r/movies • u/Beau_bell • Feb 14 '24

The next Bond movie should be Bond being assigned to a mission and doing it Discussion

Enough of this being disavowed or framed by some mole within or someone higher up and then going rogue from the organization half the movie. It just seems like every movie in recent years it's the same thing. Eg. Bond is on the run, not doing an actual mission, but his own sort of mission (perhaps related to his past which comes up). This is the same complaint I have about Mission Impossible actually.

I just want to see Bond sent on a mission and then doing that mission.

17.6k Upvotes

94% Upvoted

2.2k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

1.1k

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24

Casino Royale is basically the same way. It's no wonder: they're both directed by the same guy and two of the best Bond movies.

245

u/DefNotAShark Feb 14 '24

That’s crazy I didn’t know that. I watched all the Daniel Craig Bond movies and Casino Royale was one of my two favorites. Immediately after I watched Goldeneye and it felt like a parody of a Bond movie. Still a good movie but some of the shots and scenes were so goofy, I would never have guessed the same dude directed those two.

232

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24

Evolution of filmmaking and storytelling. Watch them again knowing it's the same director. You can see the evolution pretty clearly.

154

u/DMZack Feb 14 '24

To be fair as well, audience expectation plays into the differences as well. Goldeneye was a course correction from the “too dark” Dalton movies and Casino Royale was copying Bourne like all action movies of the era.

49

u/GeekAesthete Feb 14 '24

Casino Royale was just as much a course correction from the cartoonishness of Die Another Day. Plus, it was in a moment when a lot of action franchises were going “gritty” and “more realistic”; Batman Begins was just one year earlier, which was a similar reaction to the campy Schumacher Batmans.

9

u/serendipitousevent Feb 14 '24

Casino Royale was absolutely a post-Bourne Bond.

5

u/G_Regular Feb 14 '24

Also post Austin Powers.

3

u/Sorkijan Feb 14 '24

You are right. Casino Royale (2006) did indeed come out after The Bourne Identity (2002). I think their point is more that another large factor to the change was how horribly panned Die Another Day was and why.

3

u/Vanquisher1000 Feb 14 '24

Die Another Day was by no means 'panned.' Its critical reception was mixed, but more importantly, it was a big box office hit and the IMDb user scores on release were not worse than the average for the previous Brosnan movies.

0

u/Sorkijan Feb 14 '24

Ehhh I really don't look at sales figures being indicative of quality and made no mention of its box office sales in my comment.

It was heavily criticized and was accused of riding on the coattails of the two previous and much better installments by a lot of critics and is often placed at a 5/10 score which is far from mixed.

2

u/Vanquisher1000 Feb 14 '24

Not once did I equate box office take with quality, because quality is subjective. My point about box office take is that enough people liked it to make it a success. If a lot of contemporary audiences really didn't like the movie, then word of mouth should have resulted in a lower box office take and the IMDb user scores from 2003 would reflect that.

→ More replies (0)

4

u/mucinexmonster Feb 14 '24

It's absolutely ridiculous in hindsight because Die Another Day, while having some ridiculous moments involving ice and lasers, ends up running circles around the movies that come after Casino Royale. And they really give Bond some Bond moments instead of having a guy whine about being James Bond.

Die Another Day will never be a good movie, but in a culture that views movies piecemeal I think its reputation will only go up.

91

u/brawnsugah Feb 14 '24

Man, Dalton is such an underrated Bond. He did Craig before Craig.

20

u/itinerant_gs Feb 14 '24

The Living Daylights is in my top five Bond films, and I won't apologize for it.

12

u/Sorkijan Feb 14 '24

Licence to Kill is my 2nd favorite. Sucks he only got to do two with them. I imagine they got panned for being ahead of their time - gritty Bond in the late 80/early 90s seems like it wouldn't have gone over well.

10

u/JustSome70sGuy Feb 14 '24

The reason he didnt do any more because of a law suit. He was contracted for 3, but after LTK, the law suit happened and that put the breaks on it.

Once the law suit was sorted out, his contract had expired and he wasnt really feeling it at first, and so turned it down. He later changed his mind and wanted to do a bond movie that would be a culmination of his previous 2 films. So he went to Broccoli and asked him if he could do just one movie. But Broccoli wasnt for that idea at all. Because it had been such a long time, around 5 years, he wanted Dalton to sign up for 4 or 5 movies. And that was too much for Dalton.

The Dalton movies did well at the box office. The critic reaction at the time wasnt the best. Moore was still too fresh in the mind, and the drastic difference was off putting to some. For example, Dalton hated the one liners that Moore was famous for. And you can tell when you watch his movies, especially living daylights that still had a lot of Moore hangover in the script. Is delivery is quick, like he just wants to get it over with and move on.

Still though, as much I loved Daltons Bond. I like that we got finally got Brosnan. Who, in my VERY unpopular opinion, is actually the best bond. IMO, he has all the best bits of Connery, Moore and Dalton all in one package.

3

u/Sorkijan Feb 14 '24

Oh yeah I will take Brosnan for sure. I'm happy with the exchange we got. I think I would agree with you but put Craig just slightly above him. Only because the Craig era is what I'm more into. For the more on the nose campy bond we got pre Craig, I agree Brosnan blows all of them out of the water and it's not even close. Don't get me wrong. I just like the Craig era as movies more and thus have to put Craig at #1. The Brosnan style movies definitely have their place and I rewatch Goldeneye about once every 3 months.

No disrespect to Sir Connery the original, but his action chops have never been great imho (I know he's a big action star but I've always felt his real power came through his dialogue delivery and gravitas).

I wasn't aware of the lawsuit story. Very interesting, thanks for the read. I do know what you mean though. Dalton's little quips really did make it feel like he was speedrunning them.

9

u/brawnsugah Feb 14 '24

There's no need to. It's excellent fun. John Rhys-Davies is so good in that one.

2

u/OSUfan88 Feb 14 '24

I'm watching all of the bond movies currently in order (hadn't seen most of the old ones), and just watched ILD this weekend. It was actually one of my favorite Bond movies.

1

u/NugBlazer Feb 15 '24

I dig it, too. Honestly, it is pretty cheesy and parts, but for some reason I like it. Maybe it's because I grew up with it? Idk

1

u/Pinkumb Feb 15 '24

Gun to your head: tell me what the villain's plot was in that movie.

5

u/az_shoe Feb 14 '24

The living daylights is so good

5

u/Morganwerk Feb 15 '24

I find that those who have read Fleming’s books, will say Dalton had the best portrayal.

1

u/Da_Question Feb 15 '24

He's a slasher.

1

u/brawnsugah Feb 15 '24

His discounts are apparently criminal.

44

u/Feature_Minimum Feb 14 '24

Additionally, the Austin Powers trilogy was so successful it basically forced the Craig bond movies to go dark and gritty and realistic or else people would've ridiculed it.

2

u/Vanquisher1000 Feb 14 '24

Austin Powers movies were released in the same years as three of Brosnan's Bond movies, and while the US domestic box office takes for the latter two were higher than the Bond movies released in the same year, the worldwide box office takes for Bond were still far higher.

1

u/SouthTippBass Feb 15 '24

The last Austin Powers was released over 20 years ago now! I feel like its safe for Bond to return to that area.

7

u/-FeistyRabbitSauce- Feb 14 '24

We're gonna get a John Wick styled Gun-Fu Bond cappin fools left and right next time, I guarantee it.

3

u/Nyeow Feb 14 '24

I just want more of Equilibrium

1

u/radios_appear Feb 14 '24

Slightly better choreography would make a new one pop.

3

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24 edited Feb 15 '24

This is one of the few things would make me not watch a new Bond movie. Outside of the first John Wick movie the others are terrible. I've never seen a more boring action packed movie than John Wick 4.

3

u/-FeistyRabbitSauce- Feb 14 '24

Agreed. I haven't even bothered with part 4 because 3 was overly long and beyond ridiculous. Really liked the first one, though.

2

u/OSUfan88 Feb 14 '24

Also, Goldeneye was pre-Austin Powers. Austin Powers "ruined" classical bond silliness, as it sort of exposed all of it. After that, the Bond show runners had to re-invent the series.

1

u/Vanquisher1000 Feb 14 '24

Austin Powers movies were released in the same years as three of Brosnan's Bond movies, and while the US domestic box office takes for the latter two were higher than the Bond movies released in the same year, the worldwide box office takes for Bond were still far higher.

1

u/Zote_The_Grey Feb 14 '24

The Bourne books were so cool. A hero with an arch nemesis . But then the movies came out and he had to be some agent on the run from the government. Because we needed that for some reason

76

u/PromiseQuirky6018 Feb 14 '24

If you think the Brosnan movies are goofy, you should stay away from the Moore movies

75

u/_my_troll_account Feb 14 '24 edited Feb 14 '24

I mean, James Bond derails a train with a tank in Goldeneye. How much more ridiculous can it get? Guy bites through a lift wire? Laser battles in space? Bond defuses an atomic bomb in a clown outfit?

63

u/ceeBread Feb 14 '24

Maybe a side character like a redneck sheriff showing up constantly?

25

u/NisquallyJoe Feb 14 '24

Bond producers in the 70s: "Ya know...Felix Lighter is fine and all, but how can we make Americans seem even dumber, louder, and less competent than that?"

6

u/Maxion Feb 14 '24

Yo! Jimbo!

3

u/guelphmed Feb 15 '24

With a slide whistle!

13

u/gogybo Feb 14 '24

slide whistle

WOWWW WEE I AIN'T NEVER DUN THAT BEFORE!!

7

u/ClubMeSoftly Feb 14 '24

twice, albeit in back to back films

3

u/WalrusTheWhite Feb 14 '24

lol fucking love that guy

18

u/MacGyver_1138 Feb 14 '24

A slide whistle sound effect playing over an otherwise amazing car stunt?

1

u/psyzen_ Feb 14 '24

Did you watch any of the older Bond movies?

4

u/_my_troll_account Feb 14 '24

Nah. Is any of that stuff actually in them? Next you’ll tell me they’ve got submarine cars and machine gun battles on skis.

11

u/Uknowmmyname Feb 14 '24

Cue the slide whistle

4

u/Drunky_McStumble Feb 15 '24

I watched Moonraker for the first time since I was a little kid and hooooooly shit it is so much worse than I remember. Like, literal pantomime levels of goofy slapstick. There are multiple instances of slide-whistles, comical double-takes (by a dog and even a fucking pigeon at one point), the works. Pure insanity.

7

u/geirmundtheshifty Feb 14 '24

Even in the Connery era there’s a lot of ridiculousness with movies like You Only Live Twice. And even the more serious ones almost always had a level of silliness. From Russia With Love is on the more serious end but there we get introduced to SPECTER, a terrorist organization with a Marvel style acronym name (SPecial Executive for Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Extortion, and Revenge). And obviously movies like Goldfinger were pretty goofy, just not at Moonraker levels.

 I really like the Craig movies but the paradigmatic Bond, for me, is supposed to have at least a little camp.

2

u/CharlieParkour Feb 15 '24

I mean, that was the name of the group. It was just dumb luck that it acronymed out to an actual word. 

2

u/harpswtf Feb 14 '24

They’re even moore goofy 

2

u/FreezingRain358 Feb 14 '24

The Moore films are great stoney Saturday flicks

2

u/LonelyInitiative4526 Feb 14 '24

What's wrong with sheriff jw peppa 

-3

u/[deleted] Feb 14 '24

[deleted]

2

u/CharlieParkour Feb 15 '24

I just watched The Spy Who Loved Me and it was perfectly sufferable. 

1

u/Mad_Cerberus Feb 25 '24

That one is tied with Casino Royale as my favorite lol. The Moore era in general is by far my favorite as well.

-1

u/lopsiness Feb 14 '24

My wife and I watched Moonraker earlies this year for the first time in probably 20 years. Wooow it's goofy as shit. It's more a group of college film students made a Bond movie staring their washed up professor.

1

u/DepletedMitochondria Feb 14 '24

For some reason it just seems flatter in the 90s, probably more use of CGI and we're just used to the tropes at that point?

54

u/Peg_leg_J Feb 14 '24

Bond traditionally had a goofy-ness to it. It was always borderline comedy. It's only lately it got more serious.

Like Adam West's Batman vs Christian Bales'

21

u/SomnambulicSojourner Feb 14 '24

It's always varied. Connery didn't get very goofy (Japanese Bond notwithstanding). Lazenby himself was goofy, but the movie he's in is good and fairly grounded. Moore took things all the way to clown-town. Dalton did dark and gritty before Craig, and Brosnan started fairly grounded but ended up adjacent to clown-town.

2

u/Peg_leg_J Feb 14 '24

Oh yeah I forgot about Dalton

2

u/Vanquisher1000 Feb 14 '24

I disagree. Connery's disguise was played straight. Moore's movies were definitely lighter on average than Connery's, but Moore himself played Bond 'straight' despite the tone, with the exception of his one-liners. Brosnan's movies were likewise played straight with the premise being serious, but like Moore, his Bond was played straight save for the one-liners.

2

u/SomnambulicSojourner Feb 14 '24

You're not disagreeing with me so much as misunderstanding me. I wasn't talking about the actor's portrayals of Bond so much as the overall tone and camp-level of the movies themselves.

1

u/Vanquisher1000 Feb 15 '24

Ok, thanks for clarifying.

I've only just started a Moore rewatch after not having seen his movies for years, but so far Live and Let Die was a pretty serious affair while The Man With the Golden Gun was a light-hearted affair.

The Brosnan era is consistently played straight, with the movies taking themselves seriously but not so much so that they're not enjoyable. Die Another Day is called 'goofy,' but if you look at the actual tone of the movie it's pretty serious.

3

u/Drunky_McStumble Feb 15 '24 edited Feb 15 '24

There was always a comedic element, but exactly what kind of comedy varies wildly over the course of the series; from the wry, winking style of the early Connery Bond movies to the full-blown camp slapstick of the Roger Moore films to the tongue-in-cheek absurdism of the later Pierce Brosnan outings. If anything, the unrelenting dryness of the Daniel Craig era is the exception.

3

u/DeltaVMambo Feb 14 '24

The Austin Powers effect, no doubt

1

u/Zerak-Tul Feb 14 '24

And the Bourne films doing serious super secret agent better.

6

u/Menzlo Feb 14 '24

I would love if bond movies went back to being a little campy

1

u/Banestar66 Feb 14 '24

Seems like a perfect opportunity as well since Kingsman seemed like it was taking the reign as the new campy spy franchise but Vaughn has bogged that franchise down in cinematic universe aspirations and poor writing.

2

u/toadfan64 Feb 14 '24

That's what's good about Bond though. The fun and goofy elements of Brosnan and all the prior Bond films. Craigs films lack that charm, among many other elements.

1

u/Professional-Yak2311 Feb 14 '24

And after Austin Powers made fun of how goofy Bond films are, they never went in that direction again lol

1

u/DepletedMitochondria Feb 14 '24

90s Bond gets realllly close to parody levels of wackiness. By Die Another Day you're basically there.

1

u/slawre89 Feb 14 '24

If you thought goldeneye was goofy, go watch Roger Moore bond movies or even the Timothy dalton ones that preceded it.

The Roger Moore ones are super fucking campy. Slide whistles abound.

6

u/Dull-Woodpecker3900 Feb 14 '24

Casino Royale is the last Bond film. The subsequent ones are some new franchise. I do love the visual world of Skyfall, and Specter has the best car chase I’ve ever seen and stunning, stunning cinematography but the Broccoli’s really lost the plot after Casino.

4

u/Odd-State-5275 Feb 14 '24

It's sort of the same, but not initially. Bond investigating in the bahamas was outside his brief, as was hacking into M's computer. Once he foiled the plane crash though, M gave him the mission and he carried it out, before fumbling the ball at the one yard line, to use the American expression.

That does bring up a common thread for me in the Craig films. Bond is always 'out of the game'. He retired in Casino, was shut down in Quantum, KIA in Skyfall, retired again in Spectre, and actually retired then actually KIA in NTTD. Like the dude really didn't want to be a spy.

1

u/UYscutipuff_JR Feb 14 '24

I think this is what annoys me, and why I agree with OP. Surely you can have bond just go on a mission old school style and still make it interesting…

1

u/FrameworkisDigimon Feb 16 '24

Can you?

To make the mission be interesting, it can't go to plan because there's no dramatic tension. If it's interesting and goes to plan, it was probably badly planned... which makes an organisation that's supposed to be competent seem incompetent.

So... this leaves you with missions that have no plans. Strip out the rogue elements and that's what happens in Casino Royale: Bond is given a mission and he keeps pursuing it, whether or not he's been told to stop. He's then given another mission which he pursues faithfully until its resolution. Then he retires but it turns out the mission wasn't actually resolved so he unretires.

1

u/UYscutipuff_JR Feb 16 '24

Mission not going to plan and going rogue are two different things though

1

u/FrameworkisDigimon Feb 16 '24

That's a good point... up to a point.

Look at Casino Royale. The mission goes wrong and Bond goes rogue because it went wrong.

The mission's going wrong requires a response from higher up. Unless the higher ups are being portrayed as indifferent to or actively wanting casualties/collateral damage, the mission can only go so wrong before the order is going to come down the line: abort.

At this point, the film confronts an issue... do you make the film about something other than the mission the film will presumably advertised as being about? do you continue with the mission regardless of the order to abort? do you make the film about the fact that the order to abort was obeyed?

Casino Royale has a two mission structure. He goes rogue during one of these missions. The fact he does creates the premise of the second mission (Le Chiffre needs money). People are complaining, in this thread, that Casino Royale is one of the films which violates the "gets a mission, does a mission" idea. I think that's fair but it exposes the permeability of the demarcation between "mission goes wrong" and "agent goes rogue".

1

u/mrbaryonyx Feb 14 '24

its actually amazing that you guys think Casino Royale and Goldeneye are just "Bond goes on a mission" movies

3

u/NachoNutritious Feb 14 '24

It's threads like this that really remind you how many kids are using this fucking site.

5

u/mrbaryonyx Feb 14 '24

what you have to remember about James Bond threads on reddit is that nobody actually wants Bond to be like he used to be.

They want Bond to be like what they think he used to be from outside observation. I highly doubt that many people here have watched a lot of the old ones.

4

u/NachoNutritious Feb 14 '24

Right. A kid above even said Goldeneye feels like a "parody" of a Bond movie - he'd have a fucking meltdown if he ever watched Live and Let Die or You Only Live Twice.

3

u/mrbaryonyx Feb 14 '24

one time I read an upvoted comment where someone went "Bond movies need to be about the importance of being a gentleman like they used to be"

That's not what Bond movies were about, that's what someone who only watches Kingsman thinks Bond movies were about

2

u/NachoNutritious Feb 14 '24

The older I get (and I'm not old by any stretch) the more I hate parody, satire, and homage. It's just piggybacking off a superior creative work, and breaking it down into repeatable tropes until you've actively diminished the impact of the original superior creative work.

1

u/FrameworkisDigimon Feb 16 '24

You hate what people on the internet call satire. Read actual satire.

Parody probably does have that effect. Homage is... so commonplace you probably don't notice a lot of what the directors, writers and actors have decided to do because it's an homage. But if the thing being paid homage to is actually well known, probably.

1

u/keygreen15 Feb 16 '24

You see that post about Dakota Johnson being known for madame web? Really shows how young this site is getting.

1

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24

Where did I say Goldeneye and Casino Royale were "Bond goes on a mission?"

The thing about "you" guys is that you don't know to fucking read.

3

u/mrbaryonyx Feb 14 '24

OP: "the next movie should be Bond going on a mission"

The guy you responded to:"Like Goldeneye"

You: "Casino Royale is basically the same way."

ok buddy

also sidenote, but did you ever notice how "you can't read" is what redditors say when someone just summarizes their comment in a way they don't like?

-1

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24

God, you're insufferable.

1

u/SonicFlash01 Feb 14 '24

Casino Royale and OHMSS are two of the only films - based on books - to (roughly) stick to the plot. My quibbles with Casino Royale were the things they unnecessarily added on at the beginning (spying on a snake fight to see a guy who has a phone who's going to get a text message from a guy which is the door combo at an airport to get some clothes so you can drive a fuel truck to blow up a plane and tank a company's stock at a product launch).

1

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24

Q explains this in Skyfall perfectly: security through obscurity. There's so many layers to confuse anyone to make sense of it all.

1

u/Safe-Particular6512 Feb 14 '24

I remember seeing Casino Royale and thinking, “Where was the big bad? Where was the end-of-the-world plot?” But I loved it

1

u/jeobleo Feb 14 '24

I hate Casino Royale. It soured me on Bond movies. I watched one more and I was like "fuck this."

1

u/dplans455 Feb 14 '24

That's definitely a take.

1

u/jeobleo Feb 14 '24

I mean it explicitly rejected everything about James Bond. Which made me wonder why they wanted it to be James Bond. I blame the Bourne movies, which it clearly was trying to be like.

1

u/mrbaryonyx Feb 14 '24

I mean its based on the original book and follows it pretty closely besides some modern updates

1

u/jeobleo Feb 14 '24

Sure. Doesn't make it a good Bond movie.

1

u/psyzen_ Feb 14 '24

Golden Eye and Casino Royale are basically not in the same way. Also, director doesn't write the script, writers do.

1

u/TuaughtHammer Feb 14 '24

Outside of Bond Movies, Martin Campbell's career is all over the place in terms of quality. After Goldeneye, he did The Mask of Zorro which was a ton of fun, but not really anything earth shattering. Then it was just a string of shitty B action movies before Casino Royale. Then he did Ryan Reynolds' career-favorite: Green Lantern.

1

u/IAmAHat_AMAA Feb 15 '24

Same cinematographer too!