Just Seen: Die Another Day

[Confucius]

It's late (well, early I s'pose) so no in-depth review!

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+ :

Very Good all round, thoroughly enjoyed by Mrs C & self.

Fantastic to have Bond back where he should always have been: in an Aston Martin, good to see the 'baddie' driving Italian & German exotica too!

Far bettter than the first 3 Brosnan efforts on all fronts.

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- :

A little derivative even for Bond films.

Cameo appearance jarred a little (watch it & see!)

Awful title song (IMO)

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I was going to give it 8/10, but the Aston makes it 9.

20th film and 40th anniversary celebrated in style.


I wonder if Brosnan tried out for the lead in 'Castaway'?.......

 

[Mr.D]

What did you think of the wave sequence?

 

[Taz]

Just seen it....LOL!

Had some great bits and some not so great!

Sound was amazing great DD mix

Crappy song for sure, Ms Berry played her part suprisingly well.

I prefered Goldeneye but D.A.D. was worth seeing.

I have to give it 007 out of 009


Taz.

 

[Mr.D]

What did you think of the wave sequence?

 

[Setenza]

Have a hand in this part Mr D.

Should I be looking for your bit of foam?

 

[Mr.D]

The water itself is without a doubt the best CG water ever. ( its way better than perfect storm and AOTC) The Ice is pretty good also....

 

[DaveH]

I'm sorry but I must have been watching a different film.

I thought it was awful. Almost as bad as Diamonds Are Forever.

I thought it was way too sci-fi. The aston martin being invisible was rediculous.

Oh and Virtual Reality that virtual? please.

This was the worst Brosnan effort. It simply was not a Bond film. They need to go back to the roots to have a proper Bond story.

I thought that after 15 minutes we were in for a treat but it turned out so bad in the same way The World Is Not Enough did.

 

[Rambo John J]

They need to go back to their roots, when Bond was a spy rather than some world famous guy (well, everyone seems to know who he is) that runs around playing with gadgets and getting into contrived action situations. The last decent Bond film was Licence To Kill, and that was very good.
I felt pretty disappointed with DAD, but then I'm not really a fan of any of the Brosnan Bond films, they just seem to get dafter as they go along.
I remember when Bond got sent out on a mission with a briefcase that had a secret stack of gold sovereigns hidden in it, these days they give him a car that's got more firepower than Saddam Hussein

 

[Confucius]

DERA (Defence Evaluation and Research Agency) are working on 'invisibility'. OK, it's not so advanced as the fictional Aston, but initial trials are promising - it should be noted that it only works at longer ranges so far.

As for the 'wave' - I agree, a fabulous bit of water, though the paragliding Bond looked a little too digital (much the same as the kung fu nonsense in Blade II did)

 

[DaveH]

I agree Bond should go back to Spying.

Everyone does know who he is.

Living Daylights was the last great Bond film. It has the ebst Bond performance ever and the story is complex and enjoyable and is about spying not world domination.

Die Another Day was embarrasing.

 

[Setenza]

I feel the need to post a complete list of Bond acronyms

DN
FRWL
G
T
YOLT
OHMSS
DAF
LALD
TMWTGG
TSWLM
M
FYEO
O
AVTAK
TLD
LTK
G
TND
TWINE
DAD

I agree with Rambo, that LTK was the last Bond movie that provided any credible treatment of the character. Brutal, minimalist (in Bond terms) with a top villain. Dave H is also right as TLD also provided a more traditionalist plot.

Dalton was a good Bond, but was hamstrung by the studios need to have a "star" rather than a actor who could provide an accurate performance. Bond is not a particualarly likeable man (if you read the Fleming text). Shame he got the push. Still he brought head butting into the franchise.

DAD is classic example of Hollywood immitating Hollywood.

 

[kevenh]

How long is it?
It's not 199min like LOTR:TT

 

[Ryan]

Saw it last night. Went with a mate who knows everything about Bond and Flemming and knows all the films inside out.
We both thought it was the worst Bond ever. In fact we compared it to MI2 (IMO the worst film ever made ) but it wasn't quite as bad.

Plot holes everywhere.

Kept saying to myself "This isn't Bond".

It has good scenes though, and the sound was amazing.

 

[buns]

I enjoyed it, but, dare i say it, i felt it was a little too much action! Most bond films are a bit quieter than this, i was constantly barraged by sound, which i didnt like. That said, it was great fun and my complaint could as easily be due to the sound level being clearly too high.

ad

 

[EvilMudge]

I'm with ad on that one. The mix was very enjoyable, but was obviously pitched at the DVD release - at reference level in a cinema it was unbelievably loud - and thus bad because the sound system in most cinemas is just not up to the job.
Nice to see a bit of darkness creeping back into the Bond character. And an Aston Martin.

BTW I almost got punched for laughing at the hovercraft bit, by my girlfriend. It was all too familiar for me.
That's not Aldershot, it's the DERA off-road research centre, which is about ten miles away.

 

[DVDcake]

Originally posted by buns
I enjoyed it, but, dare i say it, i felt it was a little too much action! Most bond films are a bit quieter than this, i was constantly barraged by sound, which i didnt like. That said, it was great fun and my complaint could as easily be due to the sound level being clearly too high.

ad

I thought this too. I enjoyed TWINE but found DAD strangely underwhelming, just a collection of action set pieces. I did enjoy the fight in the club though and felt the noise made by the icarus was spot on. As for Madonna, well I just hope they leave her out of the next film.

 

[Joe Pineapples]

the lowlight of the film had to be the escape from the burning (but NEVER exploding) russian cargo plane, via the helicopter - i thought i had seen everything with the Mission Impossible helicopter stunt (through the tunnel), but this one has pushed 'silliness' sooo much further.

Why did they bother with the Aston Martin at all?? - all it did was drive on ice - i think any old car (with the right driver), could have done that. They should have stuck some missiles on a mini metro and saved some money. The point of having a performance car like the Aston (i would have thought), would be to show just how well it could handle at high-speed - something it was never given to do in the film.

The best scenes for me were

1. the hovercraft stuff
2. Bond & Cleese (with the old gadgets on view)

(edit) - yeah, thanks for reminding me groundy - the 'sword fencing' scene' was actually my favourite too - now why would this be? - no fancy effects/over-the-top stunts........hmmm, think i've just answered that, so lets get back to more of this in the next one please.

 

[groundy]

Saw it last night. The first half of the movie was very good and I enjoyed the sword fight especially. However when we got to the Ice scenes the movie descended in to hilarity. Bond was elevated to the ranks of Superhero and one scene in particular had the audience (including myself) in an uproar of laughter. I'm sure I don't need to mention which scene it was but the special effect was diabolical.

From that point on, the film was sheer crap.

 

[Jason S]

Mr D.

Is the wave sequence digital?

http://www.jamesbond.com/bond20/newswrap/newswrap_09.php

?????

 

[DVDcake]

Originally posted by Jason S
Mr D.

Is the wave sequence digital?

The bit at the begining is real, I think, but the bit with Bond on his own in the middle of the film is most definately digital or else they used a jerky camera frame rate. It looks terrible and really ruins the illusion built up by the rest of the film up to that point.

 

[groundy]

I was hoping Keith was talking about the wave at the start which looked great, especially if it was part CGI as the other wave was the single worst special effect and ruining moment I have ever had the misfortune to watch.

 

[the_pauley]

I agree with the posters who named 'Licence To Kill' as the last great Bond movie. Thought Dalton was the best actor ever to assume the role. Personal favourite is still 'Goldfinger' though.

Has anyone noticed that the 1967 Bond spoof 'Casino Royale' has slipped out almost un-noticed on R1? Has been available on R2 for quite a while as a non-anamorphic disc with mono sound and no extras. R1 comes with anamorphic, 5.1, documentaries, and - the jewel in the crown - the complete 1954 TV play of 'Casino Royale' with Barry Nelson as "Jimmy" Bond!

Got it for £11 from Play.com.

 

[MuFu]

Anybody else think Rosamund Pike totally stole it from Halle Berry?

I have to admit that when she was stabbed to death I was actually tempted by necrophilia for the first time in my life.

MuFu.

 

[Ryan]

I agree with you Mu Fu except the bit about necrophilia (her performance would be a bit stale ).

I though she died to easily, and should have skewered Berry instead.

 

[Mr.D]

Originally posted by groundy
I was hoping Keith was talking about the wave at the start which looked great, especially if it was part CGI as the other wave was the single worst special effect and ruining moment I have ever had the misfortune to watch.

Yes its the parasurfing sequence I'm on about.

Well I was saying the water itself is great . The Ice is pretty good too. The CG bond was a little bit of a last minute addition. There were some practical limitations with regard to trying to get a stuntman to do the surfing for real with safety and make it look effective.

Its been getting a lot of negative press this scene but the water is the best CG water I've seen and I think its a shame that its being missed.
Personally I think the editing and pacing leaves a bit to be desired.

There are other things that bug me way more than this scene though.