The direction is fair at best. Lots of jump cut/shaky cam fight scenes. I must have gotten spoiled by the John Wick series because I hate shaky cam fights now. Every so often you get a good shot (sunset behind Bond, for example) but it's like the director was sleepwalking through half the production and every so often says "Hey - I have an idea... this'll look cool." Makes me long for Stanley Kubrick, who did that with EVERY shot and not just one every few minutes of screen time.
They had to be sure to include a gay character (Q, in this case) - which I don't care about. He's gay, he's not gay, I don't care. I like the character regardless. But it seemed like instead of expanding an already-interesting character they shoehorn Q into being a homosexual and it comes off like more of a joke than character development.
I love Naomie Harris as Moneypenny and Ralph Fiennes is a BOSS as M, but like Q, it seemed like they were trying to expand upon his character by making him complicit in the biological weapon's design and manufacture. That doesn't make him more interesting as a character. It makes him an ASSHOLE.
I love Rami Malek but he is criminally unused here. He doesn't even pop up until almost halfway through the movie. When he is onscreen, he gives painfully-written speeches and tries to make it sound like he and Bond are so very much alike. (they're not.) I don't blame Malek - he did the best he could with a shit script and directing.
Ultimately the problem is the script. It's hot garbage. Few, if any, memorable lines. Convoluted plot. Nanobots - deus ex machina. It would be more believable from a villain with a poisonous garden to make some sort of bioweapon instead, ala Moonraker. Rami is meant to be a master villain, but simply lets the little girl go after she has a minor temper tantrum and wants her woobie. Then James and the girl's mother find her two minutes later under a table. No suspense, no grandiose rescue - just, whoops! There she is!
It feels like the producers, writers, director, etc. are PUNISHING the character. I grew up on Moore's Bond - where he swung through the jungle doing a Tarzan yell, blew up a master villain with compressed air, swapped out a tarot reader's deck of cards to convince her to have sex with him, joked with a crowd while avoiding knife-wielding villains. IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE FUN. This was dreary and sappy. Bond is being punished for being a womanizer by not only pining for a woman whose character was killed off a few years ago but now he can never be with his love interest because the nanobots in his system will kill her. Cry cry. In the Moore films alone, he has sex with an average of two women in EVERY MOVIE. IT'S WHAT THE CHARACTER DOES. You don't have to like it, but that's how he's written. And it's what fans want to see. They want the sexy, sexist, womanizing hunk of a spy to get laid. It's part of the fun of the series.
I've heard whispers of how to proceed with the next film. Hey - let's make Bond a black guy. Let's make Bond a gay guy. Well, why not go the whole nine and make him a transsexual half Asian half Spanish lesbian with a pet chihuahua named Bob and a penchant for Blue Hawaiis instead of Martinis and he drives a VW Thing instead of the Aston Martin. OR... OR you could make your OWN new character and stop trying to change this one. I WANT to see Bond smoke cigarettes, I want to see him drinking martinis, I want to hear the cheeky jokes and see the fun gadgets, and I want to see Bond having sex with the most beautiful women you can imagine. Maybe I'm alone in that, but based on the ratings and reception of No Time to Die it looks like I'm not. (for the record, I don't have an issue with a black Bond - Idris Elbe would have been perfect, he's just a little too old for it now)
I've heard Henry Cavill's name thrown around recently as the new Bond. I guess I could see it. My choice would be Matthew Lewis (yes - Neville Longbottom from the Harry Potter movies) although Hiddleston would be a fine choice as well.
Grade: C-
Probably the worst of the Craig Bond movies.
