Bond vs. surveillance

Rating: 6/10 (20 November 2015)

"Spectre" is the newest entry to the long-running and successful James Bond franchise. It is Daniel Craig's 4th turn as the world's most famous agent and the second time for Sam Mendes as director. The movie takes place basically right after the end of "Skyfall" and there are several references back to this 3rd Daniel Craig Bond film, but also to the two films before that, mostly about Vesper Lynd, but also about LeChiffre. Judi Dench has a brief scene as M again and we find out what happened to Mr. White. But now that I mentioned M, let's elaborate a bit on that. Ralph Fiennes is back in the role and he is a very different M than all the ones before him. He actually keeps firing and fighting, something you totally wouldn't expect if you knew these characters from the old movies sitting behind their desk from 8 to 5. Then again, Fiennes' M has some kind of military background if I remember "Skyfall" correctly.
The female main role is played by French actress Léa Seydoux and well. what can I say about her. I think she is a good actress and has stunning looks and I totally can see Bond falling for her. She looks breathtaking in this film, almost as good as in "La belle et la bête". The acting is above-par for Bond girls usually and she is doing a fine job with her character. Still, there are incongruences. She decides to leave Bond as she cannot live with another assassin, but quickly changes her mind, which destroys a strong farewell scene. And in the end, Bond chooses her and decides not to kill Blofeld and he says to Q that he is gone. Second time, Craig's Bond is deeply in love after Vesper Lynd and I wonder how they will elaborate on that story line. I hope she won't get killed early in the next Bond film, but I guess they somehow have to come up with a story to get her out of the picture for Bond to return to MI6. It will be quite a challenge to make this one credible and not too similar to Lynd's. If I hadn't known that Craig will return, this actually could have been a very nice ending to his turn as James Bond with Blofeld finally not being able to take Bond's most precious.
I briefly mentioned Blofeld above and he is played by Christoph Waltz. I must say I like him as an actor, but by now, he feels very similar with his mannerisms in totally different characters he plays. His characters always have their very own brand of humour and it would actually be nice to see him as a completely serious character at some point. I found his Blofeld not as interesting as Mikkelsen's LeChiffre or Bardem's Silva, which is quite a pity as they tried so hard to make him more memorable with him being the head of Spectre of course and also with the whole brother story. Waltz' "cuckoo" was even a bit cringeworthy during their talk. The scene with Bond tied up in the chair and Blofeld acting like some psychopath scientist was really creepy, almost a touch of "Marathon Man". And of course of Connery's Goldfinger almost losing his balls to Auric's laser in this classic movie back then.
Let's talk a bit about the henchmen: Wrestling legend Dave Bautista plays a character who does not really add something great to the story and does not even make sense. He comes into the room, kills apparently a high-profile aide of Blofeld and is still appreciated. I guess this was intended to show what a cold-blooded killer he is. But wasn't he intended to perform the stadium attack in Mexico City. This was completely forgotten for the rest of the film. Still, he was fun and his final fight with Bond (and Swann) was a nice addition to the long history of memorable train fight sequences in Bond films. Generally, he had nice presence. Calling him a modern Jaws would be too much honor, but he was fine overall and they did great in letting him be quiet. That emphasized his cold-blooded ruthless character.
"Sherlock" fans will appreciate the presence of Andrew Scott here. However, I must say that I did not find him too memorable. There is no denying he is a talented actor, but everything he did here he already did on "Sherlock" and not worse. Monica Bellucci was okay in her scene and shows us that Bond also has a weakness for older women. Ben Whishaw I remember not liking too much in previous films, but he was fine here as well. I am not yet too sure about the theme song this time, but it's probably not among my favorites.
All in all, this was a good movie and I highly recommend going to a theater to see it on a big screen, not on a small computer screen. Then again , I am probably biased because of how big a fan of the franchise I am. I think it's worse than "Casino Royale" and "Skyfall", but better than "Quantum of Solace". One reason may be that the two I liked more have legendary locations, the ones in the title, and this one and "Quantum of Solace" do not. As a whole, this was not a great Bond film unfortunately, but a pretty good one with some nice inclusions and references to older films (Blofeld's scar). I certainly recommend the watch, but I still hope that the next Bond film (with or without Mendes) will be truly great again.