movies: no time to die

Fuck. This. Movie.

Fuck every single thing about this movie. Fuck this movie. Fuck you movie. Fuck off movie.

And by movie, clearly, I'm talking about No Time To Die.

Fuck this movie.

First off, this movie committed the ultimate sin of any action movie, let along a JAMES BOND movie. This movie is DULL. This movie is dull and boring and forgettable.

The movie tries to bank on you a) remembering and b) giving any kind of a shit about the female character from Spectre and c) caring AT ALL about the "love story" between the two.

And, I absolutely did not. Not only did I barely remember her character, or anything about her from the previous movie, I absolutely did not care about their love story.

Not least of all because at this point Daniel Craig actually looks like he is old enough to be Léa Seydoux's father. Yes, the age gap is only 17 years. But he looks old and haggard and she looks... about 12.

Also, in 2022, I'm no longer fucking here tolerating when the female love interest in a movie is excessively younger than her male counterpart. It's some bullshit, and I don't want to see it anymore, and, will henceforth be calling it out every single time I encounter it.

Fuck that noise. Do better.

Looking back on my review of Spectre, I liked Seydoux's character in that movie. I have no idea why, mostly because I barely remember that movie any more, but I was pretty much over her as soon as she showed up.

Wait. Hold on. Back up a second.

I know, 100%, the moment that this movie completely lost me.

This movie lost me, pretty much permanently, when they started playing the fucking love theme from On Her Majesty's Secret Service in the "pre-credit sequence". And then you're going to get character to DIRECTLY QUOTE the title of the song at the end of the movie and play it again then. Fuck you, movie.

They did that a few times, made references to older Bond movies. Not the Craig movies, the Connery and the Moore movies. Also, the Lazenby movie... for some reason.

Also I put "pre-credit sequence" in quotes because it wasn't an actual pre-credit sequence, it was just stuff. There's... some stunts. That I barely remember. There's a scene where the characters sit in a car and do nothing while James emotionally abuses the woman he's supposed to love while people shoot the car very many times with very big guns. Stuff.

This movie is 2 hours and 45 minutes long. It's very much overflowing with... stuff. And, I didn't, like, make a list or anything, but I would say that, at a bare minimum, there is at least a solid hour's worth of that "stuff" that absolutely does not to be in the fucking movie. And should not be in that movie.

Because this movie is BORING. This movie is DULL. And this movie is SLOW.

Remembering, also, that this movie is a JAMES BOND MOVIE.

It's also the rare beast of a movie that, the more I think about it afterwards, the more I fucking hate it.

Let's go through my particular gripes, shall we.

The opening title song. Boring and slow and bad. I love me some Billie Eilish, really, I do. I think she's super talented, I think she's amazing. This song is awful. I didn't like it before I saw it in context of the movie, but in context, it's perfect, because the movie is also awful.

The opening credit sequence. If you get deja vu watching it, congratulations. You're an actual human who has watched the previous Daniel Craig Bond movies. And you remember the opening title sequences for the last three movies, because it's exactly the fucking same as all of them. And, mostly, they were boring.

M. I have no issues with Ralph Fiennes, he's a fine actor. But now that M is no longer being played by Dame Judi Dench, the character doesn't need to be in the movies beyond five minutes at the start and for about 30 seconds for wrap up at the end.

What I don't need during a nearly three hour movie, is to cut back to M's office every 2 minutes to get a, frankly, pointless reaction shot from both M and fucking Tanner. Nobody cares about fucking TANNER. At all. Ever. Those scenes should have been on the cutting room floor.

Let's just talking about the writing for a second...

The writers on this were Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and Cary Joji Fukunaga, the latter is also the director. And they did a bad. They made a boring. Phoebe Waller-Bridge, late of Fleabag fame, did a punch up on the script from what I understand, and I'll go out on a limb and say that those few scenes that I actually liked were probably mostly her work. I'm guessing so anyway. Of course, the annoying fake Russian (?) scientist character and his expanded role could also be her writing and he was useless.

Sorry, David Dencik, you were badly overacting and your performance was annoying and your dialogue was badly written. Most of your performance, likewise, should have been on the cutting room floor.

Yeah, the writing... not good. I didn't care about the characters, the stakes were not made clear. I mean, yes, virus, world, also, not a great theme for your movie in these current times, but, you started this before the world fell apart, and that is a staple of Bond movies, I get it.

But, otherwise, they made the plot overly convoluted for no reason. Yes, previous movies in the franchise have done that, but in those cases, the actual stakes were clear. In this case... no, not at all.

Basically, when it comes to this movie's plot, you have to ask... what fucking plot? 

I have no fucking clue WHAT the Bond Villain was after. What was his plan? Couldn't tell you. Why was he doing it? No fucking clue. What did he want? Fuck knows. I mean, yes, I know, he stole the bio weapon thing and he was... making more of it. But, he took some of it, so he didn't already know how to make it, but he also took the... guy who developed it. So, why didn't he just take the guy... and have him make more... 

And what was his ultimate goal. Just to kill all of Spectre? He did that in the first third of the movie.

Oh, yeah, in case you didn't realise, we're in fucking spoiler territory now. I give no shits about most of the spoilers for this movie. So, he kills all of Spectre, because one Spectre guy, Seydoux's character's dad who is mentioned in the last movie, poisons his whole family. And Villain kills her mother. And comes to kill her dad. Where was the dad? No fucking idea, because I don't remember any of the useless plot from the last movie.

But then... he does, what, nothing for the next... thirty years?

Huh?

Also, if the Villain released the virus thingy in the room where Bond already was early in the movie, the one that targeted every member of Spectre, why did he then need to get that other character to apply the virus to themselves in order to try and kill Blofeld, when Bond was going to see Blofeld and he was already infected with the Kills Spectre Virus and they can't get rid of the virus, so why did that whole plotline that goes nowhere need to be in the movie?

Why is this movie nearly 3 hours long? Why is the plot/writing so fucking bad?

They also seemed to have decided that, because this was Craig's last entry in the franchise, and, honestly, maybe they were seeing the writing on the wall when it comes to James Bond movies (more on that by the end), but they essentially burn the whole fucking thing down and salt the ground behind them. They just started killing off recurring characters at a certain point. 

Well, you know, first off all of Spectre. Dead. Granted those are people we've never met and don't care about. But, in the context of the movie. They're all dead.

Blofeld. Who, also, didn't need to be in this movie. And was... pointless. Sure, sure, give Christoph Waltz a big fat check and put him in a box on wheels and have him in one scene and whatever. Give him all the moneys. But he exists in the movie only as a red herring and as a future dead body. Jeffrey Wright's Felix Leiter. Dead. See if you can follow the thought process of "many of the characters are just killed off" all the way through to it's logical conclusion. I'm not going to say it... but yes. That happens. No, not that... the other thing, the one you're thinking "he can't mean THAT". Yes. That.

Also, while we're talking about the villain.

I'm sure that Rami Malek is a lovely human being. I'm sure he's polite to old people, I bet he's kind to animals. He's probably a lovely man to have a beer with.

He's also, perpetually, creepy as fuck. Just as a human being in the world. There's almost always something... off... about him.

Which should 100% work for a Bond villain. And it might. If he was IN THE FUCKING MOVIE. Or the character was actually... a character.

He's in the movie maybe slightly more than, for example, Doctor No was in the very first Bond movie. Which is an apt comparison, because he's basically the same fucking character. I mean, technically he's not. But he basically is. He's all "slightly Japanese themed", and mostly ineffectual. But much more badly written than Doctor No was.

He's... lets just say it together... bad. Now, what I will say is that I'm sure that all of the actors in this movie where doing what they could with the material that they were given. However, like with every single fucking villain in the Daniel Craig era, the villain in this movie is bad. And not interesting.

I want a villain with some flair and some flavour and some style. I want somebody with a sense of drama. Give me... I dunno... Emma Thompson maybe. Someone who understands how to chew the scenery and be Capital E Evil. Give me... something... anything.

Also, this movie is so forgettable that I cannot, right now, remember the villain's name without looking it up. 

Sidebar... no fucking wonder I can't remember it... it's Lyutsifer Safin. Sorry, huh?

Moving on.

The costume design. If nothing else is true about a Bond movie, I should not have to complain about the FUCKING COSTUMES in a modern James Bond movie. Remember, like three movies ago, when Bonds entire wardrobe was provided by Tom Ford. Remember that?

This is not a full Tom Ford wardrobe. These clothes, with the exception of two of James's suits, a very beautiful midnight blue dress and... no, actually, that's it. The grey suit, the black tux (both of which are actually Tom Ford) and the dress (which is by Michael Lo Sordo Alexandra). That was basically the very short list of good clothes in this movie.

Oh, and Naomie Harris as Moneypenny. Harris looks fantastic throughout. Everything else. Terrible.

Like, think about that Suttirat Anne Larlarb, you failed, at a fundamental level, to make Lashana Lynch look fucking stunning. You have just failed at life. The last person to do that was the wig designer for Captain Marvel. But she wasn't playing a fucking Double O agent in that movie.

Wait, sorry... what's that? No... are you serious? They put Lashana Lynch in a Tom Ford in that movie and she still looked... that bad? That cannot be correct. Oh... that hideous white jacket abomination. That was a Tom Ford? And cost... how much? Well... fuck me I guess. Still hideous though.

But overall the costumes were awful. And boring. Not at all flattering or stylish. Honestly, not making Lynch look sen-fucking-sational in every scene she's in is possibly my biggest gripe. That and the fact that they just put Malek in... a kimono-y looking thing and called it a day.

Urgh. 

So, the very short list of things I liked...

They made Q canonically gay. Super fucking obvious, because he's being played by Ben Whishaw, who essentially plays him as "fussy gay" anyway. But good. I suspect Whishaw possibly had a hand in that decision, but don't know for certain. Also, who cares? But at the same time, good.

Eyeball Man. Listed in the credits as Primo (Cyclops)... but they never properly introduced him or had any other fucking character TALK TO HIM. So we never learn his name. And we called him Eyeball Man throughout. He was... somebody's henchman. Possibly Safin's henchman, pretending to be Blofeld's henchman. Don't ask me, this movie is badly written. 

Played by Dali Benssalah, and, for once, we get a henchman with a gimmick. It's only taken the, what, FIVE movies. They give him a fake eyeball. And make it plot related. And, also give him a super distinctive haircut, so you can actually identify him every time he shows up, even when you only see him from the back. I just wish I knew exactly whose henchman he was.

He was great, and Benssalah was eating what he did have up with a spoon. He just needed to have been given more... more of a character, more dialogue, more plot. Not sure which, but essentially he just needed a better Bond movie.

Tiny, little Lisa-Dorah Sonnet as the daughter of Seydoux's character. And yeah, do the math on that one. Given that I already said that Seydoux and Craig continue their love affair from the previous movie. So, the character, fucking annoying and pointless and didn't need to be in the movie and I fucking hated her. Sonnet, however, makes it through the movie with this perpetual look of WTF on her face, gets an "action" moment and somehow doesn't make the... first ever... child in a Bond movie annoying as a character.

Wait... can someone check that and get back to me... other than background extras or flashbacks... has there ever been an actual child character in a Bond movie before? I don't think that there has. And, probably, Mr Writer Director... for a very good FUCKING REASON.

However the existence of the character is, as I said, fucking stupid and shouldn't be in the movie. To be clear. Character bad. Sonnet good.

I already partially mentioned Lashana Lynch as the very first, on-screen, female Double O. And, she's exactly what she needs to be. A contrast to Bond and his style. A kickass character in her own right, albeit a character that doesn't... DO that much. She is, as generally happens in a Bond movie, scaffolding to prop up James and the plot, such as it is.

However.

She's not the best female character in the movie.

Enter Ana de Armas as Paolma. Wearer of the midnight blue dress. Kicker of asses. Displayer of cleavage. She is the single best character in this movie. And she's in it for like... 10 minutes. Fifteen at the most.

Did I mention that this movie is too fucking long? Much like this review at this point.

But de Armas is fucking amazing. She's... from a whole other Bond movie. Honestly. This is why I suspect that her character was both super punched up by Waller-Bridge, but also that de Armas understands what the character of a Bond sidekick is supposed to be, in a way that, clearly, the writers and director of this movie do not understand.

She even wrote the best line of her own dialogue. When her character mentions only having had three weeks training, that was because de Armas had only had three weeks worth of training for her action scenes and she kept saying that to the director Fukunaga until he told her to say it in character.

She's fantastic.

She's also, despite the appearance of that dress and that cleavage, not a Bond girl. Like I said before, she's a sidekick. Bond never hits on her, she never hits on him (comical misdirect notwithstanding), she leaves the movie with a handshake and a job well done. She's great.

And lastly... Billy Magnussen. He's very pretty. And is used either not enough, not effectively... or possibly exactly the right amount. Like many things in this movie, however, the character of Logan Ash is... pretty much pointless and doesn't need to really exist. Or, several other very similar characters should have been rolled into one character, saving us all time in our lives we won't be betting back after this movie.

Mostly, though, he's very pretty. And there's at least one scene where Daniel Craig, as Bond, is seriously thinking about fucking him. Serious. The bar scene in Jamaica. Go back and watch it. Watch the way Bond is just eye-fucking him/considering seducing him. It's all right there on the screen.

And now we come to the end of this movie. Which, if you haven't worked it out yet, I won't actually spoil. But, if you've been paying attention throughout the movie, you'll have seen it coming. Because it's legitimately the only way this movie could end.

However.

This seems like the perfect point for me to announce. I'm done with Bond movies. This is, potentially, the last Bond movie I'll ever bother watching.

For two reasons. Firstly, there are better movies in the world these days. Better action movies, better movies that are basically driving in the Bond lane. And we don't need Bond any more. Even current Bond is still a dick to women and a grumpy fuck. And I don't need him any more.

And secondly, given the end of this movie, if there was ever a time to get out of the Bond franchise, it's now. I'll still go back and watch the shit out of the old movies. But that's it for me.

I'm out.

Also, fuck you movie.

yani's rating: 1 stuffed rabbit out of 5