Pierce Brosnan

The James Bond Project #22:  Die Another Day (2002)

~ Randy Blazak ~ 8 Comments

May 26, 2025

This series is intended to evaluate each product of the James Bond film franchise through a feminist lens, and the relevance of the Bond archetype to shifting ideas of masculinity in the 2020s.

Die Another Day (2002, directed by Lee Tamahori)

The first Bond film of the 21st century and the last Pierce Brosnan 007 role was also intended to be a celebration of 40 years of James Bond movies. Several directors were considered, including Ang Lee and Martin Scorsese, but producer Barbara Broccoli settled on New Zealander Lee Tamahori, who directed the brilliant When We Were Warriors (1994). The result is a sweeping adventure that pulls together North Korean torture chambers, conflict diamonds, and Halle Berry into a film that is often placed at the bottom of Bond lists but is also surprisingly satisfying. Die Another Day would mark the end of 40 year run and take Bond into a new era with the arrival of Daniel Craig.

Die Another Day is meant to pay homage to all the previous Eon Bond films. Halle Berry walks out onto a Cuban beach as a doppelgänger of Ursula Andress in Dr. No (1962). John Cleese has been promoted to Q and his laboratory is a museum of past 007 gadgets, including the jet pack from Thunderball (1965). I’m sure there’s a website that goes through the film’s nods. (Live and Let Die’s interracial love scene?) There was even talk of having Sean Connery make a cameo.

As is expected, we get James underwater and on snow. James in a tux, making plenty of sexual double entendres (“ I have been known to keep my tip up”), and James in exotic locales; North Korea, Cuba, and Iceland. But there are also some departures. The opening title sequence features a theme song sung by Madonna (who also has a small role in the film) with usual female bodies, but also a montage of Bond being tortured in a North Korean prison. Weird. Also, the film relies heavily on CGI, including a really dumb invisible Aston Martin. So dated now.

There are actually a lot of dumb things in this film. We’re to believe that 007 was tortured for 14 straight months in North Korea, allowing his hair to grow a few feet. There’s also a Korean terrorist named Zao, played by Rick Yune, who has diamonds embedded in his face from a blast and I kept thinking, “With a pair of tweezers, I could take care of that for you.” There’s also the classic dumb Bond trope of using “science” to change somebody’s face to look like somebody’s else face. And then there’s the thing of James running around Iceland without a parka on. Not only does a single bullet not strike Bond, neither does a chill.

Let’s plug Bond at 40 into our matrix, shall we?

Driver of Action – We do get a little bit of Halle Berry previewing her 2004 Catwoman role, but this is a Jame Bond revenge movie. Although he doesn’t seem that angry that he was tortured in a North Korean jail for 14 months. In Brosnan’s final jaunt as 007, all plot lines are on him. Even M is sidelined.

Role of Violence – 007 takes out a few dozen guards and henchmen in the film, including during an over-the top hovercraft chase scene. There’s a pretty awesome sword fight scene between Bond and bad guy Gustave Graves (played by Toby Stephens) that smashes up a fancy fencing hall that’s so old school film violence that I didn’t want it to end. And the Bond kills Graves by opening his parachute on a plane so he gets sucked through the jet engine, which is pretty gross. If 40 years, there hasn’t been shred of remorse for this body count.

Vulnerability – After Bond has been traded for Zao to get him out of North Korea, M takes away his “00” status on the belief that James revealed state secrets under torture. He could have taken his cyanide pill but chose not to. (“Threw it away years ago…” he tells M.) There’s a brief moment where James is confronted with the realization, “If I’m not 007, what am I?” But it’s just a split second. Then he goes ape shit and busts out on his rogue (again) vengeance mission.

Sexual Potency – The sex scene with Halle Berry’s character, Jinx, is pretty hot, with her on top. Woman power! I remember seeing this in the theater and slinking into my seat. (Remind me to tell you the story of meeting Berry at a Braves game.) He also beds MI-6 operative Miranda Frost (played by Rosamund Pike), which seems completely unbelievable and dumb. Shockingly, there is a scene of Bond nailing Miss Moneypenny on her desk, but it turns out just be a fantasy she’s having on Q’s virtual reality contraption. So, we don’t get the “3 conquests” quota, and that’s probably a good thing.

Connection – Bond is so alone. More alone than in any previous film. M, Q, and all the other letters are annoyances. Jinx is an NSA agent so there is some connection there and they do end up flying a helicopter to a Korean island to role around in a pile of conflict diamonds, but it’s more obligatory than romantic. Poor James.

Toxic Masculinity Scale: 5

Summary This isn’t a great Bond film, but it is a romp. There’s cool stuff that are like a series of chef’s kisses for loyal Bond fans. The opening scene of Bond and South Korean soldiers surfing massive waves to land behind the DMZ is cool. Bond driving a 50s convertible in Havana is cool. Bond escaping the hospital bed by stopping his own heart is cool. Dumb, but cool. And the Clash’s “London Calling” playing as he flies back to HQ is super cool.

The 40th Anniversary Bond also suffers from the trap of toxic masculinity. The man alone who kills without consequence and beds women without care or kindness because that’s what men do is just sad decade after decade after decade after decade. He’s morphed into a robot. I suppose that’s functional for the MI-6 mandate, but it’s not human. Ten years earlier, the cost of this life was explored in Clint Eastwood’s brilliant film, The Unforgiven. But for James Bond, the cartoon character in a new millennium, it’s just a fading shell of what men were supposed to be.

Die Another Day premiered on November 18, 2002 at Royal Albert Hall with Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip in attendance. It was the week the SARS pandemic was causing panic and the week President Bush created the Department of Homeland Security. The world was changing and the relevance of a 007 was, again, in doubt. Or maybe needed more than ever. It would be up to Daniel Craig to tell us.

Next: Casino Royale (2006)

The James Bond Project #21:  The World Is Not Enough (1999)

The James Bond Project #20:  Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

The James Bond Project #19: GoldenEye (1995)

The James Bond Project #18: License to Kill (1989)

The James Bond Project #17: The Living Daylights (1987)

The James Bond Project #16: A View to a Kill (1985)

The James Bond Project #15: Never Say Never Again (1983)

The James Bond Project #14: Octopussy (1983)

The James Bond Project #13: For Your Eyes Only (1981)

The James Bond Project #12: Moonraker (1979)

The James Bond Project #11: The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

The James Bond Project #10: The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

The James Bond Project #9: Live and Let Die (1973)

The James Bond Project #8: Diamonds are Forever (1971)

The James Bond Project #7: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)

The James Bond Project #6: You Only Live Twice (1967)

The James Bond Project #5: Casino Royale (1967)

The James Bond Project #4: Thunderball (1965)

The James Bond Project #3: Goldfinger (1964)

The James Bond Project #2: From Russia With Love (1963)

The James Bond Project: #1: Dr. No (1962)

The James Bond Project #21:  The World Is Not Enough (1999)

~ Randy Blazak ~ 6 Comments

May 1, 2025

This series is intended to evaluate each product of the James Bond film franchise through a feminist lens, and the relevance of the Bond archetype to shifting ideas of masculinity in the 2020s.

The World Is Not Enough (1999, directed by Michael Apted)

Four decades of 007 movies and so many bullets fired at Bond. Not that I want to see James get shot, but couldn’t one bullet at least graze his perfect temple? The World Is Not Enough, Pierce Brosnan’s third go at 007, finds Brosnan comfortably coasting as Bond in a film with epic stunts but not much else. Eon Productions still seems unsure of Bond’s role in a post-Cold War world, so they rely on the time-tested (over 37 years! That’s 4 years older than Jesus Christ!!) conventions. James in a tux in a casino. James wrestling a nuclear submarine. James and his obligatory three sexual conquests. Yawn.

Barbara Broccoli wanted to find a director who could bring out strong female performances. (Peter Jackson, pre-LOTR, had been considered.) She settled on Michael Apted because of his work with Sigourney Weaver (Gorillas in the Mist), Jodie Foster (Nell) and Sissy Spacek (Coal Miner’s Daughter). All three women were nominated for Oscars (with Spacek winning). One would think that would lead to a more woman-centered film, especially after the heavy reliance on Michelle Yeoh in Tomorrow Never Dies. Nope. TWINE is about as boilerplate Bond as we get.

Side note, as a viewer who has been keeping an eye on the credits of these films, the one filmmaking role that is most constantly populated by women (besides costumes, and hair & makeup) is the casting director. According to 2025 data, 74% of casting directors in the United States are women. So one wonders what casting director Debbie McWilliams was thinking when she cast Denise Richards as nuclear physicist Dr. Christmas Jones. Richards was an “it” girl in the late 90s, starring in two of my favorite fluff films of the era, Starship Troopers and Wild Things. She might be believable cast as a substitute high school science teacher (maybe), but as a nuclear physicist dressed as Lara Croft, completely laughable. Maybe Barbara Broccoli was trying to hold on to the horny teenage boy demographic (who, in 1999, were heavily breaking for Natalie Portman in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace).

There were some casting coups in TWINE. Robert Carlylem, who had been so great in Trainspotting, was cast as the psychotic terrorist, Renard. And Sophie Marceau, the French actress who stared in Braveheart and Anna Karenina, played the erotically complex role of Electra. But most notable was the final performance of Desmond Llewelyn as Q. The one consistent thread through the Bond franchise was Llewelyn’s Q, starting with From Russia with Love in 1963, through 17 films. TWINE had Q training his replacement, R (played by Monty Python’s John Cleese) and joking about retirement, but his fate in the series was sealed. Three weeks after the premiere of TWINE, Llewelyn, 85, was driving home in his Renault Mégane, when he was hit head on by 35-year-old man in a Fiat. To die a young man’s death.

The World Is Not Enough, as expected, has plenty of exotic locations, including Spain, Azerbaijan, and an UNDERGROUND LAIR in Kazakhstan. We even get the Bond staple of 007 on skis being chased by Russian assassins. (Don’t fix it if it ain’t broke.) But this film finally gives us an action sequence in London with an epic boat chase on the Thames that climaxes with Bond flying off his rocket boat and grabbing a dangling rope of hot air balloon that the beautiful assassin is getting away in. (Assassin played by Maria Grazia Cucinotta. I had to look her up.) Cinema!

The 20th century of Bond ended, not with a bang, but with a meh. Let’s analyze it.

Driver of Action – Unlike the previous film, TWINE is a Bond solo vehicle. There’s a subplot about a relationship between Renard and Electra but it’s barely dealt with. M has more of a role but she’s mostly another damsel in distress for 007 to rescue. The world is not enough for the black hole that is James Bond.

Role of Violence – The body count is significantly less than the last two Brosnan films. About 19, if you don’t count all the henchmen that drown in the nuclear submarine. He kills Renard with a nuclear fuel rod to the chest. More dramatic is when he confronts Elektra for planning mass murder. “You wouldn’t kill me. You’d miss me,” she says. “I never miss,” he says then shoots her in the chest. She dies in her bed and Bond lays on top of her in one of the creepiest moments in the franchise.

Vulnerability – Early in the film we see James wearing glasses, but they may be a disguise, not a sign of aging. Later, when the beautiful assassin blows up her hot air ballon, he falls, crashing on a roof and dislocating his shoulder. It’s not getting shot, but it’s something. Later, Elektra talks about the death of her mother and asks James, “Have you ever lost someone?” but the scene moves on before we can get a glimpse of James recalling the death of his wife. That inference is left for longtime Bond fans.

Sexual Potency – The formula is in play. First Bond sleeps an MI-6 doctor, Dr. Molly Warmflash (I shit you not) so he can get her to forge a doctors note so James can get back to work. Then he sleeps with Elektra, who turns out to be a bad girl. At the end of the film, he sleeps with Dr. Christmas Jones as M, R, and the rest of the MI-6 brass watch their humping heat signatures. Bond quips, “And I thought Christmas only came once a year.” Check, please!  And, just to check it off the list, there is the prerequisite sex banter between James and Moneypenny. “Close, but no cigar.”

Connection – Yeah, no. Brosnan has mastered Moore’s detached Bond. There’s no sense of connection, not even with the fading Q or captured M. There are no CIA friends to lean on. We’re not sure why he sleeps with Elektra. It’s just expected. And his relationship with Denise Richards’ nuclear-physicist-damsel-in-distress-in-wet-clothes is more than flimsy. They don’t end up in a screwing in a boat. They do it on a rooftop in Istanbul while fireworks explode overhead. But for a Bond climax, it’s pretty flaccid.

Toxic Masculinity Scale – 6

Summary Bond 1999 is a disappointment. The previous film, Tomorrow Never Dies, offered so much promise. TWINE feels like a big back slide. Brosnan is playing a cartoon character version of James Bond, swimming up from the floor of the Black Sea, with his damsel in distress, holding his breath. (If ever a scene needed a man-eating shark.) We expect the sexy one-liners. When future beautiful assassin is just the beautiful cigar girl, she asks James, “Would you like to check my figures? Bond replies, “Oh, I’m sure they’re perfectly rounded.” Low hanging fruit. The action scenes redeem somewhat but, otherwise, this is 007 the two-dimensional prick.

The film was originally going to be called James Bond 2000, but they moved up the release to cash in on the holiday season and the film did quite well. (It was the first film I saw as a new homeowner on Thanksgiving night 1999.) The World Is Not Enough premiered in LA on November 8, 1999, as a MGM film (not United Artists). Four days later a massive earthquake struck Turkey, destroying some of the locations used in the film. The theme  song, performed by Garbage, attempted to make the film contemporary, but the TWINE made Bond feel like an artifact of the 20th century. Brosnan would have one more chance to update Bond for the new millennium.

Next: Die Another Day (2002)

The James Bond Project #20:  Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

The James Bond Project #19: GoldenEye (1995)

The James Bond Project #18: License to Kill (1989)

The James Bond Project #17: The Living Daylights (1987)

The James Bond Project #16: A View to a Kill (1985)

The James Bond Project #15: Never Say Never Again (1983)

The James Bond Project #14: Octopussy (1983)

The James Bond Project #13: For Your Eyes Only (1981)

The James Bond Project #12: Moonraker (1979)

The James Bond Project #11: The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

The James Bond Project #10: The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

The James Bond Project #9: Live and Let Die (1973)

The James Bond Project #8: Diamonds are Forever (1971)

The James Bond Project #7: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)

The James Bond Project #6: You Only Live Twice (1967)

The James Bond Project #5: Casino Royale (1967)

The James Bond Project #4: Thunderball (1965)

The James Bond Project #3: Goldfinger (1964)

The James Bond Project #2: From Russia With Love (1963)

The James Bond Project: #1: Dr. No (1962)

The James Bond Project #19: GoldenEye (1995)

~ Randy Blazak ~ 8 Comments

April 15, 2025

This series is intended to evaluate each product of the James Bond film franchise through a feminist lens, and the relevance of the Bond archetype to shifting ideas of masculinity in the 2020s.

GoldenEye (1995, directed by Martin Campbell)

The first Bond film in the fourth decade of the 007 franchise is something of a synthesis of all the previous EON Production films and a fair send-off for EON producer Cubby Broccoli, who died five months after its release. After a long six year gap, while Eon dragged Timothy Dalton into development hell, Bond was back with Pierce Brosnan as the new British MI-6 commander. GoldenEye fused License to Kill’s vengeful 007 with the smarmy, Casanova Bond of the past. The first Bond film not to be based on an Ian Fleming story is a sweeping tale that presents Bond with his first post-Cold War conflict and was tailor-made for 90s audiences who were getting used to the widescreen violence in films like Natural Born Killers.

Brosnan, who had been offered the role before Dalton, comes in a more upper crust English, but also more boyish, Bond who has parachuted into a third-wave feminist world. This disconnect is magnified by the new M, now played by Dame Judi Dench. The new M states a clear opinion on the archetype that is Bond, James Bond. “I think you’re a sexist, misogynist dinosaur, a relic of the Cold War, whose boyish charms are wasted on me,” she tells him. Welcome to the 90s, James. We still have Desmond Llewelyn as Q to link us to the Bond cannon. This installment’s Bond “girl” is Swedish model and actress Izabella Scorupco, who forces a rough Russian accent. Also trying to be Russian (or Georgian) is “sadistic lust murderer” Xenia Onatopp (There’s the names we love in these films), played by Famke Janssen (soon to be Jean Grey in the X-Men films).

GoldenEye starts with a flashback to the Cold War days with 007 and 006 on a mission in the Soviet Union where 006 (played by the great Sean Bean) is killed. Bond blames himself, setting up the revenge redux. After an epic scene where James dives into a falling plane (This is the first Bond film to use CGI), we flash forward to the present where new Russia is losing track of its shit and we’re off. The scene where James is chasing the rogue Russian general through the streets in St. Petersburg in a giant Russian tank was classic 007 thrills on the big screen. I remember watching it in the Lloyd Center Cinema and thinking it was the wildest thing filmmakers could cock up for a James Bond movie.

This installment gives us plenty of Bond staples fans crave. There’s Bond in a tux, playing baccarat, there’s Bond in the Caribbean, there’s the double entendre quips (none very clever), and thousands of bullets fired at our James with nary a scratch. The film also features some epic stunts, including a record setting bungee jump off a Russian (actually Swiss) dam that has to be seen to believed. Brosnan plays Bond closer to Moore than Connery and his bourgeois demeanor adds to the “Man out of place” element that makes this film kinda fun. Cubby Broccoli’s daughter, Barbara, took over the production as her father’s health failed, so some of the gender commentary may have been here doing.

Let’s see how GoldenEye fares in our feminist matrix.

Driver of Action – New Bond, new star. Q and his lab techs show up for comedic effect. There’s a new CIA agent, Jack Wade, to help out (Joe Don Baker is back!) because Felix is still legless from the shark. The new post-communist Russia really plays the support role. In the gap between Yeltsin and Putin, it presented a blank slate to the world, where the need for secret agents might be a thing of the past. But this film rests purely on the shoulders of Remington Steele star Pierce Brosnan.

Role of Violence – There’s a lot of slaughter in GoldenEye, largely due to Bond’s use of machine guns. I had to ask ChatGBT the body count because I lost track. AI reports James killed 47 people in the film, mostly Russian soldiers. (Wasn’t the Cold War over?) There’s also some weird violent sexual scenes with Xenia Onatopp (we’re to believe that violence is her kink) and a scene where 007 knocks her unconscious.

Vulnerability – For the first time in a Bond film, we learn that James’ parents were killed in a mountain climbing accident when he was a boy. But there’s no sense that this plays a role in his present psyche. It’s just presented as a factoid to contrast the story that 006’s parents were killed by Stalin.  There’s no James in love and only a mild sense of guilt that 006’s death might be his fault.

Sexual Potency – Here’s the James Bond rule of three. 1) Caroline – An MI-6 psychologist, sent to evaluate James, gets seduced by our agent who has a bottle of bubbly in the glovebox. He’s going to let her give him, “a very thorough evaluation.” Wink. 2) Xenia Onatopp – It’s more fighting than sex. James is taken aback by her biting his lip and drawing blood. Her death (pulled into a tree by a helicopter) is also played as sexual but in 2025 seems just weird. 3) Natalya Simonova (played by Izabella Scorupco), a Russian computer programmer, is Bond’s “love” interest/damsel in distress in the film. He forcibly kisses her and then suddenly they’re a romantic couple. (This quasi-rape trope seems all too common in 007 flicks.)

It should be mentioned that Bond’s relationship with Moneypenny (now played by Samantha Bond) is firmly located in 90s feminist positions. She’s not having any of James’ “charm” offensive. Bond: “What would I do without you?” Moneypenny : “As far as I can remember James, you’ve never had me.” Bond: “Hope springs eternal.” Moneypenny: “This sort of behavior could qualify as sexual harassment.” Finally.

Connection – Brosnan plays Bond detached, as we have come to expect. There’s a hint of a back story between 006 and 007 that might have been nice to know about. As is expected, he and Natalya end the film together, not in a boat but in a Cuban meadow. They think they’re alone, but there is some coitus interruptus from the United States Marines, so they’ll have to save their victory sex for another day, or never. There’s no real chemistry between these two so the door is open for Bond’s next “girl.”

Toxic Masculinity Scale: 5

Summary The opening title sequence of GoldenEye, with women smashing hammers and sickles to a song written by U2 (and sung by Tina Turner) locates the film in a new era. The Cold War was the golden era of the Flemming novels and the platform for Bond’s good vs. evil adventures. Now New Bond is forced (again?) to find his relevance. Is he a 90s-action hero, right up there with Arnold Schwarzenegger, or a washed-up antique who has lost his cultural relevance? His elevated violence and philandering may be intended as a middle finger to the politically correct shifts in cinema.

The tech in GoldenEye is a co-star along with lots of product placement. (Welcome to the new global market place.) IBM is featured front and center (and a great scene where a young Alan Cumming gets an “email”). The Aston Martin is replaced with a BMW, fully loaded with Q’s gadgets. “You have a license to kill, not to break the traffic laws,” Q tells an impish Bond. GoldenEye also gives us that most central staple of Bond Baddie accessories, the underground lair, hidden below a lake, from where a deadly satellite is controlled. Its explosive destruction is everything that Bond fans buy movie tickets to see.

GoldenEye premiered on November 13, 1995 at Radio City Music Hall, as the war in Yugoslavia, the largest hot war resulting from the end of the Cold War, was reaching its peak. The direction of Martin Campbell and the production of Barbara Broccoli (with Judi Dench’s M) represented a chance to reboot the franchise in a world without the Soviet Union. What issues would MI-6 confront as the 20th century closed? With the help of CGI, the promise of epic stunts and a horny agents would be a part of it.

Next: Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

The James Bond Project #18: License to Kill (1989)

The James Bond Project #17: The Living Daylights (1987)

The James Bond Project #16: A View to a Kill (1985)

The James Bond Project #15: Never Say Never Again (1983)

The James Bond Project #14: Octopussy (1983)

The James Bond Project #13: For Your Eyes Only (1981)

The James Bond Project #12: Moonraker (1979)

The James Bond Project #11: The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

The James Bond Project #10: The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

The James Bond Project #9: Live and Let Die (1973)

The James Bond Project #8: Diamonds are Forever (1971)

The James Bond Project #7: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)

The James Bond Project #6: You Only Live Twice (1967)

The James Bond Project #5: Casino Royale (1967)

The James Bond Project #4: Thunderball (1965)

The James Bond Project #3: Goldfinger (1964)

The James Bond Project #2: From Russia With Love (1963)

The James Bond Project: #1: Dr. No (1962)