DAD: Should I Give It Another Shot?

I haven't watched DAD since July '05. The reason for the avoidance is that my first two viewings scarred me badly. But now, 7 1/2 years on, I feel a strange temptation to give the infamous flick another go. What do you think? Should I? Is it possible that I will arrive at a renewed appreciation of DAD? Or would it most certainly be another wasted two hours?

I think you'll arrive at a renewed appreciation of the good bits of DAD, but nothing will make Jinx or the CGI tsunami any better.

I've given it a couple of shots while it aired on USA Network but was never able to sit through the whole thing. It starts of okay but as soon as he shaves his beard it descends into cartoon territory.

I think you should. If you feel like nothing's improved for you, you have all the more ammunition to slam it when the time comes again. :)

Largo's Shark wrote:

I think you'll arrive at a renewed appreciation of the good bits of DAD

I have found that concentrating on the positive stuff works, though it does make me wonder what the film could have been if it were made properly.

Give it a shot, then you'll realize how worse TND and TWINE are.

Oh, just ignore everyone else's opinions and watch it. If you like that kind of Bond film (Lewis Gilbert's YOLT/TSWLM/MR style) then you'll appreciate its OTT elements. If you prefer the down-to earth, FRWL/OHMSS/FYEO/LTK/CR/SF style, then go ahead and jump back on the bandwagon of popular opinion and keep hating it.

Who knows? You may find that - like me - you have room in your heart for both styles, which will double your enjoyment of the canon.

The first hour of DAD is still decent, middle-of-the-road Bond entertainment - I agree in some ways an improvement on TND and TWINE.

Yes, take the bloody shot.

Jinx undoubtedly grates at times, the 'invisible' Aston, 'face-changing' DNA manipulation clinic and Graves' satellite-controlling 'Robocop' suit are ill-advised forays too far into science-fiction territory, some of the dialogue clunks terribly and the CGI parasurfing sequence is, of course, rubbish.

But the remainder of DAD I can live quite happily with, particularly the likes of the hovercraft chase, swordfight sequence and 'You're cleverer than you look' ... 'Yes. Still, better than looking cleverer than you are'.

Decided I'm not quite ready to take the plunge again. Watched John Carpenter's The Thing, instead. I'm reasonably sure I'll give DAD another go eventually. Preferably when the Khantessa is away and I've got a bottle of rotgut by my side.

at you deciding The Thing was a less 'horrific' prospect than DAD, Khanners.

It was certainly less gruesome!

:affraid:

Sorry but even ten years on, after hearing everybody's reasons for hating this film, I do not find it descending in my personal ranking. I understand that a lot of people despise it and I understand why, but I find this doesn't affect me.

DAD remains firmly in my top ten, along with TB, OHMSS, DAF, LALD, TMWTGG, TSWLM, OP, TLD and CR. The rest are my second-favorites, with AVTAK second-last to CR '67, and even that doesn't mean that I hate AVTAK - I just don't enjoy it as much as the others.

Despite its critical and financial success, Skyfall failed to displace any of my top ten. Perhaps B24 will be the magic number.

(BTW I like this new background colour scheme - much easier on the eyes. Well done!)

I've been re-watchimng it recently and it has good parts - just way too much CGI - the plane at the end especially. It's a throw back to the Lewis Gilbert films, and this is what makes it sop jarring in the Brosnan/Craig era. We thought that those type of Bond films stayed in the past.

I will watch the film akll in order - I'd say give it another viewing if you've not seen it since 2005, Mr Khan!

Advice: Watch it with a sound system. It helps to have an experience closer to theatrical with any film, especially one you may be avoiding. The 5.1 sound mix was great for DAD. Better than any of the Craig era to be honest. Opening night on release was in matrixed 6.1 DTS-ES and when the title song started, the poor manager thought he had just blown the new amplifiers.

Thought it was way too loud when I saw it at the cinema. Same goes for the train and helicopter crashes in SKYFALL. I can enjoy films more when I don't feel like my ear drums are getting raped.

Whatever you do don't go to an IMAX. They crank their sound to a point where you need earplugs for any action sequences. Heck, I can't even find a decent sounding theater anywhere. It's too loud or too soft and dialogue is lucky to be clearly audible.

At the tail end of the Dolby/DTS era when DAD came out you could still get away with an action movie that had some dynamics.

hegottheboot wrote:

Whatever you do don't go to an IMAX.

That's where I saw SKYFALL.

BFI IMAX in Waterloo, London - the largest IMAX screen in the British Isles.

Largo's Shark wrote:

hegottheboot wrote:

Whatever you do don't go to an IMAX.

That's where I saw SKYFALL.

BFI IMAX in Waterloo, London - the largest IMAX screen in the British Isles.

I've seen Dark Knight and Star Trek there, the latter suffered in terms of loudness. Then the movie was a wall of noise otherwise.

hegottheboot wrote:

At the tail end of the Dolby/DTS era when DAD came out you could still get away with an action movie that had some dynamics.

I'm curious. Why did Dolby/DTS die?

I think it went from competition dying (DTS effectively being the standard for digital sound in theaters), then film dying as a presentation medium all together. All movies now come with uncompressed PCM sound in either 5.1 or 7.1 configurations.

Yeah give DAD another shot. Its has plenty of flaws, but it has lots of enjoyable scenes in between them. A lot of the CGI special effects are terrible, but the action otherwise is very good.

Hey PK, did you ever end up giving DAD a watch again?

He still has all of his cognitive functions, so I'd assume not.