At 2 hours and 28 minutes that includes a wimpy soundtrack by Sam Smith (Where’s Adele when we need her?) and lyrics of “How do I breathe? Without you I have to risk it all,” this is the lightweight Daniel Craig in his final James Bond role. Physically he’s not as thick and muscular as he used to be. Instead more metro-sexual. And a bit of “I’m not going to take it anymore” attitude. This Bond stylishly cuts through the politics of bureaucratic authority.
The movie opens as it always does. One continuous scene stretched across rooftops with men leaping them…this time in Mexico City. But, Bond is reprimanded by his boss, ‘M’ (Ralph Fiennes) for risking a community of Mexican’s lives. But the life Bond is worried about is/was’ Q’ (Judi Dench) who tells him in a final message before she died: “If anything happens to me, find a man called Marco.” But the search to Marco leads to the discovery of a lot of emotional baggage for our boy, Bond.
He comes across yellowed and tattered documents suggesting who his childhood guardian was. His parents were killed in a climbing accident. In some roundabout way – through Tokyo, Austria, Africa and London – we learn that Oberhauser (Christoph Waltz) is an evil Kingpin behind one organization making multiple attacks. And btw, he’s Bond’s long lost step-brother.
There’s a lot of suspension of disbelief at play here, but the movie heats up romantically when Bond makes a promise to Mr. White (Jesper Christensen) to take care of his daughter, Madeleine Swann (Lea Seydoux) should he die. And what a daughter she is! Not only Oxford educated, but a doctor who just happens to go from one death-defying scene to another, hopping from country to country, and always with the perfect wardrobe. If she’s suddenly in Africa, she’s got the starched linen-white safari dress having come from an Austrian blizzard and a snow parka.
While the movie is drawn out in the middle, it somehow compensates with great car chases and other Bondish violence. The film is unnecessarily too long but it’s not to say it isn’t good. It is. And even if this is Craig’s final Bond film, let’s hope Sam Mendes continues to direct.