having this sense that somehow I knew they wouldn't get to. I hadn't read the book or seen any other film versions; so I didn't know the plot or ending.

R25. Volcano (1997) - Standard over-the-top disaster stuff. Generally a fun time. I wish it had a few less clichés though. The anti-racism message was really awkward and forced. The effects mostly held up, though. And I like the way the city itself was so important to the plot. Overall I think I prefer Dante's Peak for a Volcano disaster film; though I haven't seen that one in a long time either.

R26. The World Is Not Enough (1999) - I don't think this was as bad as I was expecting from its reputation, but mostly it was just fairly bland. Unlike the last couple Brosnan movies, I don't think I actually remembered anything at all about this one. The story places a lot of emphasis on Elektra as a twist villain, but I don't think she made a very good or interesting villain. Renard could have made a good villain with the concept of him not being able to feel pain; but they really didn't do anything with it, and he ended up basically being a henchman. John Cleese's introduction was a lot of fun. The bit of dialogue hinting at Q's possible retirement hits differently knowing that it wasn't actually planned to be Desmond Llewelyn's last Bond film, but he tragically died in a car accident shortly after the movie was released.

[Gendo]

R27. Die Another Day (2002) - So ends the Brosnan era, with a fairly bad movie that had a few really fun parts. The super car vs super car thing was great, and I'm surprised we hadn't already seen it in a Bond film. The fencing scene was great just for how ridiculously quickly it escalated. And Bond's general capture, release, and then escape from MI6 made for a generally compelling opening. Basically everything until he gets to Cuba. But the overall story was just too much. Having 3 main villains failed for the same reason having 2 failed in the last one. The effects are infamously bad. Halle Berry's character didn't need to be in the movie at all and just added bloat. And the whole weird Power Glove thing with the bad guy at the end was just dumb. I think I'd still put this above World, though.

[Gendo]

R28. Casino Royale (2006) - Also practically not a rewatch; may have been theaters when I last saw it. It was overall quite a good film. I'm not sure how I feel about Daniel Craig's Bond... it's very similar to Timothy Dalton's, but Dalton may have done better at "that Bond". I would have liked at least a little more humor here. But the action was probably the best in any Bond so far, and the concept of a young Bond who's still learning the ropes is quite interesting. Similar to OHMSS, I don't think a love story really works with Bond though. And there was just a bit too much of it in the second half. A few different scenes could have been shortened, I think. The villain was good, but he had a very anticlimactic ending. To sum it all up, probably a better movie than a Bond movie.

[Gendo]

71. Oppenheimer (2023) - Awesome movie. Pretty much lives up to its high reputation. I didn't know it was possible for a biopic comprised of almost nothing but dialogue could be so intense and exciting throughout. A lot of the film felt like it was the climax in the energy it had. It reminded me of Dunkirk in the way the constant sound/music just kept building tension. The acting was phenomenal all around, especially from Blunt and Downey. Also, I had no idea that was Gary Oldman until looking up info about the film afterwards. A lot of amazing performances though.

R29. Quantum of Solace (2008) - Better than I remembered. That is to say, I didn't remember a single thing about it other than the fact that I didn't like it that much. But this works as a really solid follow-up to Casino. The action leaned too heavily into the shaky cam thing, and it the villain and story weren't the best. It was also really short, while Casino was really long... almost wonder if there was a way to just take the last 15 minutes from Casino and make it the cold opening here. As a whole, a decent film though.

[Lord_Lyndon]

71. Oppenheimer (2023) - Awesome movie. Pretty much lives up to its high reputation. I didn't know it was possible for a biopic comprised of almost nothing but dialogue could be so intense and exciting throughout. A lot of the film felt like it was the climax in the energy it had. It reminded me of Dunkirk in the way the constant sound/music just kept building tension. The acting was phenomenal all around, especially from Blunt and Downey. Also, I had no idea that was Gary Oldman until looking up info about the film afterwards. A lot of amazing performances though.

I agree with you. This one was fantastic. And I just wanted to say something. The more I think about Nolan's films, I realize that he is becoming my favourite director of all time.

[Gendo]

Yeah I've always been a huge fan of his.

72. Skyfall (2012) - Definitely one of the best. It still is an overall different feel than what I now call "classic Bond", but as an action thriller, it was excellent. Javier Bardem always plays a great psychopath, and he made for a threatening villain here. I like how the villain was unknown/hidden for so long; in most other Bonds the villain has been known from almost the beginning. A lot more serious themes explored here; going into Bond's past and his relationship with M. I'm quite surprised they killed M, I just didn't see that coming. I did think for sure that Albert Finney was going to die, so I'm glad they avoided that cliché. I could have seen them trying to get Sean Connery for that role actually; especially with that "Welcome to Scotland" line. There were some fun callbacks to other Bonds here too, with the classic Aston Martin and the joke about the exploding pen. Also, while it still had no where near the level of comedy as classic Bond, it did have a bit more than the past 2 films.

Speaking of callbacks, I forgot to mention last night that I appreciated the Goldfinger callback in Quantum, with Strawberry being killed and completely covered in oil; found in almost the same exact post as the girl covered in gold.

[Gendo]

73. Spectre (2015) - I heard most people didn't like this, but I thought it was still mostly good. The overall action and filmmaking seemed to have the same quality as Skyfall. But there were a few different things with the writing that really bugged me. The whole "adoptive brother" thing was both a bad idea and a bad execution. It came from nowhere, had pretty much no relevance to anything, and just seemed really weird. Also, the retcon of the previous movies to say that Spectre was behind everything, especially Silva. Silva was already a great villain on his own terms; he had a reason for being the villain. Suddenly saying he was part of Spectre makes no sense. It also felt like Dave Bautista and Christoph Waltz were both wasted here, though Waltz was good during the brief screen time he had. Still, if I can ignore those issues with the script, I think it's good.

So only 1 film remains; which will wait a couple days.

[Gendo]

74. No Time to Die (2021) - The first half was pretty good, with lots of mystery and suspense. But the second half was kind of a mess. It also seemed way too long, being the longest Bond by a good bit, and I felt the runtime. This felt more different from the rest than any of the others, with lots of drama and not enough action. The overall story kind of took some of the more convoluted Bond stories to a whole new level. I was on board with the idea of a bad guy whose motivation was to get revenge on Spectre, that was neat and made sense. But then, suddenly this same person also wants to kill millions of random people too? With no explanation or motivation given. In general a good Bond villain doesn't need a good motivation to want to kill millions of people, but this guy was set up to have a specific motivation; to get revenge on Spectre.

Then there's Felix. Definitely not a fan of what they did with him, considering he was already a character in the other Bonds. While of course Bond has always existed in this grey area between "is it the same person in every movie or a different version of that person or a completely different person", this was the first time when there was a very clear line drawn to say that no, it's impossible for the Felix we've been watching here to be the same one from the other movies.

And of course the same goes for the very ending and what happened with Bond himself. Maybe if these 5 films were the only ones to exist then that could work just fine. But in the context of this being a pre-existing character from 20 other films before Daniel Craig, I really didn't like it. It just doesn't work for a Bond movie. And it's not like this was presented as the last ever Bond either; heck even the end credits say "James Bond Will Return" as they almost always have. You obviously can't end any other Bond film that way, so what makes this one so special that it gets to have that ending?

All that aside, it was a fairly entertaining movie, with good acting and good cinematography. And I liked Zimmer's take on the Bond theme.

I'm going to save my overall thoughts on all 25 films for tomorrow.

[Gendo]

So I watched all 25 Eon Productions Bond films in just under 6 weeks. Some rambling thoughts:

As a whole, a pretty enjoyable series. It seems clear that they didn't intend them to be watched the way I did. Rax took like 4 years to watch them all; that's the smart way to go. And of course in release timeline; they expected people to take 40 years to watch them all. There's just so much similarity throughout the first 20 films that they really do blend together somewhat.

I didn't really get this until after the last one, but there's clearly 2 separate film series here. There's Bond, and then there's Daniel Craig's Bond, loosely based on the Bond series. Daniel Craig's Bond was as a whole overall well done, but it suffered plenty of writing issues. While not as bad as Star Wars 7-9, it definitely seemed to have some of the same issues where there wasn't a set plan for the 5-film saga, but rather each new director just did his own thing.

Even not counting Craig's Bond, the rest of the movies have a pretty big swing in overall tone and even genre. Especially noticeable when jumping from From Russia With Love to Goldfinger, but there are some other wild swings also. Similarly, the film quality shifts a fair bit. Sadly, these shifts often have an inverse correlation between quality and silliness. Goldfinger was really the only one that managed to pull off both high quality and high silliness. I say sadly, because I personally enjoyed the silly films more that the series films as a whole.

I'm not about to rank all the films, but I for sure have a list of my favorites and my least favorites:

Favorites: Goldfinger, You Only Live Twice, The Spy Who Loved Me, License to Kill, Tomorrow Never Dies, Skyfall.

Least favorites: On Her Majesty's Secret Service, The Man with the Golden Gun, For Your Eyes Only, A View to a Kill, The World Is Not Enough,

Honorable mention also goes to both Dr. No and From Russia With Love, as both were very good films. They just aren't on the list because I think I personally enjoyed those other 6 more. All the ones not mentioned were just fine.

Best Villain: Goldfinger, easy. "No Mr. Bond, I expect you to die" is absolutely the single best line from any of the films. But there were plenty of memorable ones.

Best Bond: Sean Connery. Maybe it's a cliché, but I just felt like all the others failed to quite measure up. Timothy Dalton takes second place, but I did miss the charm and humor from the earlier films there. Rogor Moore was a lot of fun to watch, but he was just too goofy to be great.

I loved all the opening music videos. Generally good music, and very interesting visuals. But also too similar for me to pick out favorites there. Oh, and the Bond theme is amazingly iconic and just a great piece. Bill Conti and Hans Zimmer stood out as having great versions of it.

[Gendo]

Rax did you ever watch No Time To Die? I can't find a review from you for it.

[Raxivace]

Rax did you ever watch No Time To Die? I can't find a review from you for it.

I did but it was after I stopped posting movie reviews. I mostly liked it overall. For whatever issues it has, I do respect them killing off Bond. Even if they somehow retcon this away in a new movie, I still think it works as an ending to the Craig saga here.

It does make me wonder what on Earth they're possibly going to do with the next film though, and a new Bond. Will it be more serious? For Moore-esque? Something else? It's hard to say.