A Bit of History and Other Random Thoughts to Start With...

I wish I could recall when I first encountered James Bond.  I'm not sure what the first film I saw was. The most likely scenario is that I probably ended up watching parts of one with my father when it aired on TV.  I discovered a variety of movies that way growing up, lounging around on lazy weekend afternoons, watching whatever happened to come on.  What I do know is that by middle school age, I was pretty obsessed.  I have memories of watching the movies A LOT during the period of my adolescence and early teenage years.  Once I realized I liked them, my habit was to record them whenever they played on TV, and I can tell you, I wore those VHS tapes out!

One of my fondest and clearest memories is from when I was about to enter eighth grade.  One of the Roger Moore films was on TV the night before the first day of school.  I was allowed to watch about the first half hour or so before going to bed.  The whole next day, I couldn't wait to get home to finish the movie.

The first Bond film I saw was very likely one of Sean Connery's, because he's the actor I initially thought of as the true "James Bond."  I've never been much a fan of Moore's, but I think that has more to do with the films he was in than his performances.  As I mentioned previously, I really liked Timothy Dalton as Bond.  For a time as a teenager, both of his films were among my absolute favorites.  And I still think Licence to Kill is one of the best, most underrated Bond films. 

Initially, I really liked Pierce Brosnan too.  A major milestone, and very happy memory, in my Bond fandom was seeing GoldenEye.  That was the first Bond film I saw in a theater.  I was fourteen at the time (which is a great age for enjoying Bond), and I loved it.

I really enjoyed Brosnan in the role, and I think GoldenEye is the best of the movies he starred in.  I wish Brosnan had been given better movies during his tenure as Bond, as I think his talents were not well served by the generally silly and occasionally preposterous elements of the films he ended up in.  At the time, I could accept him as Bond very easily.  He had the look, for sure, and was a capable enough action hero.

These days, I consider Daniel Craig to be my favorite Bond, and perhaps the "essential" Bond.  Craig possesses just the right mix of intelligence, attitude, toughness, charm, and vulnerability to be totally convincing.  The films of his era do more to convey Bond's human-ness than pretty much any other Bond films have, but a big part of that is due to how Craig plays him.  I buy him as Bond, completely.  I will be sad to see him go.

As I mentioned, the Bond films I've always been most drawn to are those darker and more serious in tone.  So when Casino Royale (2006) came out, instantly I was a huge fan.  It is hard to overstate how much that film reinvigorated the Bond franchise.  The movie made it startling clear just how stale the series had become.  It served as a kind of reboot of the series, and on that level it delivered: the movie was fresh, exciting, and didn't follow the predictable formula.  But perhaps what was most surprising, and appealing, was the amount of feeling in it.  The story had real stakes, and I found myself caring in ways I hadn't been accustomed to with the majority of Bond films.  The climax of the movie wasn't just an obligatory action set piece; it was something tragic and genuinely emotional.

I've loved all the Craig era films.  I like them all so much, in fact, that I'm a little surprised when I hear Bond fans criticizing them.  The filmmaking in the Craig era has been of an uncharacteristically high order.  The acting and production values are excellent; certainly among the best the Bond series has ever showcased.  Recently, I've discovered that lots of fans apparently do not like Spectre, but I like even that one quite a bit.  The personal connection between Bond and Blofeld, and the fact that the filmmakers try to tie all of the Craig films together, seemed to rub a lot of fans the wrong way.  Me?  I can acknowledge that the "brothers" connection was unnecessary, and perhaps even (as some protest) a slap in the face to the preceding films and to Ian Fleming especially.  But...I kind of like that they tried to invest the series with a deeper sense of meaning and pathos.  Whatever missteps story-wise the Craig era films have made are far outweighed for me by what those films do well. 

It's really cool to think that I've been a fan of Bond for something like 30 years.  Even cooler, perhaps, is the fact that Bond is still as fresh and relevant today as he ever was.  It's truly amazing to think that the series hasn't died off after all these years.  Over the course of five-plus decades, the Bond film series has been mostly good, occasionally great, and sometimes pretty bad, but somehow the producers have always done a good job of resetting things when needed in order to keep the franchise alive.  I'm so grateful for that, because it gives me hope that Bond will be around for a long time to come.