However more interesting films are currently to be seen on the big screen (“Cloud Atlas”, “Le Magasin Des Suicides”) we set out to see the latest 007 spectacle. It surely is a spectacle. The full speed opening fight is pretty annoying and the first half of the film makes one of those hip action films of today. What Mendes did manage well is that through all this up-to-date action, he manages to weave that Bond feeling a bit. This gets much better in the second half which is for a large part a real Bond. The story is somewhat atypical with both prequel and sequel elements. With an old drunkard as Bond, the sequel elements prevail. The bad guy does not have plans to blow up the world this time, but this is made into another element to give depth to the whole Bond story. We learn about James’ youth, his relation at work, etc. and Silva’s plan also fits into Mendes’ theme in this regard. There is another nice twist to this film. People who watch the better kind of film, will know Sam Mendes for his “American Beauty”. However he did not plan to make an “Arty-Farty” film the arthouse audience will recognise several actors from “Skyfall” from smaller productions, so Mendes somehow managed to mix the old feeling of Bond with arthouse and action as the audience wants in 2012. “Skyfall”, to me, is not much better (nor worse) than most Bond films, but it will please people who come for the action and people who come for a good film, so I guess this explains why it is already the most succesfull Bond film.
