Cast: You've got all the regulars like Daniel Craig (of course), Naomie Harris, Ben Wishaw, and Ralph Fiennes along with [probably] single installment characters played by Christoph Waltz, Lea Seydoux, Monica Belucci, and Dave Bautista.
Plot: James Bond goes rogue [again] as he hunts down a secret organization called Spectre and learns that it is led by someone from his past.
Thoughts:
A Bond movie is a Bond movie. There is a rigid structure to the movies that this follows as well (Action sequence, main titles, plot setup, sex with random woman, meet main Bond Girl/Woman, fight a henchman, secret base, explosions, end). I could basically see the N64 Goldeneye version of this movie with each scene. I like that consistency.
This is a really solid core cast at this point. Daniel Craig is a great Bond, even if he's barely been able to be a traditional Bond at all. Whishaw, Harris, and Fiennes are a great team to surround him with when the movie chooses to use them. The new people too are well chosen. Christoph Waltz is built to be a Bond villain, just as Dave Bautista is built to be a mid-movie henchman. Lea Seydoux has everything you could want from a Bond girl: she's attractive, believably can kick some ass, and banters well.
The place where I start running into trouble is with the story. It plays into all my least favorite tropes. A villain with a master plan that plays out like it was barely even sketched out. Haphazard plotting. My One Big Leap* principal is completely thrown out the window. Honestly, the less I pay attention to the larger plot, the better the movie is.
*A quick refresher on One Big Leap. I'll allow any movie one big leap, be it a high concept conceit (The main character can travel in time) or a massive coincidence (twins separated at birth start dating the same man). After that one leap, the rest of the world and plotting has to abide by that logic. Or, more simply, first the weird, then the human.
<Spoiler>Elephant in the Room: Blofield (Waltz) does all this because he's jealous that his dad liked James better than him. Are you kidding me? I wish I was. This is where the One Big Leap stuff starts falling apart. Blofield just happened to know James as child. Then he just happens to be able to fake his own death and run the world's largest criminal empire. Even Waltz doesn't sound like he believes all the trouble he went to to do all this. What, were all the previous movies just to get James' attention? Was there never any stakes at all before now? Did Blofield get to this level as a bad guy simply because James Bond became a super spy? If James Bond was an Assistant Manager at a McDonalds, would Blofield still be going after James like this? Why couldn't Blofield have just been an enemy James made during his time as a spy. That would be so much more plausible. I'm not even precious about the 007 books and mythology and all these stupid plot twists pissed me off.
To Sum Things Up:
This is a fine James Bond movie. If all you are looking for is a fine James Bond movie, it will please you. If you wanted this to follow through on some grand promise made by Casino Royale and Skyfall, I'm sorry. Oh, and the Sam Smith Bond song is no good.
Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend
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