Tomorrow Never Dies is an underrated adventure for Pierce Brosnan’s underrated Bond
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Watch This offers movie recommendations inspired by new releases, premieres, current events, or occasionally just our own inscrutable whims. This week: No Time To Die won’t be hitting theaters, but you can still enjoy some vintage 007 action.
Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
Popular consensus holds that Pierce Brosnan’s best outing as James Bond is his first, 1995’s GoldenEye. It’s hard not to wonder if there’s a halo effect from the beloved video game adaptation affecting its reputation when 1997’s Tomorrow Never Dies is sitting right there. More than two decades later, Brosnan’s second appearance in the role stands out as both the most ’90s Bond movie and the rare entry that has elements of prescience, rather than pure trend-chasing.
Actually, prescience versus trend-chasing neatly encompasses the motives of the best villain of the Brosnan run: media baron Elliot Carver (Jonathan Pryce), a somewhat more megalomaniacal version of Rupert Murdoch, intent on starting World War III for the benefit of his broadcasting empire. Satirical skepticism of the media (and its fixations on ratings, sensationalism, etc.) is a fashionable remnant of the Natural Born Killers era, while the threats of conglomerates and consolidation have only gotten scarier and more vivid in the years since. Tomorrow Never Dies isn’t exactly incisive in its treatment of Carver; he is a Bond villain, after all. But Pryce gnashes his teeth with style, and it’s satisfying to see 007 take on a Murdoch stand-in without completely demonizing real journalism.
This is one of the brisker, briefer Bond adventures. (At the time, it was the first one to clock in under two hours, albeit just barely, in 30 years.) With GoldenEye’s throat-clearing reintroduction out of the way, Brosnan can lean into his take on the role, which could be described as debonair with just a touch of wry, self-effacing clock-punching—not for nothing does he operate his fancy BMW by remote control. In general, Tomorrow Never Dies certainly adheres to series routines; its pleasures come from small but crucial elevations. One is crisp cinematography from frequent Paul Thomas Anderson collaborator Robert Elswit, easily the most prestigious DP of the Brosnan quartet. His work shines in a sequence at Carver’s lavish network launch party with plenty of spotlight glares and vivid blues. There’s also an eclectic supporting cast (Ricky Jay and Vincent Schiavelli both appear) and a solid Sheryl Crow theme song.
Best of all is Michelle Yeoh as Wai Lin, a Chinese agent chasing the same leads as Bond. She wasn’t the first Bond Girl to be hyped as an action-ready equal to 007, and she wouldn’t be the last. But Yeoh lends that claim more credibility than most, with acrobat (if too-infrequent) fights and a no-nonsense charm. The movie’s best set piece—and one of the best of the Brosnan era—finds Bond and Lin handcuffed together on a motorcycle pursued by a helicopter, and their interlocking maneuvering (hands clasped together as he steers and she works the clutch) is flirtatious without getting smirky.
It’s Teri Hatcher’s tragic bad-gal character who is perhaps oversold—not as a badass, but as an emotional connection to our superspy. (She’s yet another Bond ex.) Like a few other Brosnan-era variations, the personal angle would be better-explored by the Daniel Craig series. That doesn’t diminish this one’s entertainment value, though maybe it was fated to be overlooked anyway: Tomorrow Never Dies opened the same day as Titanic (for a few precious days, the grosses were quite close!), and even features some underwater sequences. That’s Brosnan’s Bond for you: getting the job done, making semi-nostalgic hit action-adventure movies while more seismic events happen around him.
Availability: Tomorrow Never Dies is currently streaming on both Netflix and Amazon Prime. It’s also available to rent or purchase from Google Play, iTunes, YouTube, and VUDU.
196 Comments
Anyone else notice how much the villain looks and dresses like iPod-era Steve Jobs?
YES! Eerie, considering Jobs was juuuust returning to Apple around the time this movie would have been finished shooting.
Yeah, the people who made the movie…?
k.d. lang >>>>> Sheryl Crow. It is known.
This is definitely one of my favorites! Better than Goldeneye in my book. I think one of the keys is that it’s brisk. So many Bond movies would benefit from trimming 15-20 minutes and just making everything tighter. OHMSS probably could stand more like 25-30 minutes.
So many movies, period.
Agree. Not everybody is Tarantino or Kubrick. Judd Apatow movies don’t need to run 2 hours! Leave them wanting more!
I was rewatching the Craig films to prep for the new one, and as good as Casino Royale is, the runtime is a bit much, and it drags at the end. Especially with the little interlude before the final set piece.
My wife refuses to watch Bond movies with me anymore because they’re so goddamn long.
My wife doesn’t outright refuse, but it’s definitely diminished her interest, knowing that 90% of them will be at least 20 minutes too long and/or feature one too many country visited.
I love Bond movies in general and Casino Royale in particular, and even I groan when I realize, oh shit, I still have to sit through Venice.
[SPOILERS] In the book, Vesper just slits her wrists in the bathtub (which the film makes reference to), so I get why the film tacked on the big extended finale. They built up Vesper’s character so well, they had to build a proper finale for the film around her after the villain was easily dispatched without Bond really doing anything. No one watching it for the first time in the theater in 2006 wanted this movie to end.
it really is an incredible movie, and Vesper is iconic in her own right.
My favorite joke at the time was the reveal that one of Carver’s henchman was a Bill Gates knockoff who proudly confessed his new operating system was full of new bugs.The context was that Microsoft was developing Windows ‘98 at the time, and had just joined forces with NBC (forming MSNBC) in a desperate gambit to remain relevant in the age of Yahoo and AOL.
Ranking those three entities now in order of relevance:1) Microsoft (not what it once was, but still the OS used in a lot of desktops and laptops)2) Yahoo (very much not what it once was, but it’s still there)3) AOL (does it even exist as a shell of its former self?)
Microsoft has actually had a big turnaround since the Ballmer era, focusing on enterprise customers.
My controversial opinion (well, only controversial among Bond fans): Crow’s song > kd lang’s. I’m not saying she’s better but I think they made the right choice in theme song.
Nah fam. Goldeneye shits all over the rest of the Brosnan outings. And it’s not close, honestly.Not only that, it shits all over the Craig movies, IMO.
Wow. I can’t tell if that’s high praise or if you just really really love Goldeneye. I’ll be rewatching it again later this year, but I remember Casino Royale being vastly better than Goldeneye, to the point where I was a little surprised that they were directed by the same guy. I think Campbell was also allowed more stylistic leeway in Royale, but it’s a great-looking movie in a way that I don’t think his earlier Bond outing is. I actually like Brosnan’s time as Bond pretty well overall, but I’ve always been puzzled by the idea that Goldeneye is way better than the others (or that Die Another Day is worse!). They strike me as pretty even.
Casino Royale is objectively better than Goldeneye. Die Another Day is REALLY bad, but it at least appears to lean into the utter stupidity far more than Tomorrow Never Dies
Die Another Day has a room full of people applauding the concept of global warming.Every time I watch it I find a new thing to hate, and I generally like the rest of Brosnan’s run.
Such a fucking waste of Halle Berry AND Rosemund Pike. That’s what pisses me off most about Die Another Day.
They’re both very good bond films, and each one is a personal favorite, or at least in my personal top 5 or so. That said, I don’t know how one can make an objective argument that one is better than the other because they’re such different films, made with obviously different intentions. GoldenEye, to me, seems to be saying “We can keep on making Bond films just like you’ve always liked them, with a few updates for the 90’s and the end of the cold war” after the multiyear break since License to Kill. Brosnan’s bond feels like a distillation of what people liked about all the earlier bonds; tough like Connery, quippy like Moore, serious like Dalton, and even a bit sensitive like Lazenby. They updated a few things for the changed political and social climate of the 90’s, but retained all the classic bond essentials; cars, guns, action, an oversexed bond girl villain, gadgets, explosions, one-liners (quippy to the point of silliness or dripping with double entendre depending on the gender recipient), etc. Casino Royale obviously leaned into the “gritty reboot” angle, while retaining just enough connection to rest of the franchise to make it feel like they haven’t thrown all the history out the window. It’s obviously a more “modern” approach, and feels like it’s a lot more ambitious than GoldenEye, which is why it’s probably aged better critically. But IMO both movies did what they were intended to do very, very well.
I don’t like Craig as Bond, so that’s what it comes down to for me,
I also think Casino Royale benefits from one of the best of bonds loves of all time (if not THE best)
Casino Royale is damn close, but I agree that Goldeneye is the best of the Brosnan/Craig era Bonds.I thought Tomorrow Never Dies was fluff, TBH. That scene at the end where Bond is threatening Carver with the “You forgot the first rule of mass media…” is one of the worst and silliest showdown enders in the entire series.The World is not Enough was better. Despite that silly sub reactor showdown scene.
Disagree on Casino vs Goldeneye, but definitely feel like TWINE is a better movie than this one.
Which did you like better, Casino or GE?
I think Casino Royale is the better film. Goldeneye is more fun, but I can’t call it the best of the Brosnan/Craig eras.
Oh OK. I just wasn’t clear on which one you were taking over the other.
I’m not sure it quite shits all over Casino Royale and Skyfall, but the rest? Absolutely.The Brosnan movies kept working their way deeper and deeper into silliness, but Goldeneye struck some of the best balance in the franchise. Tomorrow Never Dies isn’t as awful as The World Is Not Enough or Die Another Day, but it doesn’t give Brosnan near as much to work with and is the beginning of a downward trend that caused a reboot.How can you not love a film that balanced the over the top Xenia Onatopp, “I’m invincible!” and a tank chase with a strong, personal plot capped off with an ice cold climax that rivals anything Connery, Dalton or Craig ever quipped?“For England, James?”“No. For me.”
This one is fine but Goldeneye is miles and miles its superior. And I’ve never played the game. Ever. Not a gamer. Goldeneye is the best Brosnan film and one of my top 5 007 favorites of all time. And it really holds up.
This times a million. Goldeneye is the best Brosnan and certainly a top-5 Bond film. I think Craig’s films benefit from modernism and our relative close proximity to them but I wouldn’t put any of them beyond Casino Royale above Goldeneye and maybe a few of Connery’s outings.
It really is interesting how Brosnan’s Bond tenure was underappreciated. I remember that from the start of the Remington Steele TV show everybody said “That’s the guy who should be the next Bond!” — and then when we got him, we weren’t that excited. People have tried to come up reasons why — some people have brought up that the Cold War was over, but the Soviets never were that big a deal in the Bond universe, with SPECTRE and other independent villains being the primary bad guys.
He more or less redefined the modern-era Bond with Dalton being roundly panned and Moore staying far too long (3-5 is about as long as you want a Bond).
With that said, Goldeneye is a top-5 Bond film and Tomorrow-Never-Dies is better than most by still trying to figure out how Bond fits into real geopolitics like Connery’s did and early Moore’s did (remember, we literally have the 2nd film being ‘From RUSSIA with Love’ and squarely centered on the soviets). Blofeld and SPECTRE became the center of his later novels as a soviet-esque/capitalist/totalitarian stand-in for an oppressive power. I feel this is a weird transition issue where Brosnan was really well liked through the first two Bond films and then went too far into sci-fi with the latter two that it cost him. Had he not been screwed by NBC and took over where Dalton stepped in we would likely have had him retire around the same time but 5-6 films in easily without him ever being a creepy sociopath like Dalton was.
I routinely defend the Dalton films (usually to people who didn’t ask and start slowly backing away from me.) They were good! License To Kill is great! Dalton was a physical, sexy, and funny, if sometimes overly-exasperated, Bond. I mean, yeah, ok, at one point he sledded down a mountain in a cello…but dammit The Living Daylights was fun and the theme song was a bop!
I’ve decided to revisit them all during the quarantine now because i’m locked inside. We’re starting with Dr. No tomorrow and going through them all. I’m really going to be preparing myself for that late april/early may where I hit the end of Moore and into Dalton. I’m going in open minded, I actually liked OHMSS (Lazenby is fine…Not great, but fine, the movie really does ride on Savalas). So I’ll report back once i’ve seen it. I’m really not ready to call Dalton’s movies AWFUL. My father can’t live on his own anymore, so we’re turning it into a ranking game, we’re going to be forced to rank each fill on 1-24. My predictions:Dalton ends up higher than 20, I’ll be legitimately amazed. I expect Connery to not fall lower than 10th and no Moore film to break the Top-5. I’m willing to revisit it and see where I’m wrong.
I’ve also been inspired to embark on a rewatch.In my mind, the only chances for a top 5 Moore are if you allow the set pieces and music of Live and Let Die to sweep it in. There’s so much wrong with it on a sexism/racism scale but shit the music and sets were so, so good. I look forward to hearing you’re Dalton hot-takes. I think License will surprise you but I think your Moore fatigue will taint your ability to enjoy them. Start with them, perhaps? Or go straight from Connery to Dalton?
I’ve just sat through Dr. No and I’m preparing for From Russia with Love…
I’m trying to space them out so I don’t just get blasted with Moore fatigue. He does feel like he stuck around to long, reading the synopsis of his last 2 or 3 makes me realize I’ve seen them….once? Like 20 years ago when I was a teen during one of the marathons they would have in the lead up to a Brosnan-era release…
It will be interesting to look at the decline in quality of the Moore-era Bonds through the same lens as the Brosnan era and the Craig era, I feel like they all saw the pressure to “do more” that came with success and ultimately out-sillied themselves to the point of blandness. Here’s my recape of the Moore era based on my memory. Live and Let Die: That cold open! That theme song! The music! The locales! The villains! Yikes. The racism! A true romp! After the clunky Diamonds Are Forever, Bond is back and he’s….jocular, I guess? Thanks, I love it!The Man With The Golden Gun: An outrageous villain played by a fantastic actor. A trip-nip. A showdown in a funhouse. Thanks, I love it. The Spy Who Loved Me: Ok….a megalomaniac who…wants…to…build…an…underwater society??? Uh, ok. But Barbara Bach as Agent Triple X! Jaws!!! Thanks, I still love it! They would have been wise to stop here but what followed was….Moonraker: This dumb shit. Holly Goodhead deserves the eyeroll, the whole recycled premise is such an obvious cash grab. Watching them in succession is likely to be painful. The plot is so silly you don’t notice how old Moore is getting for the role (but you will in the next one.) Thanks, I hate it!
For Your Eyes Only: I have a soft spot for this one because I’m a big fan of revenge plots and crossbows, but the age difference between Melina and Roger Moore’s Bond has reached a may-september pointthat is painful to watch. Even so…thanks I love it even though Bond approaches the mission with all the bemusement of a grandfather trying to log into facebook for the first time. Octopussy: Maud Adams and there is a floating palace. If I remember correctly this is the slowest Bond movie ever and if you told me it was 4 hours long I would believe. Thanks, I hate it so much and am also in a boredom coma. A View To A Kill: I feel like people either absolutely love or absolutely hate this one, and I am firmly in the hate camp, despite the all-star cast of Walken, Tanya Roberts, Grace Jones, and the Golden Gate Bridge. THANKS, I HATE IT NO MATTER WHAT EVERYONE ELSE SAYS!
He more or less redefined the modern-era Bond with Dalton being roundly panned
Ehem… speak for yourself. First that’s false – Dalton got many very good notices when he debuted as Bond. Secondly, Dalton continues to have a very dedicated following among Bond fans, including this one. I’ll take either of the Dalton films over any of the Brosnan ones.
2 Movies and after a quick google search of rankings….Dalton’s all fall behind Goldeneye. We can debate the merits but Dalton was canned after 2 films AND a 6 year gap to cool the franchise…Shouting ‘false’ at people on the internet is tiresome.
“a quick google search of rankings….Dalton’s all fall behind Goldeneye”Well, there’s a very well defined set of criteria if ever I’ve heard one. Sort of like those “More doctors recommend SWIP than any other brand” advertisements you used to see.I wouldn’t call Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomatometer a “scientific assessment” (as reviews are such subjective things), but it basically gives “The Living Daylights” 72%, “License to Kill” 76%, and “Goldeneye” 78%. A six point difference, with a clear majority liking the film is hardly “roundly panned,” as you originally put it.
By all means, please continue to defend Dalton. I’m just here to point out there is a reason why he made 2 films and the franchise went dormant for 6 years.
The decision to leave was Dalton’s. The producers asked him back on more than one occasion, even after he had announced he was no longer interested in making another Bond. If it were simply a matter of them wishing they had Brosnan rather than Dalton, it wouldn’t have taken them six years to achieve that. Remington Steele was cancelled. Pierce Brosnan was, as they say, not exactly over-booked at that point in time. You literally have no idea what you’re talking about:https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a26988704/james-bond-movies-lawsuit/
I will always chalk this up to fans of the movies or fans of the books. For the movies, Brosnan is a great Bond. For the books, Dalton was the first one they got right.Killing people all the time should make you seem like a a creepy sociopath (Dalton, Craig). The real sociopaths are the ones who do it without blinking (Connery, Moore, Brosnan).
He more or less redefined the modern-era Bond with Dalton being roundly pannedWait, what? Dalton was critically very well-received when those movies came out. I still think his performance in The Living Daylights was one of the best, most nuanced Bond portrayals we got before Daniel Craig’s. I do think Brosnan had a much greater influence on the character, but that’s not surprising since he was the only person to play the role between License to Kill in 1989 and Casino Royale in 2006.
I think it’s also important to remember that at the time, Brosnan was very successful, and a lot of the shrugging came afterward. GoldenEye did $100 million domestic after a decade of $50 million-or-less numbers, and each of his entries did more business (in the U.S., at least) than the last, more than keeping pace with inflation. In retrospect, it did feel like a safe choice, given that he was supposedly up for the part when Dalton got it (due to Remington Steele commitments!). Even Die Another Day, which for some reason felt like it inspired a changing of the guard, actually did about the same level of biz as Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace. If not for the massive success/acclaim of Skyfall, Craig’s tenure would be very much on par with Brosnan’s in terms of popularity.
I don’t know how Brosnan feels, but if one contract conflict gave us Brosnan in Remington Steele and Dalton in The Living Daylights, followed by Brosnan as Bond…Maybe someone leapt back and set things exactly right.
Yeah, during his tenure as Bond fans LOVED Brosnan. He was equal parts Connery and Moore. I was never a big fan of Brosnan’s Bond, I always felt he was a bit melodramatic, but it’s only after Craig took over that you got anyone else pooing Brosnan.
I think the pendulum swings back on every Bond actor. Fans loved Moore by the late 1970s, but his Bonds are viewed as pretty silly in retrospect. After years of Moore, fans viewed Dalton as too serious, but today he has been re-evaluated as Fleming’s Bond. I’m sure the same thing will happen to Craig in some form.
The time period (mid-90s to say, 2001) was all about polish, excess, remixing, adding, more-is-more. This is in lockstep with the Internet and the breathless rise of basically, everything to a fever pitch. Grit was very undesirable. Post-grunge. Think the Chumbawamba album cover and chest-stripe neon ski sweaters. Slick, rave-y, “schnell”. Therefore Brosnan is too perfect as Bond. He’s the perfect 90’s Bond. The sleeker and more polished the better. He was a product of his time, and that time is still deeply unfashionable in 2020. I’d go so far as to say the year-2000 gender climate is even more non grata than the 1980s homophobia, because we thought we were so right.
For me, Brosnan was a good 007 at the time but looking back I don’t find him as interesting as the Bonds who came before or after him.
M herself brought up that important point that the Cold War was over….she called Bond a “sexist, misogynistic, dinosaur, a relic of the cold war” in Goldeneye. The script did a great job of acknowledging that shift.I sometimes wonder if the infighting around the franchise had dragged on and Bond didn’t return until say, 2003, how much this would have changed the outcome of those Brosnan films. Goldeneye, Tomorrow, and World follow previous era blueprints that still had that touch of “spy movie”. But Die Another Day went full Fast and Furious, complete with surfing into North Korea and melting ice palaces with diamond lasers) and I think that’s because action films were getting really, really silly by that time and a whole generation (my generation, millennials) had no real concept of spies.
That M line is cited a lot, in part because it’s so memorable, and in part it’s because it’s one of the only times the movie actually acknowledges all of this stuff it sort of feigns acknowledging.
I really appreciated the ways GoldenEye was a little bit introspective, not just about Bond in his fictional universe, but to some degree about how Bond as a concept fit into a new audience, a generation of fans who had no real concept of Cold War politics and spy vs spy storytelling.Xenia looking wistful and saying “things are very different now,” since she, as much as Bond, no longer felt relevant in a post-Soviet world. She wasn’t an agent anymore, the dream of democracy in post-Soviet Russia wasn’t quite coming to fruition, so what was next for her? Janus. They did a good job positioning her opposite Bond. GoldenEye was also the first true attempt to right some of the wrongs of how they treated women in the past films. They gave them expertise and resourcefulness and agency. They dabbled in it with License to Kill, but I felt they got it right with Natalya in GoldenEye.
But then promptly ignores, and we’re later stuck with “Christmas only comes once a year” puns
and I think that’s because action films were getting really, really silly by that time and a whole generation (my generation, millennials) had no real concept of spies
Yup. Mission Impossible 2, Bad Boys 2, 60s Avengers reboot, and XXX come to mind. Hell, in XXX, there is a scene where the James Bond spy character gets killed by raving millennials. The only spy movies late 90s-2000s were spoofs of them: Austin Powers, Spy Hard, Johnny English. Only Ronin stood out. 9/11 re-orientated everything back to normal.
The problem was never Brosnan, the problem were his films. It was all downhill after Tomorrow Never Dies. Especially with Die another Day. He just had a bad deal and unlucky to be in such shit films.
(Not really) Hot take: Brosnan got better in each of his films, just as they got progressively worse.
That is exactly what I said, just with the words changed around. So what’s your point then other than agreeing with me?
Erm not sure what I posted merited that response. I wasn’t attacking you or anything. As you say I was agreeing with your general point, nothing more was implied.
I wasn’t old enough to remember (or be aware of) the reaction to Brosnan at the time. I always thought he was a great Bond though that made two very good Bond movies in Goldeneye and Tomorrow Never Dies. But TWINE was middling (albeit with a great video game that is vastly underrated compared to Goldeneye) and Die Another Day was just so, so bad that it unfairly diminishes how Brosnan himself was a fit for the role.
Indeed! The general populace was shouting that Brosnan should be the next Bond when he was doing Remington Steele, which I think had an influence on how Dalton was perceived when he took the role. Of course, Brosnan couldn’t take on being Bond until his contract with NBC ran out.The situation was like Moore’s in a lot of ways. People were screaming for Moore to be Bond when he was doing The Saint, and he was almost too old for the role by the time he got it. Likewise, it would have been HUGE if Brosnan had replaced Moore instead of Dalton.
I honestly blame it on how bad World is Never Enough and Die Another Day were.
He nearly got the Bond gig when Roger Moore left, but NBC forced him to do a couple of Remington Steele TV movies, which kept him from doing The Living Daylights and allowed Timothy Dalton to get the role.
I remember that from the start of the Remington Steele TV show everybody said “That’s the guy who should be the next Bond!” — and then when we got him, we weren’t that excited. This is one of a few ways his run paralleled Moore. After all, people saw Moore in The Saint, and said, “He should be Bond.” I think it really helps if people have no firm preconceptions of the actor once he steps into the role. Then fans are more apt to focus on the character rather than the guy playing him.And for me, Brosnan’s portrayal always seemed to be a bit too beholden to what the popular perception of what Bond should be. It seems to me that the ones who really stand out – Connery, Dalton, Craig – all did a pretty good job of remaking the character in their own image.
As much as I like all the Bond actors the biggest issue I had with Moore and Brosnan, compared to the others, is that they weren’t ruthless enough and even when they tried it didn’t work. If one of the villains had only thought to put Brosnan in a paper bag he would’t have been able to fight his way out.
Maybe the Soviets were never that big of a named villain during that era of Bond films, but Cold War spycraft was absolutely the background of that fictional universe. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the absence of an opposing government actor took a toll.That said, I get your point. But it was the presence of the USSR that made SPECTRE and other independent agents more plausible, I think. “We were concentrating so much on the Soviets that we never noticed Blofeld!” or some such.
What are you talking about? Brosnans Bond movies made bank, and people were surprised when he was replaced so soon.
Vincent Schiavelli
Good article! I feel GoldenEye is a better Bond film with slightly more grounded action scenes, some attempts to actually deconstruct Bond a bit as a character, and its bridging Cold War and Modern political elements. But Tomorrow Never Dies is a perfectly fun Bond flick that gets an unfair rap and deserves a revisit. The story is at least clever, Brosnan is still very charming as Bond, Michelle Yeoh kicks ass, and the music thankfully dropped Eric Serra’s bizarre early-90’s-ification experiment in Goldeneye for a far more timeless John Barry-esque feel. I only fault it for starting to veer into Moore-era sillyness in a few spots (the gadgets and some one liners can be real eye-rollers), although nowhere near as bad as the next two Brosnan films.
I saw 3 of the Brosnans in the theater (I missed Die Another Day, or rather it missed me) but I’ve never seen any of them since. I remember liking this one the most. Yeoh was impressive. My biggest complaint about the Craig Bonds is that they got away from the travel porn. I want Bond to go places where I’d be politely asked to leave before I got out of the foyer. Craig spends entirely too much time in the desert or the slums of Rio.
I saw them all in theaters, although I was pretty young at the time. Even at 12 and 16, The World is not Enough and Die Another Day felt more irritating than entertaining to me. Die Another Day in particular felt like my brain was melting out of my ears in its stupidity, so I’d wager you didn’t miss much skipping the theaters for that one haha.
I feel like as much as the Craigs throw in a few more grounded, grittier places, they make up for it with gorgeous cinematography in the scenic places. In particular, I have never wanted to go to the Scottish Highlands than after Skyfall.
When did people start using “deconstruct” to mean mild auto-critique? Deconstructing a character within a work is extremely difficult and takes a rare amount of skill to get right. Just calling the character names does not qualify, no more than Zack Snyder’s dour, killer superhero movies “deconstruct” Batman or Superman.
This one was actually a decent one, favorite action scene being at the printing factory. But Goldeneye is far superior. Bond driving a tank in a chase scene is a franchise highlight for me.
This tends to float between the bottom rungs of any given ranking of Bond movies, so pretty appropriate it gets a favorable write up from the king of prequel apologists (please take that as a compliment). That said, I find this film comfortingly fine, despite the disturbing prescience of the subject matter. It’s the You Only Live Twice plot resurrected for the fourth time. It ambles pleasingly through the James Bond motions, occasionally spiking your interest with a solid fight/chase/villain monologue. Yesterday I did an online training and had Thunderball going silently in the background. Playing silently and comfortingly in the background is a legitimate function of the Bond movies and this is, for me, another go-to in that category. Two egregious areas of complaint: 1) Eliot Carver has literally never heard of the internet; b) glorious Vincent Schiavelli needed to be the primary henchman. Mr. Stamper is a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy of Red Grant and does nothing for me.
How many times has Bond gone up against a big blondie since Red Grant? Many, and you’re right, it’s a bit tired. The one in Tomorrow Never Dies is offset a bit by the fact that Ricky Jay is the other main henchman. But they really missed a bet not having RJ attack Bond with playing cards, because we know of course that in real life Ricky was quite able to kill a man by throwing cards at him.
I read somewhere that they originally were going to do the lethal playing cards and then it was cut because someone thought it silly.
He literally wrote the book: https://archive.org/details/Cards_as_Weapons_-_Ricky_Jay_1977/mode/2up
It turns out I was wrong, they cut it because he nearly pierced Brosnan with them. https://film.avclub.com/ricky-jay-1798218351
Take your star. You know why.
It does seem like something Cesar Romero or Frank Gorshin would do, but I still say it would have been cool. No special effects required!
It’s funny, in the post Roger Moore era, I find myself judging the Bond films much less on Bond and much more on the Bond girls (or moreso, the ability for the writers to get it right.)GoldenEye is strong because of its Bond Girls. Tomorrow is strong BECAUSE of Michelle Yeoh, no doubt about that. It’s otherwise a silly, silly Bond movie, and without her would have felt like it was meant for the late-Moore era. Meanwhile (and I said this in another comment but want to reiterate here) Die Another Day is MOST infuriating because Halle Berry and Rosemund Pike were utterly wasted in a spectacularly shitty movie. Pike was perfectly and deliciously icy as the lady-bad. Berry’s character basically was half-written because someone in the writers room said “OMG WHAT IF WE HAVE HER COME OUT OF THE WATER IN AN URSULA ANDRESS SWIMSUIT SO WE CAN ALL FEEL SO SMUG AT THIS DEVILISHLY CLEVER HOMAGE!” and then forgot to do anything else with her.World is 50/50; Sophia Marceau was perfectly cast, but they totally shit the bed with Denise Richards The Nuclear Physicist Reading From a Teleprompter.
Carver’s lack of Internet savvy does jump out on modern viewing, even though so much else about him and his motivations feels more timely than ever. There’s a scene where the guy is using what appears to be a straight-up tablet computer – at a time when even PDAs were a clunky novelty at best – while crowing about how vast his magazine empire is.
In a bizarre way that makes him even more like Rupert Murdoch who not only lost a fortune buying MySpace, but last year sold off his satellite TV empire in Europe to Comcast in order to concentrate on dead-tree media.(If anyone knows the mystery of getting out of the greys please let me know – I’m going with me being stuck under an ancient pharaonic curse)
“… glorious Vincent Schiavelli needed to be the primary henchman.”Was looking for this comment.“Bond, I could shoot you from Stuttgart und still create ze proper effect.”Best line of the movie.
I was just thinking about this recently, and now I remember it’s because Burl, who used to post here, and whose eccentric movie reviews I quite enjoy, addressed it recently. He seems to feel more or less the same about it as young Hassenger.
http://hiitsburl.blogspot.com/2020/03/burl-reviews-tomorrow-never-dies-1997.html
Absolutely love this one. Pierce is so cool and Carver is easily my favorite villain outside of the Connery era. Finally a villain that breaks the mold.
The only thing holding this movie back is Bond’s bizarre failure to make some sort of “carve”-related pun after killing Elliot Carver.
Well, he more got ground than carved.
I’m imagining a scene of Brosnan behind the wheel of his 750iL, speeding to some exotic location, muttering to himself as he workshops his quips. “This turkey’s been carved’? Bah, it’s not the 70’s, nobody’s calling anybody a turkey anymore….‘Looks like they’ll need to carve out a grave for you’? That’s going to far to make it work. This is hard, harder than it should be!”
Top 3 favorite Bonds for me. Good cartoonish villain that – in a truly rare thing for Bond films – felt almost prophetic, Michelle Yeoh as a badass, older Bond Girl who is also beautiful but not in a way you’d expect from a mainstream ‘90s film, solid attempt to humanize Bond through Teri Hatcher, great set pieces and great pace.The only real slight I have against this film is that kd lang’s “Surrender“ which plays over the credits is superior to Sheryl Crow’s theme and should have been the opening song. I don’t think Crow’s attempt is as bad as some folks believe, but “Surrender” is just better and is unofficially in the canon of best Bond themes.
It’s absolutely criminal that k.d. lang’s “Surrender” was relegated to end credits for Sheryl Crow’s (frankly, weak) effort. This should be mentioned as one of the all-time best Bond songs but hardly anyone knows it exists.
Is this one considered underrated? I know it’s less popular than Goldeneye, but I remember it being a pretty big hit. If anything, I think it’s overrated compared to The World Is Not Enough which (with the exception of Denise Richards) is very solid and has the best theme of the Brosnan era.
The World Is Not Enough is 100% underrated, because Denise Richards is basically all anyone remembers about it. Robert Carlyle took what should have been a ridiculous Moore-ian henchman role (he can’t feel pain!) and humanized it, and Sophie Marceau owned the movie (plus, 21-year old spoilers – her as the actual villain was the best twist of 1999 cinema). Also, Desmond Llewellyn got a nice send-off. Some of the gadgety bits were a little much (Avalanche jacket, we’re looking at you), but it was overall solid.
8 year old spoiler – Dark Knight Rises petty much ripped off the whole bad guy setup from TWINE
Plus it did the ‘villain wants revenge on M’ thing much better than the widely adored Skyfall. And Robbie Coltrane comes back!
/agrees that Sophie Marceau is criminally under-recognized for how awesome she is in TWINE//googles to confirm what year The Sixth Sense came out///Can’t decide if subtle joke or most insane comment ever
Yeah, my ranking of the Brosnan films is Goldeneye>The World Is Not Enough>Tomorrow Never Dies>>>>>>>>Die Another Day. I feel like people just talked about the absurdity of the Denise Richards role and that groan-worthy “I thought Christmas only comes once a year” line to end the film, and that overshadowed the legitimately good parts of it.
That final line was meant for a late-era Moore Bond, true, but that Sophia Marceau ice scene was a part of my sexual awakening. World got so many other pieces RIGHT that I wish we could all look past that post-Wild Things stunt casting to try and get American teenage boys into theaters. But we can’t, because she truly tanked that movie. It’s not even that her character was dumb, it’s that hearing her muddle through her lines is an affront to stellar Bond girls that came before her in GoldenEye and Tomorrow, and even the ones that were given shit in previous eras and did so much with it (lookin at you, Honor Blackman!)
Well, I rate Bond movies on the Bond girls alone, so TWINE is probably my least favorite of all time, while TND is my favorite, because of Michelle Yoeh. That motorcycle scene is stunning.
Using that criteria, I’d have to agree.
I still find it amazing that this movie is in the upper half of Brosnan’s career, even though the title was the result of a damn typo.Don’t get me wrong, the eventual title, even though it’s utterly nonsensical, is still better than “Tomorrow Never Lies.”
Sheryl Crow’s theme song is….fine I guess. But k.d. lang’s song over the closing credits is 1000 times better. David Arnold wrote it for the title track, but the Broccoli’s wanted a more popular artist and went with Crow and the song she ended up using. Arnold used a theme from his score as the melody, and that plus lang’s epic vocals would have made this one of the all-time great Bond movie songs if it had been used instead.
“Bond… you know the rest.”Don’t be a dick, bro.
and a solid Sheryl Crow theme song.Tomorrow Never Dies had bangers. k.d. lang’s theme submission ended up being used over the end credits (those horns!), and Pulp’s rejected submission still slaps.
Gotz Otto as Stamper made a fairly good tough-guy functionary as well. Maybe not as traditionally cartoonish as Onatop, but certainly more memorable than whoever they had in the World is Not Enough and Die Another Day.
While I was certainly aware that Carver was intended to represent Murdoch, because I found this movie disappointing after Goldeneye, I preferred to (mockingly) think of the character as a stand-in for Ted Turner instead.
I’ve made my bed. You don’t sleep in it anymore.Like Teri Hatcher’s character, I once used this line on an ex.(And, um, like Teri Hatcher’s character, the ex and I still smashed at least once afterwards … What can I say, the ex was a cunning linguist … )
The movie has its high points and low points. But it also boasts one is the top scenes ever in a Bond film.When Bond is waiting for Carver’s henchmen with a gun and a bottle of vodka. He thinks he’s about to kill in cold blood and needs some booze. That scene could be pulled out and put in early Connery. And then it’s ruined by Teri Fucking Hatcher, who couldn’t convey falling off you pushed her off a cliff. Between her, a ridiculous Denise Richards and a phoning-it-in Halle Berry, women were a net weakness of Brosnan’s tenure, even with Yeoh, Sophie Marceau and Rosamund PikeFor some reason, I also really enjoyed how Bond kept referring to Carver as “Elliot.” He never does that. You could see it really irritating him.
Can everyone in this comments section rank their Brosnan/Craig era films so I understand where you stand on these? I think how you rank will speak volumes about what your criteria are… 🙂 1. GoldenEye2. Casino Royale3. Tomorrow Never Dies4. The World Is Not Enough5. Quantum of Solace (it’s so forgettable, but then when you watch it it’s really good and better than Skyfall or Spectre but I can’t in good conscious put it above World because I have seen it about 5 times through the years and I still don’t think I could tell you the whole plot if you held a gun to my head. Avenge Vesper something something Bolivian water rights?)6. Die Another Day7. Skyfall8. SpectreTBH, 6,7,8 are a tossup. Die Another Day and Skyfall were utterly silly but had redeemable, watchable qualities. Spectre was the worst. NOW if we’re ranking theme songs, that list changes significantly (Except GoldenEye is still at the top. Tina Turner’s GoldenEye UNDERRATED!!!!!!)
quantum of solace works particularly well if you watch it directly after casino royale as a bond mega-movie, because as you stated it truly has no plot. something about stealing water, something about a mysterious organization (that gets retconned anyway), something about it all having to do with vesper and then it’s over.
this is a VERY good point and I can’t even imagine my wife’s face if I suggested a Bond double feature. She’s already rewatched the entire Planet of the Apes catalogue this quarantine.
With the caveat that I will probably rewatch all of these save TND in the next six months, I’d go:1. Skyfall2. Casino Royale3. Tomorrow Never Dies4. Quantum of Solace (UNDERRATED)5. Die Another Day6. The World Is Not Enough7. Goldeneye8. Spectre…though even the one I like least, SPECTRE, is like half awesome.
Ooh, this should be fun. I’d go…Casino Royale (a perfect resetting of the series)Skyfall (a total one-off, but exceptional + Deakins!)GoldenEye (a childhood staple, and also an exceptional series entry)Tomorrow Never Dies (Rupert Murdoch as the bad guy! you love to see it)The World is Not Enough (would be higher but oh, Denise…)Spectre (definitionally fine)Quantum of Solace (clunky as its title)Die Another Day (awful)Songs?GoldenEye (Bassey-level)The World is Not Enough (underrated + low-key amazing)Skyfall (slightly anticlimactic but great)You Know My Name (rough, but deliberate)Another Way to Die (sure, fine)Tomorrow Never Dies (sure, fine)Die Another Day (bad but kind of an earworm)The Writing’s on the Wall (wretched)
Songs:GoldenEye (fuck me up tinaaaaaaaaa!)The World is Not Enough (A BANGER!)You Know My Name (fits the intro perfectly)Die Another Day (I said what I said)Another Way To Die (I loved this one)Tomorrow Never Dies (Sheryl Crow’s range is insane but the slow parts were waaaaay too slow. Could see Tom Jones singing it, gave me Thunderball vibes)Skyfall (could be an Adele song on its own, so didn’t feel Bond-y enough)The Writing’s On the Wall (honestly, how dare you, Sam Smith?)
I’m with you on those tunes
Pretty close to mine but I’d swap Skyfall and Casino, and move tomorrow up one. And Die another day is definitely bottom, about the only thing I liked about it was that they kept the plot moving through the opening credits.
Casino RoyaleGoldenEyeSkyfallThe World is not EnoughQuantum of SolaceSpectreDie Another DayTomorrow Never Dies
Man everyone has Skyfall so high. I need to rewatch it. I saw it in theaters and again once it came to blu-ray but I just…meh?
I’ve always felt it took Goldeneye’s themes and brought them to completion. Is Bond a relic? It’s a little on-the-nose, but I loved the touches of when Bond meets Q and they’re looking at a painting of a warship being retired, then at the end of the movie in M’s office, there’s a painting of a ship heading out into the sea and Bond has yet another mission. The films are even Judi Dench’s first and last movies, respectively, for a real bookend.Syfall’s flaws might be the action. Overall, it’s a low-stakes movie, the most exciting scene is arguably the intro, and Silva (kinda like Heath Ledger in Dark Knight) is an awesome villain but almost too smart (please, screenwriters, retire the “I planned to be caught” twist). It’s very re-watchable, though, as is Goldeneye.
The I planned to be caught trope always sticks in my craw— but I will admit I did love the Home Alone Booby Trap finale. I love that shit.
Absolutely. Despite it not being the epic lair-set finale of a lot of the films, it’s a good ending. Then Silva’s death scene is just great (that, “Ughhh, you got me” look is a great touch), and M and Bond’s last moment is one of the most affecting moments in the series.
My theme songs top 5 for the 90’s-current1. Goldeneye I definitely loved the song and Tina Turner classed it up for Brosnan’s debut as Bond2. Skyfall Adele again brings the class in a new decade3. The World is Not Enough I loved the take Garbage took on the song and the video was fun4. Tomorrow Never Dies The producers I have heard wanted Mariah Carey to do the theme but couldn’t get her and Sheryl Crow got the nod and it was work for her you could feel her doing the work to get the song she pulled it together and the song was her best work.5. Another Way to Die Jack White and Alicia Keys is unexpected but they made it work and it was a really great song.
Agree on the top 4. Some of the rest are decent tunes but they aren’t good Bond themes.
RoyaleGoldenEyeWorld is Not EnoughSkyfallQuantum of SolaceTomorrow Never DiesDie Another DaySpectre
Uhhh I don’t have a full ratings list but Quantum is not good. I remember being so disappointed in it the very first time I saw it in the theater. The opening sequence was a good follow-on from Casino Royale…and then it went completely into every single piece of cliche Bond nonsense. Unless of course that’s why people like it?
Re-watched recently in prep for No Time to Die (guess I’ll be doing it again later) and it was surprisingly better than I remembered. I think part of that is Craig is just great, if pretty damn angry in this one, but goddam is the action hard to follow. Just bad direction in those scenes. It came out in the Bourne era and it showed. Another big advantage for it, though, is it’s possibly the shortest Bond film in the series in decades and moves at a good clip. Slows down some in the latter half, but it still clocks in under two hours.
1. GoldenEye2. Casino Royale (a close second. GE is just more fun, it’s watchable all the way through, whereas CR has some bits that drag, like the poker game and the Bond-and-Vesper’s-romantic-getaway bit)3. Skyfall4. Quantum of Solace (yes, underrated)5. Tomorrow Never Dies6. The World is Not Enough7. Spectre8. Die Another Day
Casino Royale was so great! Such a powerful reset of the character and then 3 (probabaly 4) bullshit borefests to follow. What happened?
Tied 1. Casino Royale (Best) Tied 1. Goldeneye (Favorite)3. Skyfall4. Tomorrow Never Dies5. Quantum6. Spectre7. World Is Not Enough8. Die Another Day6, 7, 8 are so bad they aren’t even enjoyable. Quantum is underrated and frankly isn’t worse than TND. But TND is more fun and memorable and it’d be cowardly of me to have two sets of ties. Skyfall was a different kind of Bond film. It was just a damn good film and rebooted the franchise before it needed rebooting.
The films:
1. Casino Royale: Hands down the best Bond film, and one of the best actions films I’ve ever seen.
2. Skyfall
3. Tomorrow Never Dies
4. GoldenEye
5. Quantum of Solace: Not so much a bad installment in the series as a failure at a good installment.
6. The World Is Not Enough: “I never miss.”
7. Die Another Day: I rate it above Spectre only because of the torture credits sequence.
8. Spectre
The songs:
1. “GoldenEye”
2. “Skyfall”
3. “You Know My Name”
4. “Tomorrow Never Dies”
5. “The World Is Not Enough”
6. “Die Another Day”: As someone else said, an earworm. If you described it to me I’d surely hate it, but in practice it sort of works.
7. “Another Way to Die”: There’s a good song hiding somewhere in there.
8. “Writing’s on the Wall”: Can’t say the same about this one.
1. Skyfall2. Goldeneye3. Casino Royale4. Tomorrow Never Dies5. Spectre6. Quantum of Solace
7. The World is Not Enough8. Die Another Day.
THE GREAT
1. Casino Royale – just an all-time great action movie, dated ‘00s poker trends notwithstanding
2. Goldeneye – memorable setpieces, fantastic villain, the movie that cracked post-Cold War BondTHE GOOD
3. Skyfall – not as good as its reputation, but Adele & Deakins elevate it
4. Tomorrow Never Dies – Only slightly better than TWINE
5. The World Is Not Enough – Only slightly worse than TNDTHE BAD
6. Spectre – misguided and long, but at least the Mexico stuff is cool
7. Quantum of Solace – misguided and brief
8. Die Another Day – Batman & Robin levels of failed camp
I think the best Brosnan release wasn’t even a movie, it was Everything or Nothing, a video game release with it’s own complete plot and a wide cast of characters, including villain Willem Dafoe
A bold and deep cut of a take! I’ll allow it!
1. Casino Royale (Even if this wasn’t a Bond movie, it still stands as one of the best action movies in the past two decades.)
2. Tomorrow Never Dies (a DISTANT second. Pryce’s villain scheme was cheesy but I remember it better than most other bond villain schemes.)3. Skyfall (a DISTANT third, as I feel this movie is trying too hard to be Batman. But it’s got good action, and Bardem was a watchable baddie.)4. GoldenEye (I think this has aged very poorly- especially all the Alan Cumming scenes- but Peirce is working hard to cut his teeth as the new Bond)5. The World is Not Enough (I love Sophie Marceau in this. Not so much Christmas Jones. Her name only exists for a punchline at the end of the film.)6. Die Another Day (Every minute of this movie is either absurd or cringey. Sometimes I sure this is the worst 007 film. But other times…I kind of love it?)7. Quantum of Solace. (I don’t remember a thing about this, honestly. Some oil? Lots of shakey cam? Not leaving much of an impression is not a good sign.)8. Spectre (Daniel Craig clearly didn’t want to be there, and it shows, and it brings the whole thing down. A shame since it’s got some cool ideas)
“I don’t remember a thing about this, honestly. Some oil? Lots of shakey cam? Not leaving much of an impression is not a good sign.”
Me neither. I saw it in the theater and haven’t rewatched it. I remember the action sequences being the nadir of that era of the Bourne-inspired visual style in action movies.
1: GoldenEye, 2:Casino Royale (both directed by Martin Campbell) 3: the rest of the Brosnan movies 4:Quantum of Solace 5: Spectre 6: Skyfall
1. Casino Royale2. Skyfall3. Goldeneye4. Tomorrow Never Dies 5. Spectre6. Quantum of Solace7. Die Another Day8. The World Is Not Enough
1. Goldeneye -still hold up well for me, in the top 5 Bond films IMHO2. Skyfall – some of the best fight choreography and photography in the series3. Casino Royal – best reboot of the series next to Goldeneye4. The World is not Enough – the interesting villains redeem some of the sins, Denise!, the thought of Brosnan’s ultra suave version of Bond getting a face full of filthy Thames water in the first 10 minutes amuses me.5. Quantum of Solace – better in terms of being treated as the 3rd act of Casino Royal, but even then the ending is the most underwhelming of modern era Bond
6. Tomorrow Never Dies – It’s OK, the JAG of Bond films7. Die Another Day – too much CGI, it really just tried too hard to be an IMPORTANT Bond film8. Spectre – the most spectacular first 20 minutes of any Bond film, then that godawful theme song hits the screen with a thud and it’s all downhill from there.
How rubbish is that Spectre song!It might be saved from the bottom when No Time To Die is released though.
Die Another Day was saved from mediocrity by that spectacular swordfight (choreographed by the master Bob Anderson), and the onliner delivered by Toby Stephen as Graves:
“You see, when your intervention forced me to present the world with a new face, I chose to model the disgusting Gustav Graves on you. I paid attention to details – that unjustifiable swagger, the crass quips, the self-defence mechanism concealing such inadequacy…”
GoldenEyeCasino Royale
……….Big gap……..Skyfall
The World is not Enough
Tomorrow Never Dies
Die Another Day
Quantum of SolaceSpectre
Music wise I find the modern era home to some of the weakest Bond themes (with No Time To Die due to joining them). Some of the worst ones aren’t necessarily bad songs, but they are bad Bond themes.Good – Goldeneye, Skyfall, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not EnoughAwful – Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Die Another Day, Spectre, No Time to Die.
Truthfully the only thing I really remember from the Bronson films is that death scene in Goldeneye. I was a young teenager and it really had a lasting impact on me. Well, maybe not long lasting, but I revisited it in my mind for 90-120 seconds quite often.
I agree that TND is the best Brosnan outing and a top-tier Bond movie. It’s probably in my top five. I like Goldeneye, but this is a much more self-assured entry. I love the glee that Brosnan shows as he’s wheeling around with his remote controlled car, and Michelle Yeoh is in a class of her own as a “Bond girl.” She really seems like an equal to Bond in ways that almost none of the others are.
Tomorrow Never Dies had a lot going for it, especially with its commentary on media. And this was Brosnan at his peak. He was still young enough for the physicality of the role to be believable and he still had that Remington Steele swagger. I mean, let’s face it, Brosnan was playing pretty much the same guy in both Steele and Bond. Steele just didn’t kill people.I agree that perhaps Hatcher’s character was the weakest, not because of her acting but because the script made her so two-dimensional. I’m guessing what drove her casting was her success in Lois and Clark. I think she could have rocked the role had they given her a little more to sink her teeth into.When you really break it down, the script was probably the biggest problem with the film, though it wasn’t as bad as some other Bond films. There are parts of it that may well have been written in crayon. Even so, Jonathan Price could have read the phone book through most of the movie and still been a great villain. He’s that good.
One thing I would’ve changed would be to have Lin kill at least one of Carver’s guys. Like I would’ve had her kill off the main head honcho. Because it’s weird seeing Denise Richards add more to the final fight than Michelle Yeoh y’know?
Yeah, rewatching it, I found myself longing for the condescending “toughest bad girl takes on the toughest good girl” fight cliche just out of desperation to see Yeoh really unleashed. But her prop-heavy scene where she takes on a bunch of dude is pretty great.
“But Yeoh lends that claim more credibility than most”She once rode a motorbike off a ramp onto a moving train for a scene in Police Story 3. One that the stuntman testing out said stunt earlier ended up breaking a leg, no less!
Yeah, even Bond parody film Die Another Day gives Halle Berry two henchperson kills, one of them a decent action scene.
Denise Richards isn’t in this one, that was The World is Not Enough.
Yes and in that film she adds more fighting Robert Carlyle then Yeoh does fighting Pryce or The Other One.
I like Jonathan Pryce as an actor, but it was a dumb idea for a Bond villain. Trevelyan was a much better one, with experience as an MI6 agent, history with Bond and a grudge against the British government.
Great concept, kind of dry in execution.
Agreed Pryce is a great actor, but his whole villain thing is underselling, which works in GOT, but as a megalomaniac he just can’t get there.
It made no sense for his character to be on the boat at the end, a more likely setup would him be having a plausible layer of deniability when his ‘stealth boat’ is foiled and smugly telling the authorities from behind his desk that they can’t touch for this followed by the sick look of surprise when Bond murders him in his office that because even if you’re rich and powerful, there’s a level of behaviour that will not be tolerated by the other even more powerful people out there.
I kind of disagree here. Pryce has the inexplicable way (charisma even?) of making you sympathize with him. I’m talking about his abilities in general, it’s been too long since I’ve seen Tomorrow Never Dies to recall if the script could back up his ability.I’ve always enjoyed his take on villains.
I would go as far to say that Brosnan had two decent films, and two not good ones. It’s interesting to wonder how different Bond would have been if they actually got Brosnan into the role when he was still in his thirties.
I just wish dalton had been given more films.
Really? I always thought “GoldenEye” was an unimpeachable classic, and the rest of the Brosnan films were not bad at all. Corny as hell — I mean, I think at one point Bond gets clocked in the head with a nuclear submarine reactor rod swung by a North Korean dude who’s doomed by a bullet migrating through his brain, and another time Bond shoots dead a Bond girl in cold blood before he saves the world — but it’s more fun than Daniel Craig.
Both of those instances are from The World is Not Enough. Bond shoots the girl and then dives into the water to get aboard the submarine where he is subsequently clocked by said nuclear reactor rod – except the guy wasn’t North Korean. The North Koreans were Die Another Day.
Bond and Craig both represent interesting points in Bond.
Bond is, and has been very silly, Brosnan’s breakout was a slightly (emphasis on slightly) more serious take on the character, and then his run on the character was ended by a movie that was beholden to hitting all sorts of anniversary milestones, because it may or may have not been the 20th movie in the franchise.
I grew up with “Silly Bond” and I have to be honest, that’s what I prefer. Craig is decent at the job, but his series also just seems exhausting to me.BTW if you haven’t already, look into the drama surrounding Bond movies, it’s pretty damn good.
In a lesser actor’s hands the villain would be terrible, but Pryce over acts to such a delightfully insane degree that he elevates that character through sheer force of talent and will. A newspaper man as a villain trying to start World War 3 to sell newspapers is ridiculous. Jonathan Pryce as a newspaper man villain trying to start World War 3 to sell newspapers is crazy enough to be incredibly entertaining.
While I wasn’t keen on the idea of a media mogul as the big bad, I sort of wished Patrick Stewart had played the part (as a random dream casting). Jonathan Pryce is fun in the role, but I never bought him as dangerous.
who’s changed world history more in the last 30 years than Roger Murdoch? Of couse he’s a Bond villain!that being said, a few good bits aside (Vincet S, the motorcycle setpiece) this is the most *boring* of the Brosnan bonds. I *hate* Die Another Day, but it’s so whacko it’s kinda unique.
I still remember the overwhelming critical “hur hur dumb plot” response to “newspaper man starts war to sell more newspaper”. Turns out the movie was more than prophetic.
Agreed- I distinctly remember thinking- as the villain detailed his plot- that it was quite a bit more insipid and comic-booky than we’d come to expect from Bond canon.
I’ve always hated this movie, but it has one of the best car chases in the franchise, in the German parking garage.It has other things going for it, like the riveting pre-credits sequence and Teri Hatcher, but there are long stretches where it feels like not much is happening. Accounts of how rushed everything was behind-the-scenes help explain why the story lurches from one beat to the next.But maybe I’ll give it another shot with fresh eyes.
I know few would put this in their Top 10 Bond movies, and maybe it’s nostalgia since this was the first Bond movie I ever saw, but Tomorrow Never Dies remains my favorite in the entire franchise. The action scenes are fun and goofy in all the right ways, Pierce Brosnan is still the best non-Connery Bond, and Carver is a glorious villain. And for all the hype over Halle Berry’s character in Die Another Day getting a spinoff, I always thought Michelle Yeoh’s character was far more deserving. Hell, Wai Lyn is the reason I love Asian Action Girls so much today. Fun fact: For the motorcycle scene, the director told Pierce and Michelle separately that they were going to be the ones driving the motorcycle. All the confusion and wrestling for control wasn’t just acting, the actors were legitimately trying to take control during the chase.
I totally agree that Tomorrow Never Dies is underrated, but better than Goldeneye? Nah. (And FWIW I never played the video game.)Still, there’s a lot about TND to love. It’s basically a more fast-paced Thunderball-meets-The Spy Who Loved Me with less interminable SCUBA scenes and more Michelle Yeoh and motorcycle/remote control car chases.
I’ve always loved this one. It’s not as good as Goldeneye but it’s solidly the second-best of the Brosnan films and it’s super underrated.The pre-credits sequence alone is excellent and it’s got so many memorable scenes.The criticism of Brosnan I don’t recall happening until several years after Die Another Day. That film was mocked plenty at the time but it I remember plenty of people enjoying it, though saying it seemed like a very pre-9/11 movie compared to Bourne Identity which came out slightly earlier the same year, yet was very much a post-9/11 movie.
I agree that this one kind of gets lost in the penumbra of Goldeneye. Still I’m not especially enthusiastic about it – though certainly, there was a major drop-off in quality to the Brosnan films after this. Michelle Yeoh was pretty good as a partner, and she was convincing – this isn’t a case like Holly Goodhead or Christmas Jones where we’re presented with an attractive mannequin who everybody in the film treats like an accomplished professional when it’s patently obvious she’s not. Still, I think the very best Bond women are in the Vesper Lynd mold – they’re smart, they’re capable, but they don’t have to be presented as basically 007 without a Y chromosome.And yeah, the stuff with Teri Hatcher didn’t work for me. First, it depends an awful lot upon you having seen and had some level of fondness for the remake of the Thomas Crowne Affair. Otherwise, we’re just supposed to buy into the idea of some spark between these two because the dialog announces that they’ve had a past together. And the scene pictured in the still at the head of the story always kind of grossed me out. Basically [spoiler ahead] what you’re seeing there is Bond caressing her recently dead corpse. Now, that worked in OHMSS because it was very clear that Bond was in a state of complete shock and devastation. Here, it just seemed very weird and creepy – sort of an ultimate expression of the objectification and pacification of one of Bond’s conquests.There’s just something off to me about the Brosnan run. They were made by Broccoli/Wilson, they’ve got lots of scenes with Bond in a tux and driving an Aston Martin, and they’ve got Demond Llewelyn in 3 out of 4. But for whatever reason, they just don’t feel truly “Bond” to me. And I don’t fault Brosnan for it at all – I think it’s more of a matter of the creative team that was placed around him. But when I saw Casino Royale in 2006 this thought kept running through my mind like, “Wow, I’m watching a new James Bond movie,” because it felt like I really hadn’t seen one in a long time.
I had the same reaction to Brosnan, although for me it’s partly his performance. There’s a degree of foppishness and lack of physicality to it, especially post-Goldeneye, that doesn’t work for me. It may be partly because I watched all 5 seasons of Remington Steele, where he played a movie nerd pretending to be a super detective who often made a fool of himself. He was “dashing” in that, but definitely not “tough.” I think he tried hardest to differentiate between that character and Bond in Goldeneye, but stopped trying after that.
It’s Brosnan. You always feel like he’s ACTING like Bond rather than IS Bond.
I’d say he’s always acting like what he thinks you want Bond to be. More than anyone else, I just get this sense of, “Is that what Connery would have done?” or “Was that Bond enough, or should I do it over?” running through his performance.
But I will also say the scripts had a large part to do with it. I will defend License to Kill to the death, but I get that in the aftermath of its B.O. performance the conventional diagnosis was, “More spectacular and humorous, less gritty and dour.” So while Goldeneye tilted a little more towards the former than I care for, I can forgive aspects like Alan Cumming’s clowning here or “Xenia Onatopp” there.
But they just never let up on the gas pedal. We never got a “corrective” Brosnan Bond film like For Your Eyes Only was for Moore. It’s as if, after Moonraker, they had looked at the box office receipts and kept on going in that direction for three more films before anyone decided they needed to blow it all up and start over.
I vastly prefer both Goldeneye (the ultimate Sean Bean role!) and, especially, The World is Not Enough.
(She’s yet another Bond ex.)
I… don’t get this? When has Bond ever run into an ex-Bond girl again? In fact, this is why I rate TND and all other Brosnan Bonds lesser than GE – because they all had great, series-reinventing premises, but only GE really made full use of them:GE – What if the villain is a Bond gone bad?TND – What if a former Bond girl, whom Bond had callously pumped and dumped as he always does, showed up again?TWINE – What if the Bond girl is the villain?DAD – What if Bond finally got caught by the bad guys, disavowed and left to rot in jail?I’m willing to bet anything that someone at EON floated the idea of casting an actual former Bond girl for Paris Carver, and imagine how great that would’ve been. Jane Seymour, or Maryam d’Abo, both of whom played particularly naive and innocent characters who would’ve had real grudges against Bond for ditching them when they were no longer useful.
In any case, I rewatched this a while ago and it’s probably Brosnan’s 2nd best. I agree that the short runtime helped it – the pacing is great, and it moves like a freight train. Curiously, this is one of two films where EON decided to hire jobber directors (Roger Spottiswoode and Michael Apted) whose job seemed to be to manage the film set and nothing more. DAD is deservedly reviled, but at least Lee Tamahori had some experience with big-budget action movies.
Having the “bad” bond girl turn out to be the main villain would be fucking amazing.
Also, one thing that always bugged me about this movie. While the car chase is great and a lot of fun – Bond cackling with glee as he wrecks shit up is hilarious – I hated the fact that he was driving a BMW 7 series.James Bond should never drive a goddamn sedan.
Ha, shittest Bond car ever. James Bond, License to park up in a reserved executive spot at the office.
I think Goldeneye does have the game halo effect. And I think Tomorrow Never Dies gets the opposite from Die Another Day. Every time I hear the title I think “that’s the really crap one with the invisible car” before being reminded that that’s Die Another Day.
Hard no.
Brosnan is the 007 my generation grew up with, and yet his movies still didn’t do much for me- Which may explain why it took me longer to get into James Bond than other people. I suppose Tomorrow Never Dies (what a title!) is the one of his I like best (sorry GoldenEye), thanks largely to Hatcher and Yeoh. In fact, it’s the Brosnan-Era Bond girls (Famke Janssen, Sophie Marceau, Halley Berry, Rosemund Pike, and yes, I’m counting Judi Dench), that I think were the best thing about his run.
Totally agree with all of this. TND>Goldeneye
My favorite part of this movie is how they treat having remote start on Bonds BMW is AMAZING 🙂
The plot, about scrounging for wealth in new media by beating everyone else to the headline, is underrated
If we could go back in time and show Nathan Rabin and Josh Modell that there would be critics on this site ferociously dismantling their legacy praising shit films just because they are streaming by a site that is paying …. what would they say?
Brosnan was easily the best actor to play Bond. Yeoh was wasted in the movie, which was still rather entertaining. I’d still rather watch Tomorrow over any of the Craig movies.
The look of glee on Brosnan’s face as he remote controls the BMW is probably the best of his Bond. The characterization of Bond has been all over the place over the years, but a big part of its core is that he genuinely enjoys the crazy stunts he pulls. That was the biggest thing that went missing during Dalton’s stint as Bond.
Aside from Goldeneye, his film are shit bur I would love to see him portray Old Man Bond, though not nearly as much as I would like to see Timothy Dalton.
I think the “Christmas only comes once a year” line from The World is Not Enough hurt Brosnan’s reputation as Bond more than anything he did. When I saw it, the groan from the audience was probably audible in the theater hallway.
Bond movies always go right up to the edge of what can be taken seriously, but aren’t a joke, everybody knows that’s part of it. The audience has to feel in on it, not be the butt of it. To have to have the movie end on such an aggressively flippant note pulled the rug out.