(no subject)
I saw Skyfall today!
Loved it. It was very ‘James Bond via The Dark Knight. And HOT DAMN THE CINEMATOGRAPHY. It was SO PRETTY. Ahem.
I’m really glad no-one spoiled it for me, because I didn’t know M was going to die and that came as an actual surprise. Also, how good was Judi Dench? Very good. I’m sad she’s not going to be in it anymore.
Did the old guy at the end call her ‘Emma’? Is that her real name?
Note on the ‘waste of good scotch’ line that caused controversy: that part of the film was EXTREMELY problematic and I don’t like it. And in order for me to feel remotely sympathetic towards Bond for the rest of the film, I had to write that line off as “that’s just the way he deals with violent death”. But what I hated more was that we the audience don’t get to react to Severine’s death- she’s shot so quickly you barely see it, Bond delivers his line and starts beating people up and…that’s it. She’s just written off, not even mentioned again, and I didn’t like that at all.
Anyway-
This film passed the Bechdel test I think! Helen McCrory’s character and M. Okay, they were kinda making statements to the whole room when they were talking, but they seemed to be pretty much sniping at each other too.
I know almost nothing about James Bond’s cast of supporting characters so I had no idea that Naomi Harris was playing Miss Moneypenny, but I liked her a lot. She had that whole “not putting up with any of this bullshit” thing going on.
(I am pretty distressed to see people at the above link furious that she ended up as ‘just a secretary’ – I haven’t got any job, let alone being a secretary, how insulting must I be to women?
Sorry. Got turned down for another one just before writing this.)
There’s probably a lot more to be said about this film- like how much it promoted a sense of British patriotism and stoicism and the symbolism of the bulldog, but that should probably be left up to people who actually know the Bond franchise. One last thing, though-
-the bits involving the Tube really reminded me of 7/7? I think that’s maybe what they were going for? Otherwise, why even use the Tube…
I don’t know. But if anyone’s ever up for writing fanfic for this film, I’d love to read something about what the average Londoner made of that day. Transport ground to a halt, shootings in government buildings, terrorists apparently everywhere- it must have been horrible. Wonder how many civilians actually died, both in London and all the other places Bond went? I’d love to see a film dealing with that, but it will probably never be…
November 15, 2012 @ 3:18 am
I didn’t even catch that Severine had died! I thought she was just bent over in ‘oh holy shit’ mode – I’ll have to watch for that on the rewatch. That scene was just disturbing and wrong, which was the intent (or at least I really, really hope that was what it was) but yeah that line is weird. Honestly I just wrote it off (which is bad of me) as one of those Bond lines but yeah it’s a touch not good. So is the shower scene with Severine as well but that really is just Bond film logic for you *eyeroll* The rage about Naomi Harris ending up as a secretary is annoying. In this economy where any job is a blessing it’s just like ‘whatever I’ll take it’ lol. Also she was in the field and made a choice to not do it anymore. It’s not a reward. At least not how I see it. I really need to see this movie again for many, many reason. Mostly fannish though of course :)
November 15, 2012 @ 6:29 pm
Y’know, I didn’t even think of that, that she might not have died! Because now I come to think of it, there wasn’t any blood… I’m not sure Eve is ever even referred to as ‘a secretary’ either! She just says she chose to take a desk job. Would people be as mad if she was called ‘head administrator’, because that’s basically what she is… Other then the disturbing Severine stuff, this was a really good film, definitely the best Bond movie I’ve ever seen…(not that I’ve seen more than three.)
November 16, 2012 @ 4:56 am
The wikipedia article says she’s dead apparently. Can’t find much else contradicting that – there was no blood but PG-13 action movies tend not to show the blood so much (otherwise they would be R rated action movies, lol). Moneypenny is actually M’s secretary not Bond’s so, yeah, that little skip by some of the people who claim to know Bond is annoying and the set up at the end of Skyfall certainly has her at least working directly under M in a desk job. Secretary? Who knows in this version. If they had said “Head Administrator” or something I highly doubt people would have flipped.
November 16, 2012 @ 8:48 pm
They don’t in Britain, anyway. I remember, The Hunger Games had loads of blood cut out…(and then they accidentally left it in for the DVD extras, HA) The other thing about Moneypenny, of course, is that now they’ve put a black woman in a (fairly iconic) role that’s always been played by a white woman…but no-one’s really talked about that as far as I can tell…
November 15, 2012 @ 7:37 pm
Yeah, I got really confused when people talked about her dying because I thought what happened is that Silva won by startling/scaring her so badly she bent over and dropped the scotch. There need to be more action movies which deal with the fallout. Or heck, maybe a “day in the life” comedy film which is all about how some random civilians deal with generic action movie good guys and bad guys rampaging through their town! I think the tropes of action films are embedded deeply enough for that to work.
November 15, 2012 @ 7:49 pm
I hope a director’s cut or something explains that! I’d really like it if she turned out not to be dead after all. I remember during the opening scene there was the traditonal ‘car chase in a market’ and there was fruit and stalls flying everywhere and I remember thinking, “wow, Bond, you probably put a whole ton of people out of business just now!” Also- daymn I would love to see a Dark And Gritty ™ type movie dealing with the cannon-fodder type characters in a movie – the cops, the henchmen, the redshirts and so on…but it would have to be done right… (Is that a Phoenix Wright icon? :D)
November 16, 2012 @ 10:28 pm
Yeah, it was very unclear what happened there either way. I was thinking more “loving pastiche” a la Hot Fuzz, but maybe split the difference and make it a black comedy? It is indeed! Baby Ema is so adorable. :)