The Brosnan Era '1995 - 2002'

Hilly wrote:

Stamper wrote:

1- Thomas Crown Affair
2- Tailor of Panama

I had no idea Brosnan did other Bond flicks during that time.

Dante's Peak and some thing with Red Indians.

Grey Owl.

I think Casino Royale is more fun than any of Brosnan's films. It's got a spark and a warmth to it. Skyfall looks (based on the trailer) to be continuing the dour mood established in QoS, although the few rumours I've run into seem to suggest the film will be a lot more colourful than the trailer suggests.

lachesis wrote:

hopefully Skyfall will play to a broader and more rounded Bond so some real comparison is possible.

I think CR's Bond was well-rounded enough to make a comparison, despite the Bond Begins angle.

AMC Hornet wrote:

I can't wait to see these forums in 10 years time:

"Cavill/Fassbender/Whoever is so much better than Craig ever was! He's so charming and witty and debonair! He's the best Bond after Connery and Brosnan!"

You think not? We'll see.

Newly registered members on a Bond forum might indeed prefer the incumbent Bond... Myself, I was never interested in seeing a new Bond film when Brosnan had the role.

Louis Armstrong wrote:

I think Casino Royale is more fun than any of Brosnan's films. It's got a spark and a warmth to it.

What spark it's got is quickly extinguished by David Arnold's tedious, leaden, morose score. GOLDENEYE beats it out when it comes to warmth (I find Natalya a far more human, bangable and sympathetic character than anybody in the 06 film) and edge too, IMHO.

Hilly wrote:

some thing with Red Indians.

Yes, the Communist Party of India is pretty insidious.

Louis Armstrong wrote:

I think Casino Royale is more fun than any of Brosnan's films. It's got a spark and a warmth to it. Skyfall looks (based on the trailer) to be continuing the dour mood established in QoS, although the few rumours I've run into seem to suggest the film will be a lot more colourful than the trailer suggests.

lachesis wrote:

hopefully Skyfall will play to a broader and more rounded Bond so some real comparison is possible.

I think CR's Bond was well-rounded enough to make a comparison, despite the Bond Begins angle.

Oddly I find Casino Royale a very cold and cynical film, and as regards fun, the series has seemed very starved since GE essentially by its need to perosnalise everything. As for Craig's Bond I feel he was actually better and more rounded (though still lacking in key departments) in Quantum of Solace even amid the dour low key surroundings, but Casino, deliberately to my understanding, didn't really attempt a rounded character and he does feel raw and undernourished to me. But thats fandom, we're all different etc.

1/22. Goldeneye 9/10
2/22. The World Is Not Enough 8.5/10
3/22. Tomorrow Never Dies 7.5/10
18/22. Die Another Day 6/10

Best Brosnan performance

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. Goldeneye
4. Die Another Day

Brosnan vs the rest

1. Roger Moore
2. Pierce Brosnan
3. Sean Connery
4. Timothy Dalton
5. George Lazenby
6. Daniel Craig

M:

1. Goldeneye
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. Twine
4. DAD

Bondgirl

1. Natalya
2. Wailin
3. Xenia
4. Elektra
5. Paris
6. Frost
7. Jinx

Lead Villian

1. Eliot Carver
2. Alec
3. Elekta
4. Renard
5. Moon
6. Graves

Best Chacter development

1. Goldeneye
2. The World Is Not Enough
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. Die Another Day

Best pre-title

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Goldeneye
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. Die Another Day

Best End

1. Goldeneye
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. The World Is Not Enough
4. Die Another Day

Title song:

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Goldeneye
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. Die Another Day

Maintitle

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Goldeneye
3. Die Another Day
4. Tomorrow Never Dies

Gunbarrel

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Goldeneye
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. Die Another Day

Score:

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. Goldeneye
4. Die Another Day

Best SE DVD

1. Die Another Day
2. The World Is Not Enough
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. Goldeneye

Dvd menu:

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Goldeneye
3. Die Another Day
4. Tomorrow Never Dies

Best promoted Bond movie from Brosnan his last 3 movies.

1. The World Is Not Enough
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. Die Another Day

What's the deal with DAD not coming dead last under 'main title' and DVD/menu? :x

Come on, man: if you're going to hate something, hate it overall - don't equivocate over a few minor details.

People might get the idea from you that DAD has a few saving graces, and where might that lead? :bom:

I don't hate Brosnan's films as much as many seem to, but right now I'm detecting a very similar formula to Brosnan's era emerging across Craig's three films (1st film fresh intro, 2nd film action movie, 3rd film combination of the previous two with added emo) which makes me just want to have a bit of fun brought back to things and have Bond exist in his own sphere again. Brosnan had his flaws and his films were a bit uninspired, but the enjoyable colourful adventure aspect which even some of the more "thriller" earlier films had was still there. I miss that in Craig's films, and judging from all we know I'll possibly miss it in Skyfall as well.

M wrote:

I don't hate Brosnan's films as much as many seem to, but right now I'm detecting a very similar formula to Brosnan's era emerging across Craig's three films (1st film fresh intro, 2nd film action movie, 3rd film combination of the previous two with added emo) which makes me just want to have a bit of fun brought back to things and have Bond exist in his own sphere again. Brosnan had his flaws and his films were a bit uninspired, but the enjoyable colourful adventure aspect which even some of the more "thriller" earlier films had was still there. I miss that in Craig's films, and judging from all we know I'll possibly miss it in Skyfall as well.

SKYFALL could end being the next TWINE however the scenes in Shanghai suggest to me that it's still likely to have more joie de vivre than that awful mess of a film.

M wrote:

I don't hate Brosnan's films as much as many seem to, but right now I'm detecting a very similar formula to Brosnan's era emerging across Craig's three films (1st film fresh intro, 2nd film action movie, 3rd film combination of the previous two with added emo) which makes me just want to have a bit of fun brought back to things and have Bond exist in his own sphere again. Brosnan had his flaws and his films were a bit uninspired, but the enjoyable colourful adventure aspect which even some of the more "thriller" earlier films had was still there. I miss that in Craig's films, and judging from all we know I'll possibly miss it in Skyfall as well.

Indeed I find myself at the in pretty much the same place. My issues with Bond post GE are independent of Brosnan and Craig, there is an inconsistency in style and an inability to present the whole package evidenced in every film across both eras (not that individually we havent seen decent films but theres always something important missing from the mix). If Bond is relentlessly forced to become personally invested in every new scenario, then fun is quite frankly out of the window. While Brosnan wasn't constrained by pretentions of grit and realism there still seemed a desperate Poe faced attitude to the remainder of the proceedings. Hopefully Skyfall will break the cycle, but if it does it's the new blood introduced that are likely most deserving of praise and sadly no guarantee they will stick around.

In the style of MBalje, I'll try my hand at a big Brosnan era dissection.

Movie Ranking:

1. GoldenEye
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. The World is not Enough
4. Die Another Day

Brosnan Himself:

1. GoldenEye
2. The World is not Enough
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. Die Another Day

Main Villain:
1. Alec Trevelyan
2. Elliot Carver
3. Renard
4. Elektra King
5. Gustav Graves

Henchmen:
1. General Ourumov/Xenia Onatopp/Boris Grishenko
2. Stamper/Henry Gupta/Dr. Kaufman
3. Miranda Frost/Zao/Mr. Kil/Vlad
4. Gabor/Mr. Bullion/Davidov

PTS:

1. GoldenEye
2. The World is not Enough
3. Die Another Day
4. Tomorrow Never Dies

Soundtracks:

1. GoldenEye
2. Tomorrow Never Dies
3. The World is not Enough
4. Die Another Day

Bond Girls:

1. Natalya Simonova
2. Wai Lin
3. Christmas Jones
4. Jinx
5. Paris Carver

I have to admit, the Brosnan era does contain one of my all-time favourite one-liners in the Bond franchise:

"Natalya Simonova, Russian Minister for transportation."

I never really picked up on it until recently, simply because Brosnan's delivery is very uncharacteristic. Every time he delivers a punchline, I usually expect him to take a moment to face the camera and raise his eyebrows at it, as if telling the audience that it's their cue to laugh.

I think the line works because Brosnan plays it dry, Izabella Scorupco doesn't react to it, and it's also consistent with her character giving Bond a hard time for destroying vehicles at every opportunity.

@Prisoner Monkeys: Haha, indeed, that's one of the best, and you're right, it is hard to catch sometimes.

Sadly none of these scripts were really well developed. GE has style but lacks heavily in development. All of the enjoyable parts are really style and Brosnan being both extremely stylized and being the misogynist dinosaur in the 1990's.
TND rose in my opinion over the years a sit is very well made, but it lacks even more in development, which leaves you with a big empty feeling. Plus the climax is just silly and underdone to the extreme.
TWINE should have been great, instead we only have great parts of a film, with way too little development again. Elektra, Renard and Bond are screaming for story development.
DAD doesn't know what it wants to be, and if you turn your brain off it works for the most part. It's sill in the wrong places and over-serious in others. Two things which DO NOT MIX! And I HATE THE JINX CHARACTER! LOATHE!

Films:
TWINE-GE-TND-DAD

Sometimes I'm tempted to import lines, scenes and dialogue from Tailor of Panama into these four.

If anything, I think TND's climax is overdone. What would you 'develop' further in TND and GE?

And what are the great parts in TWINE? :)

FieldsMan wrote:

If anything, I think TND's climax is overdone. What would you 'develop' further in TND and GE?

And what are the great parts in TWINE? :)

Boat chase.

Hilly wrote:

FieldsMan wrote:

If anything, I think TND's climax is overdone. What would you 'develop' further in TND and GE?

And what are the great parts in TWINE? :)

Boat chase.

I'd add the the bank scene in Spain, the scene where Renard meets with Dr. Arkov and Davidov, the shoot-out in the underground missile silo, the caviar factory shoot-out, and the climax up to the fight with Renard, which is a pathetic "fight" and doesn't deserve to be mentioned.

GoldenEye is up there with the very best Bond films. I prefer it to Casino Royale, although only by an inch. Pierce Brosnan is brilliant in this one, combining aspects of all his predecessors. I love the post-Soviet feel and Eric Serra's industrial score. The movie feels like a comic book due to Phil Meheux's cinematography. But also because of the sheer difference in character depiction: Alec, Xenia, Natalya, Ourumov, Zukovsky, Boris, Mishkin and Wade. They are all hard to forget. It has great action and dialogue as well as plenty of glamour (I would love to drive to Monte Carlo in an Aston Martin DB 5). Still, Bond has to deal with his past: the Cold War agent in a new world order. Trevelyan ('spare me the Freud'), Natalya ("all your guns and your shootings") and even M ('relic of the Cold War') confront with his own dubious personality. Sheer excellence. 9/10

Tomorrow Never Dies on the other hand must be the worst Bond to date. The plot seems to be ripped from a mediocre videogame. There is not a moment of pause and reflection or even glamour. It is all about action and violence. Bond wielding two machine guns at once shooting everyone in his path is not my idea of our stylish secret agent, this is Rambo. The combination with Michelle Yeoh does not work either. Her kung fu action seems to drag the movie into an even more violent nature. On the positive side, Brosnan gives a confident performance, he has a few fun dialogues (Q and Kaufman), the pre-titles and BMW chase are well executed. David Arnold delivers a solid score and both songs serve adequately well. 5/10

The World Is Not Enough on the other hand is heavily underrated. By many listed as one of the least convincing entries. I, for one, do not agree. Brosnan delivers a complete performance and his psyche is rediscoverd after the wild shooting party that was Tomorrow. His mind is completely overthrown by Sophie Marceau's Elektra who has to be one of the most interesting characters of the Brosnan era. This fact combined with imaginative action (certainly the Thames chase and the caviar factory are memorable). The return of the flamboyant Zukovsky is also a big plus for the movie. Q's good bye is unforgettable, Cleese makes a fun entry and M is emotionally involved. Of course, it is far from perfect. Denise Richards is nice to look at but she should have kept her mouth shut as Connery would have put it. Renard is ok but nowhere near as memorable as a Bond villain should be and there is one very underwhelming underground scene which should have better been left out. 7/10

Die Another Day is the most schizophrenic movie in the franchise. It has a first segment with cold realism and interesting developments. Bond being captured and tortured (during incredible title sequence) is a fine way to start the movie building further on the way of accentuating the human nature of the character. The cinematography by David Tattersall works very effectively here as well. After the introduction of the ice palace which is actually a nice set we are served with one admirable car chase and for the rest the movie sinks away in terrible CGI action and xXx imitation. Let us not get started on the painful oneliners throughout that part of the movie either. It's good for three fourths but eventually slides down to complete awfulness, thus overall it is an ok film. 6/10

Krilencu wrote:

GoldenEye is up there with the very best Bond films. I prefer it to Casino Royale, although only by an inch. Pierce Brosnan is brilliant in this is brilliant in this one, combining aspects of all his predecessors. I love the post-Soviet feel and Eric Serra's industrial score. The movie feel like a comic book due to Phil Meheux's cinematography. But also because of the sheer difference in character depiction: Alec, Xenia, Natalya, Ourumov, Zukovsky, Boris, Mishkin and Wade. They are all hard to forget. It has great action and dialogue as well as plenty of glamour (I would love to drive to Monte Carlo in an Aston Martin DB 5). Still, Bond has to deal with his past: the Cold War agent in a new world order. Trevelyan ('spare me the Freud'), Natalya ("all your guns and your shootings") and even M ('relic of the Cold War') confront with his own dubious personality. Sheer excellence. 9/10

Tomorrow Never Dies on the other hand must be the worst Bond to date. The plot seems to be ripped from a mediocre videogame. There is not a moment of pause and reflection or even glamour. It is all about action and violence. Bond wielding two machine guns at once shooting everyone in his path is not my idea of our stylish secret agent, this is Rambo. The combination with Michelle Yeoh does not work either. Her kung fu action seems to drag the movie even into an even more violent nature. On the positive side, Brosnan gives a confident performance, he has a few fun dialogues (Q and Kaufman), the pre-titles and BMW chase is well executed. David Arnold delivers a solid score and both songs serve adequately well. 5/10

The World Is Not Enough on the other hand is heavily underrated. By many listed as one of the least convincing entries. I, for one, do not agree. Brosnan delivers a complete performance and his psyche is rediscoverd after the wild shooting party that was Tomorrow. His mind completely overthrown by Sophie Marceau's Elektra who has to be one of the most interesting characters of the Brosnan era. This fact combined with imaginative action (certainly the Thames chase and the caviar factory are memorable). The return of the flamboyant Zukovsky is also a big plus for the movie. Q's good bye is unforgettable, Cleese makes a fun entry and M is emotionally involved. Of course, it is far from perfect. Denise Richards is nice to look at but she should have kept her mouth shut as Connery would have said. Renard is ok but nowhere near as memorable as a Bond villain should be and there is one very underwhelming underground scene which would have better been left out. 7/10

Die Another Day is the most schizophrenic movie in the franchise. It has a first segment with cold realism and interesting developments. Bond being captured and tortured (with an incredible title sequence) is a fine way to start the movie building further on the way of accentuating the human nature of the character. The cinematography by David Tattersall works very effectively as well. After the introduction of the ice palace which is actually a nice set we are served with one admirable car chase and for the rest the movie sinks away in terrible CGI action and xXx imitation. Let us not get started on the painful oneliners throughout that part of the movie either. It's half good, hlaf bad thus it's ok. 6/10

Very nice summary of the era.

Thanks lachesis.
Though I discovered some typos there in my text while rereading it. Sorry for that, it was done in a hurry in the middle of examination period :oops:

My ranking of Brosner's films:

GOLDENEYE 4/10
TOMORROW NEVER DIES 1/10 (only because we see a semi-nude Cecilie Thomsen)
THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH 5/10
DIE ANOTHER DAY 2/10

Brosner's best performance was in TWINE, in my opinion. Marceau was also my favorite Bond girl from his era. I also liked Pike--not for her performance, though. Trevelyan was a solid villain, while Carver was absolutely pathetic. Xenia was the best henchman. We need more villains with big tits and a high sex drive.

And Joe Don Baker was the greatest aspect of the entire era.

Brozza's performance was schizophrenic in TWINE. Almost as if on everyday of principle photography, he came on set and thought 'what the hell!, and decided to play a different interpretation of Bond. So one minute, he's trying to hard to be a real tough SOB, pinning down barmens' suits with their knives, the next he's fallen head over heals for Elektra. No development. Just on and off like a switch.

Also - Scorupco > Marceau.

Largo's Shark wrote:

Brozza's performance was schizophrenic in TWINE. Almost as if on everyday of principle photography, he came on set and thought 'what the hell!, and decided to play a different interpretation of Bond. So one minute, he's trying to hard to be a real tough SOB, pinning down barmens' suits with their knives, the next he's fallen head over heals for Elektra. No development. Just on and off like a switch.

Also - Scorupco > Marceau.

I don't agree. Some people are like that in real life. One can be tough but still fall in love.

Brosnan didn't gel it together in a believable way though. The biggest gaffe being he's supposed to play a tough guy like Dalton but then he suddenly becomes a sleazy Roger Moore without the charm. It's even worse when he's shown to be incompetent and not picking up the clues where he should until its too late. He should have immediately suspected Elektra was up to no good the moment the parahawks started attacking him and avoiding her.

He's a lot more consistent in DAD, his best performance. Shamefully it had to be in that film.

Makeshift Python wrote:

He's a lot more consistent in DAD, his best performance.

True, he drops the pretensions of toughness and gives us two full hours of oleaginous twattery.