Years ago, I dreamt up a Bond story in which our hero is injured badly in a screwed up mission. He assumes there’s a mole…..to recover from his injuries he retires to the Highlands. Once there, the rest of the film would deal with a quite primitive life and death struggle between Bond and an army of hit men sent by the mole. Minimalist, gadgetless, in other words: everything Bond wasn’t at the time (The World is not Enough, really?).
Well, thank my lucky stars, Skyfall has, at least in spirit, made this dream come true. A quite straightforward, and comprehensible plot, based on just a few main characters. And it even takes us to Scotland!
I really enjoyed Skyfall. Sure, there are several plot holes that don’t stand up to close scrutiny. Daniel Craig’s bond is, to me, as ever ambiguous. At times I just don’t see him as Bond, yet at other moments I understand the toffish/brutish type he is portraying. Javier Bardem is the perfect creepy foil, although I found that too little was done with certain aspects of his plot line, to say more would be to spoil….
The opening stimulates the senses, and some viewers have complained that the film slows down too much afterward. I couldn’t agree less. The timing is in fact a strong point of the film. The long build up to the climax works. The finale is both exhilarating and ridiculous in the best Bond tradition. Well done Sam Mendes and screenwriters Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and John Logan.
If you even slightly enjoy the Bond genre, you have to see this installment. A die hard Bond fan friend of mine actually clapped his hands in delight at the return of a number of Bond canon characters and set details at the very end of the movie. It bodes well for the future of this fascinating franchise. And then in a few more years they can reboot with Michael Fassbender as 007 – can you imagine that?