Review of GoldenEye (1995) by Pradyut V — 15 Jan 2012

OH, BOY! Another James Bond movie revision that I did. I didn't have much recollection of the movie. I saw it as one of the first English-language movies that I have seen primarily because my dad was a fan of Sean Connery and wanted to see how Mr. Brosnan measures up to him. Anyways, here I am from the world of Jason Bourne and 3D version of pirates of the Caribbean, watching James Bond kick ass in Golden Eye. A good film, though I found it difficult to sit through the entire length of the movie and towards the end was getting a little impatient. The one twist that I loved about the movie happened around interval time when the 006 agent turned out to be the villain of the whole plot. But as is true with most Hindi cinema, it was because of some wrong-doing during childhood that he wanted to revenge. Among other things, the opening scene of the movie literally had my jaw wide-open as James Bond actually pulled off a Hrithik-Abhishek stunt from Dhoom 2. That was one action scene which was too difficult to believe even in the world of James Bond.

Coming to the good part, Pierce Brosnan I guess improves upon Timothy Dalton by around 1000%. Naturally charming, he revels in his role as the MI6 agent. Not to forget, Judi Dench as the first female M, and her wonderfully delivered dialogue about Bond being a relic and "misogynist dinosaur". A lot of hamming and unnecessary sexual energy on display by the lady in question, Famke Janssen, who years later, appears in a much subtle role of Jean Grey in the X-men series. While the main villain looks very mean and measures up adequately to Bond, probably the confrontation scenes between him and Brosnan got ignored. In the context of the movie, the Soviet-USA cold war had just entered and it was only logical to portray USSR as the common enemy(considering MI4 still alludes to that!). All in all, a good start by Pierce Brosnan as the new Bond. In a style of his own, he looks likely to take the role of the suave, sophisticated British agent forward.