The Canadoo (2016) – Five twentysomethings are chosen to be part of a survival TV show. However, it seems like they’ve actually been set up as they prey for a supernatural predator.
I can say this: The filmmakers were trying to make a good movie. That’s most apparent in how the script treats the five people of divergent personalities and backgrounds — while there’s plenty of disagreement and character conflict to go around, it’s at a higher level than the “continuous bickering” that fills the place of character development in too many low-budget horror movies.
However, the finished product is hampered by the stupidity of the premise. The five meet at the pre-arranged spot, which is a secluded pier on a river (shot in Georgia). They are then transported down the river by two long-bearded rednecks in a boat, and left on shore in the middle of nowhere with a single digital camera and no instructions. Even the stupidest among them should have instantly seen that this is NOT how TV is made, yet it still takes them more than 24 hours (and the disappearance of one of their number) before they start to realize that, “Gee, this may not actually be a reality show television shoot after all.”
My favorite ridiculous moment comes when one character, hunting for edible berries, comes across… a shotgun shell. No, sorry, a shotgun shell. This is treated as Teh Most Ominous Thing Evar. You know, despite the fact that they’re in the deep woods in redneck country where people would be expected to (gasp) hunt, and so a used shell would be about as ominous as finding a fishing bobber on the shoreline.
Skyfall (2012) – I guess there’s no time like the present to catch up on the Bond movies, right?
The Daniel Craig reboot* series is an interesting, and mostly successful, exercise in what had been tried several times before: the “re-energizing” of the franchise. (The last major attempt came with the casting of Timothy Dalton; his Bond was a more sincere, less tongue-in-cheek character — I think the Bond of License to Kill is most similar to the Daniel Craig version — but it was hampered by an unwillingness to let go of the very crud that was dragging the series down, like Q being played for comic relief.) I guess that the Bond of the movies started diverging from the Bond of the novels right from Dr. No — Sean Connery had such an irreverent, boyish charm that it was impossible to resist leaning into that, with the result that when the franchise was handed to Roger Moore, it was already a parody. Cutting back to an interpretation grounded more in the books (in mood and theme, if not actual plot) and casting a Bond that could definitely not be called “boyish” finally freed them from all the baggage that they wanted to jettison.
*When the first couple of Daniel Craig installments came out, there was much debate on whether this was a reboot (given that Bond was explicitly shown as the “new guy” just getting his “00” designation in Casino Royale) or a straight chronological continuation (with Judi Dench continuing as M from the Pierce Brosnan installments), the idea being that “James Bond” was a nom de guerre identity given to a succession of MI6 agents. The latter workaround finally gave up the ghost in Skyfall, when we see Bond’s father’s name, “Andrew Bond,” on his tombstone.
Oddly enough, I had just read an article decrying the overuse of the “trauma plot” trope as a shorthand for real characterization right before watching this, so I instinctively bristled when part of the story ended up uncovering Bond’s childhood loss of his parents. But this also led into the multi-installment character arc that is another differentiator between the Daniel Craig movies and the interchangeable installments before that.
It seemed very much that Skyfall ended with the rebooted pieces all put back in place: A male M, a quartermaster called Q, and even a Miss Moneypenny. Of course, the next one couldn’t just fall back on the status quo…
Spectre (2015) – Once again, the plot links to something in Bond’s past (he apparently had a very busy childhood, as evidenced by some pretty crappy Photoshops), and is on something of a personal vendetta (echo to License to Kill, again).
It’s interesting that the recent James Bond movies and the recent Mission: Impossible movies share a lot of themes and trends:
- A greater awareness of the uncertain morality inherent in the espionage game (compared to the earlier “us good, them bad” backdrop)
- A small group of morally uncompromised agents working outside a bureaucracy which has been compromised by the surveillance state
- The world at large questioning the need of the organizational structure supporting the protagonists (“After all, it’s the current year!”)
Throw in those same themes showing up in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and you begin to realize that the concept of a hero is inherently small-l libertarian — that these protagonists have gotten to a position in which they can make an honest difference, even if it runs counter to the current directives of the organization which got them to that position in the first place.
Given the almost uniform leftwing background of those who produce and profit from all the movie franchises mentioned, it would probably give each of them a heart attack that they are inadvertently promoting the ideas of individual liberty, moral agency, and the power of an individual with an internalized sense of duty to principle.
Abandoned movies:
Exit Humanity (2011) – I’d like a good post-Civil War zombie movie, but this isn’t it. Somehow city folks don’t realize that if your house is in the middle of nowhere on the frontier, the zombies just aren’t gonna be all over the place. And what kind of Western guy never wears a hat?
Bloody Pit of Horror (1965) – Yeah yeah yeah, classic Euro-horror, blah blah blah. It still underwhelmed me severely in the first 20 minutes. Is this what “maturity” feels like?
I thought that Dalton was one of the best Bonds, period. A harder, less comic Bond and I agree–Broccoli, et al, were unwilling to let go of the Roger Moore era, which to my mind, had wreaked havoc with the entire Bond series. (reader of Ian Fleming here…).
Dalton got short shrift, unfortunately. Brosnan was okay, sort of back in the Connery mode of lighter stuff, somewhere between Connery and the early Moore. Still…too much charm, too little hardcore intelligence agent going on, IMHO. I like Brosnan, don’t get me wrong. But…well.
Trust me, don’t watch the final (Craig) Bond movie. Just **don’t.**
Already did.
There are three James Bond Movies: Dr No, From Russia With Love, Goldfinger.
The only ones I have on DVD.
Don’t get me started on the Matt Helm movies. I was introduced first to the Donald Hamilton novels. The Matt Helm movies are unnecessary parodies of James Bond. For a parody of James Bond select any one of the Roger Moore Bond movies.
On the Canadoo: If I went down (south) to the mountain and there were no empty shells at either the old home place or my son’s property, THAT would be weird.