We went to see the latest Bond movie, Quantum of Solace. The reviews have been so consistently bad that we were, if anything, slightly pleasantly surprised. All the emphasis is on action, to such an extent that the plot becomes largely irrelevant, and the film rattles along alarmingly like an express train on a branch line. The critics say that, by eschewing romance in favour of cynicism, Marc Forster is sawing off the branch he is sitting on, since the Bond franchise has traditionally involved a big dollop of schmalz, but I suspect Ian Fleming would recognise more of his Bond in Daniel Craig than in, say, Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan.
And what about Sean Connery? To me he is still more “Bond” than Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan or Timothy Dalton . Admittedly each actor brought a slightly different character to the part but I personalise Bond with Connery. There was, in the distant past, another actor who portrayed 007 and if my memory doesn’t fail me it was the first “Casino Royale”. I do not remember the name of this actor but it wasn’t a great success, that came about when Connery took the part.