Welcome to Part 3 of In Conclusion: The James Bond Series. When we left off we raked the Moon and had a taste of “Octopussy”. The first quite dull, the latter quite nasty. You can find recaps for #s 22 and 21 here and #s 20 and 19 here.
Now let’s resume our countdown with #18 and #17 on the list.
18.
As usual Bond is presented front and center and behind him stand two of the Bond girls, Wai Lin and Paris Carver with the villain Elliot Carver standing up top. There is a nice little symbolism of note there as Carver resembles the imagery usually associated with “Big Brother” from the Novel 1984. Something that works incredibly well for the context of his character. The rest of the poster however, well yeah its just off to me. The television symbolism makes sense in the context of the plot revolving around Carver being a media man and television at that time, the exotic far away year of 1997 was the largest media source in America.
This isn’t bad since it does show some shots from the film but looks really photo shopped and amateurish when you throw in the car crashing threw, the motorcycle in the air, and a plane flying over a car. Of course its still better than Amazon women in space and it seems like they really tried with this poster, but its hindered a bit by the randomness and goo in the background. As for the title I’m sure that tomorrow will “die” when the apocalypse comes but till then this poster is correct. The title though doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Carver isn’t trying to start an apocalypse in this movie, he’s simply trying to start a war for the sake of making money off of media coverage(more on this weirdness later).
Pierce Brosnan is Bond again and he does an okay job, he isn’t too great but not bad either. Jonathan Pryce plays Elliot Carver, the villain of the movie. I found Pryce and the Carver character, himself to be fantastic in this film. He’s sinister, charming, and is a fantastic villain. Although there are a few spots where he is just too over the top.
I somewhat see him as the “Big Brother” type villain(for those who don’t know google, “1984” by George Orwell). Michelle Yeoh is Wai Lin, the Bond girl of the movie. She’s pretty equal to Bond in this movie and you can tell she was inspired by XXX in The Spy Who Loved Me. I think she was probably the best Bond girl in the Brosnan series. The action sequences with the chase scenes and ending in the submarine were nice sequences.
I liked seeing a bit of England for once in the Bond series and the scenes in Thailand were nice. The theme song, “Tomorrow Never Dies” by Sheryl Crow is just bad, really bad. Its one of the worst themes of the series. Whats my problem with this movie? Well first the title of the movie makes about zero sense.
It was originally going to be called, “Tomorrow Never Lies” but because of a typo it was called what it is now. “Why is that?”, you ask? Well someone sent a fax to MGM and due to that typo it read “Tomorrow Never Dies” instead of “Lies”. For some reason they liked this nonsensical title better. The original title makes more sense since the main plot revolves around Carver creating the news ahead of time for tomorrow’s editions.
I like the story of a media man creating news in order to create a war to profit off of on terms of ratings, newspaper sales, etc. but creating a war between two nations got really old after The Living Daylights. In fact to add more to my slight annoyance, its basically The Spy Who Loved Me set in 1997 with “Chinese Agent” replacing “Russian Agent” and a different plot. Despite that I still like the “Wai Lin” character, Carver, and the story of a media man trying to start WW3 to profit off of it but between Brosnan’s ok-ish performance, the lack of a strong supporting cast, and the dull moments of this film it just isn’t good.
17.
I’ve been contemplating if I really should include Daniel Craig’s Bond films as part of this. My reasoning is because well really they’re a different take of the Bond universe. There is no connection between this and say You Only Live Twice. This isn’t the same James Bond and it isn’t the same style of Bond films. Sure the format is the same but its really difficult to place it with the other 20 Bond films from 1962-2002.
The poster is well reminiscent of modern-day Bond, serious and intense. Yes James Bond looks badass holding that gun and wearing a suit but dammit I miss the days of various women around him and other nonsensical shenanigans. Sadly this is probably the nicest Bond looks in the entire film. After the success of Casino Royale everyone(except “classic” Bond fans) was ready to see more of the “new” Bond. After this film they really started to miss quips, “Q”, gadgets, and villains that were over the top.
This is Daniel Craig’s second Bond outing and I have to say its just awful. The main plot line revolves around Bond getting revenge for the events of Casino Royale. I guess you can say that it was Daniel Craig’s, Licence to Kill except instead of coming off as emotionally conflicted and furious like Dalton did in that movie, he comes more off to me as a robot. Matheiu Amalric is Dominic Greene, the villain of the piece. He has somewhat of an evil side but other than that he’s bland, uninteresting, and doesn’t come off to me as a threat to Bond.
"Seriously, you're the antagonist? Do you know I've fought a man who can throw hats that can decapitate statues, an assassin that killed hundreds of men, a man with steel teeth, and a man who can't feel pain? They couldn't beat me, what you makes you or anyone watching this think you can?"
Olga Kurylenko is Camielle, the Bond girl of the story. Camielle isn’t too bad and makes for an okay Bond girl. She stands up for herself and makes reminds me a bit of Wai Lin from Tomorrow Never Dies. I did read that she did model her character after Wai Lin. Again though its just another secret agent female that Bond meets up with and helps him thwart the villain’s plans.
The action of the film would’ve been better if not for the frickin quick cuts that just annoy me. I think this is one of the most poorly edited movies I’ve ever watched. Bolivia isn’t a bad setting and it works for the most part but it doesn’t really help the films already existing blandness. I’m just going to go ahead and say this movie does everything wrong. I know Casino Royale didn’t really have a legitimate gun-barrel (although it looked cool) but the lack of one here until the end is just off.
Then again I have read its symbolic of the fact that he is now James Bond, so maybe it works. The title song, “Another Way to Die” by Alicia Keys and Jack White is one of the worst I’ve ever heard, I cringe every time I hear it. The acting is mediocre to say the least, the editing is atrocious, and compared to Casino Royale, it looks bad. I really hope they can bounce back in the next movie because this was bad. In the end, the lack of direction, the poor editing, the boring villain, and acting that is not too great to say the least really hinders this movie.
That’s all for now, tune in next week for Part 4.