Skyfall - Film Review

*CAUTION - The following review contiains potential spoilers. If you are yet to see Skyfall but wish to do so, proceed with this in mind*

James Bond may well be a cinema icon but over his previous 22 outings it's not always been plain sailing.

Skyfall is Bond's 23rd outing but this almost didn't happen, given film studio MGM almost bit the dust. But in terms of actual content, a lot of critics felt that Bond had something to prove after 2008's Quantum of Solace. This may have had a lot to do with timing - while The Dark Knight had become seen as the perfect film alongst critics, the Jason Bourne movies vied for action-genre supremacy and were seen to hve won their battle.

Now, following a Bourne movie that didn't seem to generate excitement following the departure of Matt Damon, Daniel Craig returns for his third outing as film's biggest secret agent.

The writing seems to have been sampling the (real and screen) world around it and cramming it in. Repeated government losses of sensitive data serve as plot points, while the gritty realistic action that fuelled the Dark Knight trilogy also gets an airing.

In a nod to the frenetic past Bond films, there is high action from the word go. Bond and his new fellow agent Eve (Naomie Harris) pursue a baddie through the streets of Istanbul, then on the rooves of the city, and then on a train heading away, and all before Eve, on M's (Dame Judi Dench) orders, unintentionally kills Bond.

Or at least she thinks she does - Bond is instead, in his words "enjoying death", drinking with scorpions in a tropical island bar. And boy does he drink - during the course of this film, he drinks Heineken, tequilla, scotch and his classic vodka martini. In his returning physical that baddie Silva (Javier Bardem) later takes glee in reading, he is listed as having an alcohol dependency.

Before a morning boozer, he realises the news Thames House has exploded. M is on her way back from attending a meeting with Gareth Mallorry (Ralph Fiennes), who has suggested she leave the agency.

Bond, as a result, comes back to Blighty and, after a fitness test and a meeting with Q (Ben Wishaw), it's off on the globe-trotting adventures Bond normally goes on. Not to the same extent as usual though - while previous Bond films have seen him traverse the globe and spend minutes in the UK, his foreign trips are minimal, with the early Istanbul visit, trips to Shanghai and Macau and a sojourn on Silva's island the only foreign action to occur.

There is further emphasis on the characters beyond the heros. Ordinarily Bond is the king of the castle but here, Dench gets a chance to drive proceedings. M is the real star of the show here. As well as the dynamism between her and Bond that fuels many films, she also gets to venture out the office and makes her presence felt at the heart of the film.

The others are also impressive. Mallory is a very impressive and competent man, while Q is an intriguing counterpoint with a run of youth that keeps things well-grounded in the face of the experienced counterpants running around him.

Bond of course is running the show, whether involved in all manner of action scrapes, or delivering a large amount of dry one-liners that would seamlessly fit into a comedy show. Craig certainly makes the role his own - he has had two very impressive performances so far to hone in on his character but here he really shines.

This amount of dry quippery and action scenes are needed to keep his head in the face of his enemy, who reveals an hour into the piece. Silva, when he surfaces, is a slick man looking to gain revenge after M decided to cut him loose, holding her responsible for his capture, imprisonment and torture by the Chinese.

Silva is also a very clever man. He relentlessly manipulates the world to his desires of revenge, manipulating the electronical world. It is a very relevant threat - cyber-terrorism is becoming a major threat to global security, and is seen as the next big threat to individual countries.

He is also very clever - just as it looks that Bond, Q and the rest have him in a corner after he is captured from his island, he breaks free. After this, he runs under London and blows up a tube tunnel to lose Bond before he breaks into Whitehall for the purposes of shooting up a select committee hearing that M has been bought to. But his goal of revenge doesn't pull off here, although he is close to success.

This swiftly leads to the end game, as Bond and M flee to Bond's childhood home - Skyfall Hunting Lodge. He lures Silva and his henchmen there before engaging in a final shootout.

It brings into it two cliches of modern cinema - 1. the tortured backstory of the hero and 2. bad guys are really terrible shots.

But by this point and the surprise ending, the intricate plotting has paid of.

Many critics have trumpeted this film as possibly one of the best Bond films since the notable theme song first made it out the speakers in the 1960s. 50 years on and Bond has not only retained its sense of adventure and fun, but has updated itself - making a delightful film with the talent performing the part and making a late contender for a possible film of the year.

Whether the Oscar people agree is another matter...

4/5