'Spectre' - Movie Review

Daniel Craig's fourth outing as James Bond. As has been mentioned before, I thought his first movie as Bond ("Casino Royale") was the best thing they'd ever done with the series, by a rather wide margin. Because of that and mediocre reviews I stayed away from "Quantum of Solace," Craig's second. Good reviews lured me back to the third, "Skyfall." It struck me as terribly workman-like: Javier Bardem turned in a better-than-average villain, but the movie was overlong and a bit tedious. So that's where I'm coming from - I watched this one on a "whatever" whim on a Saturday night, and got exactly what I paid for with a movie borrowed from the library.

Bond goes rogue (again), causing chaos in Mexico City and Rome. He is, with the ponderous inevitability of 24 previous Bond films, found to be justified. He seduces Léa Seydoux and Monica Bellucci - each in the heat of the moment after violent action. He saves MI6 (and, to some extent, the world) again. I'd apologize for the spoiler, but dear lord, you knew he'd succeed, right? It's well filmed and ploddingly workman-like in much the same way as "Skyfall." Lives are endangered, shit blows up, the plot and dialogue plods onwards. I'd ask "where's the writing that made 'Casino Royale' so good?", but in truth it wouldn't help all that much with the utter inevitability of the outcome. With "Casino Royale" there were actual moments of doubt with a new Bond.

I'm so, so sick of these movies.