Skyfall: An Intimate, Riveting Return to Form for Bond

The best thing Sam Mendes did for the history of James Bond was commit to making Skyfall a standalone story in virtually every way, from its plot to the bigger ideas surrounding it. If you worry that it tries to connect itself to the dismal Quantum of Solace, then I'm here to assuage you of that. I think we've always viewed Bond as an indestructible force of British intelligence who somehow avoids STDs while he's at it, but Skyfall tells a rich, self-contained story that challenges everything 007 thinks he's good at with surprising quietness and respect. You'll hear Adele's theme song for this movie early on, and it is one of the best, most fitting Bond themes I have ever heard, fluctuating between quiet piano and a sweeping 77-piece orchestra. It's a small thing, but a wonderful indicator of how this movie nods at the character's rich history while also pushing him forward into the future in exciting ways. This is my favorite James Bond movie because it explores the character on which this entire franchise is founded more intimately than any other.

This movie and everything Bond cares about in it are predicated on a fateful decision M makes almost as soon as it starts. As Bond and a mercenary named Patrice (who we will see more of later) struggle atop a speeding train in Istanbul, Ms. Moneypenny, portrayed wonderfully by Naomie Harris with all the subtlety due her in a story like this, watches from a nearby hill with her rifle trained on the two fighters. Through her earpiece, she warns an M supervising from London that she doesn't have a clear shot, but out of desperation, M tells her to take the bloody shot anyway. Moneypenny hits Bond, who falls about three hundred feet into the river below. It seems to both women that they've just killed 007, but because this happens a little over ten minutes into the movie, it probably won't shock you to hear that they didn't. Bond spends a little time overseas, as he puts it, enjoying death, but it doesn't take long before he's drawn back in by a terror attack on MI6, an attack stemming from a deep personal grudge someone holds with M herself. The rest of this movie - and how Bond looks at it - is filtered through his frustration and even hurt over M's decision, a hurt that someone out there less noble than everyone's favorite secret agent can empathize with.

Skyfall is as immense a step up in quality from Quantum of Solace as can be, and that's apparent from the first frame. In many ways, it's a reversal of the thematic dynamic from the equally great Casino Royale. Craig's first Bond film was about him learning to humble himself. This one is about him being forced to make a comeback. His character as a whole has been somewhat static since Dr. No, so Mendes makes a simple but profound choice to set Bond back physically with an injury and force him to work his way up. Because they're British and one of them has just been shot in the shoulder, these characters aren't always happy with each other, because why would they be, and their dialogue is cuttingly brilliant. They find countless ways to insult each other, but these insults are subtle and Bri'ish enough to sometimes make you think about them for a couple of seconds before their amusing meaning becomes clear. 

Bond's injury is used in significant ways in this story, and we're shown how it affects him rather than just told it has and asked to accept it. Pull-ups are more painful for him than they used to be. His arm shakes when he shoots a pistol now, something that gets brought back up in a twisted, fateful mind game by the movie's villain. Skyfall is a slower, more contemplative Bond movie, and one of the best in the franchise because it does something radically different by fundamentally challenging who James thinks he is. It's not as laser-focused as Casino Royale, but it's not meant to be. It is the most personal outing for Craig's Bond, conceptually similar to his other movies as far as car chases and espionage are concerned, but ideologically different in nearly every way. It is virtually a standalone story, but it's so surprisingly thoughtful and restrained that I think it deserves to be. 

Raoul Silva is a wonderful Bond villain whose motivations cut far deeper and more intimately than any other of the Craig era. This isn't about oil and geopolitics for him. This is personal. He's a phantom for much of the movie, one who carries out horrible terror attacks with the precision of a mastermind and the keyboard lingo of an internet troll, but once you meet him, he's not exactly the man you expect him to be. He's flamboyant and even lighthearted, the type to blast classic rock from a helicopter as he flies into battle, but in a way that alludes more to the broken, deep-seated pain he's trying to shove down than it does any desire for fun. His interactions with Bond take on homoerotic undertones, though the movie forgoes making any explicit statements about his sexuality. These encounters give him a unique, extremely uncomfortable presence, one wrought with a confused tragedy that Skyfall doesn't shy away from. Javier Bardem perfectly sells a character with a psyche so fractured that he's almost tricked himself into thinking the horrible things that happened to him were funny. 

All of this would have already made for top-tier cinema, but one of the best things about Skyfall is how beautifully Roger Deakins's cinematography frames it all. The very first shot of the movie balances focus and pinpoint light. Bond steps into view at the end of a hallway, blurry and out of focus, and walks into it right as a beam of light falls on his blue eyes. And that's just the first shot. The world in this Bond feels so much richer than it did in Quantum of Solace, thanks to both Deakins and the brilliant production design. Oriental casinos are dimly lit with lanterns and opulently decorated by wealthy men making money by evil means. Istanbul's streets are lined with vendors selling colorful products, though Bond soon forgoes his motorbike chase on these streets for one on rooftops and the top of a train (traintops?) The practical stunts in Skyfall are just unbelievable, and unlike the previous movie, they have a keen grasp of the geography and space of the world Bond lives in. Many interesting elements of the world are used by both our heroes and our villains, with Bond himself crushing real VW Beetles with a backhoe during one of the best chase sequences in the history of the franchise, all of this happening on a cargo car being hauled by that very real train I mentioned. 

Back to Deakins's command of the visuals, though. Another highlight of this movie and, frankly, of Deakins's career features a brilliantly-shot nighttime sequence in a Shanghai skyscraper made almost entirely of glass. The colorful neon billboards and displays surrounding the skyscraper make for the most visually striking sequence in the history of Bond, at least in my view. Deakins travels through strong stylistic choices like these to arrive at the movie's final act, which takes on an earthier, simpler tone in Middle of Nowhere, Scotland. Deakins captures it perfectly with a precise minimalism evocative of both The Banshees of Inisherin and his own work on 1917. The last act of this movie is an emotional one, and both Deakins and Mendes strip Bond down to the bare bones of what makes his character interesting, just in different ways. The cinematography of this movie is beautiful, yes, but it also serves a purpose that goes hand-in-hand with what Skyfall is trying to do. It both celebrates and critiques the flamboyance of his franchise before going back to the roots of where James Bond came from to explore the boy he used to be. 

To say that Skyfall is a "quieter" movie than other Bond flicks would be a relative statement, because it's still a globetrotting spy thriller, but its exploration of Bond goes deeper than any other movie in the franchise. It pokes around in subtle ways that feel emotionally genuine rather than obligatory or shallow, examining deeply broken characters who choose either to embrace their brokenness for the worse or to fight hopelessly against it while hoping for the better. It's really a beautiful movie in more ways than one, and it does something no other Bond movie has done before, giving us a methodical, long-overdue dissection of his heart and soul. It takes the personal questions Casino Royale raised and pushes them further. Looking at the relationship M and Bond share has often felt like observing a pair of colleagues. Watching Skyfall is like watching an always-busy mother and an estranged son who wants to love her. 

Skyfall - 10/10

Matthew 23:11-12