YEAH, WE'VE GOT SPOILERS HERE: No, this isn't the best Bond movie of the last 40 years (hard to believe it's been 40 years, isn't it?)--that would be one of the first five, take your pick--or one of the worst--that would be "Man With the Golden Gun" or "Moonraker." What "Die Another Day" IS is an extremely entertaining exercise in Bondian shenanigans that gets more and more implausible as one mulls it over afterwards. It is as action packed as any fan could want, the villains pretty nasty, the Bond girls attractive (especially the yummy Rosamund Pike), the gadgets pretty way out (OK, VERY way out) and the fights interesting, if nothing classic. But special honors should be handed out to the exciting, swashbuckling sword fight that 007 engages in midway through the film; this is the high point of the film, for me, and the most exciting, tensest sequence in the movie. Certainly more entertaining than a game of baccarat! I would agree with other viewers that the sequence with Bond surfing on the giant wave looks as phony as phony can be, and I'm a viewer who is usually easily taken in by special FX. I for one happened to adore all the homages to past Bond movies. As a viewer who has been making the pilgrimmage to see the new 007 for 40 years now, I found it touching to be reminded of the glory days of yore. But why James Bond, a man with impeccable taste in food, wine, women, clothing and all the finer things in general, would ever want to sniff the 40-year-old shoe of Rosa Klebb is somewhat of a mystery to me!!! Pretty weird, that! And speaking of mysteries, there were some other things that I am not too clear about. For example, the diamond-forging angle in the story. Does anyone really understand what that was about? At first, I thought that the chief villain wanted these diamonds to use in his space satellite, as in "Diamonds Are Forever." But then at the end, we see a whole load of this loot lying in the back of a helicopter. Huh? I was also a little confused about the whole assumed identity thing of the main villain. Here is a North Korean baddy who, through DNA transfer, becomes a new man. But was there ever really a guy named Gustave Graves to begin with? Whatever happened to him? Was he killed, and his identity assumed? Does anybody know? I guess I'll have to see this movie again--I always see the new Bondy twice, but that's just me--to clear up these fine points. I would agree with the bulk of the viewers that the Madonna theme song is just awful: tuneless, forgettable and ugly. Although Ms. Ciccone does fairly well in her bit part in the movie itself, her theme song is easily the worst in the Bond catalog. You thought that a-ha song was bad? Wait'll you hear this techno trash! The late Maurice Binder would have appreciated the visuals behind this theme song, but as for the tune itself... What's the word? Feh! I would disagree with other viewers about the excess of humor in the movie. Despite the quips, which are always a part of a Bond film, the tone of this movie is fairly serious, and Brosnan plays it arrow straight. Sure, there are double entendres and such, but we are spared the painful cartoon antics that wrecked "Moonraker" (I am thinking of Jaws flapping his arms like a bird as his parachute fails, and the double take of the pigeon in Venice) and the embarrassing, ill-conceived moments of "Octopussy" (Bond's Tarzan yodel, the absolute nadir of the series, and Bond recognizing his own theme song when it is played in the Indian bazaar!). Despite the wild goings-on, and the invisible car, and the solar death ray, and the ice palace, the movie doesn't embarrass the viewer as some of the earlier Bonds did. For that, we fans are grateful. Still, it WOULD be nice if, in the next installment (the DO say at the end of the credits that "James Bond Will Return"), they pared things back a bit, and gave us a gritty, sexy spy thriller--the kind that Ian Fleming wrote in the '50s and '60s, and as exemplified on film by "From Russia With Love." I still feel that nobody does it better, but with a little more attention to story, things could be even better still! All in all, though, "Day Another Day" makes for a nice anniversary party, one that I was very pleased to attend.
Review of Die Another Day
