SPECTRE leaked documents -- MAJOR SPOILERS

About the "last one" with Sony, I think that's a reference to the deal between MGM and Sony ending after this one. The original plan was that only Bonds 21 and 22 would be a joint venture between MGM and Sony. After QOS, MGM was to be on their own for the following films. But then the money troubles at MGM happened, thus along the way a new deal was made with Sony to help co-produce Bond 23 and 24. Hence SPECTRE being referred to as "the last one".

This is just my guess, but I think the tension was always that Bond never truly belonged to SONY. In the end, it will always be an MGM joint. It blew THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (along with other tentpole films) out of the water at the box office, which must have bruised a lot of egos because that was their crown jewel franchise. Now that they'll no longer be in on the Bond gig, and that they now have to work with Marvel on Spider-Man, they no longer have an active major franchise to call their own. They'll have to hope GHOSTBUSTERS: GIRL EDITION will make up for their losses.


Here's the article MI6-HQ posted back when the Sony deal was struck in 2011. http://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/articles/bond_23_sony_distribution.php3

Makeshift Python wrote:

About the "last one" with Sony, I think that's a reference to the deal between MGM and Sony ending after this one. The original plan was that only Bonds 21 and 22 would be a joint venture between MGM and Sony. After QOS, MGM was to be on their own for the following films. But then the money troubles at MGM happened, thus along the way a new deal was made with Sony to help co-produce Bond 23 and 24. Hence SPECTRE being referred to as "the last one".

This is just my guess, but I think the tension was always that Bond never truly belonged to SONY. In the end, it will always be an MGM joint. It blew THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN (along with other tentpole films) out of the water at the box office, which must have bruised a lot of egos because that was their crown jewel franchise. Now that they'll no longer be in on the Bond gig, and that they now have to work with Marvel on Spider-Man, they no longer have an active major franchise to call their own. They'll have to hope GHOSTBUSTERS: GIRL EDITION will make up for their losses.


Here's the article MI6-HQ posted back when the Sony deal was struck in 2011. http://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/articles/bond_23_sony_distribution.php3

I understood all that. But there is an email communication back and forth between Amy and Barbara where they talk about how much they love each other, would miss each other, and don't want to stop making films together and how both don't want SPECTRE to be the last joint venture. SPECTRE was marked "the last one" in her notes due to the structure of the current deal, but now that Amy is gone from SONY, it truly is the last one for Amy....don't know whether this is the last one for MGM/SONY at this point. I guess profitability will determine future ventures.

What I'm adding is that now that The Amazing Amy is no longer working at SONY, EON has lost a principal backer in their corner. SPECTRE went at least $50 million over budget (with Glickman's assessment that the film was on its way to costing "mid-300's"). So I would expect some changes for BOND 25 top to bottom. I dont' expect Craig back. I don't know where EON will land. There was an email from Amy suggesting that SONY attempt to buy the rights to Bond so that SONY would their own "tentpole" Apparently SONY suffers from a lack of homegrown talent and viable "franchises"

Everyone involved has completely mucked up what should have been the triumphant return of......., well, you-know-who, to the series.

Thanks for sharing, Grav, with relatively minor spoilers (especially since most of that has been binned). This was probably the worst bit of the early drafts:

Quote :

M was written as....well, if you saw what Brian DePalma did to the Jim Phelps character in MI, then this should come as no surprise, as Logan/Mendes both pull a page out of Cruise's 1996 Mission Impossible film and try to turn M into a puppet of Blofeld. Ralph Fiennes got wind of this and put his foot down; didnt' want any part of it. So they give the thankless task to Rory Kinnear's Tanner, but not sure if that's made it into the shooting script.

I really hope Tanner doesn't end up that way. These producers and writers really know how to fuck up classic characters. You're right about them acting like they haven't seen a Bond film pre-CASINO ROYALE. And the only one who knows Fleming's material seems to be Mendes.

GS's concerns are overstated. This will be the most consistently entertaining film of Craig's tenure.

Tanner is not a traitor in the shooting script for Spectre.

And Seydoux's role turned out very nicely.

Harmsway wrote:

GS's concerns are overstated.

Forgive him, he suffers from PTBD (Post Traumatic Babs Disorder).

Control wrote:

Thanks for sharing, Grav, with relatively minor spoilers (especially since most of that has been binned). This was probably the worst bit of the early drafts:

Quote :

M was written as....well, if you saw what Brian DePalma did to the Jim Phelps character in MI, then this should come as no surprise, as Logan/Mendes both pull a page out of Cruise's 1996 Mission Impossible film and try to turn M into a puppet of Blofeld. Ralph Fiennes got wind of this and put his foot down; didnt' want any  part of it. So they give the thankless task to Rory Kinnear's Tanner, but not sure if that's made it into the shooting script.

I really hope Tanner doesn't end up that way. These producers and writers really know how to fuck up classic characters. You're right about them acting like they haven't seen a Bond film pre-CASINO ROYALE. And the only one who knows Fleming's material seems to be Mendes.

I guess what I was saying is that if your knowledge of Bond extends no further back than CR, then you might think Craig's tenure is original and fresh. But even within the Craig tenure we've had the same plot points used repeatedly. The notion of someone close to Bond or within MI6 betraying him or the organization was already explored in CR and QOS so why does it need exploring yet again? And prior to Craig 3 of Brosnan's 4 films involved him being betrayed by someone he trusted. We've gone to the well too many times on this issue.

Mendes knows Bond, but that doesn't insulate him from making bad decisions either. The idea that he would reveal Franz Oberhauser to actually be Blofeld in the last 3-5 minutes of the film #1 not only deprives the audience of getting Blofeld "as is" for a 2 hour film, but #2 it's a conceit that was already used with Moneypenny in the previous film. Why go there again?

John Logan was thrown under the bus last summer by people on the production, so it's only fair to see what these people were actually saying and thinking to themselves and one another while at the same time lying to Bond fans that everything was okay and that the script was very good (aren't they always very good? Mendes, Craig and Seydoux aren't going to stand up in front the world's press and announce that the shooting script is a load of bollocks and that the acting talent on-board is middling and average, so it's helpful to read some of these emails to find out what was REALLY going on.)

For example, I believe Elizabeth Cantillion describes Oberhauser as 'sickly and weak' and asks how a villain that was supposed to be behind the events of all three previous films (and was the puppet master pulling the strings on the death of Vesper, M, as well as manipulating Le Chiffre, Green, and Silva) could somehow be less a villain than the three that came before him. Excellent question!

Personally, I think that the script has bitten off more than it can chew. One executive complains that the script is "5 months" behind in terms of development. "Babzy" was alleged to have been "mortified" that SONY execs were given the draft of the script that they did get, but again, they'd been wanting to see something since the first draft was turned in very, very late. Why was it so late? Were Mendes and Logan no longer on the same page? Was Mendes trying to run out the clock so that SONY had no choice but to use his script? After all, he did just bring them a billion-dollar Bond film, so I guess that should buy him some street cred and the right to not be micro-managed.

It's also clear "Babzy" is totally hooked on keeping Sam in the fold and will do whatever possible to stop him from bolting the production when it looks at one point as if he's thinking of walking.

Back in my day (back in the 80's I guess) it wasn't necessary for me to know *why* Zorin was evil. I didn't need to know about Sanchez's childhood growing up or whether Blofeld had difficulty as a child being toilet trained. It was just understood these were evil, bad people. But today's Bond villain apparently needs to have all his pathos explained to the audience. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that M suffers from erectile dysfunction and that is why he is at war with MI5 in this film, or maybe Scarria has a yeast infection or leaky bladder syndrome and that's why she is a lesbian. You think I'm joking, but 10 years ago I would've sworn on a stack of Ian Fleming 1st print editions that we would never see the day when 007 would have "mommy issues", or that the villain would try to destroy the world because as a child his father showed more attention to James Bond, an orphan, than he himself received, and yet here we are.  It's bollocks. Pure, straight up, 100% bollocks.

I'd love to know what the "fuselage" action sequence was all about. Paschal said it "strained credulity". Well, yeah, Amy. Welcome to the club. Most of the decisions SONY and MGM have made from 2004 onward have strained credulity.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

The idea that he would reveal Franz Oberhauser to actually be Blofeld in the last 3-5 minutes of the film #1 not only deprives the audience of getting Blofeld "as is" for a 2 hour film, but #2 it's a conceit that was already used with Moneypenny in the previous film. Why go there again?

The reveal happens more like 25-30 minutes before the end of the film. The outline and leaks you've seen doesn't reflect later tweaks to how it all plays out.

Trust me, Spectre reads much better than it sounds in abstract. Much like Skyfall.

Harmsway wrote:

The reveal happens more like 25-30 minutes before the end of the film. The outline and leaks you've seen doesn't reflect later tweaks to how it all plays out.

Why does there need to be a "reveal" at all? Why can we not dispense with these plot gimmicks and just start getting down to making straight-up Bond movies without the plot twists, the reveals, the gimmicky devices, the secrets, the dark history, etc...? 4 films into the Craig era and it barely feels like we've had a proper Bond film yet. We were promised this s*** was over in SKYFALL and that Bond was fully formed and would be going on about his normal missions but that simply isn't the case.

The reason we're not getting a typical Bond film of the Connery/Moore days is because SKYFALL made a lot of money and Craig doesn't seem interested in making a Bond film without some poignancy. I pretty much doubt that Craig will ever make a personal stakes-free Bond film like A VIEW TO A KILL ever. These are the Bond films of this era, you might as well either accept that and hope they make something great out of that or just wait it out until Craig leaves, or whenever Mike and Babs no longer run the franchise.

Gravity's Silhouett wrote:

Why does there need to be a "reveal" at all? Why can we not dispense with these plot gimmicks and just start getting down to making straight-up Bond movies without the plot twists, the reveals, the gimmicky devices, the secrets, the dark history, etc...?

Cuz then we'd get Die Another Day 2

Although if the Craig crew had thought of that scene with freefalling cars from Fast 7 first, I'd eat crow with my silver spoon.

These attempts at plot twists and turns have been in play ever since GE, when Sean Bean's character turned rogue (although you could argue we saw it first in FYEO, then again in TLD), but this seems to be a major trait now of the post Cubby era.

In the Fleming novels, this is not something that was really evident in his plots, which instead were fairly straightforward affairs. We normally knew from the outset who the villain was that Bond was about to pursue, and it didn't detract from that.

And the films followed suit for most part, up until Babs got her hands on the franchise. Now we have this concept of twists, reveals and Nolanesque origins, which is getting a bit too much.

As I have said in earlier posts, if this film reveals Blofeld is family connected to Bond in some way, this just pisses all over everything Fleming ever wrote from a Skyfall height, and totally discredits the well-used opinion that Craig's films are somehow closer to the Fleming novels.

And maybe it is just me, but reading these email exchanges from Amy Rascal and co. makes me want to vomit, when I see the kind of ridiculous ideas they were all throwing around - Blofeld a woman, M a traitor. Fleming probably still hasn't stopped spinning in his grave at the imbeciles in charge of the franchise he started.

Why can't we have a straightforward traditional 60's type storyline anymore?

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Why can we not dispense with these plot gimmicks and just start getting down to making straight-up Bond movies without the plot twists, the reveals, the gimmicky devices, the secrets, the dark history, etc...?

Because every major player involved in making the Bond films at this stage in the game regards that as boring.

Now, I agree that it's a bit much. I think it's the case that we'll see the Bond films ease up on this stuff after Craig departs the role, because some sort of course adjustment will be required if only to distinguish the successor from his predecessor.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

We were promised this s*** was over in SKYFALL and that Bond was fully formed and would be going on about his normal missions but that simply isn't the case.

Well, despite the gloomy trailer, Spectre does generally play more lighthearted and more "classic" than any of the Craig entries to date. It doesn't really put Bond through the angst of previous Craig installments, and structurally, it's pretty "standard Bond," as it were.

bitchcraft wrote:

Cuz then we'd get Die Another Day 2

Although if the Craig crew had thought of that scene with freefalling cars from Fast 7 first, I'd eat crow with my silver spoon.

When I refer to the "reveal" in SPECTRE, I'm referring to the fact that the villain is Blofeld (which, by the way, Christoph Waltz is flat out lying about when he says he's not playing Blofeld; he's being very misleading and economical with the truth), but everyone involved is going through the pretense that it's not (a lot like bad sex, where everyone in the room is going through the motions but isn't truly in the mood yet pretends to be into it). We all know it is, just like we all knew Naomi Harris was playing Moneypenny. When you call your film SPECTRE, the given assumption is that the villain is Blofeld, so why try and be so cute with all this?

They are going to spend waste upwards of two hours pretending that Oberhauser is someone else, or explaining why Oberhauser being a bed-wetter until he was 11 is the cause of his plan for world domination trying to get his hands on a birth certificate/passport that reveals his true identity when all that time could have been put to better use in servicing the plot. Remember when Bond films use to be about big ideas? Creating earthquakes? Setting off nuclear devices? Using a genetically engineered orchid to wipe out humanity? Now it's the smallest of small potatoes.

jet set willy wrote:

These attempts at plot twists and turns have been in play ever since GE, when Sean Bean's character turned rogue (although you could argue we saw it first in FYEO, then again in TLD), but this seems to be a major trait now of the post Cubby era.

Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. In 1987, without the Internet, I was totally surprised that Kara was Koskov's girlfriend. By 1995, the previews gave away everything about Goldeneye, so no one should have been the slightest bit shocked that 006 was a traitor (plus from the outset I don't think they really tried to hide Sean Bean as the villain, so I give them a pass).

I think the twist works in TWINE and probably in DAD (though Pike is so cold and unforgiving that a few non-core fans guessed she was the person who ratted out Bond). But the theme of "trust no one" and constantly being betrayed has run its course in the Craig films: Vesper is in league with the villain; by QOS M's bodyguard and another agent are in league with Quantum. In SF, Silva feels betrayed by M. It's got to stop. Furthermore, does anyone really, really, truly believe that Bond's relationship with Vesper was so strong that he would still be whinging on and on and on about it 9 years later?

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And the films followed suit for most part, up until Babs got her hands on the franchise. Now we have this concept of twists, reveals and Nolanesque origins, which is getting a bit too much.

I believe "Babzy" wanted a female Blofeld (which I might not have had any problem with had the idea just been straightforward instead of trying to hide her identity) from the very beginning and tried to hide it from the rest of SONY until it could no longer be denied. I certainly believe Mendes was in on it along with Logan.

And for the record, I wonder if Ejiofor was dropped from contention because SONY didn't want there to be a black Moneypenny, black Felix, and black Blofeld all in the same movie. If you read any of the emails regarding the score cards SONY was getting back from preview audiences at screenings of ANNIE, they were definitely aware and sensitive to the idea that ANNIE was being perceived as an unnecessary "retool" or "remake", and that it was considered a "black film", which meant it was likely to get lower turnout by all demographics except black audiences, and that's exactly what happened.

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And maybe it is just me, but reading these email exchanges from Amy Rascal and co. makes me want to vomit, when I see the kind of ridiculous ideas they were all throwing around - Blofeld a woman, M a traitor. Fleming probably still hasn't stopped spinning in his grave at the imbeciles in charge of the franchise he started.

Amy *RASCAL*???? Why didn't I think of that?

I mean, it really does seem like they've started to run out of ideas: make Bond black, make Blofeld a woman...make M a traitor. It's lazy, sloppy story-planning. How would M have put? 'When you can't tell your 007 screenplay from your Mission:Impossible screenplay, it's time to go.'

Babzy, Michael...........it's time to go. Sell Bond to someone else and get off the playing field.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

They are going to spend waste upwards of two hours pretending that Oberhauser is someone else, or explaining why Oberhauser being a bed-wetter until he was 11 is the cause of his plan for world domination trying to get his hands on a birth certificate/passport that reveals his true identity when all that time could have been put to better use in servicing the plot. Remember when Bond films use to be about big ideas? Creating earthquakes? Setting off nuclear devices? Using a genetically engineered orchid to wipe out humanity? Now it's the smallest of small potatoes.

Your info is way out of date. The "passport" storyline was dropped a long time ago in favor of something more in the vein of "classic Blofeld."

Harmsway wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

They are going to spend waste upwards of two hours pretending that Oberhauser is someone else, or explaining why Oberhauser being a bed-wetter until he was 11 is the cause of his plan for world domination trying to get his hands on a birth certificate/passport that reveals his true identity when all that time could have been put to better use in servicing the plot. Remember when Bond films use to be about big ideas? Creating earthquakes? Setting off nuclear devices? Using a genetically engineered orchid to wipe out humanity? Now it's the smallest of small potatoes.

Your info is way out of date. The "passport" storyline was dropped a long time ago in favor of something more in the vein of "classic Blofeld."

We'll see. Because my gut instinct is that this will be all or nothing; it'll either be the greatest Bond film of all time, or the worst (worse than TMWTGG, QOS, AVTAK, LR). I see no middle ground. Mendes will need a great deal of luck talent to get out of this.

I think you've built up a false impression of what the film will be based on what you've heard about what the film almost was. Earlier versions of Spectre would be the disaster you're imagining, but by the time shooting began, they'd settled on something that was in pretty good shape.

Harmsway wrote:

I think you've built up a false impression of what the film will be based on what you've heard about what the film almost was. Earlier versions of Spectre would be the disaster you're imagining, but by the time shooting began, they'd settled on something that was in pretty good shape.

My problem with your take on the matter is that much of what was objectionable in those early drafts IS STILL IN THE MOVIE. So whilethey may have tweaked some things here and there, it looks like the basic framework is still in place. Bond's "secret" is still there....Bond being "rogue" is still there...MI6 having to work underground (again) is still there....maybe Bond doesn't throw his gun in the river and quit in this draft, and maybe Blofeld is revealed a bit earlier than in the last 5 pages...but still plenty to be concerned about.

Still concerned about a producer that hires a 50 year old woman as a "Bond Girl" as if the Bond series is meant to be some sort of social engineering program. 007 used to be about fantasy, but now we have to make sure all age-ranges, genders, sexual orientations and colors are represented in the film, regardless of whether it services the story or not. So, yeah, I'm still skeptical. Good chemistry between Craig and Seydoux and mindless stunts and action will go a long way towards making me like this film. Otherwise, it'll look like nothing more than a 120 minute Benetton commercial.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Still concerned about a producer that hires a 50 year old woman as a "Bond Girl" as if the Bond series is meant to be some sort of social engineering program.

This is the least of my concerns. In fact, it's as though someone's been listening to me for a change. It gets creepy and somewhat disgusting when Bond keeps bedding women half his age. Especially when they are boneheads like Bibi or Christmas Jones. Boning the 50 year old wife of a baddie he just killed is perfectly Bond like to me and there is no reason why a mature shag should be disqualified. Besides, the majority of the guys on this board would bone an older woman in a flash if they got the opportunity - that's not fantasy, it's poontang pie and some much needed experience.

Just for the record, the "secret" Moneypenny refers to in the trailer isn't anything to do with Bond's childhood, even though they edited the trailer to make that connection.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

My problem with your take on the matter is that much of what was objectionable in those early drafts IS STILL IN THE MOVIE.

Perhaps, but a lot of this stuff plays differently in context than it sounds in isolation.

bitchcraft wrote:

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Still concerned about a producer that hires a 50 year old woman as a "Bond Girl" as if the Bond series is meant to be some sort of social engineering program.

This is the least of my concerns. In fact, it's as though someone's been listening to me for a change. It gets creepy and somewhat disgusting when Bond keeps bedding women half his age. Especially when they are boneheads like Bibi or Christmas Jones. Boning the 50 year old wife of a baddie he just killed is perfectly Bond like to me and there is no reason why a mature shag should be disqualified. Besides, the majority of the guys on this board would bone an older woman in a flash if they got the opportunity - that's not fantasy, it's poontang pie and some much needed experience.

I've got no problem with the age of the women going up in the series, but 50 seems to be really pushing it. I mean, she's older than Craig. But I digress. We'll see how well she looks when the movie comes out...I'm sure Sam will shoot her from her best angles and use only the softest of lighting. I think hiring a 50 year old woman was Barbara's lady-boner, not because there was a groundswell of support from the 18-49 male demographic looking for more mature poontang than what Denise Richards or Rosamund Pike could offer. Bond's gone from barely legal to MILF in just one picture.

Belluci is only four years older than Craig. How is that pushing it? Honor Blackman is five years older than Sean Connery, and nobody cared.

I don't have a problem with Belucci because she looks great for her age, but I'm assuming the difference is that Connery wasn't in his forties at the time of shooting GF, and neither was Honor Blackman.

Having more mature age Bond girls is fine by me but there are the 40s age group to consider before jumping from mid-late 30s (Severine and Eve) straight to 50.

Seems a bit over the top considering that Bellucci is not even the main Bond girl.

When I died on these forums, thank God I donated my spirit to Gravity and not to some dumbass, text-speaking medical research students whose idea of nu-Blofeld casts what was once the iconic bastion of Bond villainy as a transgender lesbian with learning difficulties who ended up that way either because of some unforetold inbreeding in the Bond household or because James got given more lollipops than poor fucking Ernst when they were kids. It took half a dozen piles of IT'S PERSONAL shite for them to finally get it borderline right with SKYFALL. Quit while you're kind of ahead PLEASE, you mad woman. Time for some fun, you sadistic psychobabbling c*nt.

SPECTRE: TWINE PART III. (copyright Lazenby, 2015).