Spectre

A hot mess.

Spoilers below.


The producers of the Daniel Craig films need to Make Up Their Minds. Either they are not making Bond Films (see, e.g., Quantum of Solace, which is tremendously underrated), or they are making Bond Films. Their most recent two efforts have both tried for a middle ground, and both have come up horribly short.

Let's get this out of the way. The first and most fundamental problem with this film is that it was obviously made merely because they got the rights to SPECTRE - the Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion - back from the McClory estate after years of stupid boring and available-elsewhere litigation. They didn't plan on having QUANTUM actually be SPECTRE - or Spectre, I guess, since the Special Executive yadda yadda is never actually mentioned. Is Quantum Spectre? I actually don't know. The movie never says. They just expect us to take Blofeld's word for it.

Ah. Right. Blofeld is in this movie. I hope that wasn't a surprise. He's played by Christoph Waltz, who actually, sad to say, gives Charles Gray a run for his money as Worst Blofeld Ever. I mean this guy is so camp he makes Raoul Silva look like Franz Sanchez. Of all the Classic Bond Shit to throw at us, you had to have a probably-gay villain? WHY? 

Here's my next problem: they Khan'd us. See back in my Spectre prediction post, I said

after the fiasco that was Star Trek Into Derpdom, EVERY STUDIO ON EARTH knows not to bullshit its audience about who the villain really is.

I said that. You can look it up, click on the link. (You will also notice that I nailed the prediction about Madeline Swann's identity.)

So, yay! Blofeld's back! And he has his white cat. And he's nothing like the original incarnation and he tortures Bond by drilling holes in Bond's skull.

Because that's how these villains operate now. Weeping blood, being French and wussy (I repeat myself), having really horrible facial wounds, and now brain-torture. Why was it necessary for this guy to be Blofeld? The real Blofeld never acted this way! (Personal opinion: the "real" Blofeld is the one who went on about the chickens,* not the Dr. Evil inspiration, although come to think of it, Dr. Evil is closer to the real Blofeld than the Nazi is.)

*But I would say that, because OHMSS is the greatest Bond Film ever made and Telly Savalas was one of the reasons why. In fact, he was reason number three.

Now way the hell back in my Skyfall review I bitched and moaned that James Bond has always been and will always continue to be a Boring Invincible Hero. Some snippets:

Despite the fact that the rest of the film will try to convince you that this is Vulnerable Human James Bond, the man who just got shot was Boring Invincible Comic-Book Superagent 007. 

  Snip

Then Bond takes out all of Silva's henchmen without missing a single shot. You know, because his shoulder injury only kicks in at dramatic moments.

Now I'll admit that whether this is a problem is a subjective matter. After all, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan, even the more human Timothy Dalton, you wouldn't expect these guys to go on about an owie or two (aside from TWINE, evidently). But with Daniel Craig, one always gets the impression that he's trying not to be a Boring Invincible Superagent. Only the script will never let him do that. Did they fix this? No. No they did not. In fact, this movie features Blofeld drilling holes into Bond's brain and telling him that the holes being drilled into Bond's brain will make him bloody useless in action, messing with his sight and balance and so on... and Bond gets free and shoots up the place anyway.

Why do we have to exact such a mental toll on Daniel Craig and ask him to do Serious Acting when he's just going to shrug off literally everything we throw at him? Actually wound James Bond for f*ck's sake.  If not physically, then emotionally (cf. the two good Craig films) - and I maintain that the Specter bullet-hole logo was unfairly evocative of the haunting final shot of OHMSS.

Next problem: the villain literally has no plan. He is going to take over the world's spy ring and then... who knows? He was behind all of the other villains, somehow. They don't bother to explain anything because Hey Look Blofeld's Back so we can skimp on plot. And characterization. Monica Bellucci must be the most horrifically wasted actress since Maud Adams in The Man With the Golden Gun, and unlike Adams, Bellucci probably is too old to have another go-round 9 years from now. (Trivia fans - she is the third Bond Girl, after Honor Blackman and Diana Rigg, to be older than the actor playing James Bond.)

The cast, Waltz aside, is very good. Waltz is literally playing Hans Landa, which doesn't work because this is not a Quentin Tarantino film. Even then, credit where it's due, it's not a cringe-inducing "arch" performance like the one Berenice Marlohe subjected us to in the last go-round. But, still, so what? Madeline Swann's characterization changes depending on the needs of the scene. She wants to go with Bond, so she can be captured, and then later she doesn't want to go with Bond, so she can be captured again.

(And why do Bond and Mr. White suddenly respect and trust each other all of a sudden?)

The title track is instantly forgettable, but such is the case of most of these. Singer's got some impressive pipes, though.

Even the action seems dull and uninspired, with two exceptions. Those exceptions are the pre-credits, where a helicopter does several barrel rolls, and a fight on a train that seems to be one huge homage, particularly in the brutal editing and near-complete lack of music, to the greatest fight scene in any film ever. But everything else is pretty crap. One punch takes out Blofeld's mole. One lucky shot brings down Blofeld's helicopter. There's a car chase that doesn't deserve the name, as it's just two cars driving really fast for a while until one of them crashes.

I know I have a mantra that no James Bond Film is actually utterly terrible - even Diamonds Are Forever has a decent fight in an elevator - but really, there's no defending Spectre (aside from the "Hildebrand" reference, which I chuckled long and hard at). It is simply Not Good. At All.

Lastly Blofeld's scar is on the wrong side of his face. Cheerio.