Director: Michael Apted
Cast: Pierce Brosnan, Sophie Marceau, Robert Carlyle, Denise Richards
Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure. It was twenty-five years ago, and I can’t remember the precise details about that Christmas season, but I do have the distinct memory of being stuck at the mall for a number of hours, and managed to pull away from whatever was going on to go catch a screening.
Did I Like It: As with most of the Pierce Brosnan Bond films, twenty-five years ago I remember thinking that the post-gun barrel pre-title sequence was a well-crafted little thriller. The succeeding film meanders through perfunctory scenes, punctuated by an occasional ambition to give some depth to Bond that was never going to be fully realized until they were able to re-boot things entirely with Casino Royale (2006).
I’m pretty much feeling that same way now. Renard (Carlyle) is an interesting villain, but oddly enough may have worked better in a novel than it does in film. Having him already essentially dead might have fueled several good chapters trying to get into the head of someone who has already died but is losing sensation after sensation as he slowly loses consciousness. In a film, it removes any sort of pretense to tension, and makes him essentially invulnerable for those moments where he has to exchange blows with Brosnan.
Dame Judi Dench clearly wielded her power well going into this film. Having a number of juicy scenes to play in Goldeneye (1995), she spent most of Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) doing control-room schtick that wouldn’t have challenged Bernard Lee or Robert Brown in earlier films. Here, she has a very real role in the story and even plays into the action as it unfolds. Yet another example of the series’ ambitions that were waiting for Craig.
On the “Bond Girl”* front, it is a mixed bag. Sophie Marceau plays an interesting character, archly named in the best Bond tradition. She is full of as close to surprises as this era of the franchise is likely to get, and Marceau clearly understand the best parts of the assignment at hand. Then there’s Denise Richards. Whoo, boy. It’s not so much that she’s bad casting for a nuclear scientist (she is, but at least she has a good sense of humor about it, as evidence by her later appearances on 30 Rock), but it is that her performance is so perfunctory that she makes Britt Eklund and Tanya Roberts look like possible heirs to… Well, Dame Judi Dench, now that I think about it.
*It almost feels like that term should be trademarked, no?