Skyfall (***1/2)

Until recently, I had never especially cared for the James Bond series. It all seemed little cartoonish, and the various post-Sean Connery, pre-Daniel Craig Bonds seemed a bit too self-satisfied for my taste. But with Casino Royale, which made Agent 007 a little dirtier, a little sweatier, and, of course, unlucky in love (not sex), I was won over. The newest film, is, for at least the first half, the equal of that first Craig film. The opening is nearly as good as any chase sequence I’ve seen, with Bond tracking a computer drive, and the man carrying it, on a variety of wheeled vehicles, most notably a backhoe, while destroying much of Istanbul. The drive has the identities of secret agents on it; unlike other opening sequences, the chase sets up the rest of the movie.

Along with most of the other action, it’s highly improbable, but not obviously ridiculous. The primary villain, played by Javier Bardem with a blond dye job, verges on the cartoonish, but with certain human emotions and motivations. At times, the film both harkens back to the series’ past or consciously turns in a new direction. Nods to the past include the return, after an absence, of the character Q (Ben Whishaw), now retooled as the now-familiar type of the computer geek. Judi Dench again plays M; the character has a heightened role in the plot. At the same time, a scene in which Bond employs a simple radio-beacon device subtly mocks the reliance of earlier installments on elaborate gadgetry. This Bond does not order that his martini be “shaken not stirred,” but does take a picturesque drive in his Aston Martin.

But the most notable thing remains the Craig/Bond persona. He is not cocky, or especially debonair, at least compared to, say, Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan; his characteristic expression is somewhere between dour and thoughtful, rarely smiling, never smirking. The toughness and physicality recollects Connery, but I doubt if anyone would have spoken of the 1960s model as having “unresolved childhood trauma,” as happens here. Moreover, Connery would not have been seen with gray stubble, as Craig is. He’s taken some time off, for reasons the opening makes clear, and gotten rusty enough that he has to pause and rest his hand while clinging to the bottom of an elevator in a Shanghai high-rise.

While Casino Royale was adapted from an Ian Fleming story, and Quantum of Solace directly related to events in that movie, the story here stands alone. Screenplay credit goes to Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, who’ve collaborated on all Bond films from 1999’s The World Is Not Enough on, and Josh Logan (Hugo), with Sam Mendes (American Beauty) directing. Ralph Fiennes, as a British spy chief, and Naomie Harris, as a field agent who appears in the opening and later, are welcome cast additions with, it appears, recurring roles. Harris and Craig share some of the wittiest banter in the movie, but French actress Bérénice Marlohe, appears as the more traditional Bond girl. It would give away a plot point to say why her character arc is slightly distasteful, but in any case “romance” is a small part of the plot. After a nice sequence in a Shanghai skyscraper, the action flags in the middle before the literally explosive conclusion, whose setting finally explains the title.

IMDb link

viewed 11/17/12 11:50 am at Riverview and reviewed 11/18–25/12