GoldenEye (1995)

Starring: Pierce Brosnan, Judi Dench, Sean Bean, Izabella Scorupco, Famke Janssen

Director: Martin Campbell

Genre: Action, Adventure, Thriller

Rating: B

"You don't like me, Bond. You don't like my methods. You think I'm an accountant, a bean counter more interested in my numbers than your instincts." "The thought had occurred to me." "Good, because I think you're a sexist, misogynist dinosaur. A relic of the Cold War, whose boyish charms, though wasted on me, obviously appealed to that young woman I sent out to evaluate you." "Point taken."

How to summarize the plot without spoiling... Nine years after the death of agent 006, Alec Trevelyan (Bean), during an infiltration of a Soviet chemical weapons facility, Bond (Brosnan) is charged with following Xenia Onatopp (Janssen), a member of the Janus crime syndicate.  After killing a Royal Canadian Navy admiral Xenia and a colleague massacre a bunch of people and steal the control disc for the dual GoldenEye satellite weapons, which emits electromagnetic pulses and destroys computers basically.  But, of course, Bond is on the mission, and is aided by the only survivor of the massacre, Natalya Simonov (Scorupco).

My big problem with GoldenEye is that there was a huge set up for the villains to be the Russians.  I got bored with the Soviets as villains in the previous films, I'm not looking forward to it's slightly different but basically the same variation now that the Cold War has ended.  That being said, though, I really like the direction that the movie then decided to go in.  The whole rouge agent plot is awesome, especially if you realize that they did it from the other angel in Licence to Kill, where Bond was the rouge.

My favourite moment in this movie, however, is when M (Dench) called Bond out on his behaviour.  Everything that she said in the line (which I quoted at the top) is exactly what I've been saying for a lot of movies now. Bond is sexist and myogynistic.  He's also a relic of the Cold War simply because so many of these movies have to do with the idea of Soviets/Russians being the villains.  I only hope that by calling him on it M is predicting a change in the movies, a leap forward.  Another thing, weirdly enough, that I liked was that Bond showed no problem with the idea of killing Xenia.  When she was introduced I was kind of worried that they would go the way of May Day (Grace Jones) in A View to Kill, but I was happy that they didn't.  Bond's changing, however slowly.

Mirror Mirror (2012)

Stars: Julia Roberts, Lily Collins, Armie Hammer, Nathan Lane, Jordan Prentice, Mark Povinelli, Joe Gnoffo, Danny Woodburn, Sebastian Saraceno, Martin Klebba, Ronald Lee Clark, Mare Winningham, Sean Bean
Director: Tarsem Singh Dhandwar

Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Drama

Rating: B-

The first of the two feature films on the legend of Snow White, Mirror Mirror is an attempt to reimagine the story in a feminine world while remaining child friendly.  This whole idea, or at least the reimaging portion of it, is a common theme in current retellings of Snow White, to the point that it’s pushing becoming a cliché (and will definitely achieve such a status by the end of the year, what with the two Snow White movies coming out and the Snow White television show on ABC).  My problem with Mirror Mirror is that in its reimaging it really loses elements of the original story.  I like the idea of an action girl Snow White, who is as eager to fight the evil queen alongside her prince and the dwarves, but I still want the poison apples and true loves kiss and what not.

The story is such: Once upon a time there was a young girl, Snow White (Collins), who had a wonderful father, the King (Bean), but no mother.  One day her father marries again, so as to give his daughter a mother.  But the new Queen (Roberts) is somewhat of a wicked stepmother; more concerned with maintaining her beauty and power than anything else.  The King eventually goes off to fight a great evil, from which he never returns, leaving the power to rule in the Queen’s hands.  She essentially locks Snow up in the castle, forbidding her to leave, and taxes the country into destitution.  Snow finally comes to her senses and realizes that she should stand up for her people… causing the Queen to get a henchman (Lane) to kill her; he fails to do so, and Snow ends up moving in with seven dwarfs (Prentice, Povinelli, Gnoffo, Woodburn, Saraceno, Klebba, and Clark), who teach her their banditry ways and provide her with room and board, in exchange for her far superior cooking.  Oh, and also, there’s a Prince (Hammer), who is being pursued by the Queen despite his strong attraction to Snow.  Sound familiar?

The highlight of this film is the dwarfs, which I think is a bit typical of a Snow White film.  They don’t sing and dance, but they do provide a good comic relief for the film.  They are, if not in name than in essence, Teacher, Grumpy, Weird, Gay (or European?), Pervy, Hungry, and Giggles.  Each one is a very unique character and while they don’t really get much individual development in the film they do more than just push the plot forward.  Even during the obligatory montage they interact with Snow in a way that is unique unto them.  It takes awhile for Snow herself to become a strong character, but as she begins to escape from the Queen’s hold she begins to show her independence.  She never descends into the damsel in distress category, even when she is in a distressful position.  The Queen is far less evil than in other depictions, although she is a bit flat.  Her motivation really is the desire to stay beautiful, and the way in which her magic works isn’t really explained.  The world that she travels to in order to get to her magic mirror is cool, as is the being inside of it, but the whole aspect isn’t really developed.  The consequences of her using magic aren’t fully explained either, just ominously threatened.  The idea in itself, however, is rather clichéd, so I guess it doesn’t really need to be further developed.  In some ways, the Prince is more villainous than the Queen.  Like Snow he has to go through some development, but in the beginning of the film he is pretty much everything that you would expect of a fairytale Prince Charming: attractive, daring, charming, conceited, and totally sexist.  He does grow and realize the error of his personality, and it is that development that is one of the few surprising moments of the movie.  That being said, however, while Mirror Mirror is a bit predictable, and doesn’t fully embrace the elements of the classic story, it is still a fun movie and, I suspect probably the best Snow White movie to come out this year.