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David392is
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- Review count1
- Helpfulness votes1
- First reviewNovember 11, 2012
- Last reviewNovember 11, 2012
- Featured reviews0
- Average rating2
David392is's Reviews
Overall rating
2
/
5
Placeholder movie to tee up subsequent sequels - rent it
PostedNovember 11, 2012
David392is
from Chicago, IL, USA
Age:35 to 44
Gender:Male
Goes to the movies:monthly
Dialogue
1
/
5
Special Effects
2
/
5
Art Direction
3
/
5
Acting
3
/
5
Story
1
/
5
Camerawork
4
/
5
Wow, what a disappointment. Low on action, low on suspense, low on Bond, and very poor story. Maybe this was some kind of attempt to be a cerebral, reflective movie instead of the usual Bond flick, but it dies in the canyon between - neither entertaining in the classic Bond way, nor really qualifying as a thoughtful movie.
Javier Bardem delivers the only engaging performance in the movie as the villain, but the story line of his character's vendetta against M is shallow and simultaneously leaves a lot on the table that could have made for a more interesting movie - it was obviously just a half-baked mechanism to enable the theme of M being "put to pasture". That theme itself was cliche and poorly executed as well - the performance by Dench felt recycled, and Whishaw, Fiennes and Finney were underutilized and limited to cardboard roles.
Bond films always ask for a great deal of suspended disbelief from the audience, but this time Bond's return from the grave was so dismissively handled, it feels like any thin veil of storytelling was dropped: It's like you're in the script pitch session at the studio, instead of watching the finished product: "Yada yada yada, Bond somehow survives, let's skip the details, you know how it always goes". Sure, but at least make an attempt to entertain us! Much of the movie was like that.
It also felt like there were real budget constraints, impacting location. The London scenes were basically a studio basement; Shanghai amounted to a fly-by; Bardem's island held promise, but they did little except show up and shoot a couple cheap scenes there - not exactly the lair you'd hope to see for a digitally-omniscient villain.
The purpose of the movie seems merely to be to shuffle in and out various actors, and prep the audience for sequels to come.
Cons slow, bad story
No, I do not recommend this movie.
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