Skyfall
Director: Sam Mendes
Writer: Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, John Logan
Based on: Ian Fleming‘s James Bond novels
Sequel to: Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace
Cast: Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Javier Bardem, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Bérénice Marlohe, Albert Finney, Ben Whishaw, Rory Kinnear, Helen McCrory

Plot:
James Bond’s (Daniel Craig) mission is to protect a computer drive that contains the identities of several agents. But things go very wrong, Bond loses the drive and is shot by fellow agent Eve (Naomie Harris) – at the orders of M (Judi Dench). Believed dead, Bond disappears. But M has to face a lot of criticism for her actions and losing the list. When the MI6 HQ is bombed, Bond returns from his supposed death and he and M both have to face their pasts to clear this matter up.

I had heard only good things about Skyfall before seeing it and that might have made me expect a little too much. It was still a very good film, it just wasn’t as great as I had expected.

Here are the things that worked very well for me: there was much more M than in the other films and more Judi Dench is always kick-ass. Especially since she brought a sense of humor to the whole film that was a bit missing in the others (though she wasn’t the only one who got to be funny in this film, which was generally appreciated*). Ben Whishaw was great as Q. The intro was awesome.

And they really treated the women excellently in this script – which Bond is not exactly famous for, as we all know. But I liked how Bond connected with each and every one of the women in this film – on an emotional level and how they could all hold their own. And btw, what a performance from Bérénice Marlohe.

But the film did have a few lengths and some logical inconsistencies that were just unnecessary like [SPOILER] the second Q plugs in the LAN cable into Silva’s laptop, I was like, “dude, you’re the technological genius in this, aren’t you? Even I know that you don’t connect suspicious laptops to your supersecret spy network and I couldn’t hack myself out of a mousetrap if my life depended on it.” [/SPOILER] That’s just lazy writing right there.

And while Javier Bardem was great, I just thought that Silva was too much, too cartoonish to be a good villain.

But altogether, these are small complaints and I did enjoy myself and the film a whole lot.

Summarising: I’m not sure if I didn’t like Casino Royale a little better, but the quality was at least equal. And very entertaining.

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*Favorite scene, btw: Silva hitting on Bond and the wonderful dialogue that ensued:

Bond: [M] never tied me to a chair.
Silva: Her loss.

Me: So true.