Signs of life?

I'm ready.

I am past ready. The worst thing that could happen is for them to lose Daniel Craig with all of the delays.

If a new film comes in 2012, I hope it is a good film and not just one thrown together to make MGM money. Since MGM is desperate, one has to wonder how concerned they will be with overall quality versus just getting somthing out to generate ticket sales. I have my fingers conservatively crossed.

Well, MGM puts up the money and releases the film, but Eon still produces it. I have hard time imagining Michael Wilson and Barbara Broccoli making anything other than the film that they want to (for good or ill.)

You're telling me that everyone was happy with Die Another Day?

No, but I am saying that it was the movie that they intended to make. MGM (and briefly Sony, in the case of Die Another Day and Casino Royale) has never really had creative control. That control has resided in the metaphorical hands of Eon. But that does not mean that Broccoli and Wilson (and Barbara's father before that) have not made their share of mistakes over the years. They usually adjust.

Keep in mind that Die Another Day was the most financially succesful Bond movie to date (in unadjusted dollars.) From a business standpoint, they did what appeared to have worked in the previous Brosnan films and it paid off. That is why I really respect their decision to jettison Brosnan and reboot the series -- they did not do it because of any financial failure on the part of DAD, but rather because they acknowledged (discretely, of course) the artistic failure of the film.

I like the rationale and it is quite poetic, but there are many factors that could have contributed to Bronson's departure. The first that comes to mind is his age. In Die Another Day, he no longer looked the part of a secret agent. Even though he was always a softer Bond, he had an edge in Goldeneye and Tomorrow Never Dies -- an edge that was lost in his subsequent two outings.

Regardless of the exact motives, you are quite right about Broccoli and Wilson's willingness to take creative licence and risk. It is not all about money.

There is much more to it than age. They let Moore continue playing the part well into his Eighties (O.K., that is a slight exaggeration, but only slight.) They finally switched when Moore was the one who called it quits. The same was true of all the other actors -- even George Lazenby. The Brosnan switch was different than any of the others in that Brosnan wanted to continue playing the part. As far as I know that is the first time they have dropped an actor who was still willing to play the part, regardless of age.

I didn't know that about Bronson.

Brosnan has stated repeatedly that he was disappointed that they made the switch.

I obviously don't pay attention!

Interesting. According to the article, he only voiced his feelings on the matter this year. That would explain why I was unaware of the full story. I'll fully admit that I've fallen behind on entertainment gossip this year.

I got a kick out of the reader's comments. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I don't see Bronson as being the best Bond since Connery. Craig definitely took the role to a new level, and in a good way. And Dalton is underrated. He brought a brooding darkness to the role, which was a perfect wake up from what we had seen from Moore. It would also have been interesting to see what Lazenby would have done with the role, had he have been given the chance.

It looks like most of the commenters on that page were members of the DanielCraigisnotBond website -- their effusive praise of Brosnan was borderline toadying. I do not have anything against Brosnan, especially in Goldeneye, but he is hardly the ideal Bond. Dalton had great potential, and in some ways was probably the closest to the Bond in the novels (both in terms of personality and in terms of looks.) He struggled with the humor, though. I am glad that in Craig's case they have simply jettisoned much of the "humor."

Datlton does much better in Licence to Kill. I think a large part of that is owing to the writers, who wrote the script with Dalton in mind and eschewed much of the humour in favour of Dalton's darkness. That said, I have always been a fan of the intro sequence to The Living Daylights.

Wilson (who was co-writing the screenplays at the time) has said that since they did not know who was going to play Bond when they wrote the screenplay for The Living Daylights, they wrote a "generic" Bond and then made some last minute tweaks to tailor it a bit more toward Dalton. Licence to Kill was written with him in mind. My biggest problem with Licence is that they could not quite let go of the silly elements from the Roger Moore era. There were far less of them, but they were still there. Still, Licence is one of my favorite Bond films, warts and all. I would liked to have seen what would have happened with a third Dalton film, but it was not to be.


Good call on the pre-credit sequence of Living Daylights. That is one of my favorites in the series. If the rest of the film had kept that tone, it would have been fantastic.

I think we did this on the old boards on one of our Bond threads, but what are your favorite pre-credit sequences?

I don't recall if we ever did, but it is an exercise worth revisiting nonetheless.

Let me give it some thought and I will come up with a list and some thoughts. Beyond Living, the pre-credit sequences that come to mind are the ones from From Russian With Love, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, Goldeneye and Casino Royale . However, I am sure there are more.

Good choices. I would go with:

From Russia With Love

On Her Majesty's Secret Service

Live and Let Die

The Spy Who Loved Me

The Living Daylights

Goldeneye

Casino Royale

I agree with the Spy Who Loved Me, since it tied in to the storyline from OHMSS. That was a nice touch. It was also the best Moore film, which is an added bonus.

I'm trying to recall my thoughts of the pre-credit sequence to Goldfinger. I might have to rewatch that one.

In my last post, I incorrectly typed Licence, when I meant to type Living (I've since corrected). However, the pre-credit sequence to Licence wasn't bad. Just not sure if I would consider it a favourite.

I do not like the pre-credit sequence from Goldfinger because it is the moment that the series started to jump the shark for me. The whole duck-hat/tuxedo-under-wetsuit thing is really stupid, and the "shocking" one-liner really started a bad, bad trend for the films.

Licence does have a good pre-credit sequence, but it misses the "favorite" mark due to some clumsy direction from John Glenn and a major techinical gaffe during the skydive to the wedding. (It is really distracting how the shots of the helicopter viewed from the ground and the shots of the same helicopter viewed from above were not just at two different altitudes, they were nearly on two different planets.) Still, any sequence that includes a henchman cutting out a character's heart while the main villain whips his girlfriend as "punishment" has something going for it.

I recall Goldfinger now, and I agree. It is silly. Funny thing is that if they were to have lost the duck hat and tuxedo get-up, it would have been a very good pre-credit sequence, even with a closing remark of "Shocking."

Another pre-credit sequence that I think had potential, but falls short, is the sequence from The Man With The Golden Gun.

That one had the virtue of being somewhat off-putting. The same can be said of the opening of Live and Let Die -- my father tells the story of seeing that in the theatre when it was originally released, and everyone was completely confused by what was happening. Nothing wrong with that.

Octopussy is another near-miss. While it is too silly to ultimately rank very high, the aerial stunts are spectacular. I am even generous to the opening of A View to a Kill, since I am partial to ski sequences -- right up until the point that the Beach Boys start playing.

View To A Kill did have the Duran Duran number, but that is about all it has going for it. And, no, I am not a Duran Duran fan, but the title song is catchy.

Well, Tanya Roberts was cute. Horrible actress, but cute.