Roger Moore dies at 89

[mirth]

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/23/movies/roger-moore-was-the-best-bond-because-he-was-the-gen-x-bond.html

[Sir Slash]

I'd say he definitely was the most British of all the actors to play Bond. I also liked Dalton.  ::)

[mirth]

I liked Dalton. Living Daylights is one of my favorite Bond films.

[MetalDog]

Roger Moore was the Bond of my youth.  The best part of watching him play the role was that he always seemed to be in on the joke.  He knew it was over the top, but he never lost his cool and the ladies always loved him.  RIP Mr. Moore.

[Sir Slash]

He and Connery seem funny to watch now being so occupied with banging all the women in sight. Dalton was a step in the more neutered side for Bond. Today Bond would be hauled before the Hague charged with International Sexual Harassment.  8)

[bayonetbrant]

Dalton was a step closer to the Bond of the books.  "License to Kill" was the closest they got to the 'book' Bond until the Daniel Craig movies

[Staggerwing]

Dalton was a step closer to the Bond of the books.  "License to Kill" was the closest they got to the 'book' Bond until the Daniel Craig movies

I've only read one Bond novel and I was surprised at how dark the book's tone and Bond's character were compared to the Connery and Moore movies I'd seen up to then.

[MetalDog]

http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/24/entertainment/roger-moore-marc-haynes-post/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_showbiz+%28RSS%3A+CNN+-+Entertainment%29

[Gusington]

What do you guys think of Daniel Craig's Bond? I haven't seen any of the Bond movies with him as the lead.

[mirth]

He's good. I really enjoyed Casino Royale. I've been meh on everything since, not because of Craig though.

[JasonPratt]

Craig as an actor is fine. As a grumpy bitter James Bond even in the origin story is, well, different, and added to "fine actor" is fine. I think the writers wrongly (but perhaps inescapably) overplayed the idea that Bond is an aging sad loser too quickly. They hadn't even fully finished his origin story yet, and by film 3 -- which in effect was really film 2, because Quantum of Solace was pretty much literally the action-packed hour-and-a-half grand finale to a 4 hour first Bond film -- they're already leaning heavily on how washed up and old James Bond is.

Which is one thousand percent insane. It could have barely worked but only if the scripts, especially in the first film, had emphasized that only veterans with lots of experience have earned the rare license to kill double-0 status. But the first film botches a faint execution on that by seeming to pretend that we're seeing Bond's first two kills in the pre-credit sequence -- followed by a credit sequence where he's coldly and methodically racking up a body count. (Obligatory RIP Chris Cornell, btw.) So... what was that? Was that what he did before the pre-credit sequence to earn the chance at a double-0? The credit sequence seems to imply it, but the pre-credit sequence seems to contradict it. Was that what he did after being given the license? The next scenes seem to imply that he's trying to quietly hunt whomever his target had sold out to, and that not a lot of time has passed, and the bad guys ("Quantum" as later revealed, "Spectre" as later ret-con revealed since for copyright tangles they couldn't just use Spectre to start with) aren't in danger mode that an unstoppable killing machine has been recently mowing through their ranks.

Anyway. It's just weird. The performance is fine on its own merits. It can work as an aging, bitter operative stretching himself to be functional beyond his expected service life -- which makes sense in the original novels because Bond was a clearly established war vet, on the constant edge of burnout, trying to stay relevant in the new Cold War. The tone of how to present Bond to audiences in the four Craig films is highly schizophrenic by comparison.

[Gusington]

Are you aging and bitter, Pratt?

[Sir Slash]

I thought they were pretty good but like Pratt says, too focused on Bond being an old, war-weary, relic type of guy that's, of course, always right about the bad guys. He's more of a strong, stoic  figure where as the other Bonds were more sophisticated and smooth. I can't imagine Connery getting his balls smashed in any of his films the way Craig did in Casino Royale-- Q would've given him a "Testicle Protector" device of some kind. But the films were OK, even Spectre wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Still, I'd love to see a new face in the Bond role. Maybe the black guy that plays Hemidal in Thor or Hardy from Madd Maxx.

[JasonPratt]

Are you aging and bitter, Pratt?

Sure!  :D

Re Spectre not as bad as I'd heard -- I watched it for the first time a few weeks ago on Amazon Prime (iirc), and I could agree with the complaints and the complements (such as they were) pretty clearly.

Good points for all the films: they look great, including great scenery; the acting is good to great in all of them; decent selection of action sequences (although QoS has too much trendy shakycam); good music in all of them (aside from the eyescratching theme from QoS).

[Gusington]

SPECTRE looked very good but I was scared away by poor reviews.