You say you like your Bond shaken, not stirred. And that in their quest to modernize 007, the film series’ producers have tried too hard to modernize him, leaving behind the things that made him great. If those efforts have left a bad taste in your mouth, and you swore you’d never go see another Bond film, well, never say never again.
Sorry for the references, but it’s all in keeping with Die Another Day. As the 20th “official” Bond film, it’s full of callbacks to the Bonds that have gone before. Some are pretty obvious, but the most crucial callback comes in the form of the fun that the best Bonds have. Die Another Day has everything that made you like Bond in the first place, while still maintaining its modern spin on the series.
Easily the best of those featuring Pierce Brosnan, the movie breaks from formula at the outset. Bond infiltrates a North Korean military base, trying to destroy the efforts of Colonel Moon* (Will Yun Lee). Though he manages to cause the appropriate amount of chaos, Bond gets captured, and his fourteen months of torture get mingled with the trademark clever title sequence.
Eventually Bond gets traded politically for the villainous Zhao (Rick Yune), Moon’s right-hand man whose encounter with 007 left him literally diamond-studded. Everyone involved gets what they want: Brosnan gets to show Bond’s steely vulnerability as the character suffers betrayal by his government, we get an old-school grotesque villain in Zao and we get Brosnan showing Bond’s steely vulnerability overwith early in the movie. The rest of it runs on pure style and adrenaline, just as a Bond movie should. Writers Neal Purvis and Robert Wade deliver all the goods. The film jumps around in exotic locations with suspicious names (in Cuba, a nefarious laboratory sits on “The Island of the Organs.” It sounds much better in Spanish.)
Eventually, a nemesis arises in the form of Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens), whose scheme could stand up against any of the Bond greats, especially since it involves a giant laser. Best of all, Graves has one spectacular secret hideaway, even though it’s not really secret. Through the graces of Q (a welcome John Cleese), Bond has gadgets and gizmos a-plenty, including the greatest innovation ever – a totally hot car that effectively turns invisible in an almost plausible way.
And of course, there are the babes.
Halle Berry enters the film just like the series introduced the babe concept: not just rising out of the water like Ursula Andress did in Dr. No, but even wearing her swimsuit. As Jinx, Berry proves that the character is worth a film series of her own. To provide a little competition, Graves has a female sidekick, Miranda Frost (Rosamund Pike), of dubious loyalties and definitely memorable.
Director Lee Tamahori really pumps up the action, an effort greatly appreciated. Recent Bond sequences have seemed to be going through the motions, but Tamahori injects some style and life. Only one stunt involves obvious CG, but Bond movies have always veered over into the occasionally ludicrous anyway. In homage to Goldfinger, Tamahori ups the ante with the famous laser to the crotch scene. The danger is much more intense, a little more graphic, and then goes coolly over the top with a speeding phallic symbol fleeing across the ice. Niiiiice.
Little of this movie drags. Title songstress Madonna makes a cameo appearance as a lesbian fencing instructor, a moment that completely snaps you out of the movie. And why is it that this woman speaks with a false British accent in real life, and then when playing someone in England, drops it? Something about the silver screen completely drains Madonna of being interesting.
Despite the charm of Cleese and Brosnan playing off of each other, a tour of gadgets from older movies just clunks along, because it’s obviously just a tour of gadgets. However, Die Another Day does give Moneypenny (Samantha Bond) far more character than she’s had in years.
As fun as it is, the script also backs away from some of its own interesting set-ups, sharing a weakness with the writers’ previous The World Is Not Enough. For reasons best left undiscovered here, Graves doesn’t sleep. At all. But like Robert Carlyle’s Zokas in the earlier film, this quirk never really gets used as anything other than something people mention rather than serving the plot. Maybe it’s because though Graves can’t sleep, Bond still has to, especially after a hard night of seduction.
And they are hard nights, indeed. For those of you more prurient readers, yes, Die Another Day features the most graphic (though still somewhat coy) sex scenes of any Bond film. If only the double entendres could live up to them.
Some people complain about the Bond formula, Brosnan among them. But Die Another Day proves that the formula works, and works well, if everyone accepts it full throttle. Ironically, what Bond needs is commitment. And for the first time in at least a decade, he gets it.
*For Bond geeks: Colonel Moon’s full name is Colonel Yan-Sun Moon, and I’m going to hazard a guess that this is a reference to an unfilmed Bond novel by Kingsley Amis: Colonel Sun. Bond also picks up a copy of The Field Guide To Birds of the West Indies , crucial in Bond lore for reasons I’ll leave unexplained. Pray you don’t sit next to a guy like me in the theater when you see this movie.
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