Skyfall

Rating: 7/10 (3 May 2013)

For me, Skyfall is a marked improvement over the previous (badly titled) Quantum of Solace if just because of how involved M (Judi Dench) is in the overall plot. That and Javier Bardem is just superb as the villain (with more than a strong reason to harbor some real resentment and to be a bit on the loony side) who was once a MI6 agent and knows plenty of secrets that he can use (besides the genius mixed with the madness) to expose the British Secret Service (not only that he actually is responsible for blowing the agency building in London up!) as maybe not as soundly protected or impenetrable as their reputation suggests.
Because M is willing to sacrifice her agents if needed to protect her country and government from terrorism and attack, Bardem's former agent, Silva, was tortured and had actually bit into a cyanide pill that didn't kill him but poisoned and "melted" inside him his mouth (ouch); when he removed his teeth it adds weight to his seething bitterness and hate for M (and the agency he worked for several years). James Bond (Daniel Craig, fit but for a while looking a bit sickly once returned from near death when shot accidentally by a field agent ordered by M to "take the shot") is on the pursuit, at the beginning, after an assassin who confiscated a list of MI6 agents undercover, traveling through crowded traffic in Turkey.
The fight on top of the moving train (and how Craig uses a Cat to get from one motorcar to another) kicks off the movie nicely, but there's a lot of plot that stretches out the action scenes. M's character is on trial (literally) when she must appear before a tribunal of sorts to address the miscues and infiltration of her agency, with Silva actually freeing himself from a cell heavily guarded in an underground bunker of London, crashing a court, and firing away (a slight hesitation allows M to be rescued by her new boss, Mallory (played by Ralph Fiennes) in a fine moment for him, grabbing a gun and helping 007 fend off Silva and a couple of his men).
Silva seems to have cyber skills and advantages that even trick MI6's Q (Ben Whishaw) and cause plenty of headaches for the agency; when 007 is taken to an island with a city abandoned by hysterical citizens who believed they would perish, Silva has a building plentiful with computer technology that has raised such havoc around the world, such power at his fingertips (how Bardem describes this and a bit of homoerotic groping on 007 while Bond is bound in a chair are examples of the showy theatrics for which Silva embellishes his villainy) provided much opportunity for him to smack around the morale of a highly renowned British Intelligence Agency. This film sheds light on a new threat that cannot be so easily exposed and recognized when M addresses her judiciary committee and their questions on her agency's mistakes.
Regarding the action, there's a nifty fight in a Shanghai high rise (the eye candy night scenes of Shanghai's city lit is quite stunning as is Macau) between Bond and the assassin he battled on the train (how Bond grabs hold to the bottom rail of the elevator, following him up, is cool), Bond's pursuit of Silva after he escapes his cell (the explosion of a wall and how a subway train falls through the collapsed hole nearly smashing Bond is epic) is a real hair-raiser, and the final sequence at Bond's Scottish manor (Silva's men sure lay waste to the place!) has plenty of gunfire and things go kaboom! The Bond girls are perhaps not as memorable as in times past (but still hot)--Naomi Harris is Bond's field partner, responsible for shooting him when M demands she attempt to shoot the assassin (and her shave of Bond's face, not to mention, her last name will make Bond fans smile), while Bérénice Marlohe as Severine, a lady Bond meets while trying to gain introduction to Silva through her, has a steamy shower scene with 007 before her head is used to balance a shotglass of liquor (Silva is punishing her for her little tryst with Bond, purposely missing the glass he could probably have hit with ease)--but have their moments opposite Bond.
This is ultimately all about Bond and M contending with Silva who is hellbent on his revenge. There are plenty of inspired homages to the Bond brand such as his gun and car (good joke about an exploding pen when Q and Bond share a conversation about the young and old in the agency), and this movie comments on the vulnerability and age of Bond. This is certainly my favorite of the Craig Bond films. Dench is expertly used and her moments with Craig are a perfect swan song to her M character. Albert Finney, as an old family friend of Bond's, has a marvelous supporting part and helps combat Silva's barrage of bulletfire.