I've been looking forward to Skyfall for over a year now. Pretty much as soon as I heard that Daniel Craig was in for Bond 23 I was all over it, watching for any tidbits of news. When Miramax ran into financial trouble I was seriously worried about whether or not it would even get made.
I've been a fan of the Bond films since my first encounter with 007 as a child at my grandparents. Sean Connery in Thunderball was on late night TV and I opted to watch that instead of getting a good night's sleep like I was supposed to. I had no idea that it was a "Bond" movie, or even what that was, or that there were so many more to see. Needless to say I loved it, and over the years I've seen every Bond film ever made, even the unofficial ones as bad as they are.
My favourite Bond for the majority of my life was Connery, whether it was because he was the first I'd seen (despite there being 4 bonds before I was born!) or because he was simply the best I couldn't say (though I'm going to go with the latter, even if his last 2 movies as Bond are some of my least favourite).
Brosnan was good fun, and I enjoyed Goldeneye and Tomorrow Never Dies immensely. I enjoyed watching Denise Richards in The World Is Not Enough, even if her acting was flat. I had a huge crush on her at the time. Die Another Day, however, almost made me quit the franchise. It was just too... goofy I guess.
When Daniel Craig stepped into the role for Casino Royale I had just finished devouring all of Fleming's books, and pulpy as they were, I was hoping for a Bond that could reach their potential. A cold-hearted, yet human 007. Craig delivered.
He was hard, yet not impervious, he was funny, without losing his edge, he was a lady killer, without looking like a pretty-boy. This was my Bond.
Quantum of Solace, yeah, I actually really liked it. So sue me! When you take into account that the whole thing was nearly improv because of the writer's strike, they actually managed to fit a lot of neat call-outs in there.
Skyfall (I know, I'm long winded, bear with me) is the penultimate Bond movie in my books. It's got everything a great movie needs. Action, Suspense, one HELL of a story, and my favourite Bond in his best performance.
I don't want to ruin anything, but some of the stuff that gets pulled out in this movie to tie it in with the past, add in Dame Judi Dench as M and the powerful relationship she's cultivated with Craig's Bond over the previous movies and this one, and it's all so far beyond amazing that I have every desire to rush back to the theatre, hand them my money and watch it again and again.
The pacing is perfect, the twists are just the right amount of "I saw that coming" and "OMG I never saw that coming" and Javier Bardem as the villain Silva is bloody awesome!
The chemistry between Silva and Bond and M on screen is simply electric. It blew me away.
So, as you can imagine, it's made #1 on The List, just edging out The Avengers. With only The Hobbit or Django Unchained left having the potential to unseat it this year. I don't know that that's going to happen.
Oh right, writing, about that. I busted out a nice run on words today (~2,600), after slumping the past few days between clipping the puppy's nails too close and having a veritable fount of blood in my kitchen (no really, who needs corn syrup and red food colouring for a horror movie? Just cut one of my puppy's toenails too close!) and a nice head cold (still have it, yay!).
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