New Trailer for JOHNNY ENGLISH STRIKES AGAIN

Man, I am looking forward to this one so much! Universal has dropped another trailer for the upcoming Rowan Atkinson threequel Johnny English Strikes Again (a title that aptly references the slapstick spy parody series' debt to Blake Edwards Pink Panther movies). As in prior English movies (albeit disparate ones), a former Bond Girl (Quantum of Solace's Olga Kurylenko) and former Bond car (The Living Daylights' Aston Martin V8 Vantage) co-star.

Trailer: JOHNNY ENGLISH STRIKES AGAIN

Universal has released the first trailer for the third Johnny English movie starring Rowan Atkinson, Johnny English Strikes Again. I think it's hysterical. For me, the English movies have always been superior to the Austin Powers (though the Jean Dujardin OSS 117 movies take the cake as far as spy parodies go), and I'm glad they keep coming. There are some Pink Panther-level gags in this trailer that crack me up. (And, of course, that no doubt intentionally resonant title.) I'm also very happy to see Ben Miller's Bough (English's straight man assistant, a highlight of the first film) back in a larger role.. though also sorry to see no sign of Daniel Kaluuya, the sidekick from the second film. (Obviously he's gone on to bigger things.) As usual, there's a stellar supporting cast including Olga Kurylenko (Quantum of Solace), Emma Thompson (The Love Punch), Jake Lacy (Miss Sloane), and a beautiful red Aston Martin V8 Vantage.

Johnny English Strikes Again opens September 20, 2018.

First Footage of Pierce Brosnan in November Man

The Solution Entertainment Group, who's handling international sales on the film, has offered us our first look at Pierce Brosnan's return to spying in the eagerly awaited November Man, based on the Bill Granger novel There Are No Spies. Bear in mind that this is a sizzle reel and not a trailer or a teaser, so it highlights action rather than story. Despite the terrible choice of music (I recommend watching on mute; there's no dialogue so you won't miss anything), the action looks pretty great. I can't wait to see a real trailer! That should be pretty soon, because, as previously reported, Relativity releases November Man in the United States on August 27. Olga Kurylenko, Luke Bracey and Will Patton costar. And speaking of music, Marco Beltrami provides the real score, and I look forward to hearing him do spy music!

Thanks to Jack Christian for the alert and MI6-HQ for the video!

Tradecraft: Pierce Brosnan's November Man Due in Theaters This August!

Here's some very exciting news! The Pierce Brosnan spy thriller November Man, recently acquired for U.S. distribution by Relativity Media, at long last has a release date. According to Variety, it will hit American theaters on August 27. With U.S./Russian tensions ratcheting up lately, it's a timely release for an espionage story involving Russian politics. Brosnan plays Bill Granger's ex-CIA operative Devereaux in an adaptation of Granger's novel There Are No Spies. In the movie, the trade reports, Devereaux is brought out of retirement to track down his former pupil (Luke Bracey) in a complex spy plot involving the Russian president-elect and high-level CIA officers. Former Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko co-stars, and Roger Donaldson (No Way Out, The Bank Job) directs. November Man has taken a very long road to the screen. Brosnan spent years trying to get it off the ground, and it looked finally set to start shooting back in 2012, but didn't end up going before cameras until 2013. Even then fans still wondered when they'd get to see it, since it was produced independently and didn't have a distributor lined up. But last month it got that distributor, and now it has a release date! And come August, we'll be seeing a film with the potential to launch a second Brosnan spy franchise.

Tradecraft: Aronofsky Abandons Red Sparrow

According to The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision (via Dark Horizons), Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan) has opted not to direct the spy movie he'd been flirting with, Red Sparrow, based on the novel by Jason Matthews. This is too bad. Not only am I a big fan of the director who was looking forward to seeing what an Aronofsky spy movie would look like, but I'm also a fan of the book, and eager to see it become a movie. Luckily, the trade blog adds that "Fox is still high on the project, which it picked up in a seven-figure deal in April 2013 for Steve Zaillian and Garrett Basch of Film Rites and Peter Chernin of Chernin to produce." So hopefully the project will continue to move forward even without Aronofsky. There's even a chance, according to Heat Vision, that the studio could re-approach Aronofsky in the future once it has a viable script. For now, they'll focus on hiring a screenwriter. (Hand goes up.)

I enthusiastically recommend the novel Red Sparrow. Matthews spent a whole career in the CIA before turning his hand to fiction, and his book benefits from all of his experience, dripping with apparent verisimilitude. The characters are rich, and the locations exactly what I want from a good spy yarn, jumping the globe from Moscow to Helsinki to Washington to New London to Rome and beyond. There are moles and double agents and betrayals and tradecraft aplenty. There is also, in the proud tradition of Ian Fleming, lots of good food consumed, and in a neat gimmick unlikely to be included in the film, Matthews provides a recipe at the end of each chapter for one of the dishes discussed. It's a two-hander between Russian SVR agent Dominika Egorova and CIA golden boy Nate Nash (yes, it sounds like a name concocted by Stan Lee), but Dominika is the juiciest part. With Aronofsky on board, I previously speculated that he might reteam with his Black Swan star Natalie Portman (who would definitely be good in the role), but perhaps without him the door will be left open for former Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko. I actually pictured Kurylenko in the role as I read the book. I just hope the project continues to move forward.

Tradecraft: Darren Aronofsky Mulls Spy Movie Red Sparrow

Let me go on the record as saying I would love to see a Darren Aronofsky spy movie! There's a chance that could happen. According to Deadline, the Black Swan and Requiem For a Dream director is in talks to direct Red Sparrow for Fox. The studio purchased the new novel by former CIA agent Jason Matthews after winning a bidding war in April, prior to its publication. Red Sparrow tells the story of Dominika Egorova, a "sparrow," or trained seductress, working for Russian intelligence in present-day, Putin-controlled Moscow. She's assigned to ensnare CIA wunderkind Nathaniel Nash, the man running America's top mole inside Putin's government. Allegiances shift, moles are uncovered on both sides, and, I'm guessing here, a deadly cat and mouse game probably ensues. That's usually how these things go, and you know I wouldn't have it any other way! I've actually got this book in my stack, and hope to read it soon. When the news broke about its sale to Fox, I immediately thought it sounded like a great vehicle for Olga Kurylenko. I'd love to see that, though should Aronofsky come aboard I suppose it's a definite possibility he might want to re-team with his Oscar-winning Black Swan star, Natalie Portman.

Movie Review: Erased aka The Expatriate (2012)

The latest neo-Eurospy movie to hit American screens barely hit them at all; Erased (which came out in other territories last year as The Expatriate) was unceremoniously dumped in a handful of theaters with zero advertising by The Weinstein Company. And it’s a bit of a shame, too, because it’s a decent flick that might have done some decent business if given half a chance. When it comes to the neo-Eurospy subgenre, it’s no Taken, but it’s definitely better than Taken 2. It’s also a far sight better than star Aaron Eckhart’s last action movie, Olympus Has Fallen, and that managed to do impressive business. Of course, Eckhart shared the bill there with Gerard Butler. But despite being most famous for supporting turns (like The Dark Knight), he’s got the chops to carry a film and does well in a spy role here.

Eckhart plays Ben Logan, a former CIA agent who specialized in, well, killing people. He was drummed out of the Agency—and America—when terms like “kill squads” went out of favor, apparently—though I’m not completely sure that particular term was ever in favor. Isn’t that why euphemisms like “wetworks” and “black ops” were invented? Unable to return home, the titular (in Europe, anyway) expatriate now works for a private security firm in Antwerp, Belgium. He’s also trying to form a relationship with his estranged teenage daughter, Amy (Liana Liberato), who resents having to leave her school in Connecticut to come live with a dad she barely knows after losing her mom—Ben’s ex-wife—to cancer. The dialogue between father and daughter may be a little bit on the cheesy side (though nowhere near as egregious as in the first Taken), but Eckhart and Liberato have excellent chemistry and they sell the strained relationship easily.

Ben works late one night after discovering a patent discrepancy in one of his company’s security devices, and then, ignoring the friendly security guard’s advice to go home and hit the hay, makes a predictably late entrance to Amy’s school presentation. In an attempt to mollify his understandably angry (and hungry) daughter, he offers her some food, not realizing that she has a peanut allergy. They end up spending the night in the hospital, and she has no choice but to accompany him on a stop at his office the next morning. But the office is gone. All the furniture and equipment have been cleared out, and there’s no sign of any of the people. When Ben calls the corporate headquarters in Brussels, he’s informed that the company has no Antwerp office.

He runs into a coworker, but rather than collaborating to solve this mystery, his former colleague carjacks Ben and Amy at gunpoint. Ben’s spy instincts kick in, and he ends up in close-quarters combat with the colleague-turned-assassin as the car careens dangerously along the highway. Amy looks on in terror as the fight results in a spectacular wreck, the death of the assassin who might have been able to give them some answers, and ultimately father and daughter on the run from the local law enforcement.

Ben has no choice but to bring Amy along on his quest to find answers, and he teaches her some handy Jason Bourne-style tradecraft along the way. (Like how to blend in in a crowd.) That relationship is really the best part of Erased. When I first reported the logline way back in 2010, I somewhat snarkily remarked that it sounded like a cross between the Liam Neeson movies Taken and Unknown. But the daughter storyline in Erased is very different from that in Taken. Whereas in Taken father and daughter are separated and Neeson’s Bryan Mills demonstrates he’ll do anything to find his daughter, in Erased they are together. And that’s a twist I haven’t seen before in this sort of spy movie: an agent on the run with his daughter, bonding and bickering with her as he dispatches cadres of enemies.

The Ludlumesque setup isn’t as Unknown as it sounds, either. In fact, a disturbing trip to the morgue confirms to Ben that it’s much more of a Three Days of the Condor situation; the rest of his co-workers are all dead, as he would have been had he gone home that night (as the security guard suggested) instead of to the hospital. Ben’s investigation into this scenario takes him and Amy from Antwerp to Brussels, affording the audience some very nice European travelogue shots, and into contact with spy veterans Olga Kurylenko (Quantum of Solace, Hitman) and Garrick Hagpn (The Adventurer, The Spy Who Loved Me). Kurylenko plays Ben’s former CIA controller, Anna Brandt, though her present loyalties are decidedly in question. I’ve been a fan of hers since before she was a Bond Girl, and I’m always happy to see her in a spy movie. But honestly her role here is somewhat limited; I would have liked to see more of her. Still, she’s good in the scenes she has, and her presence automatically elevates any spy movie! Hagon plays the enigmatic and somewhat sinister CEO of the company Ben believed himself to be working for. There’s also the friendly security guard from his old job to contend with, who proves himself to in fact not be very friendly, but a psychotic and seemingly unstoppable killer. The violent fight between Ben and him in a hospital is the film’s action highlight, easily rivaling the similar sequence in The Bourne Legacy. Late in the film, we’re also introduced to an even more unstoppable French “cleaner” played by Jean Reno lookalike Eric Godon. The role would have had more impact had the producers been able to secure Reno himself.

Erased has all the right ingredients: good actors, good action, good locations, and an intriguing premise. But somehow they don’t gel quite right. The pacing is off, and I can’t quite put my finger on why. The plot moves along from one turning point to another at more or less the right intervals, and the action scenes come in good succession. Nevertheless, it still manages to feel much longer than its actual 100-minute runtime. Overall, though, the good elements outweigh the bad. I can put up with slow pacing in exchange for engaging performances from likable stars and a good neo-Eurospy plot. Erased deserved a wider theatrical release with some real advertising behind it. It’s a more rewarding viewing experience than the last neo-Eurospy release, Taken 2, and that one managed to rack up a whopping $376 million worldwide! So this one deserved a shot. Well, hopefully viewers will discover it on demand (where it can currently be seen), or on DVD and Blu-ray come July. At least then it can justifiably put Liberato on the map; her performance here promises a career worth watching. And Eckhart’s shows he has what it takes to be an action star; let’s hope he gets another chance in a bigger movie.

Tradecraft: Olga Kurylenko Signs Up For Even More Spying

The girl can't stop spying! Hot on the heels of joining Pierce Brosnan in The November Man, former Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko has attached herself to another spy movie as well. And this one also features a male star with James Bond connections. Screen Daily reports (via Dark Horizons) that Kurylenko will star in the Cold War spy thriller Despite The Falling Snow alongside German TV star Maria Furtwangler and the great Charles Dance, who has played both a Bond baddie (in For Your Eyes Only), and 007 creator Ian Fleming (in Goldeneye: The Secret Life of Ian Fleming). According to the trade, "Kurylenko is set to play an enigmatic female spy who falls in love with an idealistic politician. The action will move between 1950s and present day Moscow and London." As she did on her first feature, The World Unseen, Shamim Sarif will adapt her own novel and direct. Morten Søborg, who recently shot Brosnan in the the beautifully filmed Love is All You Need (a much better movie than its generic title would have you believe, by the way) will serve as Director of Photography. Shooting is expected to begin mid-October. Olga Kurylenko can currently be seen spying in Erased opposite Aaron Eckhart.

Olga Kurylenko Signs on for Pierce Brosnan Spy Movie November Man (Updated)

The November Man (or possibly just "November Man" with no "The," depending on what source you trust), Pierce Brosnan's return to the world of spying (and potential second spy franchise in a perfect world!) is one of the projects on the horizon that I'm most excited about. But because it's being financed independently, I live in fear that it will fall through, and the longer we go without hearing any substantial news on the project, the more I start to fear. Luckily, my fears are pretty much allayed today! Because the project has an actual start date... and it's next week! According to Deadline, "shooting starts May 20 on the story of an ex-CIA operative who’s pitted against his former pupil in a race to find a woman who holds the key to an international conspiracy." Furthermore, the trade blog confirms what Contact Music first reported a few weeks ago: that former Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko is teaming up with the former Bond star. That's pretty cool! The November Man has long been a passion project for Brosnan (he's been trying to make it since at least 2005), so the solid start date must have made a great birthday present for the actor, who turned 60 this week.

The November Man, better known as Devereaux, is the hero of 13 books by Bill Granger. Strangely enough, this movie is not based on Granger’s 1979 novel of that title (the first in the Deveraux series), but on his 1986 entry (the seventh in the series), There Are No Spies. Roger Donaldson (no stranger to spies, having previously helmed The Bank Job and The Recruit) directs, and screenwriters Michael Finch (Predators) and Karl Gajdusek (Last Resort) penned the adaptation. Donaldson and Brosnan previously collaborated on Dante's Peak. I've never read any of Granger's books (which are sadly out of print), and I definitely need to rectify that before this movie comes out!

Brosnan, for his part, seems quite keen to return to the genre for which he's most famous. "I shall jump back into that arena," he excitedly told WENN (via Contact Music) while doing publicity for his latest movie, Love is All You Need. "I think there's ... room on the stage for another spy! Daniel [Craig] can't have it all to himself. My co-star is a lovely actress called Olga Kurylenko, who seems to be going through leading men like hot dinners. She started with Daniel Craig and she's gonna end up with Brosnan! She's a gorgeous actress, beautiful woman. She's in and it's the older spy, younger spy."

Dominic Cooper, who's playing Ian Fleming in the upcoming miniseries Fleming, was previously attached to this film as well, but it's unclear if he's still involved at this point. [UPDATE: It looks like he's out. Variety reports that the role he was set to play has been filled by Luke Bracey, an Australian actor who played Cobra Commander in G.I. Joe: Retaliation.) Brosnan will next be seen spying in The Coup, opposite Owen Wilson.

Neo-Eurospy Trailer: Erased

Wow! In the new Aaorn Eckhart neo-Eurospy movie Erased, Eckhart reenacts not one but two recent Liam Neeson entries in that genre: Taken (review here) and Unknown (review here). Regular readers will no doubt register no surprise when I share that not only am I okay with that... I'm excited for it! The Eurospy genre at large, after all, is built around the basic tenet that imitation is the sincerest form of... well, commerce, I guess. While that title may sound unfamiliar, this is actually a film we've been tracking for a long time... quite a long time, as a matter of fact. Eckhart's involvement was first announced in 2010 when the movie was called The Expatriate, and in late 2011 we learned that Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko (herself no stranger to the neo-Eurospy movement) would co-star. Oh yes: did I fail to mention that? Yet another reason to be excited for this movie! Olga Kurylenko, car chases, European streets, and heaping dollops of Taken and Unknown. Does all that equal a winning formula? Check out the trailer and judge for yourself. Erased opens in theaters on May 10 after premiering on demand a whole month earlier, on April 5. I'll be seeing it in a theater.

Olga Kurylenko Billed as "Bond Girl" in New Trailer

This is interesting. It has to have happened before in the Sixties, I would imagine, but I can't recall any recent instances where a former Bond Girl was actually billed as such in a trailer for another movie! But the tongue-in-cheek trailer for Martin McDonagh's (In Bruges) new film Seven Psychopaths does just that, touting Quantum of Solace's Olga Kurylenko as a Bond Girl! Take a look:



I don't know about you, but I'm prepared to watch the beautiful Ms. Kurylenko (who made her spy debut in Hitman) in just about anything! But especially something from the talented director of In Bruges.

Tradecraft: Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko Signs On For Another Spy Mission

Olga Kurylenko, arguably the best thing about Quantum of Solace (and definitely the best thing about Hitman!), has signed on for another spy movie. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the former Bond Girl will play an active CIA agent and former lover of Aaron Eckhart's former operative (that's a lot of formers) in The Expatriate.  As previously reported, Eckhart will play a retired spy who hopes to make a fresh start with his estranged 15-year old daughter in Belgium, where he takes a job as a security expert for a multinational corporation. One day he arrives at work to find that the corporation no longer exists, his coworkers are gone, and his assistant is really an assassin out to kill him and his daughter. Father and daughter go on the run together and learn to trust each other as his shadowy past comes to haunt them (as it always does for ex-spies in this sort of movie). The trade also reports that Liana Liberato (Sons of Anarchy) has come aboard to play the daughter. The Expatriate is currently filming in Montreal. I was already excited to see Eckhart venture into neo-Eurospy territory, but with Kurylenko involved, now I'm really excited to see this movie!

Tradecraft For February 6, 2008

Michael Weston Gets A Raise

In this week's episode of Burn Notice, Michael finally needed to break down and take a real job for cash. Granted, he did it with false papers and didn't really end up fulfilling his contractual obligations, but still... he did actually get paid. In a case of life imitating art, The Hollywood Reporter reports today that Michael Weston actor Jeffrey Donovan has earned himself a well-deserved raise, more than doubling his Burn Notice salary! "Under the new agreement," the trade reveals, "Donovan will be paid $125,000-$150,000 an episode, a big bump from the $55,000 he used to make." More importantly for fans, the new deal "also adds one year to his original seven-year contract for the show."

Quantum Exposure Pays Off For Kurylenko

Still hot from co-starring in the biggest 007 blockbuster of all-time, beautiful Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko has lined up her next two jobs on the momentum of her performance as Camille. First, she'll journey to an Age Undreamed Of for director Neil Marshall's sword-and-sandal epic Centurion. "The movie," says The Hollywood Reporter, is "a thriller set during the Roman invasion of Britain in A.D. 117, tells the story of Quintus Dias, sole survivor of a Pictish raid on a Roman frontier fort, who marches north with General Virilus' legendary Ninth Legion, under orders to wipe the Picts from the face of the Earth and destroy their leader, Gorlacon." Then, according to Variety, she'll head from the ancient past to the near future for Andrew Niccol's sci-fi picture The Cross, also starring Orlando Bloom and Vincent Cassel. "Bloom plays a man seeking to cross a mysterious border, something no one else has achieved; Cassel limns the guard who will go to any lengths to foil him. Kurylenko takes the femme lead."

Before either of those, however, she'll be seen as a prostitute-turned-hitwoman in the La Femme Nikita-ish action thriller Kirot. Variety says: "The project sees Kurylenko's character coerced into becoming a hit woman for a shadowy organization after being imprisoned for working as a prostitute. She escapes from her new employers and joins forces with an abused woman she encounters on the run. Together they embark on a campaign of revenge."

Campbell Turns From Spies to Superheroes

Following two spy movies (Casino Royale and Edge of Darkness), Goldeneye director Martin Campbell will next turn his attention to the superhero genre. Variety reports that the director is in talks to helm a bigscreen version of DC's Green Lantern. That's great... but do we really have to wait until Eon decides to break in yet another new Bond for Campbell to return to 007? I'd love to see him re-team with Daniel Craig!

Movie Review: Quantum Of Solace (2008)

The trailers were so awesome. The concept of a direct continuation within the Bond series held so much merit. I really believed that this movie had the potential to be even more incredible than its genuinely illustrious predecessor, Casino Royale (2006). Regrettably, it isn’t.
Quantum of Solace is far from a Die Another Day-level disaster, to be sure, but–sadly–it’s also far from a Casino Royale-level success. And coming on the heels of such a masterpiece, that’s a fairly crushing disappointment.

My heart sank as soon as the gun barrel failed to appear on screen. I had the same sinking feeling at the beginning of Casino Royale, but that movie quickly demonstrated its right to be different, and, indeed, it was a good choice not to begin it with the classic James Bond opening. But at the end of Casino Royale, when Daniel Craig uttered the line "Bond, James Bond" and The James Bond Theme kicked in on the soundtrack, it was clear that Craig’s neophyte 007 had earned his stripes. Therefore, I was expecting some classic elements of the series to fall back into place after the experiment of Casino Royale. Foremost among them, the gun barrel.

There is a gun barrel sequence in Quantum of Solace, but it doesn’t come until the end of the movie. Yes, I understand the implication. Bond has dealt with his own emotions regarding Vesper’s death; he’s ready to move on and become the 007 we know from the other movies. That gun barrel signifies the opening of every adventure to come. But that’s not the purpose of the gun barrel sequence. The gun barrel opening, along with the distinctive theme music that accompanies it, is designed to get the audience’s pulses pounding. To get the adrenalin pumping. To prepare us for the ride to come. It simply doesn’t work at the end of a movie. And, besides, the gimmick of putting it there is too repetitive after Casino Royale. Bond has a decidedly different arc in Quantum of Solace, but closing with the gun barrel makes it feel far to similar to what came before.

Anyway, back to the beginning: director Marc Forster started his movie in a hole for me without the gun barrel. He’d have to dig himself out quickly. Luckily, that should be entirely possible. After all, we’ve got an opening sequence with all the classic Bond elements one could ask for: one sleek Aston Martin and a few fast pursuit cars leaden with machine guns careening along some beautiful Italian countryside. (Tim Lucas points out in his review that one of the locations is even the tunnel from Mario Bava’s spy classic Danger: Diabolik, so there’s another thing going for it!) Furthermore, we’d all read about how the filmmakers wrecked two Aston Martins shooting this sequence, and a stuntman came perilously close to losing his life. Surely, all that hard work would pay off in something great?

Again, it saddens me to no end to report that the answer is no. All the elements are there, yes, but Forster and editors Matt Chesse and Richard Pearson don’t ever let them stay on screen long enough to pay off. We’re thrust into the midst of a chase already in progress, but never situated. I am not averse to shaky, hand-held cameras or ultra-fast cutting in an action film. The Bourne Ultimatum used these techniques masterfully. But director Paul Greengrass had already used two other films to perfect them, starting with the not-entirely-successful Bourne Supremacy. Forster had never done an action movie at all before, and plunged into this most difficult of contemporary styles. As chaotic as the action appeared in The Bourne Ultimatum, it was all expertly orchestrated. There was never a moment where I felt like I didn’t know what was going on. In the opening scene of Quantum of Solace, I never felt situated. I never felt like I knew what was going on.

The spectacular stunts (Alfa Romeos going over cliffs) happen so quickly that it almost doesn’t matter that the stunt team worked so hard on them. They might as well be CGI. A James Bond pre-credits sequence should be about allowing spectacular stunts to unfold before our eyes, causing us to exclaim, "I can’t believe a guy actually did that!" Cases in point: the ski jump from The Spy Who Loved Me, or the bungee jump in GoldenEye. Here, the stunts happen so fast that they didn’t elicit much more than a shrug from me, I’m sorry to say. Maybe they really did that, but who’s to know? Not only are the stunts denied a chance to breathe; so is the scenery. We never get a sustained establishing shot, so we never get to bask in the beauty of the Italian countryside. We never even get a beauty shot of the Aston Martin DBS, so it doesn’t really matter that it even is an Aston Martin DBS. This is James Bond! These things should matter! The exotic locations and the luxury marques are part of the appeal!

I suspect that the sequence was well-written, and I’m positive that a lot of hard work went into creating it. But Forster and his editing team have rendered it incomprehensible, using those potentially fantastic elements to instead create the single worst pre-credits sequence of the entire series.

Things don’t improve with the entirely lackluster title sequence, either, courtesy of MK12. Why was Danny Kleinman not brought back after doing the best work of his career on Casino Royale? I certainly hope he returns for the next Bond. Jack White’s theme song, "Another Way To Die," never really made a strong impression on me one way or the other before seeing it in the context of the film. I didn’t love it, but I certainly didn’t hate it either. A suberb title sequence to go with it could have easily elevated the song to love for me, but the one we get unfortunately does nothing of the sort. I like that the girls are back, but it’s weird that the first one rears up out of the sand to accompany Judi Dench’s name, and their dancing seems pretty uninspired. Additionally, there’s altogether too much of 007 himself in the titles. This worked well in The Spy Who Loved Me and Casino Royale, but the concept has lost its originality in Quantum of Solace.

Immediately following the credits comes yet another incomprehensible action scene, this one a foot chase across the rooftops of Siena against the incredible backdrop of the Palio. Again, it should be a winner. All the elements are there. It’s a great Bondian setting, and how can you mess up a rooftop chase? Sadly, Forster manages. As with the opening, the sequence is cut so poorly it’s often difficult to tell which figure is James Bond. The chase culminates in what was probably a pretty amazing setpiece on paper, with Bond and his opponent dangling as counterweights to each other, each man trying to get his hands on a gun. As it plays, though, the device is never given the single set-up shot it requires for the audience to fully appreciate the situation. Furthermore, there hasn’t been a break in the frenetic action for a plot to manifest itself yet, and I found myself wondering why I was even supposed to care about the outcome. Who was this guy anyway? Forster’s rapid cuts and disassociated camerawork serve to completely relieve the scene of any stakes whatsoever.

So for the first fifteen minutes of Quantum of Solace, I was slumped down low in my seat, fearing the worst. Happily, things get better after that.

While the action direction remains atrocious, the story is finally allowed a chance to kick in, and it’s pretty good. The script, credited to Paul Haggis, Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, appears to be quite solid beneath the movie’s iffy veneer. And performances are top notch across the board. Daniel Craig once again makes a truly compelling 007, Mathieu Amalric hones a creepy intensity (somewhat reminiscent of Klaus Maria Brandauer’s Maximillian Largo in Never Say Never Again) to elevate an otherwise unremarkable villain into a genuine scene-stealer, and Jeffrey Wright and Giancarlo Giannini both give incredibly solid supporting performances as two of my favorite Ian Fleming characters, Felix and Mathis. When she first caught my eye in Hitman, I remarked that Olga Kurylenko didn’t have much to do with her character other than look nice, but she intrigued me enough that I’d like to see her with the chance to do more. Here she gets that chance, and she fully rises to the occasion as one of the more fully rounded female characters of the series. She also continues to look great.

The globehopping locations are amazing (and I like the stylized titles identifying each one), but Forster never allows us one of those great, lingering travelogue shots to fully take them in. The action is fairly wall-to-wall, but I cherished the brief expository moments where the camera calmed down and the editor actually let shots play out for more than a few seconds to focus on the performances. These moments, rather than any of the copious action sequences, become the movie’s standout scenes: a shared drink between Bond and Felix, developing their still-testy friendship, or a rooftop reunion with Mathis and his sunbathing companion. Here, Forster excels.

The centerpiece of Quantum of Solace takes place at an opera house in Austria. There was a lot that I loved about this sequence, including the giant eye motif of the stage, the villains’ ingenious method of meeting secretly and Bond’s interruption thereof, and the way Craig manages to simultaneously look both perfectly comfortable and slightly out of place in a tuxedo. The sequence also proffers the movie’s funniest line (levity is fairly scarce in this Bond entry), courtesy of the enigmatic Casino Royale holdover Mr. White (Jesper Christiensen). As the villains make hurried retreats from the audience, thus identifying themselves to MI6, he remarks, "Tosca’s not for everyone." Neither is Forster’s affinity for cross-cutting, which intrudes a little too much on this whole sequence. Making matters especially confusing is the fact that it’s a modern-day staging of Puccini's Tosca we’re seeing, so all the players–on stage and off–are brandishing guns. Still, by this point in the film I was at least accustomed enough to the direction that it didn’t bother me too much.

I’d hoped that Craig’s second Bond film would echo Connery’s, From Russia With Love. In that movie, the actor used a down-to-earth espionage plot to iron out any rough edges on the character, shaping him into the cinematic icon he is today. I was looking forward to witnessing that once again, a bit more intentionally this time out. Instead, it plays out like a mixture between the second Bond films of Dalton and Brosnan–Licence To Kill and Tomorrow Never Dies–but not as good as either of those. It’s the revenge-driven, rogue agent Bond of Licence To Kill in the nonstop action Cuisinart of Tomorrow Never Dies. In 1997, the favored action style of the moment was wire-heavy Hong Kong chic; now it’s a grittier, Bourne-driven hand-held style. Both cases are examples of 007 following the pack rather than leading.

Following the resonant conclusion of Casino Royale, I’d expected a more fully-formed James Bond this time out. Instead, he’s still a work in progress–though his real arc is getting over Vesper’s betrayal and death. (The film’s final scene is one of its most successful, bringing that storyline to a truly satisfying conclusion.) I really hope that next time we get to finally see Craig come into his own as a suave, assured 007. I think he’s more than capable of carrying that off, and I’m dying to see it!

I don’t have any problem with nonstop action Bonds; Tomorrow Never Dies is actually one of my favorites. But that’s discernable action. My problem with the action in Quantum of Solace is that it’s mostly incomprehensible, and never particularly inventive. There isn’t a single action setpiece–like the foot chase in Casino Royale, for instance–that I would consider a 007 classic. I simply had higher hopes for the follow-up to Casino Royale.

Does this mean that I won’t see Quantum of Solace again? Of course not! I’m going to try to see it again this weekend, and I plan to revisit my review after watching it a second time. Perhaps I’ll like it more. Perhaps less. Either way, I think it’s worth revisiting. Hopefully not being so hung up on the style will allow me to enjoy the substance more... or just focus more on my more petty gripes like the lack of Q and Moneypenny, or the fact that the new villainous organization isn’t SPECTRE!

The Next Eurospy Babe: Transporter 3's Natalya Rudekova

The Eurospy genre is alive and well in 2008! I like the steady stream of neo-Eurospy movies we're getting these days. It's not a glut like there was in the Sixties, with dozens and dozens of titles a year at the height of the spy craze, but there are enough low- to mid-budget action movies from much of the same European crew with cool action, great European locations and hot Euro-babes to satisfy my thirst for the genre.

Last year we had Hitman, before that Transporter 2. Each showcased a somewhat non-traditional beauty sporting plenty of black eyeliner. Transporter 2 introduced the world to American vixen Kate Nauta, and Hitman showcased the stunning Olga Kurylenko. We all know Miss Kurylenko went on to become the next Bond Girl; will Transporter 3's Slavic import Natalya Rudekova find the same success? As of now, there doesn't seem to be any information out there on her. No European Maxim shoots pop up on Google; she doesn't even seem to have an IMDB profile yet as far as I can tell. But the freckled beauty makes a striking (albeit fleeting) impression in the brand new Transporter 3 trailer. Perhaps the new Eurospy movies will prove the breeding ground for the next generation of action heroines? Only time will tell, but Ms. Rudekova has me intrigued. And Transporter 3 looks to offer more of the amazing stunts and fight scenes we got in the first two movies, thanks in no small part, I'm sure, to returning fight choreographer Cory Yuen. Former Bond baddie Jeroen Krabbe also turns up.

Read my full review of Transporter 3–and see more pictures of Natalya–here.

DVD Review: Hitman (2007)

The one scene that more than any other exemplifies all that is (in its way) great and all that is completely ludicrous about Hitman is one in which Timothy Olyphant’s titular hitman, Agent 47, impersonates an arms buyer named Mr. Price and infiltrates the lair of a sleazy Russian arms dealer named Udre (Lost’s Henry Ian Cusick). Everything is absolutely over-the-top. Udre surrounds himself with barely-dressed prostitutes and young men in equally skimpy outfits, including odd bits of metal wherever feasible. (Like weird, quasi-medieval helmet-masks.) Cusick has a ball playing up the character’s sleaze, employing an appropriately hammy Russian accent and licking (yes, licking) lines of coke off the bodies of the prostitutes with great relish. Agent 47 soon crashes his party by sliding a briefcase full of cash–and a bomb–across the table. The bomb explodes, and the cash flies everywhere, fluttering down in slow motion on the ensuing carnage like snowflakes. Why bother to fill the briefcase with cash at all if it’s really a bomb? Purely for that visual. The scene then plays out almost entirely in slowed-down or sped-up motion, with Agent 47 shooting up everyone in the room except for the women. The action isn’t particularly stylish or balletic in the John Woo/Luc Besson way it desperately wants to be, but it’s all so ridiculously over the top that it can’t possibly be taken seriously. The same can be said for the entire movie, and it’s the very trait that makes it enjoyable.

The general ludicrousness of the whole affair is also one of the traits that led me to compare Hitman to Sixties Eurospy movies when it first came out, and I stand by that assessment today. In fact, the producers themselves bear it out in the 24-minute DVD feature "In the Crosshairs: The Making of Hitman," even if they don’t use the term "Eurospy" specifically. "The character of 47 is very much an international character... and many of his adventures take place overseas, particularly in Europe and Eastern Europe," comments an American producer. His European counterpart notes, in appropriately accented English, "Is not specifically a film of professional assassin; is more close to the spy film." They go on to talk about the mostly European crew, and working with such a diverse international cast. The same comments could easily be made about just about any classic Eurospy production. It’s very interesting to see this Sixties production model still in effect today!

Director Xavier Gens (who doesn’t look much like a director, somehow) and actors Timothy Olyphant and Dougray Scott, as well as former Bond baddie Ulrich Thomsen and future Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko, also contribute to the documentary. Regrettably, it’s one of those pieces that mostly consists of everyone saying why everyone else is right for the part, or right for the direction, etc. At times, the participants even sound like they’re still trying to convince themselves that they made the right decision!

Gens helpfully explains the main character’s arc, which is nice because it’s never that clear in the movie. Basically, as he sees it, Olga’s wayward prostitute character helps Agent 47 grow as a character and not just be a cold-blooded killer anymore. Kurylenko adds, "I think he gets touched by, uh, by her, because he sees... a little reflection of himself in her. And that happens when he notices her tattoo. He has a tattoo, too, on the back of his head and she has a tattoo on her cheek. So I guess that’s what makes him feel closer to her. He can identify with her somehow."

I’m glad Olga clears that up, because it isn’t discernible from their typical interactions in the film! At one point, her character tries to seduce 47, climbing on top of him and commenting (quite aptly), "So good with firearms; not so good with ladies and their garments." He tries to squirm out from under her, prompting the warning, "Careful! I’m not wearing any panties." That’s about all he can handle, so he says simply, "This is a very bad idea." And knocks her out.

So it’s lucky that the special features clarify this ambiguous relationship!

Another featurette, the 10-minute "Digital Hits," focuses on the video game. It contains interviews with game developers, as well as plenty of shots of action-packed gameplay. There’s not much of interest to non-gamers, but it does give the unfamiliar the opportunity to see how close the art direction of the film sticks to the designs in the games.

In the 14-minute "Instruments of Destruction," Weapons Coordinator Christophe Maratier takes us through the filmmakers’ choices of hardware for Hitman, and discusses each gun, even going so far as to demonstrate it on a firing range. The featurette actually turns out to be significantly more than just porn for gun-nuts, though; he also talks about safety aspects of handling weapons on set, and he and the crew discuss certain bits (like 47 crossing his arms with a gun in each hand) that make no sense whatsoever from a tactical perspective, but simply look cool on film.

"Settling the Score" is a 5-minute look at composer Geoff Zanelli’s not-particularly-memorable score for the movie. Soundtrack buffs will find no particularly revelatory insights in the interview with Zanelli, but it provides a decent overview of what a composer does for someone who’s never given it any thought before, and there’s some brief B-roll of the orchestra recording.

Rounding out the special features are a particularly weak, Dougray-centric gag reel and five deleted scenes, ranging from a few seconds to a few minutes and mostly dealing with a wisely-excised subplot about an African warlord. They offer a few more bikini babes, a little more blood, a lot more slow motion, and a new assassination in which 47 disguises himself–a technique I gather he employs frequently in the videogames. The best one is an alternate version of the train sequence in which 47 fights and questions one of his former compatriots. The cut version is a pretty good action sequence, and actually better than what was eventually used in the film. There’s also a slightly baffling and much more downbeat alternate ending with more Kurylenko. If the movie itself had had a little more depth, this conclusion might have been more effective, but as things stand it would have proved pretty incongruous at the end of a mindless slice of escapist schlock.

Ultimately, there’s nothing wrong with escapist schlock, especially in the Eurospy genre. If your goal is nothing more than a feather-light distraction for an hour and change, Hitman fits the bill–especially on DVD, where expectations are generally lower than in the theater. Olga Kurylenko remains the primary attraction, even if she doesn’t really get much to do. She stood out for me the first time I saw this movie, though, and now that she’s since become a Bond Girl, she does even moreso. I’m looking forward to seeing what she does with a meatier role, assuming that Paul Haggis & Co. have written her one!

Hitman is certainly worth a rental for fans of the Eurospy genre, and the special features on the two-disc edition are probably better than the movie deserves, so that’s a nice bonus. The fact that it even is two discs, though, is a rip-off. All of the features fit on the first disc (but don’t come on the standard, single-disc edition); Disc 2 is reserved exclusively for an idiotic "digital copy" of the film. I can’t imagine that many people really want Hitman on their iPod, but if you want the well-made bonus content, then you need to shell out for the cumbersomely-named "Digital Copy Special Edition" anyway.

More Great Quantum of Solace Pictures!

EON is really spoiling us with Quantum of Solace pictures this week. On top of those great ones at USAToday (as well as some in good articles at IGN and Rotten Tomatoes), there's a slew of good high res images (including the ones from those other articles, plus some I haven't seen elsewhere) up at SlashFilm.

(Thanks, Bish!)

Upcoming Spy DVDs

New Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko In Hitman

Fox has just announced Hitman for release March 11 on DVD and Blu-Ray. Their press release touts its newest, best selling point: "The Stylish, Edgy Action Film Starring Timothy Olyphant And The Newest Bond Girl Olga Kurylenko!" (I'm taking advantage of that fact myself as an opportunity to run this photo...) Hitman will be available in rated and unrated editions (the latter running a minute longer), as single or double discs. Both versions include deleted scenes and an alternate ending; the cumbersomely titled "Hitman Digital Copy Unrated Special Edition" comes with all that plus the featurettes "In the Crosshairs," "Digital Hits," "Settling the Score" and "Instruments of Destruction" (focusing on each of Agent 47's various guns), as well as a gag reel and the titular digital copy. (This one, unlike the ripoff "digital copy" on Live Free or Die Hard, is compatible with iPods.) Oh, and Olga Kurylenko. Both versions come with Olga Kurylenko. Retail for the single disc will be a steep $29.98; the double disc an even steeper $34.98. Read my review of Hitman here.

Mission: Impossible: The Fourth TV Season

TVShowsOnDVD.com reports a May 13 release date for the next season of Mission Impossible. The show underwent a lot of cast changes in Season 4, with Martin Landau and Barbara Bain exiting and Leonard Nimoy joining as Paris (duly reflected on the rather unimaginative box art). There was no immediate permanent replacement for Bain. The 1969-70 season contained twenty-six episodes.

More Inspector Clouseau

No, there are no more Pink Panther movies left to be released on DVD (well, not until Steve Martin takes his second crack at it), but having exhausted all of those (even the Alan Arkin and Roger Moore entries), MGM Home Entertainment will finally (after many delays) release The Pink Panther & Friends Classic Cartoon Collection Volume Six: The Inspector, collecting classic cartoon shorts featuring the character. Included are such Sixties and Seventies favorites as "The Great DeGaulle Stone Operation," "Napoleon Blown-Aparte" and "Ape Suzette."

New Bond Girl On The Cover Of Femme Fatales

The new Bond Girl, Olga Kurylenko, is featured on the cover of the January issue of the magazine Femme Fatales, on newsstands now. The timing with her casting is purely a coincidence, but a nice one for the magazine, sales-wise, I'd imagine! The actual article has no Bond content whatsoever, not even of a "what if?" nature. I think this casting really caught everyone off guard! It does, however, offer some sexy shots of Miss Kurylenko, including a centerfold. Ironically, this issue seems to replace the previously announced Bond Girls issue, which, as best I can tell, never materialized.

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Tradecraft For Jan. 7, 2008

Bond Girls Galore!

Both trades have stories on Bond 22 casting today, and each one announces a different Bond Girl! The Hollywood Reporter confirms rumors that have been swirling for the past month about British newcomer Gemma Arterton, who will play an MI-6 agent named "Fields." At 21, she seems a little young to serve Her Majesty's Secret Service (and to pair up with the soon-to-be-40 Daniel Craig), but she's pretty. I've never seen her in anything, though I'm interested in her upcoming St. Trinian's comedy with Rupert Everett.

Variety, meanwhile, boasts the out-of-the-blue scoop that 28-year-old Hitman co-star Olga Kurylenko will play "the female lead," Camille. The Ukrainian Kurylenko has caught my eye in both of her most recent roles, as the vampire who seduces Elijah Wood in Paris, Je T'Aime and opposite Timothy Olyphant in Hitman. In my review of that movie, I said, "The obligatory girl, a Russian prostitute (Olga Kurylenko), is easy on the eyes and not a bad actress despite, once again, having virtually nothing to work with, so she fulfills all the demands of a classic Eurospy leading lady." I stand by that, and I hope that Bond 22 offers her more opportunities to show off her acting abilities! (Hitman allowed her to show off other assets.) I like that the producers are continuing to hire exotic European actresses instead of Hollywood leading ladies like Halle Berry or Teri Hatcher. It feels more in keeping with Sixties Bond. I also like the idea of a "Eurospy Girl" (essentially) becoming a Bond Girl, even if it's four decades late!

Both articles list off the rest of the cast, as has been widely reported elsewhere in recent weeks. Mathieu Amalric, who's drawing rave reviews for his current performance in The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, and who stood out in Steven Spielberg's Munich (opposite Daniel Craig) plays villain Dominic Greene. (With addition Jesper Christiensen reprising his Casino Royale role as "Mr. White," does this mean that all the villains in this mysterious organization take Clue-like color surnames?) Giancarlo Giannini returns as Mathis, as does Judi Dench as M and Jeffrey Wright as Felix Leiter. This makes Wright the second actor ever to play Felix twice in the franchise's 46-year history; only David Hedison held that honor previously.

For more information on the whole cast, check out the official press release at CommanderBond.Net.

Bond On The Xbox

No, it's not a new game... The Hollywood Reporter reports that Microsoft has inked a deal with MGM to make the Bond films (and others from the MGM library) available for download and viewing on Xbox Live. The article states that some films in the MGM deal will be made available in high-def, but doesn't clarify whether or not that includes 007.

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