Movie Review—
GoldenEye (1995): Bond Film #17
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Masterfully — best among all who have
played 007 in this regard — Pierce Brosnan shows us the flawless
amalgamation of killer and comic relief. After a brutal fight sequence
in a steam room that masterfully alternates between attempted murder and
erotic turn-on, 007 ultimately prevails by taking out both Xenia Onatopp
and her henchman, culminating with a fluid draw of his Walther PPK.
"No, no, no," he then quips. "No
more foreplay."
This is one of the best laugh lines
of the franchise, juxtaposed against a vulnerable (wearing just swim
trunks and Omega Seamaster) and gadgetless physical battle that I'd
readily put up against a similar challenge at the rehabilitation spa in
Thunderball.
Coping mechanisms aside, it's Bond's
philosophy that is not working for him here. Moreso than any concern of
irrelevancy post-Soviet Union.
And it is Natalya who ultimately
challenges James Bond on this and imposes herself more or less as his
conscious on the beach just before the Cuban incursion for the
GoldenEye climax.
Natalya: "How can you act like
this? How can you be so cold?"
Bond: "It's what keeps me alive."
Natalya: "No. It's what keeps you
alone.
Thus the stage is now perfectly set
for a great, personal transformation in the 007 character as he must
confront his friend-turned-enemy at the Janus satellite control complex
on Cuba.
The dish and antenna are imposing
symbols of what's at stake here, but the production really fails on
them. In my opinion, too many Bond films are too self-indulgent in
running their lovingly photographed destruction shots, e.g., both the
Liparus and Atlantis in The Spy Who Loved Me. Severnaya took way
too long to go down; the Janus satellite dish, too long to get up.
Better to have left the intensely
personal ending sequence between Trevelyan and Bond to carry the film
out after merely a hint of the overwhelming stakes over which they are
fighting. The cramped mechanical gearing room conflict could not have
been better staged nor executed. It was at both claustrophobic and
lethal in the make-shift opportunities for pain and death it provided.
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