Tamahori helps a little in reinvigorating the franchise.
MGM celebrated the Bond franchise’s 40th anniversary with the Oscar winning actress Halle Berry (Monster’s Ball) joining the group and mega pop-star Madonna lending her voice and her latex-friendly body for Die Another Day. At the helms is Lee Tamahori the director behind Once were Warriors and 1997’s The Edge- who brings more of the gadgets, the women and the explosions to number 20. The Bond franchise has seen better days, but Tamahori does bring a sense of hope for the personage that prefers his favorite drink shaken but not stirred.
007 (Pierce Brosnan-Evelyn) and his secret service buddies go surfing no not Hawaii-but North Korea-where Mr. Bond launches up his mini Normandy invasion and judo-chops his way into strategic position. An impressive Gameboy-like device blows his cover, – and let’s just say that it won’t be Martinis and caviar for a while. The suave tuxedo friendly body of 007 is beaten down to the status of POW, and surprisingly he doesn’t escape his situation in the usual predicament. M (Judi Dench-The Shipping News) believes that her top agent gave up some info during his TLC torture sessions-he must now save his future first before dismantling some diamond operation. The machine gun language and cars shrieks are reintroduced in the get caught, escape, meet girl named Jinx, get caught again, escape and save the girl and the world type scenario. Some excellent plastic surgery is introduced as a plot point-and we’re not talking about breast augmentation- as Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens-Possession) plays the role of the antagonist and joining his army are shrapnel-faced Zao (Rick Yune-The Fast and the Furious) and evil Miranda Frost (Rosamund Pike-Castle of Lies).
For the most part, Tamahori does little to change the trademark formula of the Bond films, the more enjoyable part is seeing Bond’s initial dilemma-which refreshingly does add to the viewer’s interest in the character’s plight. The problem is that the characters are so little developed, suffering from the same glossy treatment as in the other more recent films. Berry’s impressionable film intro-looking perfect in her orange bikini is our only point of interest for the character-in commando gear she looks even more fluffier in the head-perhaps Jinx might become better detailed in her rumored own picture. The bad guys could certainly use an upgrade-the threesome of evil aren’t even comparable to the likes of freak of nature ‘jaws’ characters. The locations-key to all international espionage chapters of 007 are the highlight of the film, the exotic local of the ice palace is a superb place for a showdown with the high octane car chases and the country of Cuba could have been visually explored and narratively enhanced to benefit from the beautiful architecture that a city like Havana has to offer. The most exciting sequence was the fencing match that gets completely out of hand-reminiscent of the choreographed martial art sequences of contemporary Asian flicks. Unfortunately, the momentum doesn’t keep up when heading into the film,s conlcusion with an overkill of the plot with the very unnecessary disintegrating plane sequence.
I yearn for the nostalgic Sean Connery episodes, where there was this romantic notion of the secret spy, now it simply stuck in the more explosions, more special effects mode that does very little justice to the franchise- I would love to see this franchise turn around with a 007 getting caught and executed with a 008 in the works or maybe a 079, but not surprisingly MGM doesn’t have the balls it takes to refocus the franchise-but maybe the Jinx spin-off will prove different. Bond 20 is an enjoyable ride at times and certainly Brosnan’s best, but the repeated formula is growing wearily thin, giving more power to crappy action pics like xXx.