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Showing posts with label robert shaw. Show all posts
Showing posts with label robert shaw. Show all posts
Sunday, December 28, 2008
From Russia With Love is one of the Bond movies that I’ve never seen. It’s an early Bond film from before the gadgets, explosions and Bond girls got in the way of Bond. It’s a Bond film that really shows you why exactly Bond is the spy he was built up to be in fiction, why Connery is considered the best Bond to this day, and contrasts sharply with the Bond films of the past two decades and is a sharp reminder of why exactly is was necessary to scale Bond back to a movie more about the spy than the spies trappings – in essence why it was necessary for Craig et all to take Bond back to what everyone is calling a rip off of Bourne. Let me tell you this – the new Bond films are not imitating Bourne, they are emulating their predecessors.
Unlike the later Bond films From Russia With Love is a genuine spy movie, very convoluted in detail yet pretty perfectly worked out. Unlike a lot of other Bond movies what makes From Russia With Love unique is the self-awareness it possesses so early in the series – the villains want Bond out of the way permanently and they try to accomplish this by seeking a femme fatale on Bond knowing that he will be unable to resist a tempting and willing woman. What follows is a complicated plot that has Bond questioning everyone that surrounds him, falling for a woman that he knows he can’t trust, and trying harder than anything to foray through the foreign spy game of Turkey & Russia to win the game for England.
An early bond film cannot be discussed without discussing Sean Connery. While Connery is audibly Scottish, the bravado and charm he exudes as Bond makes it obvious that he is Bond body and soul. From the dashing smile to his ability to wrestle with a foe you never doubt Bond is anything but lethal, an opponent who is always several steps ahead of his enemy but waiting for them to make a move that will expose their entire charade and leave him the victor.
While I wholeheartedly feel that I need to see this movie again to really follow and appreciate it, I cannot recommend From Russia With Love enough to any Bond fan that hasn’t seen it or to anyone who wonders why the Bond franchise has been around for over twenty films.
Director: Terence Young
Writer: Richard Maibaum
James Bond: Sean Connery
M: Bernard Lee
Moneypenny: Lois Maxwell
Red Grant: Robert Shaw
Tatiana Romanova: Daniela Bianchi
Rosa Klebb: Lotte Lenya
Donald "Red" Grant: Is any of the opposition around?
James Bond: Not in any condition to be worried about.
Unlike the later Bond films From Russia With Love is a genuine spy movie, very convoluted in detail yet pretty perfectly worked out. Unlike a lot of other Bond movies what makes From Russia With Love unique is the self-awareness it possesses so early in the series – the villains want Bond out of the way permanently and they try to accomplish this by seeking a femme fatale on Bond knowing that he will be unable to resist a tempting and willing woman. What follows is a complicated plot that has Bond questioning everyone that surrounds him, falling for a woman that he knows he can’t trust, and trying harder than anything to foray through the foreign spy game of Turkey & Russia to win the game for England.
An early bond film cannot be discussed without discussing Sean Connery. While Connery is audibly Scottish, the bravado and charm he exudes as Bond makes it obvious that he is Bond body and soul. From the dashing smile to his ability to wrestle with a foe you never doubt Bond is anything but lethal, an opponent who is always several steps ahead of his enemy but waiting for them to make a move that will expose their entire charade and leave him the victor.
While I wholeheartedly feel that I need to see this movie again to really follow and appreciate it, I cannot recommend From Russia With Love enough to any Bond fan that hasn’t seen it or to anyone who wonders why the Bond franchise has been around for over twenty films.
Director: Terence Young
Writer: Richard Maibaum
James Bond: Sean Connery
M: Bernard Lee
Moneypenny: Lois Maxwell
Red Grant: Robert Shaw
Tatiana Romanova: Daniela Bianchi
Rosa Klebb: Lotte Lenya
Donald "Red" Grant: Is any of the opposition around?
James Bond: Not in any condition to be worried about.
Monday, June 30, 2008
I have an irrational fear of large bodies of water & sharks; for this reason (among others) Jaws terrified me as a child. In fact I’ve completely blocked the first time I saw the film out of my memory. The second time I watched the film I was a teen and my brothers sat on either side of me, holding me down so I had to watch. Even then, I disliked the film because it scared me. I don’t remember quite when it happened, but somewhere between that viewing and film school I grew to appreciate Jaws as a well made movie, this led to me being able to view the film more and eventually buy it on DVD.
Now I genuinely think that Jaws is a filmmaking masterpiece; a film that shows what a genius like Spielberg can do, and how to make a truly terrifying picture. The film still works on my irrational fears, but I know that this is not why the film scares me, it scares me because it is masterfully crafted and executed.
The story of Jaws is simple. Chief Brody has just moved with his family to small Amity Island in search of a more peaceful existence than New York where he felt that he could never make a difference as part of the police force; Amity is a small town that relies on its summer tourist season, and the majority of the residents need profitable summers to exist the rest of the year. All is good on the island until right before the peak of the summer season a girl is killed in a shark attack, and rather than admit that the people of the island are in danger the town mayor refuses to let Brody close the beaches and hunt the shark which of course leads to more deaths before the town goes insane with greed trying to hunt the shark for money and finally Brody is allowed to do what he was attempting all along and hunt the shark without interference.
When Jaws was released in 1975 critic Roger Ebert wrote that Jaws is “a sensationally effective action picture, a scary thriller that works all the better because it’s populated with characters that have been developed into human beings”; this is probably the best description of why Jaws works that I have ever read, and it truly gets to the core of the remarkable talent of the filmmaker behind the movie.
No one can deny that the actors are amazing; there is no bad performance in the film no matter how large or how small. An entire essay could be written on the scene in the belly of the Orca where Hooper, Quint & Brody discuss their scars. However, I will save that topic for another viewing and instead move on to what no one expected from Jaws - Steven Spielberg.
Until Jaws Spielberg was only known for directing tv episodes, Duel, and Sugarland Express. People in the industry thought he was competent, but no one saw him as a directing force to be reckoned with. Spielberg did what so many filmmakers would not have the patience for; he made a film on the water, not in a tank like Cameron did with Titanic, but in the water at Martha’s Vineyard. The entire cast and crew were on separate boats for a majority of the film trying to tame mother nature, a mechanical shark and lighting conditions to get a good shot. Then the opening sequence of Jaws came on screen and by the end of the film people knew the name of Steven Spielberg.
Jaws is a classic. It’s over 30 years old now and I would not replace the rubberized mechanical shark with CGI any day.
Director: Steven Spielberg
Writers: Peter Benchley & Carl Gottlieb
Chief Bordy: Roy Scheider
Matt Hooper: Richard Dreyfuss
Quint: Robert Shaw
Brody: I'm tellin' ya, the crime rate in New York'll kill you. There's so many problems, you never feel like you're accomplishing anything. Violence, rip-offs, muggings... kids can't leave the house - you gotta walk them to school. But in Amity one man can make a difference. In twenty-five years, there's never been a shooting or a murder in this town.
Now I genuinely think that Jaws is a filmmaking masterpiece; a film that shows what a genius like Spielberg can do, and how to make a truly terrifying picture. The film still works on my irrational fears, but I know that this is not why the film scares me, it scares me because it is masterfully crafted and executed.
The story of Jaws is simple. Chief Brody has just moved with his family to small Amity Island in search of a more peaceful existence than New York where he felt that he could never make a difference as part of the police force; Amity is a small town that relies on its summer tourist season, and the majority of the residents need profitable summers to exist the rest of the year. All is good on the island until right before the peak of the summer season a girl is killed in a shark attack, and rather than admit that the people of the island are in danger the town mayor refuses to let Brody close the beaches and hunt the shark which of course leads to more deaths before the town goes insane with greed trying to hunt the shark for money and finally Brody is allowed to do what he was attempting all along and hunt the shark without interference.
When Jaws was released in 1975 critic Roger Ebert wrote that Jaws is “a sensationally effective action picture, a scary thriller that works all the better because it’s populated with characters that have been developed into human beings”; this is probably the best description of why Jaws works that I have ever read, and it truly gets to the core of the remarkable talent of the filmmaker behind the movie.
No one can deny that the actors are amazing; there is no bad performance in the film no matter how large or how small. An entire essay could be written on the scene in the belly of the Orca where Hooper, Quint & Brody discuss their scars. However, I will save that topic for another viewing and instead move on to what no one expected from Jaws - Steven Spielberg.
Until Jaws Spielberg was only known for directing tv episodes, Duel, and Sugarland Express. People in the industry thought he was competent, but no one saw him as a directing force to be reckoned with. Spielberg did what so many filmmakers would not have the patience for; he made a film on the water, not in a tank like Cameron did with Titanic, but in the water at Martha’s Vineyard. The entire cast and crew were on separate boats for a majority of the film trying to tame mother nature, a mechanical shark and lighting conditions to get a good shot. Then the opening sequence of Jaws came on screen and by the end of the film people knew the name of Steven Spielberg.
Jaws is a classic. It’s over 30 years old now and I would not replace the rubberized mechanical shark with CGI any day.
Director: Steven Spielberg
Writers: Peter Benchley & Carl Gottlieb
Chief Bordy: Roy Scheider
Matt Hooper: Richard Dreyfuss
Quint: Robert Shaw
Brody: I'm tellin' ya, the crime rate in New York'll kill you. There's so many problems, you never feel like you're accomplishing anything. Violence, rip-offs, muggings... kids can't leave the house - you gotta walk them to school. But in Amity one man can make a difference. In twenty-five years, there's never been a shooting or a murder in this town.
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