Movies!

Mr. Etherknitter does not like going to movies.  I do not like that he does not like to go to movies, but I have learned to live with it.  

We saw Skyfall last week.  I love James Bond.  I have been thoroughly uncritical in the past, plunking down my money in front of anything labeled 007 at the cinemas.  Spoilers ahead!  You can skip down to the picture which will mark the end of the spoilers.

Liked:
- Adele wrote and sang the theme song.  Beautiful!
- Daniel Craig.  He plays the best bond since Sean Connery.  I'm sure there is little debate on that.
- The new Q was very funny.  Keeping the franchise fresh is a worthy goal.  While I recognize that I am the only person in the universe, I can see why the producers would want to salt the screenplay with stuff to attract younger viewers.
- Lots of action!  Great scenery in Scotland.  Chases!  Crazy bad guys!
- The script showed a more human Bond, with conflict, pain, and overt emotional baggage.  That might even elevate him a touch above Sean Connery.  But not quite.   Connery was the Bond of his era.  Craig plays in a different time, a different sensibility.  

Hated:
- Killing off M.  Why?  WHY??  I cannot find a convincing explanation on the interwebs.
- Javier Bardem was a really convincing bad guy at first.  Then they had to make him crazy enough to be his own parody.  Bleah.  
- They blew up the Aston-Martin.  I am so so sad. 

Really?  The movie review is only an excuse to send you to more YouTube links!  You can watch the James Bond theme song, circa 1962, played on 45rpm vinyl by the original John Barry Seven.  

Or you can watch the BEST documentary on the music of 007 through the past 50 years, including clips from the films, interviews with Shirley Bassey, John Barry and others.  It is well worth the 21 minutes.  It is here on YouTube (since the ads make embedding hard to watch).

Then we saw Lincoln over the weekend.  The theatre was PACKED.  I was very impressed.  There was no sex in it, everyone knew the ending ahead of time, and it encompassed the dryness of history before all of us were born.  People came anyway.  At the end, I turned to Mr. E, and told him he had just watched the Oscar winning Best Actor performance for 2012.  Go.

The picture shows a fun, floofy FO.  KissKiss is the only funky scarf yarn that seduced my needles this year.  Fast knitting, big impact, and I made one for me, too.

 

Comments

[Ruth]

I really, really want to see Lincoln, but B doesn't like to go to movies, either. Eldest went to Silver Linings Playbook while he was home and said it was wonderful.

[margene]

We go to movies once or twice a year. Skyfall was our T-day treat. Maybe Judy Dench's eyesight problems have lead for her need to retire from the movies. I was totally pissed over the cars demise. Maybe Q can restore it for the next movie. The new Q was also in the British TV show "The Hour". It's very, very good and we highly recommend it (only one season so far). Lincoln is high on our "go to" list. Maybe Christmas day.

[Caroline M]

The boys went to see Skyfall (HD IMAX - my husband doesn't go to the flicks often and maybe it's just as well) but due to a misunderstanding of the highest order I didn't go with them. I caught myself sulking later.

Dame J now has a script reader, it can't be easy learning lines like that when you've spent all your working life reading them.

[christy]

oh, skyfall. sigh. I read an article the other day about the effects company and how they 3d-printed a scale model aston to blow up. I'll see if I can dig that out of my google chats somewhere. I think it was from the adafruit blog.

That was a very sad part of the movie.

I almost had a laughing fit because we had watched Craig Ferguson's standup on netflix earlier that week, and he was saying how in Scotland, "damp" was a color (ie, "These pants are lovely, do they come in damp?"). All the wide shots of Scotland made me agree with him.

[christy]

https://www.adafruit.com/blog/2012/11/15/voxeljet-builds-aston-martin-models-for-james-bond-film-skyfall-3dthursday/

I thought it was kind of cool, and made it a little less sad that that blew up the aston.

[Carole]

That's exactly what I said to Dale when we saw Lincoln last weekend. What an amazing film and totally worthy of Oscars. Not just best picture but best actor for DDL, best supporting actor for Tommy Lee Jones and certainly at the least a best supporting actress nomination for Sally Field.

[Martha]

I love James Bond too, even the cheesy, misogynistic ones from the 60s & 70s. About the only one I just can't stand is A View To A Kill, because Tanya Roberts was awful-granted, she wasn't given much to work with-and Moore was way past his prime. Haven't seen the Daniel Craig Bonds yet but have heard great things about them!

[--Deb]

I can't imagine Daniel Day Lewis NOT getting the Oscar for that. He was AMAZING. Mom and I saw it the day after Thanksgiving--we went to an 11:15 a.m. showing and it was packed. Totally wonderful.

...And now I'm rereading "A Team of Rivals" because Abraham Lincoln is just that amazing.

[claudia]

I'm with Mr. Etherknitter....not a movie-going type. We have other attributes though!

[Melissa G]

You go! We saw "Lincoln" as well. I was impressed by the movie theater audience. Have not seen "Skyfall" (yet). Agree re: Daniel Craig. Currently working our way through "Connections" (old PBS series, James Burke).

[Hillary]

My husband went to Skyfall with my oldest daughter and they loved it. Totally their thing.

I like movies but they have to be worthy of the time and effort required to go. We are having a little dilemma because there are currently several that I'd like to see (or that my girls want to see with me) and it's not as simple anymore. We need to coordinate baby-watching. I'd like to see Lincoln and Hitchcock. The girls are hot to see Les Miserables.