Goldfinger vs. Casino Royale: FIGHT!
Nov. 26th, 2006 03:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annathepiperYesterday I treated ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mamishka to a viewing of Casino Royale at the Neptune in the U-district, which was quite, quite fun--and tiggymalvern, darthhellokitty, and king_chiron wound up joining us. Meems informed me that she quite liked the film though Craig isn't clicking as "Bond" for her. Tiggy is totally not buying Craig as Bond at all. Me? After a second viewing, I'm not only still very solid on Craig!Bond, but strongly considering one more theater viewing before I'll consider myself done.
Continuing my Bond fangirl mood, I also watched Goldfinger again last night. The contrast between 1964 34-year-old Connery!Bond and 2006 38-year-old Craig!Bond was quite striking, and amused me quite a bit.
I think the biggest thing that struck me comparing the two films was the pacing. Goldfinger has its share of action, to be sure--Bond blowing things up, shootouts, car chases, fights. But it's also oddly a much more relaxed film than Casino Royale or even the Brosnan!Bond flicks, as I recall. There are long stretches in the latter half of the film where Bond's doing nothing but sitting on his ass in Goldfinger's cell, for example. And he spends quite a few scenes just casually (at least on the surface!) conversing with Goldfinger. At least once, too, Bond is outright admiring of his plan.
It's quite an older and more classic hero-villain dynamic, one you won't see in modern action films, pretty much. These days the hero and villain will spend most of a film always in action and on the go, trying to counter each other's maneuvers. When they finally meet, the circumstances will be anything but relaxed, and you certainly won't have the hero casually hanging around snogging the villain's gorgeous personal pilot until he finally gets an opportunity to like, y'know, do something. ;)
It was very, very odd watching Connery!Bond being outright deferential to M--and it was odd seeing a male M, too. The male M was fairly bland to me after watching Judi Dench's glorious M, but then, I can chalk that up as a difference in the eras. Back then, of course you'd have a male authority figure who maintained almost blank reserve at all times in front of his subordinate. Judi Dench also has her aura of confident authority, but hers is way more interesting to me. She actually emotes.
Young Sean Connery ain't half-bad looking at all in that smarmy sixties kind of way. Very slim, very lean, and he looks rather better with that trace of a five-o'clock shadow on his jaw, just enough to make him look a little scruffy. Craig lands a higher punch on my hormones (mmm, those shoulders!), but he needs better hair. ;)
Connery!Bond is definitely the epitome of style and sophistication, and Craig!Bond by contrast is more of a working class guy. But since Casino Royale sets his background up as his being a "maladjusted" orphan who got into Oxford on someone else's charity, that's okay! It makes Craig!Bond more interesting to me as a character, too. Connery!Bond is impressively suave and sophisticated, but doesn't seem like he has much beneath that smooth veneer. Craig!Bond will be entertaining to watch, to see if he learns how to pull on that smooth veneer over his rougher nature.
Craig!Bond gets into a fight, he looks like he's just been in a fight. Connery!Bond by contrast barely musses his hair. Hee. Again, I can groove on Connery's style here, but my preference goes to Craig. It hits both my Harrison Ford buttons and my Russell Crowe ones--I go for the rough and tumble, less "outright pretty" action heroes, the ones who are physically dynamic and who therefore engage my sympathies if they get the shit kicked out of them.
At least with these two specific films, Connery and Craig are tied for girls. Connery might have pulled ahead, except Girl #2 is clearly not interested. Snicker. It's almost funny to see him try to ingratiate himself to her as he says "By the way, my name is Bond"--he sounds almost shy for an instant there!--and she is so very clearly not interested, which is actually a bit of a refreshing switch since for once there's a pretty girl on screen with a significant part to play, and she's neither one of the villain's girls nor interested in Bond. And I am half-inclined not to count Pussy Galore, either, since fabulous though she is (woot! Training a squadron of female pilots!), I can't see her on screen without being reminded that in the book, she's queer. And, that scene in the stable, where Bond winds up kissing her in the hay? In the book she just totally kicks his ass. Craig matches Connery for sly playfulness here, plus I give Craig extra points for not smacking a girl on her bottom and telling her to go away so he and Felix Leiter can have "man talk". *smirk*
I bet that if Goldfinger were made today, Pussy Galore would still totally be a dyke. Hee.
Goldfinger still wins for Best Villain Line Ever, though. "No, Mr. Bond! I expect you to die!" Amusingly enough, Connery goes straight to trying to talk his way right out of impending laser-hot death. Muahaha. Of course, it worked, so you can't hold that against him.
And while part of me thinks that ol' Auric dropped the ball on just taking Bond's word that he knew something about what he was doing, it still speaks of a certain classic villain elan that he didn't even bother to try to torture what Bond knew out of him. (A few rounds with Oddjob, and I think Connery would have gotten more than his hair mussed. ;) ) He clearly had bigger and better things to do--like, say, carrying out the Big Evil Plan. And yet he still brought Bond out every so often to show off. It really rather plays nicely into that aforementioned classic hero-villain dynamic where you've almost got the mutual admiration thing going on. Bond has impressed him, so he gets treated almost like a guest as long as Goldfinger's in a good mood.
Le Chiffre, by contrast, goes straight to torturing the hell out of Craig!Bond. But I can't chalk that up to an artifact of the difference in eras--since that's almost lifted straight out of the books too.
Seeing the Aston Martin in Goldfinger really makes me appreciate the one in Casino Royale more, I must say. Beautiful car!
And oh yeah, although the Casino Royale opening credits song "You Know My Name" (to wit, snicker, as a song for a James Bond flick that's rebooting the franchise and introducing a shiny new Bond) is growing on me, it doesn't hold a candle to Shirley Bassey belting out "Goldfinger". I (heart) that song so much. The soundtrack to that movie, with an actual orchestra on hand and a very fine brass section, has just so much more style and class than a lot of the synthesized stuff in current Bond flicks.
Overall I think I personally prefer Casino Royale and Craig over Goldfinger and Connery, though this is not to say that I think Goldfinger and Connery are worse. More like saying I prefer chocolate over vanilla but can find vanilla quite tasty under the right circumstances, too!
mamishka to a viewing of Casino Royale at the Neptune in the U-district, which was quite, quite fun--and tiggymalvern, darthhellokitty, and king_chiron wound up joining us. Meems informed me that she quite liked the film though Craig isn't clicking as "Bond" for her. Tiggy is totally not buying Craig as Bond at all. Me? After a second viewing, I'm not only still very solid on Craig!Bond, but strongly considering one more theater viewing before I'll consider myself done.Continuing my Bond fangirl mood, I also watched Goldfinger again last night. The contrast between 1964 34-year-old Connery!Bond and 2006 38-year-old Craig!Bond was quite striking, and amused me quite a bit.
I think the biggest thing that struck me comparing the two films was the pacing. Goldfinger has its share of action, to be sure--Bond blowing things up, shootouts, car chases, fights. But it's also oddly a much more relaxed film than Casino Royale or even the Brosnan!Bond flicks, as I recall. There are long stretches in the latter half of the film where Bond's doing nothing but sitting on his ass in Goldfinger's cell, for example. And he spends quite a few scenes just casually (at least on the surface!) conversing with Goldfinger. At least once, too, Bond is outright admiring of his plan.
It's quite an older and more classic hero-villain dynamic, one you won't see in modern action films, pretty much. These days the hero and villain will spend most of a film always in action and on the go, trying to counter each other's maneuvers. When they finally meet, the circumstances will be anything but relaxed, and you certainly won't have the hero casually hanging around snogging the villain's gorgeous personal pilot until he finally gets an opportunity to like, y'know, do something. ;)
It was very, very odd watching Connery!Bond being outright deferential to M--and it was odd seeing a male M, too. The male M was fairly bland to me after watching Judi Dench's glorious M, but then, I can chalk that up as a difference in the eras. Back then, of course you'd have a male authority figure who maintained almost blank reserve at all times in front of his subordinate. Judi Dench also has her aura of confident authority, but hers is way more interesting to me. She actually emotes.
Young Sean Connery ain't half-bad looking at all in that smarmy sixties kind of way. Very slim, very lean, and he looks rather better with that trace of a five-o'clock shadow on his jaw, just enough to make him look a little scruffy. Craig lands a higher punch on my hormones (mmm, those shoulders!), but he needs better hair. ;)
Connery!Bond is definitely the epitome of style and sophistication, and Craig!Bond by contrast is more of a working class guy. But since Casino Royale sets his background up as his being a "maladjusted" orphan who got into Oxford on someone else's charity, that's okay! It makes Craig!Bond more interesting to me as a character, too. Connery!Bond is impressively suave and sophisticated, but doesn't seem like he has much beneath that smooth veneer. Craig!Bond will be entertaining to watch, to see if he learns how to pull on that smooth veneer over his rougher nature.
Craig!Bond gets into a fight, he looks like he's just been in a fight. Connery!Bond by contrast barely musses his hair. Hee. Again, I can groove on Connery's style here, but my preference goes to Craig. It hits both my Harrison Ford buttons and my Russell Crowe ones--I go for the rough and tumble, less "outright pretty" action heroes, the ones who are physically dynamic and who therefore engage my sympathies if they get the shit kicked out of them.
At least with these two specific films, Connery and Craig are tied for girls. Connery might have pulled ahead, except Girl #2 is clearly not interested. Snicker. It's almost funny to see him try to ingratiate himself to her as he says "By the way, my name is Bond"--he sounds almost shy for an instant there!--and she is so very clearly not interested, which is actually a bit of a refreshing switch since for once there's a pretty girl on screen with a significant part to play, and she's neither one of the villain's girls nor interested in Bond. And I am half-inclined not to count Pussy Galore, either, since fabulous though she is (woot! Training a squadron of female pilots!), I can't see her on screen without being reminded that in the book, she's queer. And, that scene in the stable, where Bond winds up kissing her in the hay? In the book she just totally kicks his ass. Craig matches Connery for sly playfulness here, plus I give Craig extra points for not smacking a girl on her bottom and telling her to go away so he and Felix Leiter can have "man talk". *smirk*
I bet that if Goldfinger were made today, Pussy Galore would still totally be a dyke. Hee.
Goldfinger still wins for Best Villain Line Ever, though. "No, Mr. Bond! I expect you to die!" Amusingly enough, Connery goes straight to trying to talk his way right out of impending laser-hot death. Muahaha. Of course, it worked, so you can't hold that against him.
And while part of me thinks that ol' Auric dropped the ball on just taking Bond's word that he knew something about what he was doing, it still speaks of a certain classic villain elan that he didn't even bother to try to torture what Bond knew out of him. (A few rounds with Oddjob, and I think Connery would have gotten more than his hair mussed. ;) ) He clearly had bigger and better things to do--like, say, carrying out the Big Evil Plan. And yet he still brought Bond out every so often to show off. It really rather plays nicely into that aforementioned classic hero-villain dynamic where you've almost got the mutual admiration thing going on. Bond has impressed him, so he gets treated almost like a guest as long as Goldfinger's in a good mood.
Le Chiffre, by contrast, goes straight to torturing the hell out of Craig!Bond. But I can't chalk that up to an artifact of the difference in eras--since that's almost lifted straight out of the books too.
Seeing the Aston Martin in Goldfinger really makes me appreciate the one in Casino Royale more, I must say. Beautiful car!
And oh yeah, although the Casino Royale opening credits song "You Know My Name" (to wit, snicker, as a song for a James Bond flick that's rebooting the franchise and introducing a shiny new Bond) is growing on me, it doesn't hold a candle to Shirley Bassey belting out "Goldfinger". I (heart) that song so much. The soundtrack to that movie, with an actual orchestra on hand and a very fine brass section, has just so much more style and class than a lot of the synthesized stuff in current Bond flicks.
Overall I think I personally prefer Casino Royale and Craig over Goldfinger and Connery, though this is not to say that I think Goldfinger and Connery are worse. More like saying I prefer chocolate over vanilla but can find vanilla quite tasty under the right circumstances, too!
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