Skyfall (2012)

 "You were expecting an exploding pen?"

And so here we reach unexplored territory for me- until yesterday, I hadn't seen any James Bond films since Quantum of Solace because... well, you know. But this, the very next film, is an absolutely superb return to form, and I'm not only talking about the brilliant theme song.

One of the things you tend to notice at the start of a film, before you get "used" to it, is the artiness of the direction, the composition of the shots, the camera angles, that sort of thing. And yes, Sam Mendes shoots this film very creatively. And yet at no point does he forget that he's shooting an action film. The set pieces, the action sequences, they're particularly magnificent in this film and that's down to Mendes.

The script is superb too, though. This is a Bond who's getting older, past his peak, but determined to keep going. We have a new Q, more of a computer whiz than a purveyor of gadgets- nice idea, but let's see how long that lasts. This is M's swansong, of course, with Judi Dench doing a bloody good death scene and Ralph Fiennes taking over as the new M to whose name, shockingly, we are actually made privy.

Oh yes, and there's Eve. I like the reveal about her at the end... and it's a new spin on the character to have her be a former field agent. Even the villain has motives that are closer to home. Indeed, while this is in some ways a typical Bond film on the surface, with big action sequences in Istanbul and Shanghai, it's fundamentally more about character, with the climax being a siege in Bond's rather posh childhood home. And yet, still, it never forgets that it's an action film.

This is the best Bond film in a very long time.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)

 "You said I could eat bad guys!"

I only watched this film as an easy watch after a knackering day, expecting a non-demanding bit of third rate superhero fluff- much like this film's predecessor, enjoy it though I did.

Instead, directed by Andy Serkis- he of the recent extraordinary performance in Andor- we have a taut, entertaioning action film that doesn't outstay its welcome and develops its characters superbly. I know not of Carnage and Shriek- they are after my time as far as the comics are concerned- but I really loved them as characters, well written and acted. Woody Harrelson in particular is superb as a serial killer who, we learn only at the last minute, was made that was by child abuse. It just goes to show that those who participate in judicial killing, whether signing death warrants or administering a lethal injection, are as evil as their victims and deserve no less.

Not only the villains are well-characterised, of course. Ediie and Venom's bromance gets a nice little arc, and both of them come to accept that Anne is lost to them, and to wish her well.

The plot is simple yet effective, with the King Kong conclusion an oldie but goodie. This is a film about love, however twisted; about the lingering effects of child abuse; about the evils of judicial killing- those who take part in this vice all die- but, most of all, it's a rollicking ride.

And that mid-credits, echoing Spider-Man: No Way Home: the fugitive Eddie/Venom are in the MCU...?

A Cock and Bull Story (2005)

 "Poke your little pecker out the window..."

I've actually read (and indeed blogged) The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, which on balance added to my enjoyment of this very funny film. And yet one might just as well see this as a precursor to The Trip, and the partnership of Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon.

Of course, the whole thing is quite postmodern, alternating scenres of Tristram Shandy, that famiusly unfilmable novel, with a behind the scenes narrative where Brydon and, especially, Coogan, play versions of themselves, rather effectively.

The joke throughout, of course, is that Coogan himself hasn't read the novel, and everyone else has. Through all the buddy buddy stuff with Coogan, the jokes about his sexual difficulties following the birth of the baby and his habits of infidelity nonetheless, it's really all about the fourth wall.

Stephen Fry's academic cameo puts it best: the novel probably shouldn't be seen as postmodern, an anachronistic term. There's nothing modern about textual self-referentialism- see Rabelais and Cervantes- but it becomes rather less fasionable after Lawrence Sterne. By 2005, it's back, and can be commingled with actual postmodernism. Hence this film, and its almost obvious playfulness with the fourth wall, where Coogan's sexual wakwardness echoes Walter Shandy's. Yet Coogan's life is like the Shany of the novel; too complex, real and nuanced to accurately be summed up by any narrative or work of art.

This film isn't as deep as I've made it sound. But it's funny.