Shaken, not stirred: The Bond Journey

The experience was an adventure in and of itself, let alone the movie. A group of guys from the dorm went to the midnight premiere of James Bond:Quantum of Solace. We took the last public transit bus out to the theatre around 11, and took our seats in the theatre. The theatre's decor was late 70's, the most recent figures on the mural being R2-D2 ad E.T., and the seats being made out of ripped aqua pleather and old wood; the place smelled like mildew.

The movie was supposed to begin at 11:59 promptly.....12:05 rolled around, and the credits just started. We had a good laugh when one of the previews was for a movie "Coming to you November 7!" But pretty soon we weren't laughing. The movie started, and it was a girl walking through a forest following a piece of string with notes attached to it like "Follow" or "Keep going!" We thought this was odd, but there was hope that Daniel Craig was at the other end of the rope. Then the wind started hissing warnings at her. At that point, Danny shouts, "I PAID FOR JAMES BOND!" causing a ruckus in the theatre. The manager came out and informed us that they had put on the wrong film reel (they had decided to show us Haunted instead), and that we would be seeing our feature soon. 12:45 rolls around, and the NEXT set of previews begins. Just as James Bond was starting, the film went off track, so we spent the first two minute watching the bottom half of the movie on top, while the top moved to the bottom....yay.

As for the movie itself, I thought it was really good as an action movie, but it wasn't a James Bond movie. This goes back to what I said in March: they seem to have sacrificed the witty, suave, gadget-using Bond, for a more thug, Jason Bourne-like image. Apparently others have the same opinion (warning: some plot details are in this article). Here's an interesting article on the purity of the movies in connection with Ian Fleming's actual image of James Bond.

So then the movie was over and it was time to go home. We were too cheap to get a cab, and there were a bunch of us, so we decided to walk. It was a trip, but there were sidewalks and all so it wasn't a big deal. We've become convinced that the University is keeping us away from the world: gas was $1.97 out by the theatre, and was around $2.10 right next to grounds. We got home around 3:45 AM, and I crashed.

Alright, well that's all for now. Have a great weekend!