Director: Sam Mendes
Starring: Daniel Craig, Batista,Ralph Fiennes,Christoph Waltz, some invincible chick .USA. 2h 28m
I never describe myself a as a fan of anything but after the new wave of bond movies I am certainly happy to describe myself as a fan of early bond movies. For me the 60/70s charm of bond came in the guise of Roger Moore and Sean Connery, the 90’s and early 00’s n bonds passed me by and I can’t say I bothered to watch any of them, and I was highly disappointed with the Craig movies but I have attempted to watch them, despite not really getting what makes them so amazing.. This particular installment was okay though.. yep just OK…
So Bond is in peril yet again but this time the whole ’00 field agency is under threat with him. after performing a an unauthorized mission in Mexico during the Day of the Dead festive, he grabs a ring with a stylized octopus on it, he recognises the emblem but is soon off on another unauthorised mission while M is in a power struggle with C over the disarming of the ’00’s in favour of the “Nine Eyes” global surveillance and intelligence initiative.
Bond seduces Monica Bellucci who’s recently widowed, and gathers some important information about the Pale King AKA Mr White and eventually this leads him to his daughter who he’s tasked to protect (and in bond land she has to fall in love with him) and everything leads to Franz Oberhauser. The new Q; who does a lot more field work, forensically links Oberhauser to other bad guys such as Le Chiffre, Green and Silva and all are linked with Spectre, but it’s all up to Bond to find out what links Spectre to him. Oh and Mr Hinx (Batista) is constantly stalking like a new age Jaws but without any cool gnashers or any unusual bond henchman gags.
Bond eventually managed to tie his past with his near future with lots coming back to haunt him, but obviously being bond he slimes his way out of trouble just in the nick of time but there are good actions scenes even if they are slightly mish mashed together. The more recent bonds were victims of their own formulas which they stuck to like glue and which made them incredible boring.. But despite the mundane bits in between all the ass kicking I actually enjoyed this particular Craig installment, as the bad guy was actually a bad guy without having other bad guys after him, on top of that, there was the duel storyline of Bond fighting in the field and the political boardroom fight back in London. It’s alright everything you’d expect a Bond movie to be, intriguing but no real surprises, but I would have preferred Fiennes as Bond and a Shirley Bassey OST
Rating 6/10
R – Every other bond movie?
L – 10 of my favourite bond movies
A – Why I adore Retro Bond movies
5s – Daniel Craig, Christoph Waltz
Post Discussion
Admit One Film Addict 
There are great Bond films and bad Bond films, and unfortunately, this was a humorless, dour 007….why do they have Daniel Craig be SO serious and uninteresting? And the plot was weak, never did I really dare about any of it….we have 4 Craig Bond films and he’s barely at 50/50…give me the self-assured Sean Connery any day…
I was really into the early bonds, Craig’s interpretation is more traditional to the book but not something you wanna see on the screen
That’s a great point – he is indeed, but we’ve been raised to appreciate so many other aspects to 007, it makes him dour and a bit one-note…and “Spectre” was just ponderous!