‘Spectre’ portrays 007 in throwback mode
When I first emerged from seeing the latest James Bond film "Spectre," I was abuzz with all the fuss and flash of the special effects. So much so that I didn't mind that the story seemed like such a throwback. After I had time to mull things over, I began to reconsider.
Following the review of "Spectre" that I wrote for Spokane Pubic Radio:
I can’t remember the first time I saw a James Bond spy flick. I do remember going to the theater at Norfolk Naval Base with my best friend Ed sometime during the summer of 1964 to see the second of the Sean Connery Bond offerings, “From Russia With Love.”
It was a perfect time to be immersed in Ian Fleming’s world. I was barely 16, the Cold War was in full bloom and the evening news was talking about problems in a far-off place called Vietnam. Watching movies about a suave, no-nonsense British agent fight villains and bed beauties was the perfect escape.
The times, and Bond himself, have changed over the past five-plus decades. We’re now on our seventh Bond (if you count David Niven’s solo turn in the 1967 spy-spoof “Casino Royale”). And the all-pervasive War on Terrorism has replaced the tensions that seemed at least somewhat relieved after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
The most recent Bond – and, arguably, at least tied with Connery for rank of the best – is Daniel Craig. Like Craig himself, whose penchant for humor seems limited, the films have taken a serious turn. Certainly more serious than was prevalent during the Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan eras, and even more serious than those featuring Connery – though the Scots-bread Connery, at least, was able to convey a slight smile through his always-cool line deliveries.
Take the latest film, Oscar-winning director Sam Mendes’ second Bond effort, “Spectre.” Following the ultra-serious “Skyfall,” with its references to Bond’s past and his intimate relationship with Judi Dench’s M, “Spectre” is both a continuation of the Bond back story and a seeming culmination of Craig’s participation. Reports are that the search is on for the eighth actor to play Double-0-Seven.
It’s just as well. While full of the standard Bond gimmicks and characters, implausible plot twists and beauties-in-peril, “Spectre” seems like a hybrid of the traditional and neo-Fleming storylines. Taking up from where “Skyfall” left off, we find Bond facing the new M (played by Raph Fiennes) and new obligations while intent on completing an old assignment – which, we discover, involves a request/demand from his late and former boss.
That request takes Bond from an international incident in Mexico City – revealed in a brilliant opening sequence – to Austria and on to Morocco where he confronts the villainous secret agency SPECTRE and its leader, played by Christoph Waltz: the “author,” he claims, of all Bond’s pain. Meanwhile, Bond’s confederates – M, Q (played by Ben Whishaw) and Moneypenny (Naomie Harris) find themselves targeted by a new intelligence service that considers them obsolete.
It’s just at this point, where a truly serious film would delve more deeply into the richness of plot mechanics, that “Spectre” backtracks and devolves into standard Bond material: You know, the kind where our protagonist wins every fight, has every babe fall into his arms, and survives every villain’s evil, overly complex and murderous machinations.
And that’s the problem. Give us traditional wink-wink Bond or give us the new seriousness. This hybrid version feels neither shaken nor stirred.