Ranking The Bond Films (Part 3/3): The Top Five

This month marks the 60th anniversary of the release of Dr. No, the first film in the James Bond series. Directed by Terence Young, the movie established not only one of cinema's most enduring heroes but the entire action movie genre.

In commemoration of the series' beginnings, I have ranked all twenty-five films in the main series. If you haven't read Part One yet, featuring the movies ranked 25-16, you can do so here. Part Two, counting down the films ranked 15-6, can be read here. Spanning six decades and the tenures of six actors, the films are as fascinating in their own right as they are snapshots of the times in which they were made. One of the many great things about the series is that it offers so many entry points, with any one film having a wildly different tone to another, that there can never be a conclusive list of the best Bonds. This ranking is simply my own, and if you too are a fan, you will appreciate that disagreement is not just expected, but essential. Finally, here are my top five Bond films. Enjoy.

Ranking The Bond Films (Part 2/3): 15 - 6

Poster Credit: Sean Longmore

This month marks the 60th anniversary of the release of Dr. No, the first film in the James Bond series. Directed by Terence Young, the movie established not only one of cinema's most enduring heroes but the entire action movie genre.

In commemoration of the series' beginnings, I'll be ranking all twenty-five films in the main series. If you haven't read Part One yet, featuring the movies ranked 25-16, you can do so here. Spanning six decades and the tenures of six actors, the films are as fascinating in their own right as they are snapshots of the times in which they were made. One of the many great things about the series is that it offers so many entry points, with any one film having a wildly different tone to another, that there can never be a conclusive list of the best Bonds. This ranking is simply my own, and if you too are a Bond fan, you will appreciate that disagreement is not just expected, but essential. Enjoy.

Ranking The Bond Films (Part 1/3): 25 - 16

This month marks the 60th anniversary of the release of Dr. No, the first film in the James Bond series. Directed by Terence Young, the movie established not only one of cinema's most enduring heroes but a whole new genre. If Alfred Hitchcock's North By Northwest laid the foundation for the modern action movie, it was Goldfinger which built the house with its focus on big-budget spectacle, a larger-than-life villain with an audaciously implausible plot, and a stylish, implacably cool hero helped by high-tech gadgetry and beautiful women. As much as the Bond films have always moved with the times, often chasing trends, it took decades - the action boom of the eighties - before the rest of the industry began to replicate the high-octane formula which made the classic Bonds so timelessly exciting.

In commemoration of the series' beginnings, I'll be ranking all twenty-five films in the main series. This excludes the unofficial and mostly terrible Never Say Never Again, released by a Thunderball producer who had clung onto certain rights to the story, and the fascinating trainwreck which is the 1967 'comedy' adaptation of Casino Royale. Both would be near the bottom of the list if included. The main series alone offers plenty to be getting on with: spanning six decades and the tenures of six actors, the films are as fascinating in their own right as they are snapshots of the times in which they were made. As a result, one of the many great things about the series is that it offers so many entry points, with any one film having a wildly different tone to another, that there can never be a conclusive list of the best Bonds. This ranking is simply my own, and if you too are a Bond fan, you will appreciate that disagreement is not just expected, but essential. Enjoy.

Movies: No Time To Die (no spoilers) review

FILM REVIEW

Review Scoring Chart - 10: Masterpiece; 9: Outstanding; 8: Very Good; 7: Good; 6: Above Average; 5: Average; 4: Below Average; 3: Bad; 2: Awful; 1: Reprehensible; 0: Non-Functional.

NO TIME TO DIE
Dir: Cary Joji Fukunaga

Stars: Daniel Craig, Léa Seydoux, Lashana Lynch, Rami Malek, Ben Whishaw 

Running Time: 163mins

No Time To Die arrives a year shy of the venerable Bond series' 60th anniversary and concludes the tenure of Daniel Craig in the lead role. Though all but Goldfinger of the original six films contained some degree of serialisation, Craig's time in the lead role has been characterised by plots more tightly interwoven with each other than ever before, all concerned with answering the question of who James Bond is, what role he has to play in the modern world, and what, if anything, that means.

If any conclusions can be reached from what No Time To Die has to offer, few feel satisfying and most outright misguided. Nine years ago, Skyfall - then a standalone film, since uncomfortably retconned into the increasingly incoherent Craigiverse continuity - delivered a self-assured and conclusive answer: Bond as the modern Arthur, an eternal defender forged in the best values of old but existing in a cycle of rebirth and evolution to deal with the threats of changing times. No Time To Die's version of Bond also exists somewhat in legend - one character refers to himself as a 'big fan' of the temporarily-retired spy - but looking at how he's characterised this time around, one can only wonder why.

Games: No More Heroes III (Nintendo Switch) review

GAME REVIEW

Review Scoring Chart - 10: Masterpiece; 9: Outstanding; 8: Very Good; 7: Good; 6: Above Average; 5: Average; 4: Below Average; 3: Bad; 2: Awful; 1: Reprehensible; 0: Non-Functional.

NO MORE HEROES III
Developer: Grasshopper Manufacture

Publisher: Marvelous

Platform: Nintendo Switch

 

Goichi Suda, alias: Suda51, remains a rarity in the world of game design: a true auteur. That's not to suggest there's a shortage of well-known or talented designers out there, but few have back catalogues which feel as much a result of a singular artistic vision. As is the case with his stated or assumed influences from the film world, artists like David Lynch or Alejandro Jodorowsky, Suda's games presents worlds which are outwardly insane, but inwardly purposeful. The original No More Heroes was, on the surface, about a lightsabre - sorry, 'beam katana' - wielding geek slaughtering his way thorugh an array of eccentric bosses to reach the top of an assassins' ranking list, all in hope of getting into the pants of a sexy femme fatale. Underneath, it was a story about letting go of past traumas, about how a life of killing destroys the soul, and the emptiness of pursuing external glory rather than personal fulfilment.

No More Heroes III marks a return for Suda to the director's chair of a major game, having withdrawn from the spotlight for over a decade following an extremely difficult experience with EA Games developing Shadows Of The Damned. A small-scale warm-up to this game, 2019's Travis Strikes Again, was the first time Suda had been credited as a game director since the original No More Heroes in 2007. Despite NMHIII's flaws, it is a bold and exciting a reminder of how much the gaming world has missed him.

Summer Movie Mini-Review Roundup, Part Two (including Shang-Chi & The Legend Of The Ten Rings)

Review Scoring Chart - 10: Masterpiece; 9: Outstanding; 8: Very Good; 7: Good; 6: Above Average; 5: Average; 4: Below Average; 3: Bad; 2: Awful; 1: Reprehensible; 0: Non-Functional.

Although cinemas have only just started to reopen as mass vaccination takes the edge off the COVID pandemic, there has been no shortage of movies of all shapes and sizes to watch over the past months. From comic book blockbusters like The Suicide Squad or Black Widow, to more niche genre pieces like Censor or Pig, there has been a satisfying variety of offerings compared to more traditional cinematic summers, which tend to be dominated by major studio releases alone.

Rather than review each individually, these round-ups comprise short reviews of several films released to UK viewers over the past few months. The reviews in Part Two are The Suicide Squad, The Green Knight, Zola, Free Guy, Gunpowder Milkshake, Pig and Shang-Chi & The Legend Of The Ten Rings. Part One, published last Monday, comprised Black Widow, Another Round, Reminiscence, Censor, Jungle Cruise and Old.

Summer Movie Mini-Review Roundup, Part One

Review Scoring Chart - 10: Masterpiece; 9: Outstanding; 8: Very Good; 7: Good; 6: Above Average; 5: Average; 4: Below Average; 3: Bad; 2: Awful; 1: Reprehensible; 0: Non-Functional.

Although cinemas have only just started to reopen as mass vaccination takes the edge off the COVID pandemic, there has been no shortage of movies of all shapes and sizes to watch over the past months. From comic book blockbusters like The Suicide Squad or Black Widow, to more niche genre pieces like Censor or Pig, there has been a satisfying variety of offerings compared to more traditional cinematic summers, which tend to be dominated by major studio releases alone.

Rather than review each individually, these round-ups comprise short reviews of several films released to UK viewers over the past few months. The six are Black Widow, Another Round, Reminiscence, Censor, Jungle Cruise and Old. Part Two looks at The Suicide Squad, The Green Knight, Zola, Free Guy, Gunpowder Milkshake, Pig and Shang-Chi & The Legend Of The Ten Rings.

BS With Friends Podcast: On Her Majesty's Secret Service

I was privileged to take part in a very enjoyable podcast about one of my favourite James Bond films, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, with resident hosts, Maxwell Roahrig and Xzyliac Ariel. We cover some recent entertainment news stories, Peter Hunt's borderline experimental editing, how Bond beat the Fast & Furious franchise to punch with a flying car (in addition to a double-taking pigeon), and On Her Majesty's gay influence, helped in part by writer Simon Raven, an old-school libertine who was expelled from school - and I quote said school's obituary - 'less for homosexuality than for the bravura with which he practiced it'.

 

Below the jump are links to articles I've written on this blog about Bond, including a set of film reviews and why OHMSS is the great unrecognised Christmas movie. Have fun!

In Life And In Death, Prince Philip Embodied The Value Of The British Monarchy

The past few years have been turbulent for the British Royal Family. A slew of controversies, from the links between Prince Andrew and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, to the departure of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle and their subsequent accusations of experiencing racism within the 'Firm', have led to increased questioning among the young in particular about what the monarchy is for and why it exists in an age of democracy and representation. The death of Prince Philip yesterday, the man who dutifully stood two paces behind the Queen for over seventy years and did more than anyone to make the monarchs visible and accessible to the public, will plausibly only galvanise such questions once the mourning period has faded.

Though many monarchists may recoil at the question being asked at all, it serves an important purpose not only in testing the resilience of the nation's institutions, but the clarity of people's understanding of their usefulness. The Royal Family is not elected or directly accountable to its people, nor should it be, but it cannot persist unless the people feel proud to be represented by them and that the values they embody are the right ones. In this, the allegations surrounding Prince Andrew's close friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, and the Palace seemingly closing ranks to protect him, have been particularly corrosive. If the public is unsure why the monarchy remains important in spite of any controversies surrounding it, either the people in charge of maintaining our institutions, or the institutions themselves, are not doing their job. In this respect, while the death of Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, may be the first step in a period of transition for the monarchy, the remembrance of his remarkable life may also serve to remind the British people of its immense value to the nation and the world.

Uncertainty As The Path To Resurrection In Dante's Commedia

The Christian holidays have become largely divorced from their original meanings. In some ways this is helpful, allowing them to be days of universal celebration rather than exclusively serving a single section of our theologically diverse societies. Christmas is these days about giving, gratitude, and reuniting with loved ones, rather than specifically a celebration of Christ's birth. Christ's story encompasses those qualities, but what is celebrated are the shared values rather than the event itself. Though most are aware of Christmas' religious origins - it's right there in the name - the connection is not necessarily made between those origins and the values it now represents. This inevitably leads to the hackneyed complaint that Christmas is just about 'capitalism', which says more about the complainer's inability to understand the value of giving than they might have wished.

Easter is further divorced from the reasons for its Christian celebration than Christmas. In part, this is because the name does not tie in so obviously. According to the Venerable Bede, a seventh-century monk known as the 'Father of English history' for his ecumenical writings, the month of Christ's resurrection was called Eostremonath in Old English, named for the goddess Eostre. The association between the two stuck even after the name of the month changed. Aside from the loose symbolism of eggs to birth, the idea of resurrection has been lost in how we celebrate Easter today. In search of that original meaning and how it relates to our contemporary lives, we should look to one of the great works of the global literary canon, whose narrative not coincidentally begins on Maundy Thursday, just before Easter Weekend: Dante Alighieri's epic poem, the Commedia.