Die Another Day

Pis*-poor, Ill-conceived, soulless, mindless, horrifying - and thats just the title track in this 40th Anniversary defunctular - proof positive that the series is in terrible terrible trouble. In fact, based on the this exercise in self-parody (even the title sounds like a parody), devoid of any new or exciting elements, it might be worth pondering whether its time for the super-spy to take a sabbatical while all concerned contemplate a wholesale reinvention of the Francaise; a full-scale rebuilding from the ground up with absolutely no return to the cut and paste methodology that rots this one from the inside out. It isn't even worth discussing the story to this anniversary entry because there isn't one but it might be worth pointing out the contrast between this and the last anniversary story The Living Daylights (1987) for therein lies the clues to what's gone wrong with 007's exploits. Whereas Dalton's film used the anniversary as a sort of reaffirmation of principles and a throw back to the series dramatic and literary roots, a new dawn if you like (and frankly even if you don't), Die Another Dies goes the other way and represents the zenith of the Pervis/Wade era of Brosnan Bonds that has seen the action and budgets scale upward while the substance has conversely dipped and with the arrival of an invisible car, evaporated. This is about a trillion miles away from the 25th anniversary Bond in which familiar elements made the odd cameo appearance - the Astin Martin for example. Here the familiar is everything - in fact its the building blocks of the story (such as it is) and the characters and, well everything really. The tone is pure fantasy - deadly lasers in space, an evil ice palace lair for the villain, Madonna etc... Characters with silly names trade puns and insipid dialogue while Brosnan goes through the motions. If it was the intention of all concerned to make a companion piece for Austin Powers then they should consider DAD a roaring success. For those of us expecting a serious Bond movie however, its a minor travesty - Bonds have been lazy before (Moonraker, naturally) but this one completes the post-Goldeneye trajectory toward total self-parody and in doing so arguably takes its place along other genre greats such as Rocky 4, Star Trek: Nemesis and Batman and Robin in the 'film that crashed the series' category. Bond films have also been looking down the business end of oblivion before but 'tis no exaggeration to say that this time the martini loving super-spy is fighting for his life. Bond is a great character but unless the powers that be start to take him seriously again and refrain from this derivative fluff, they might as well call it a day.

I've seen every James Bond film, including the original TV version of Casino Royale and Die Another Day manages to make it into the bottom of the mediocre pile. It's nowhere near as bad as the embarrassing Diamonds are forever, the painful Moonraker, or the nearly unwatchable Man With A Golden Gun, but it's still pretty bad and is probably the worst entry since Octopussy. For one thing, Bond is thoroughly incompetent throughout the movie. He fails in his mission objectives, he gets captured, he doesn't escape, and he remains clueless as to the identity of his adversaries. Sure, he can surf and handle a sword, but he's a lousy spy. Most Bond movies have relatively weak plots but this one seems totally rambling and inconsequential. What exactly were the scorpions meant to symbolize? Do we care? And why Iceland? Apparently just because it was cool, since it had no intrinsic meaning to the villain. Then again, this villain is one of the least fleshed out I've ever seen in a Bond movie. In some ways this was almost a retrospective of Bond movies, as the director tried to lift a scene from all the previous ones. I was slightly reminded of the homage scenes in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, but at least there the retrospectives had a narrative point. Here it just feels heavy-handed. Nobody is going to get any awards for acting in this movie. Halle Barry is miscast as Jinx and serves more as a distraction than a partner. The villain seemed like a pale imitation of John Malkovich's character in Johnny English. Judi Dench can play M in her sleep and it looks as if she's doing so this time. The obligatory Q scene felt forced. And I'm still trying to figure out why they felt the need to humiliate poor Moneypenny at the end. If Brosnan is going to make another Bond film before he retires the role I hope they get a director who understands the Bond mystique, because this one seems to think it's all about blowing things up while making jokes about your genitals.