thoughts on Skyfall
Nov. 17th, 2012 08:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chelseagirlWhat is it about Daniel Craig's James Bond that gets to me? I spent a lifetime being entirely indifferent to the franchise, and although I like Craig in general, I don't avidly seek out everything he's ever done, heart pounding all the while. But Daniel Craig AS James Bond? I am utterly transfixed. Saw Skyfall with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
althea_ann on Thursday, and it still works for me. Nobody ever actually reads my fan-related posts, but I can't help but make this one anyway. (ETA, OK, you've proved me wrong, f-list: I guess my timing was better on this one; usually I seem to be into the different thing at the different time from everyone else!)
I kind of grew up never watching James Bond movies, even if I liked the theme songs to some of them. I remember making my parents tell me the plot to Live and Let Die, because I liked the song. And when I did start watching them, it was for two reasons: 1) guest starring actors I like -- I have watched James Bond movies because Diana Rigg (even though I had to suffer through Lazenby; it was like getting bonus extra Emma Peel), Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, and Sean Bean were in them. Wasn't David Bowie in one, once? Must watch that. 2) Boys. I've always regarded Bond as pure male fantasy, as a franchise, and sometimes past boyfriends or current husbands want to watch them, and if I've got nothing better to do, then, sure.
Enter Casino Royale. As Daniel Craig got out of the water, and the camera lingered lovingly on him, I thought, "My goodness, not just a good looking man" -- after all, Pierce Brosnan is a very good-looking man, and one I find likeable overall, though that didn't get me to watch his Bond movies unless Sean Bean or Michelle Yeoh were in them -- "but a good looking man being objectified by the camera. Someone's read their Laura Mulvey. Let's see where this one goes." And I liked where it went, and have seen his subsequent Bond movies in the theater, even *without* the man in my life, who is cranky and won't go to the movies anymore.
Of course I have my quirks . . . I 'ship him with Judi Dench's M, and will whistle innocently when you say "maternal" just like I don't necessarily see your pairing, in turn. (Younger man/older woman is a tiny bit of a kink with me; after all, my M. is nine years younger than me . . . ) But this character, who is ideologically so not my cup of tea, just gets to me, as played by Mr. Craig. Spoilery thoughts behind the cut:
OMG, all the wonderful Bond/M interaction I could ever want. And his emotions as he cradles her dying. On a straightforward narrative level, forget any shipping, just gorgeous. The New Yorker actually complained that this outing wasn't as tongue-in-cheek as they would like -- I'm just going, dude, a James Bond movie made me sniffle. Go figure.
Bond, you might always have hated that house, but how I would have loved to restore it!
Eve was so awesome and I am sad she is Moneypenny because I wanted her to get her own adventures, that I would totally go and pay good money to see, not just see her in cameos flirting with Bond from behind a desk. I mean, she can do that too, but preferably not behind a desk.
Because I am stupid and read spoilers, I knew Judi M was going to go, even though somehow I had remained unspoiled on the new M, as soon as I saw Ralph Fiennes, I knew. ETA: and in a discussion elsewhere, and then in my conversation with cliosfolly below, I've crystallized what bothers me about this: all male-hierarchy restablished, Eve disempowered, and Bond having lost his final emotional connection with Judi/M's death -- does this set us up for the slick and shallow Bond who never interested me before?
Face it, these movies remain beyond silly as hell. Laws of physics, we defy thee.
Did Javier Bardem have to be blond because he was supposed to be Obviously Parallel to Bond, or just because Bond villains always have something eccentric about them? Did not go with his skin tone, though not worse than his hair in No Country For Old Men. But he was a great villain; I would like there to be backstory fic about him as M's operative in Hong Kong. Also, my god, talk about issues, when he tried to get her to shoot them both through the head and die with one bullet? Whether mother-figure-turned-on-him or scorned-ex-who-betrayed-him, dude. I think he genuinely wanted Bond, though he also wanted to disconcert him, but did he really think that someone with as busy a penis as Bond's had actually never tried that before? Bond is the Lord Byron of spies. "Try and find a place my penis has never been. It's not easy."
Ben Whishaw, Q as hipster geek boy. With excellent hipster glasses. I hear this is the new popular pairing, and I don't really see it -- Bond and Javier, yes, Bond and Eve, oh please, Bond and Judi M, yes yes!, Bond and Ralph M, I see a world in which he *always* does his Ms, probably on that polished desk . . . . But that didn't stop me from adoring him, because I always do. Hmm, I wonder if I can't see them because . . . Byron and Keats? Nuh uh. ;-)
althea_ann on Thursday, and it still works for me. Nobody ever actually reads my fan-related posts, but I can't help but make this one anyway. (ETA, OK, you've proved me wrong, f-list: I guess my timing was better on this one; usually I seem to be into the different thing at the different time from everyone else!)I kind of grew up never watching James Bond movies, even if I liked the theme songs to some of them. I remember making my parents tell me the plot to Live and Let Die, because I liked the song. And when I did start watching them, it was for two reasons: 1) guest starring actors I like -- I have watched James Bond movies because Diana Rigg (even though I had to suffer through Lazenby; it was like getting bonus extra Emma Peel), Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, and Sean Bean were in them. Wasn't David Bowie in one, once? Must watch that. 2) Boys. I've always regarded Bond as pure male fantasy, as a franchise, and sometimes past boyfriends or current husbands want to watch them, and if I've got nothing better to do, then, sure.
Enter Casino Royale. As Daniel Craig got out of the water, and the camera lingered lovingly on him, I thought, "My goodness, not just a good looking man" -- after all, Pierce Brosnan is a very good-looking man, and one I find likeable overall, though that didn't get me to watch his Bond movies unless Sean Bean or Michelle Yeoh were in them -- "but a good looking man being objectified by the camera. Someone's read their Laura Mulvey. Let's see where this one goes." And I liked where it went, and have seen his subsequent Bond movies in the theater, even *without* the man in my life, who is cranky and won't go to the movies anymore.
Of course I have my quirks . . . I 'ship him with Judi Dench's M, and will whistle innocently when you say "maternal" just like I don't necessarily see your pairing, in turn. (Younger man/older woman is a tiny bit of a kink with me; after all, my M. is nine years younger than me . . . ) But this character, who is ideologically so not my cup of tea, just gets to me, as played by Mr. Craig. Spoilery thoughts behind the cut:
OMG, all the wonderful Bond/M interaction I could ever want. And his emotions as he cradles her dying. On a straightforward narrative level, forget any shipping, just gorgeous. The New Yorker actually complained that this outing wasn't as tongue-in-cheek as they would like -- I'm just going, dude, a James Bond movie made me sniffle. Go figure.
Bond, you might always have hated that house, but how I would have loved to restore it!
Eve was so awesome and I am sad she is Moneypenny because I wanted her to get her own adventures, that I would totally go and pay good money to see, not just see her in cameos flirting with Bond from behind a desk. I mean, she can do that too, but preferably not behind a desk.
Because I am stupid and read spoilers, I knew Judi M was going to go, even though somehow I had remained unspoiled on the new M, as soon as I saw Ralph Fiennes, I knew. ETA: and in a discussion elsewhere, and then in my conversation with cliosfolly below, I've crystallized what bothers me about this: all male-hierarchy restablished, Eve disempowered, and Bond having lost his final emotional connection with Judi/M's death -- does this set us up for the slick and shallow Bond who never interested me before?
Face it, these movies remain beyond silly as hell. Laws of physics, we defy thee.
Did Javier Bardem have to be blond because he was supposed to be Obviously Parallel to Bond, or just because Bond villains always have something eccentric about them? Did not go with his skin tone, though not worse than his hair in No Country For Old Men. But he was a great villain; I would like there to be backstory fic about him as M's operative in Hong Kong. Also, my god, talk about issues, when he tried to get her to shoot them both through the head and die with one bullet? Whether mother-figure-turned-on-him or scorned-ex-who-betrayed-him, dude. I think he genuinely wanted Bond, though he also wanted to disconcert him, but did he really think that someone with as busy a penis as Bond's had actually never tried that before? Bond is the Lord Byron of spies. "Try and find a place my penis has never been. It's not easy."
Ben Whishaw, Q as hipster geek boy. With excellent hipster glasses. I hear this is the new popular pairing, and I don't really see it -- Bond and Javier, yes, Bond and Eve, oh please, Bond and Judi M, yes yes!, Bond and Ralph M, I see a world in which he *always* does his Ms, probably on that polished desk . . . . But that didn't stop me from adoring him, because I always do. Hmm, I wonder if I can't see them because . . . Byron and Keats? Nuh uh. ;-)
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Date: 2012-11-17 01:38 pm (UTC)I feel completely the same about the Bond movies - they just never interested me - even after I read a couple of novels. Timothy Dalton was a crush of mine so I was optomistic about him but... Brosnan is not on my List of Lovelies but was also OK, but still...
I have been interested in Craig for years and was curious when Casino Royale came out. Like you I went along and ----> WOW! I am glued. Somehow he seems to embody the role in ways the others simply didn't. I am looking forward to Skyfall for so many reasons.
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Date: 2012-11-17 03:01 pm (UTC)And thanks to you, I got to see him on Broadway, too! I usually ignore theater because it's expensive and people who live here rarely go, and I probably would have missed out were it not for you.
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Date: 2012-11-17 05:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-18 02:01 pm (UTC)I confess I have a level of discomfort with RPF -- not that I judge those who write it, just that it's not for me. But anything you write with Judi/M, I'm so there!
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Date: 2012-11-25 02:16 pm (UTC)I fully understand the discomfort of RPF - I kind of have that myself. But it seems the only thing I can write when I am writing. I see them as fictional people with famous faces but acknowledge that it is laziness as I could just create my own faces for fiction.
I will let you know if anything M arises. Think Skyfall is on at our one screen next week.
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Date: 2012-11-17 02:28 pm (UTC)You know me, I was never a big Bond fan, just started going after college because a close friend (B) was into it. I found them entertaining, but not memorable...until Daniel Craig... Not only does he bring an unbreakable cool and a sculpted-by-Michaelangelo body to the role, but a depth and vulnerability no one would expect to find in James Bond. It's that wound, the loss of the one woman (in hundreds?) that he actually, actually loved, that gets to me. James Bond as icon? A gripping roller coaster ride and one-night-stand all in one. James Bond as real human being (yes, with perfectly sculpted abs and cool blue eyes)? ...Ah, now you've gone and involved my heart...
Some of my Twitter friends were talking about Skyfall (which I haven't seen, btw) the other day and one said he thought Craig was looking "too haggard" for the role to which I responded, "I will never not get weak in the knees for Daniel Craig, just from memories alone..." Several chimed in in agreement. : )
msb66 said it well, Somehow he seems to embody the role in ways the others simply didn't.
Yes. Exactly.
The movie itself will have to wait for cable for me since my Bond friend is out of commission with back problems and my current movie viewing opportunities are limited (and we tend to see things like "Flight" and "Cloud Atlas" [tomorrow]). Actually, I head upstate tomorrow for what will probably be a couple months. (And no movie viewing, I'm thinking.)
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Date: 2012-11-17 02:58 pm (UTC)I need M. (mine, not Bond's) to see this, because It's Killing Me not talking about it here at home.
I will probably not get to see Cloud Atlas in the theater -- I read the book and am curious about how they are doing it. Reviews haven't been great, but just that they are doing it *at all*. Plus I have a mini-crush on Lana Wachowski, she seems so happy in her own skin now that she has transitioned.
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Date: 2012-11-17 03:51 pm (UTC)Wish I could help you out and see it so we could talk about it, but alas, I'm sure it'll be ages... :(
Did you see him in "Defiance"? He looked like no Jew I've ever known, but still, I didn't care. (James Bond as a Nazi-era Russian resistance fighter...) And I loved him in "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"...)
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Date: 2012-11-18 02:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-18 02:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-18 06:00 pm (UTC)No big -- you are just very into the bluray and I thought you might have bought it before you switched over . . .
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Date: 2012-11-19 04:15 am (UTC)As for the Blurays, yeah, I have a bunch, though not nearly as many as I'd thought. Just transfered everything into a drawer in the server and was surprised I didn't have more. And though I love Daniel Craig's Bond, I guess not enough that I have to have copies of the two movies? Make sense? I dunno - I may have to change that as I'm feeling more strongly about him lately.
OH!! And get this - R and I are going to see Skyfall tomorrow!! I was surprised to hear her say she wanted to see it, never heard her express any interest in Bond, but it's getting such great reviews and people have recommended it to her, so. :) I shall burble after I've seen it, though we're hitting the road again early Tuesday morning, so comments may have to wait a few days. M's 'rents are in for the holiday this year or did I hear wrong? Have a great one, whatever you do.
[Sidenote: it's time I made some new lj icons. They're all Max Adler and he is, sadly, becoming less and less relevant to whatever convo I am having. :( Maybe I just need to create a few non-Pirate icons. For variety. :)
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Date: 2012-11-19 10:46 am (UTC)So we have a long weekend to clean.
Hmm, you didn't mention many of my favorites --Sybil/Branson I love even slightly more than Anna/Bates who I love a whole lot, not to mention all the badinage between the Dowager Countess and Isabel -- although they're kind of inconsistently written, with Isabel being RIGHT about health care in the one case, and then Violet being right the next. It's kind of hard to hate any of them -- Edith is hateful to Mary at one point but then Mary is so hateful to Edith at others, and I like them both. Except of course Thomas and O'Brien, and considering what Thomas is going through being gay in that time period, it's hard not to sympathize with him, too.
Scary fact: the actor who plays Lord Grantham was born in 1963. I can't believe he's YOUNGER than me, maybe it's just the character, but he strikes me as well into his fifities. (Elizabeth McGovern was born in 1961, so that's okay.)
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Date: 2012-11-19 03:56 pm (UTC)Well, it wasn't meant to be a complete list - just a sampling. My battery life was running out (I'm plugged in now) and I only had so much time. I loved watching Sybil come into her own, finding ways to express that part of her heart, and I hear hard times (possibly an understatement? I'm not fully spoiled so I don't really know what I'm talking about here...)are coming for her and Branson and that will be sad to see. I have ADORED all the interaction between the Violet and Isabel! And I love that the Dowager Countess is not a stereotype, imperious to a fault, that she is often fair and sensitive. I've also loved seeing the relationship between her and Cora. When we meet them all, Mary and Edith *are* hateful to each other - they're different people then. Edith does hold onto that longer, I think, but she definitely suffers from middle child syndrome. Plus her own family, particularly her mother, treats her like she's destined for spinsterhood, whilst Mary is the focus of all their attention because she's beautiful *and* the (inheritence) hope of the family. I'm not sticking up for her so much as I can see where her attitude has come from. Maybe that feeling of being slighted and discounted by the family has motivated her all her life and set up this rivalry between them. If she'd been more classically beautiful (and therefore with more obvious prospects, from the family's point of view), she wouldn't have felt the need to compete with her older sister and they would have had a different relationship. Learning to drive was a the turning point for her - she could do something that her sisters couldn't. She got a taste of being useful - outside of the house. And when they set up the hospital, she really got a chance to help others. I think it did wonders for her self-esteem. You're right that the characters aren't black and white. (Except maybe Bates' late wife - I loved that actress on The Tudors...) Even O'Brien seems to have softened somewhat. (Remember, I've only seen the first two seasons.) After she caused Cora to lose the baby (and really, minutes before that, but it was too late), she seems slightly less venomous. I'll be curious to see if she continues to progress in S3 - or she reverts. As for Thomas, again, pretty damn hateful, but having to live as he has, you know life is hard for him. I didn't care for the (almost) transgression btw Lord Grantham and the housemaid, though I know those sorts of things happened and yeah, OK, he had reason to feel neglected. I just thought it was out of character for him. I see him as so strong. Overall, though, my favorites are Mary and Matthew (I have such a crush on the character/actor) and I cheered when they finally kissed the first time - after all those months of so clearly being in love with each other - and I was sobbing when he finally proposed and she accepted. So happy I only have to wait a couple more months to see the next season. Usually I get into these things and have a long wait, but two months isn't bad. (And I think I'll be busy enough to not notice...)
Shit, he's way younger than *me*. :( I still feel like a kid and though I may not have your youthful glow, I still don't look (or act) my age. I still surprise people, too. Lately, though, I'm finding that I'll look at someone and think they seem so much older than me and realize they're probably my age (or younger) and the real thing is that they look more like a "grown-up" than I do. Clearly, if I'm still making that distinction (in age), I will never be a grown up. And while that's usually fine with me, I sometimes wonder if I actually were a grown-up in the traditional sense, if I would have a more...traditional kind of life. (With husband and kids and career.) I am a Lost Girl... ;)
Sorry, should have just put this in a note, but it's time for Willow's shot and I have to run!
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Date: 2012-11-20 01:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-19 11:22 pm (UTC)Wah. Oh, well. There's always cable.
Got all excited today when one of my Pirate friends posted that her new ship was from Skyfall, thinking immediately she was shipping 007 and M, but alas, she was shipping "00Q"... (I was going to introduce you to each other...)
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Date: 2012-11-20 12:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-17 02:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-17 03:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-18 02:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-18 02:16 pm (UTC)There's also the fear of having to wait another month. Financially very scary for me, though I would never let on to her. Just means I need to find something, anything the minute she no longer needs me. I might be able to start looking before then, but I also need to get my head back in the game. Of necessity, I've been thinking solely about the present situation for months now and I have to remind myself what and who I am...
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Date: 2012-11-18 02:33 pm (UTC)But I feel like the universe kind of owes you because you HAVE been putting Roz first.
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Date: 2012-11-18 03:12 pm (UTC)I was going to bring up all my stuff for macaroon making, but honestly, I don't know when I'd be able to make them. So much work. I may get the chance to come back home (my home) for a couple days and I could still change my mind, but I'd have to see.
Please don't spend any money on me, OK? I just won't be able to do that for you. :( (I already have the ingredients for the macaroons.) Let's postpone and celebrate together - a Christmas/Birthday in March sort of thing. :)
And yes, I think the universe owes me, but sadly, I know it doesn't work that way... :( (Gonna have to find my own job, alas.)
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Date: 2012-11-18 06:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-19 04:16 am (UTC):P
;)
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Date: 2012-11-17 03:40 pm (UTC)Seeing Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace again, I'm struck by the relationship between Bond and M, which Skyfall paid off beautifully. It's understated and prickly--but the two women we ever hear him call "bitch" are Vesper and M. And M is probably the only woman he can have an emotional relationship with after Vesper, because she doesn't evoke (many) protective instinct with him. She has the power, and there's no one else in his life who has power over him, and who he accepts has that power over him.
I think he genuinely wanted Bond, though he also wanted to disconcert him
YES. And he reminded me of what Coulson says about Loki in Avengers--you're going to lose because you lack commitment. There's something self-defeating about Silva, even in that scene, and it becomes more and more evident as the movie goes on. I liked that his goal was so personal and unhinged. He doesn't want to triumph in the traditional way, and if part of him wants Bond to be "the other rat", part of him also knows that he won't and can't, and that the end-game is Silva's death--and he wants it that way. He just wants to take a lot of people down with him.
The hair was pretty tragic, though. And they dyed his eyebrows too. *shakes head*
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Date: 2012-11-18 02:07 pm (UTC)I think in some ways, that last scene with M, where Silva has the gun to both of their heads -- that's what he *really* wanted all along -- except, of course, he really, really wanted for her to pull the trigger. Everything else was just foreplay. Though he would have really enjoyed foreplaying with Bond. ;-)
Yeah, we were talking about the hair in book group yesterday -- I guess it was so he was more obviously a mirror of Bond (the blue contacts, too), but he is at least an actor who carries off tragic hair on a regular basis.
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Date: 2012-11-17 05:13 pm (UTC)I read almost all your posts. Specifically, I read your fannish posts whenever they are not spoilers to me. I haven't yet seen this movie, so I'll skip this particular post, as I haven't yet seen the most recent season of Doctor Who, and so on.
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Date: 2012-11-18 02:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-17 10:40 pm (UTC)I was disappointed in some issues, though: I feel most of the strangeness was displaced onto the Orientalism of Shanghai and Macau, and then the whole creepy-rapey shower scene of Bond's with Severine. And then the way the movie ends with a massively retro reestablishment of patriarchy is disappointing (Male M--rather than the person leading the inquiry, Clair Dowar, which could have fit, too--and Moneypenny = secretary).
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Date: 2012-11-18 02:22 pm (UTC)I didn't read the shower scene as rapey because she seemed very pleased to see him there -- at least as pleased as she could seem about anything. As for homosexuality as threat, Bond defused that pretty nicely, I thought, with the whole "you think I haven't done that before?" comment -- the one time the whole theater kind of squee'ed in unison. So even the internalized homophobia of the moment is kind of turned around with the whole "you assume I'm (only) straight because you've only *seen* me with women."
But as for the re-establishment of patriarchy at the end, yeah, I was talking about this in the comments in glvalentine's journal yesterday and I realized that what bothered me about the ending was that they'd kind of undone everything that made this Bond different and more appealing to me -- Eve could have remained this kickass agent, but she's become office staff; men in all the positions of power; and it kind of seemed like the origins story was over and now we get the slick and shallow Bond we always had before Craig, his last vulnerabilities destroyed by the losses of Vesper and then Judi/M. I guess next movie will tell.
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Date: 2012-11-18 01:32 pm (UTC)I agree about this Bond bringing a different level of excitement. I don't think I'd really seen any Bond films until I was out of college, and I viewed the ones I saw mostly as camp -- the Cold War stuff was already ridiculous by the 1980s. I do really like Connery's Bond, though. Partly because he created the film franchise, but I also enjoy his physicality, though it's so different from Craig's. Connery is also funny (his fake German in Diamonds Are Forever always cracks me up) and knowing. Connery's Bond has a lot more Holmes in him, especially his connoisseurship. Craig's isn't such a braggart, so I appreciated the exposition in Casino Royale about his background and education. That sort of obsessive auto-didacticism is a perfect explanation for it.
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Date: 2012-11-18 02:29 pm (UTC)I think when I first became aware of Connery as Bond, I'd already seen him as an older (though not nearly so old as he is now!) actor, and he just looked weird and kind of like a Ken doll as Bond. I've never quite gotten over that. I'm sure I'll eventually see them as M. does watch them when they come on and I sometimes watch with him. I'm dying for him to see *this* one, however, as I want to talk about it, dammit.
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Date: 2012-11-20 02:27 pm (UTC)