If this is Daniel Craig’s swansong as James Bond, the title could not be more apt. Spectre is a solid entry into the Bond canon, with wonderful set pieces, cool tech, pretty women, etc. However, nearly every piece of it falls in the shadow of its immediate predecessor, Skyfall. As Saturday Night Live has taught us, Adele makes everything better.
We open with Bond (Craig) tracking down a killer in Mexico’s Dia Di Los Muertos. This killer happens to be linked to the mysterious Spectre Organization, forcing bond to go against MI6’s orders to hunt down the syndicate. MI6 is also going through a bit of an overhaul as well; C (Andrew Scott) wants to enhance the spy organization’s monitoring capabilities at the expense of field agents, forcing M (Ralph Fiennes) into a tricky position of defending a rogue agent. M’s compromise forces Bond to utilize Moneypenny (Naomie Harris) and Q (Ben Whishaw) to shadow the shadow organization, taking unknowing bystander Dr. Madeline Swann (Lea Seydoux) along for the ride.
Spectre recenters Bond around stellar action setpieces with loose plot filling. Director Sam Mendes makes the Dia Di Los Muertos sequence beautiful to watch, with the camera slowly swooping in and out of each rich location as Bond sets up and finishes his target. Plus there’s a killer helicopter fight! There is a really cool car chase in Italy, and an awesome train fight with Dave Batista. The final chase is also pretty great, due to the stakes-raising team effort necessary for success. Spectre is the star NBA player who won a championship: when the pressure is high, they deliver and then some.
However, that same NBA player (read: Rajon Rondo) phones in games against terrible teams, much like Mendes phoned in Spectre’s plot. The secret organization stories pulls from much better films like Captain America: The Winter Soldier and minimizing the organization to cartoonish evil, very unlike the Javier Bardem villain in Skyfall. In addition, the film drops the sizzling heat of Monica Bellucci/Daniel Craig for a WTF relationship between him and Seydoux, which dies on arrival and clichés after the fight with Bautista. The same team that wrote Skyfall wrote this one, and many of the earlier Bonds; maybe their 3 year gap was not enough, or they were channeling the late Brosnan era.
Craig, it’s pretty safe to say, is the best bond since Sir Connery. The actor’s intensity gives Bond a consistent edge and drive, constantly pushing the character forward despite trauma and setback. Christoph Waltz hams it up and chews the scenery like its Christmas, when he finally shows up; that shtick worked in Inglorious Basterds, but its wrong for this film. Andrew Scott however, matches the intensity of this script better, and his scenes with Ralph Fiennes while obvious are tense because of the two professionals. Naomie Harris and (especially) Ben Whishaw were good additions in Skyfall and continue to be strong supporters here, if only for a brief period. Of the Bond girls, its no contest; while Lea Seydoux is beautiful and young, she displays no chemistry with Craig, clearly just there for name recognition. Monica Bellucci, on the other hand, oozes the fire that Seydoux lacks in ONE SCENE. If Spectre had built the story around her and Craig, the plot would have been much more interesting and fresh. Crossed fingers for a Bond Cougar in the next film.
It seems kinda funny that before Skyfall, we actually thought Jason Bourne had supplanted James Bond as the spy for the 21st Century. The best thing about James Bond is his core is fascinating and can be adapted to fit whatever world situation we live in today. After superheroing Bond for the 90’s, Daniel Craig helped transform James Bond into the gritty anti-hero du jour. I cannot wait to see where the Bond franchise goes next. Thanks Sam Mendes and Daniel Craig, for righting the ship.