Movie Review - Skyfall

Why, yes, that is an Aston-Martin DB5. Surprise!

It appears that the Bond producers have pulled a fast one on us. Casino Royal was not, in fact, the "reboot" of the Bond series; it merely set us up for Skyfall, which is more a low-level reformat than a reboot and probably a happy consequence of the failure of the not-very-good Quantum Of Solace, for which there was no excuse but now we can call it "middle of the trilogy" and ignore the awful plot and excessive flash-cutting. Casino Royale broke him in and then broke his heart; Skyfall tears him apart and rebuilds him. The result is a 21st-century Bond, relevant to the brave new world of global finance and cyberterrorism and corruption in high places and the utter inability of the few remaining honest members of the political class to deal with them. And a new - stop reading right now if you don't want to know - a new M, and a new Q, and even a new secretary named Moneypenny. The film is not without its faults (chief among them is the usual Hollywood notion that computers are magic) and so takes second place to Casino Royale, but not by much. The ending makes Southern Man downright hungry for the next one. After fifty years, James Bond is new again, and Skyfall is one more reason to break down and buy a big-screen television and a Blu-ray player.