In the half-century since superspy James Bond from Ian Fleming’s novels first swished smugly into the big screen, martini in hand and flanked by international beauties, there have been six actors who’ve passed through the franchise, starting with Sean Connery in 1962’s Dr. No, to current title-holder Daniel Craig. However, by effect of having grown up with him in the role, Pierce Brosnan, Craig’s predecessor, has always been my Bond of choice. Naturally, there was some personal resistance when Craig’s Casino Royale came out a few years ago; the actor seemed too rough-edged, too brutish-looking, to replace the always suave and ready-with-a-quip—not to mention donning those impossibly impeccable suits—Brosnan. That resistance, turns out, is still in place, tested recently at a Skyfall showing—the 23rd in the series and the first to be directed by indie hitmaker Sam Mendes, of American Beauty fame. This latest Bond escapade, to its credit, does try to walk the line between preserving beloved tradition and exposing Bond’s background with more relish than has been attempted before. But while the film might be more incisive in terms of characters’ history and humanity, one questions whether that approach is congruous with the series’ established structure, and whether it is even necessary at this point.
Skyfall begins with an end. On a mission in Turkey to retrieve a hard drive containing the names of all undercover double agents working within terrorist organisations around the world—a list that would mean certain death for these spies were it to be released—our hero is accidentally shot and presumably killed by fellow agent Eve (Naomie Harris) while grappling with a mercenary atop a moving train (preceded by a motorcycle chase over the rooftops around the Grand Bazaar…did you expect any less?). Of course, Bond isn’t really dead, even though all of MI6—the British secret service—believes him to be. No, he takes the opportunity to relax at an unnamed island, drinking and dallying with local female offerings, and glowering at his boss M (Judi Dench), who had given Eve the callous order to “take the bloody shot.”
Bond is, however, pulled back into the game when the MI6 headquarters is bombed, and whoever is responsible not only has the aforementioned hard drive, and has hacked MI6’s network, but is also pursuing a personal vendetta against M. Subplot emerges in the form of Gareth Mallory (Ralph Fiennes), a national security administrator who believes M’s methods are ill-fitted to these tech-dominated times and is keen to nudge her into retirement, something the unsmiling, ever-severe M does not want. Not only must Bond defeat the villainous entity, but he also has certain mommy-abandonment issues to resolve with M (Freud would have a field day with this), as well as proving his own relevance in the modern world—all without wrinkling his suit.
One can certainly appreciate Mendes’ attempt to dial down the acrobatics to focus more on individuals, and delve into their backstories, their motivating forces. Skyfall alludes to Bond’s childhood, a grim one, the results of which we’re meant to see in the cold, detached, half-robot that he’s become today. But while these tangents sound interesting, they feel out of place in a franchise whose success has been based on larger-than-life characters and scenarios—removed from the real world—and playful camp value. We watched Bond because he was unlike anything we’d ever seen, unflappable to the extreme, and with skills beyond compare (the man has no need for keys, as far as I can tell). The action, the gadgets, and the ladies—oh, the ladies!—was all part of that fantasy. So, to try to ‘humanise’ Bond would have called for an extensive revision of these conventions, because otherwise, if we’re to think of him as a credible everyman, the rest of his posturing just seems, well, a bit silly, really. And that is precisely the problem with Skyfall; it is too attached to familiar Bond tropes, while also aiming for depth and emotional complexity—an ineffective mix, turns out.
I suppose it all comes down to relevance—something the film itself refers to. While Bond considers how equipped he is to deal with cyber-terrorists, this could also speak of the franchise’s own possible obsoleteness. Yes, there was a time when slick superspies with a taste for weapons, women, wine and witticisms might have seemed novel, and Bond certainly played a role in amping up the spy genre, but times have changed and grittier stories have emerged—the Bourne series, for instance—making Bond, still caught within that gun-barrel POV, feel very much stuck in the past.
Craig’s performance is restricted by a script that requires him to be agile, but not necessarily expressive. And his sexual chemistry with the ladies, a major element in Bond films (let’s leave the feminist diatribe against the Bond Girl concept for another time), is at its lowest here; both Harris and the exotic Bérénice Marlohe feel like perfunctory additions. But if there’s one reason to watch Skyfall, it’s for Javier Bardem’s stint as the menacing Silva, Bond’s bane of the day. Sporting blond hair, and playing a deranged maniac with homosexual inclinations, Bardem is fantastic, able to create a psychologically-layered entity that you at once despise and pity. The act almost matches the wondrous bad-fella he portrayed in No Country For Old Men, and his scenes—that initial monologue in particular—are mesmerising.
I can’t, obviously, speak as a fan, but Skyfall seems partly disloyal to the Bond phenomenon, while at the same time unable to fully invest itself in another direction—neither here nor there. The cinematography is beautiful, no doubt, and the animated introductory theme with Adele’s smoky serenading is a wonder on its own, but as far as plot goes, there isn’t enough spectacle or convincing emotional engagement. And with two more editions to come in 2014 and 2016, a dignified end seems anywhere but close.
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