007's Arch-Nemesis: Post-Modernism

Rating: 7/10 (8 November 2015)

For me, the Bond movies are always varying degrees of great. Even the worst of them entertains. So if I sound critical of SPECTRE, it's within the context that I'll probably only see it three times instead of five. That said
SPECTRE gets so much right and so much wrong that the film almost cancels itself out in some weird way. At its best, it's a nostalgic pastiche of classic moments and plot elements that are often amusingly reinvented and thoroughly enjoyable by themselves. But they are strung together so clumsily that any attempt to interpret them as a coherent plot will confound logic.
And, what's even more frustrating: Every time the movie starts to relax and have fun, Mendes can't resist the impulse to bog down the pace with a leaden sense of profundity. I think there's a good reason why the best Bond directors aren't household names. The more iconic your personal style, the less likely you are to deliver the established style and formula. I really can't distinguish Guy Hamilton from Lewis Gilbert. But Sam Mendes stands out, and not always in the most flattering light.