Really liked it

Rating: 9/10 (10 November 2008)

I never let other peoples' views influence me before I see a film, and this was no exception. But after the first few minutes I thought I might have been wrong. The opening sequence was frankly annoying with excessive editing and that shaky camera, and as for the song, (and I hadn't heard it before), well I never thought I'd say this but it makes Madonna's Die Another Day sound good.
But when the film started for real, all that was soon forgiven. The action was breathtaking, the story was good and the rough edge to Bond's character was retained, Craig's Bond being the most human so far. I'm not ashamed to say that I was touched when he held the dying Mathis to his chest. He's also an irresponsible and dangerous Bond, a side which the character needed. The main villain was a little weak, but that was balanced out by a Bond girl who was as strong and as motivated as Bond without trying to surpass him as we saw with Jinx in DAD.
Judy Dench was great again, and I liked the portrayal of Leiter too. I hope that he and Bond will soon be friends as before. Interesting too, was a moment that I took as a homage to Goldfinger, though I won't reveal it here. And there were of course some good locations some glamorous, some not; a good balance. Curiously, they brought back the traditional gun barrel sequence though not until the end of the film.
Hold back your opinions until the end.