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DVD Die Another Day (Full Screen Special Edition)
The 20th James Bond adventure, Die Another Day succeeds on three important fronts: it avoids comparison to Austin Powers by keeping its cheesy humor in check, allows Halle Berry to be sexy and worthy of a spinoff franchise, and keeps pace with the technical wizardry that modern action films demand. Pierce Brosnan's got style and staying power as James Bond, now bearing little resemblance to Ian Fleming's original British super-spy, but able to hold his own at the box office. He's paired with American agent Jinx (Berry) in chasing a genetically altered North Korean villain (Rick Yune) armed with a satellite capable of destroying just about anything. John Cleese and Judi Dench reprise their recurring roles (as "Q" and "M," respectively); they're accompanied by weapons-laden sports cars, a hokey cameo by Madonna (who sings the techno-pulsed theme song), and enough double-entendres to keep Bond-philes adequately shaken and stirred. With clever nods to 007's cinematic legacy, Die Another Day makes you welcome the familiar end-credits promise: James Bond will return. --Jeff Shannon
Review(s): DVD Die Another Day (Full Screen Special Edition)
A Return to Science Fiction
In 2002 Pierce Brosnan returned for the fourth and final time as James Bond, in the twentieth official Bond film. I enjoyed this film more than "The World Is Not Enough," but less than "Tomorrow Never Dies." I find it interesting that so many Bond fans dislike this movie so much. There are things about this movie to dislike, but this movie has as much going for it as the other Bond movies with a strong science fiction flavor, and perhaps more than some.
This Bond movie begins with Bond penetrating North Korea. However, something goes wrong and North Koreans capture Bond. During the opening credits we see bits and pieces as Bond is tortured and Madonna sings a song from her electronic period (can we say "yuck?"). Soon after the credits are finished Bond is traded for diamond decorated Zao (Rick Yune). Bond is not pleased that he was traded, but is even less pleased that he is being considered a traitor. Bond is not one for waiting for things to happen, so he escapes from custody to discover that he is in Hong Kong.
Bond slowly discovers that Zao and Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens) are somehow linked. Gustav demonstrates the Icarus solar satellite in Iceland, both for its ostensible purpose (providing light in dark regions of the world when needed) and for a far more nefarious purpose. Bond never waivers from his goal, helped along the way by Halle Berry as Jinx, Judi Dench as M, and John Cleese as the new Q.
Several things about this movie annoyed me. I thought Madonna's role in the movie was okay (though others did not think so; read more below). However, her song was annoying. I would have to nominate Madonna's song in this movie as one of the worst Bond theme songs ever. I was also displeased by the CGI used when Bond escapes from being drowned. The escape looked like a video game, and was cheesy by Bond standards. The escape should have been handled in a fashion that did not required animating Bond.
On the plus side, this movie had a lot of cool stuff. The opening scene was filmed for real. The surfers were taken out to the waves on jet powered wave runners which enabled them to ride the big waves. The invisible car was a major coup for the film makers. In fact, the military has been experimenting with techniques to make people and vehicles literally invisible for several years, and though they are well behind Q, one of the approaches is similar.
The CGI of the Icarus satellite was excellent; one of the best CGI spacecraft ever. I enjoyed the car chase between Zao and Bond in the ice hotel. In the making of features there is lengthy discussion of the changes that had to be made to accomplish the car chase. I also enjoyed the fight scene in the laser room between Bond and Mr. Kil (Lawrence Makoare). The robot and laser combination was a stroke of genius, and Halle Berry's peril appeared real.
Last, but not least, is the sword fight between Bond and Graves. Most of the scenes were filmed with Brosnan and Stephens, a tribute to both men's abilities.
This movie edition also includes an incredible array of extras on two discs. There are two commentaries, a "pop-up" sort of extra feature that explains details of scenes, dozens of pictures, numerous making of features, and much more. The only extra that I found a little disappointing was the audio commentary by Brosnan and Rosamund Pike (who played agent Miranda Frost). In all the other audio commentaries I have heard where two people are involved the people interact. It was apparent to me that the commentaries of Brosnan and Pike were recorded separately, and thus the comments are independent snippets that I sometimes found annoying.
This movie received an incredible 25 award nominations of all sorts from various organizations and countries, winning 5. The only downside was the Razzie Award to Madonna for Worst Supporting Actress, and the Razzie nomination for Worst Original Song. I think this may have been the Bond film with the most award nominations ever, and possibly the most award wins ever.
"Die Another Day" marks 40 years of "official" Bond films. Bond films are a microcosm of western technology, showing what we thought of as high-tech in five different decades. I find it interesting that what we considered cutting edge in the early Bond films has been surpassed by what we have in our homes today. I also find the changes in styles and mannerisms interesting as well. Yet, through it all Bond remains suave and self-assured, seemingly invincible and with vast knowledge and capability. While there are no real supermen of which we are aware, if there were such a being, Bond would have to be one.
My favorite movie!
I'm being sarcastic, so I hope you noticed. I never was a big Bond fan. They're all the same thing basically, Bond meets girl, Bond beats up bad guys, Bond is invincible. These movies really demonstrate the same invincibility tis man has. But, here we've gone too far. To call this movie unrealistic is unfair. It is the father of unrealism. There are maybe only two Bonds that are 5 star babies to me and this ain't one. It was in the "so called classics" that some were good. I say some. But, some of Connery's were great action flicks that you've gotta love. This movie is pathetic. It has Bond doing the usual but in horrible fashion. We see him go to prison, get his but kicked for what purpose? We all know he's going to live! Then he shows us that he is a master fencer (?), great with women, great with cars, great with guns, great with everything. Everyone would love to be this guy. I mean he survives the sun (which was somehow controlled?!?! I mean am I an idiot? Isn't that a little too unrealistic and absurd?!)jumps off a cliff making a parachute somehow and then using a little platform to surfboard in HUGE waves! What this? Sounds similiar to that idiotic scene at the start of Batman and Robin where they surfboard in mid air?! I guess so!
So, if you like Bond and want to watch him do the same thing for the billionth time, then watch this pathectic movie, but if you're like me and want to see actually a good movie, then don't watch this horrid movie!
Spectacular Espionage with a taste of eroticism in a suit
Although Sean Connery defines James Bond Pierce Brosnan refines the character to perfection. He adds so well to the character via his mannerisms. In this installment he extended his role superbly. Who doesnt want to be James Bond? A man in a suit swooning women wether ally or foe with intellect, skills and looks but yet deadly if necessary. However, I must add that Halle Berry as a Bond girl was excellent she definitely should play further roles in the Bond series her beauty and talent complimented her well.
Die Another Day was a great creation, excellent use of the gadgets especially the Aston Martin (The perfect Bond car) and fight scenarios. It was also great how they showed a tribute to past James Bond films. Who could now ever forget Halle Berry rising and exiting the water like a butterfly, a beautiful transmogrification on the scene with Ursula Andress in Dr No. Small flaw in the CGI for the scene in which Bond evades death by wind surfing but otherwise the picture won me over.
Other espionage pictures have not challenge Bond in its deliverance of excitement so far. I wish further creations of Bond could keep that winning combination of actors, actresses etc. that it utilise so effectively in Die Another Day.
Related DVD's Die Another Day (Full Screen Special Edition)
Pierce Brosnan returns for his second stint as James Bond (after GoldenEye), and he's doing it in high style with an invigorating cast of costars. It's only appropriate that a Bond film from 1997 would find Agent 007 pitted against a media mogul (Jonathan Pryce) who's going to start a global war (beginning with stolen nuclear missiles aimed at China) to create attention-grabbing headlines for his latest multimedia news channel. It's the information age run amok, and Bond must team up with a lovely and lethal agent from the Chinese External Security Force (played by Honk Kong action star Michelle Yeoh) to foil the madman's plot of global domination. Luckily for Bond, the villain's wife (Teri Hatcher) is one of his former lovers, and at the behest of his superior M (Judi Dench), 007... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Pierce Brosnan - Jonathan Pryce - Michelle Yeoh - Teri Hatcher Director(s): Roger Spottiswoode DVD Release Date: Released the 22 October 2002 This item is currently not available.
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In his 19th screen outing, Ian Fleming's superspy is once again caught in the crosshairs of a self-created dilemma: as the longest-running feature-film franchise, James Bond is an annuity his producers want to protect, yet the series' consciously formulaic approach frustrates any real element of surprise beyond the rote application of plot twists or jump cuts to shake up the audience. This time out, credit 007's caretakers for making some visible attempts to invest their principal characters with darker motives--and blame them for squandering The World Is Not Enough's initial promise by the final reel.
By now, Bond pictures are as elegantly formal as a Bach chorale, and this one opens on an unusually powerful note. A stunning pre-title sequence reaches beyond mere pyrotechnics... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Pierce Brosnan - Sophie Marceau Director(s): Michael Apted DVD Release Date: Released the 16 May 2000 This item is currently not available.
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The 18th James Bond adventure was a runaway box-office success when released in 1995, thanks to the arrival of Pierce Brosnan as the fifth actor (following the departure of Timothy Dalton) to play the suave, danger-loving Agent 007. This James Bond is a bit more vulnerable and psychologically complex--and just a shade more politically correct--but he's still a formally attired playboy at heart, with a lovely Russian beauty (Izabella Scorupco) as his sexy ally against a cadre of renegade Russians bent on--what else?--global domination. There's also a seductive villainous with the suggestive name of Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen), and the great actress Judi Dench makes her first appearance as Bond's superior, M, who wisecracks about 007's "dinosaur" status as a globetrotting sexist. All in... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Pierce Brosnan - Sean Bean - Izabella Scorupco Director(s): Martin Campbell DVD Release Date: Released the 22 October 2002 This item is currently not available.
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After years of enduring Roger Moore in the role of James Bond, it was good to have Sean Connery back in this 1983 film for a one-time-only trip down 007's memory lane. Connery's Bond, a bit of a dinosaur in the British secret service at (then) 52, is still in demand during times of crisis. Sadly, the film is not very good. In this rehash of Thunderball, Bond is pitted against a worthy underwater villain (Klaus Maria Brandauer); and while the requisite Bond Girls include beauties Kim Basinger and Barbara Carrera, they can't save the movie. The script has several truly dumb passages, among them a (gasp) video-game duel between 007 and his nemesis that now looks utterly anachronistic. For Connery fans, however, this widescreen print of the Irvin Kershner (The Empire Strikes... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Irvin Kershner DVD Release Date: Released the 17 October 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
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Timothy Dalton's second and last shot at playing James Bond isn't nearly as much fun as his debut, two years earlier, in the 1987 The Living Daylights. This time Bond gets mad after a close friend (David Hedison) from the intelligence sector is assassinated on his wedding day, and 007 goes undercover to link the murder to an international drug cartel. Robert Davi makes an interesting adversary, but as with most of the Bond films in the '70s, '80s, and '90s--and especially since the end of the cold war--one has to wonder why we should still care about these lesser villains and their unimaginative crimes. Still, Dalton did manage in his short time with the character to make 007 his own, which neither Roger Moore did nor Pierce Brosnan did. --Tom KeoghMore Info about this DVD Actor(s): Timothy Dalton - Robert Davi Director(s): John Glen (II) DVD Release Date: Released the 22 October 2002 This item is currently not available.
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