Octopussies

Why won't the producers of the James Bond series take a fucking chance for once? I think we can all agree that, since Brosnan first appeared on the scene in Martin Campbell's adequate Goldeneye, there hasn't really been a Bond film of note. I'm not a huge Brosnan fan, but it's not even his fault, really. The movies are just DOA: uninteresting post-Cold War piffle without a decent villain, a string of tedious bids for world domination. The World Is Not Enough was particularly forgettable. I have actually forgotten what it's even about, except that it starred Denise Richards as a nuclear physicist.

Even producers Barbara Broccoli (whose family has been producing the Bond films from the very beginning) and Michael Wilson agree that the series needs some sort of boost to keep it from getting stale. (I'd already say it's too late for that).

So, why on Earth is IMDB reporting that Martin Campbell will return to produce a new James Bond film, written by the same dumb bastards that wrote The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day? I actually thought Die Another Die kind of worked as a parody of Bond, a goofy play on some of the central concepts, with a ridiculous action set piece at the end where the hero actually outraces the sun's rays. But it's not a real Bond film. There's none of the cold-blooded sleekness of the Connery era, the goofball charm of the Moore films, or even the inept half-assery of the Timothy Dalton era.

Remember, they had Quentin Tarantino actively interested in writing and directing a Bond film. Think about it. What young filmmaker wouldn't want a go at a James Bond film. I mean, you're stepping into history, directing one of those. Any action or suspense filmmaker worth his salt would probably step up to the plate. So, why go with fucking Martin Campbell?

Let me just say that there's nothing horribly wrong with Martin Campbell. As I said above, his Goldeneye is by far the best of the Brosnan Bond films, and he also made The Mask of Zorro, which is surely an above average family adventure film (which introduced the world to Catherine Zeta-Jones, I might add).

But this guy's hardly the man to hire if you want to reinvent a long-standing series. He's a traditionalist. He makes old-fashioned entertainments; they're fine, they're not bad movies, and they usually look nice, but they're not innovative, fresh, exciting, dangerous, edgy or unique. Ever. And that's what Bond 21, tentatively titled Casino Royale even though there's already a film featuring "James Bond" with that name, needs so desperately to be. Consider me disappointed already.