Wednesday, January 29, 2014

F This Movie! - GoldenEye

Patrick and Mike continue their Bond series with a look at Pierce Brosnan's first time out as 007. Did you ever know how they watched you from the shadows as a child?



Download this episode here. (32.9 MB)

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Also discussed this episode: Her (2013), Pacific Rim (2013), Drinking Buddies (2013), Sound City (2013), Dream a Little Dream (1990), Best Man Down (2013), The Woman Who Wasn't There (2012), Sexy Evil Genius (2013)

F This Movie Fest 3 is coming February 15th!

21 comments:

  1. Great podcast! I concur with a lot of what you guys say about the movie. It's my favorite of the Brosnan Bonds, but it's also a rather unwieldy mess. Mike is spot-on with his comment about how Brosnan delivers his quips - by The World is Not Enough I'm really gritting my teeth at times (in the cold open for that one, when the voluptuous woman asks Bond if he would like to check her figures, Brosnan practically jumps out of his seat and does a double take before finally saying the stupid line). I will say that Natalia is one of my favorite "good" Bond girls. She's smart, proactive, and instrumental in the film's climax. Kudos also to Dench and Samantha Bond's Moneypenny. In fact, this film has a real murderer's row of female characters.

    Thanks for the shout out! You never did explain how Sean Bean shows up later in the film when he's clearly beheaded in the opening, however.

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  2. Poor Mike, getting called out on his hatred of Timothy Dalton at the end.

    But seriously, I'm right with Steve K on Natalia, who's one of my favorite Bond girls for all those reasons. Half the movie, really, she's ahead of Bonds in getting on the trail of the villains.

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  3. I think we need a Mike support group, called "No Patricks Because He's A Big Bully!"
    Mike, we're here for ya buddy.

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    1. I appreciate all of the support, guys. With your help I can get through this.

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    2. I'd be more supportive if you didn't play Oddjob. I bet you waited for the body armor to regenerate too. Slappers for life.

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    3. I just don't think you should date Daniel Craig. I don't think you considered Rachel Weisz in this equation at all. Homewrecker

      If disliking Living Daylights is wrong, I don't want to be right.

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    4. Mark. Was that the Golden eye equivalent of CODs "Damn Campers"?

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  4. Great show guys. Goldeneye is one of my favorite Bond flicks, but it was great to find out that I wasn't the only one who was bothered by Boris's big freeze. If you're taking suggestions, I think you should tackle "Live and Let Die" next just to get it out of the way. I've never seen any of the Roger Moore films, and this seems a good a place as any to start. Afterwards, you can always wash it down with "Casino Royale" or "Dr No" if that's your thing.

    Mike, I think instead of playing the victim you should take revenge against the injustices your beloved society has levied against you and form S.O.L.D. (Shitting on Living Daylights). Make sure you let somebody else in on the ground floor so that you can be the appropriately named No. 2. S.O.L.D. will be the antagonistic backbone of F This Movie!'s Bond Series and will be feared by all. Food for thought.

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  5. Sound City. Two great docs, that don't work together. I prefer the first 2 acts (history) to the last performance section.

    This probably sums up most musicians issue with the film: http://youtu.be/g-VTxOn90c8

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  6. I wonder if you guys have ever tried to read the Ian Flemming books? They are an eye opener if you want to know about the skill of film adaptation. The books have some really rough edges that the movies smooth out fairly well. At least for the first four movies, they stick pretty close to the books. From Russia With Love and On Her Majesty's Secret Service are almost exactly to the book. Goldfinger's biggest change was to fix one of the major plot problems with the book. The series didn't really go bananas until You Only Live Twice, which shares the setting of Japan and that's about it.

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    1. Years ago I read Ian Flemming's "Casino Royal" and really dug it. I also thought that the film with Daniel Craig did a nice job of capturing the spirit of the book. If memory serves it was a fairly close adaptation plot wise and Craig's performance seemed more inline with how the Bond character is portrayed in the book rather than the previous screen Bonds. (Timothy Dalton aside)

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    2. I've never read them, but I kind of want the 2008 set for these Michael Gillette covers:

      http://www.beautifulbookcovers.com/james-bond-pin-up-cover-art-by-michael-gillette/

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  7. Nice podcast guys. One quick note though actually Scott Bakula was in Goldeneye, it was his most awkward leap ever with Xenia Onatopp, oh boy indeed.

    On the whole I think I prefer Tomorrow Never Dies to Goldeneye just by a hair. The vibe I got from you guys during this show was that you like Goldeneye but you want to LOVE Goldeneye and there are just a few quips and overdone action moments that keep it from happening. The main problem I think I have (and its true of a lot of Martin Campbell movies) is that it seems to start and stop a lot. This happens with almost all the Bond movies but in the really good ones when the script is really polished its far less noticeable. I think that might be why I prefer Tomorrow Never Dies over Goldeneye in the Brosnan bond movies.

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    1. I agree that Tomorrow Never Dies is much better paced than GoldenEye. And it has Michelle Yeoh. And it has one of my favorite pre-credits sequences - a perfect little miniature of an action scene (even if it does have that dumb "backseat driver" quip at the end). However, it also has Teri Hatcher and Jonathan Pryce, which ends up knocking it down beneath the far messier GoldenEye.

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    2. Not to pile on, but I too prefer Tomorrow Never Dies to GoldenEye. I like how Michelle Yeoh's character more than holds her own with Bond. I also agree with Steve that GoldenEye seems to have pacing issues. There are points where as I am watching I start to check the time or my mind wanders. I do still like it however.

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    3. By the way, Tom, I love your avatar. Sanjuro rocks!

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    4. No one is piling on! I may very well revisit Tomorrow Never Dies and like it more. The use of Michelle Yeoh goes a long, long way in that movie; I suspect part of the reason I don't love Natalia as much -- because I know we're only one movie away from one of my favorite Bond girls ever.

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    5. One other pet peeve about Tomorrow Never Dies - Michelle Yeoh is without a doubt a kick-ass agent and can hold her own with anyone. Yet the movie still can't resist making her just another helpless Damsel in Distress (DID) for Bond to rescue at the end. Aaargh!

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  8. I absolutely think Patrick (and Mike too? No rotating co-hosts for the Bond podcasts?) should tackle "Live And Let Die" for the next Bond flick podcast as long as the podcast drops in February. Why? Simple: BLACK HISTORY MONTH. There's your angle/special take on this Bond movie that'll keep your vile toward Roger Moore to a (manageable) minimum. Off the top of my head I can't think of any other prominent black characters in the Bond universe (except for Jeffrey Wright's Felix Leiter and Grace Jones' henchwoman in "A View To A Kill") that isn't present or associated with "Live and Let Die." Since 'F This Movie' is familiar-enough with exploitation movies to have a month-long tribute to it it'd make sense to talk/explore how this movie was influenced and, in turn, influenced the blaxploitation boom of the 70's. I'd personally listen to the Tom Mankiewicz ("Superman: The Movie") commentary track for "LALT" for an enlightened white man perspective on how/why Bond got caught into blaxploitation.

    As for "GoldenEye," it doesn't do much for me outside a few random, cool selective moments here and there (like the shot in the trailers of Brosnan shaking his head from a bullet ricochet as if it were a mosquito) and the fact Judi Dench just outrights owns the role of M. From the moment Eric Sera's score with the gun barrel comes across as dissonant (for old school fans it's so Pavlovian not to have the score go with that visual) the movie feels like it's trying too hard not to be my daddy's James Bond movie series. Messy as they were storywise though (none of Pierce's movies had the strongest writing or better directors), "Tomorrow Never Dies" and "The World Is Not Enough" employed Brosnan's on-screen charm and charisma to his fullest. In "GoldenEye" he feels and acts too green for a Bond, more prone to go for the machine gun artillery than outwit his opponents. If "Die Another Day" didn't exist this would be Pierce's worst Bond movie by default.

    And BTW, in the N64 "GoldenEye" game you could only play as other characters (pretty much every villain/supporting characters in the series up to '95) during multiplayer death matches, not the single-player campaign mode which was fairly accurate and consistent with the plot of "GoldenEye." And yes, in overall polish, accuracy and bang-for-buck gameplay value "GoldenEye" remains the single best videogame based on an movie ever made (the N64 version, not the Wii remix from a couple of years back that left out as much as it brought back). The soundtrack to that game is fantastic (check YouTube).

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