Rating: 
Summary: ** Austin Powers 4 **
Review: So here it is, the latest installment of the Austin Powers franchise. Except, no, hang on a minute, its actually James Bond 20, Die Another Day, although the comparisons are undeniable. In a plot very similar to Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, bad guy Gustav Graves, more Scott Evil than Dr Evil with that coiffure, wants to take over the world and conquer the nasty western imperialists using a frickin' big laser, codenamed Icarus. Or should that actually be The Alan Parsons Project? I'm confused! Okay, so I'm being a smart arse but it seems terribly ironic to me that for the 40th anniversary, and 20th movie, of the longest running (and most succesful) franchise in cinema history that the producers should fail to notice the similarities in plot between Die Another Day and Austin Powers, which openly lampoons the Bond films. The tragedy is that Die Another Day opens very promisingly with an excellent set piece of Bond and two other agents surfing through enormous waves before landing on the coast of North Korea. From there we then have another excellent set piece as Bond tries to make an improbable escape from the nasty North Korean arms dealers. The credit sequence is very good too, with a harder edge than is normal for Bond credits, as we see 007 being systematically tortured. At this point I'm thinking excellent, best Bond movie for a long time. New harder more serious Bond for the 21 st century. This for the most part continues even with Madonna making an unnecessary cameo, where despite only having about two minutes screen time, she once again demonstrates her carpentry skills, sorry I mean acting skills. We also get some great nods to the legacy of Bond as Pierce Brosnan tours Q's laboratory full of 007's old gadgets. We even get a great Flemingesque fencing match between the baddie Gustav Graves and Bond. There is of course the total silliness of discovering that 007's latest gadget is an invisible car (purlease) but I suspended my horror and disbelief and caried on hoping this was going to be a rather silly but minor glitch in the proceedings. Then we had the marvellous sight of Halle Berry, possibly the best Bond girl ever, emerging from the waves as the new Bond girl a la Ursula Andress in Dr No. In fact everything is going swimmingly until the movie reaches Gustav Graves ice palace in Iceland, where everything falls apart with a combination of a poor script, rubbish plot and some very awful CGI. What I want to know is, what muppet thought that having Bond kite surfing was in any way shape or form a good idea? It was like watching one of those old movies where people drive along in cars with a movie playing behind them of a country road. You know what I mean, the kind of thing that they did before they invented blue screens and digital special effects. Awful!!! From then on it doesn't get any better, the script seems to get worse and more cliched and the film becomes more and more reliant on second rate CGI special effects. Plus, the comparisons with Austin Powers don't stop at the laser plot. The script is full of the kind of rubbish puns and silly plot points, which Mike Myers lampoons with Dr Evil and his son Scott. Plus Toby Stephens as the Bond villain is well, how can I put it, rubbish? He's a crass middle/upper class English public schoolboy vaguely reminiscent of Diana's former love interest, James Hewitt (does anybody remember that cad)? I mean, ooh, how scary, not. Please don't beat me up with your posh voice Bond must have pondered.
All that said, there are some good points. Brosnan is as ever a fantastic Bond and the only actor to seriously rival Sean Connery in the part of the suavest secret agent in the world. Also, as previously mentioned, Halle Berry is possibly the classiest Bond girl ever and perhaps the only A list actress to star in a Bond movie whilst at the peak of her career. Ive been a fan of Ms Berry's since I first saw her in The Last Boy Scout, all of ten years ago and the only thing that has surprised me is that it has taken her this long to get the recognition that she has deserved. In fact, Berry as the American secret agent Jinx was probably a bit too classy for this movie and in the end is sorely wasted. Yes Bond 20 also has its moments but ultimately the movie as a whole is terribly dissapointing and certainly the worst Bond movie of the Brosnan era.
Rating:
Summary: Desmond Llewelyn is turning in his grave
Review: For almost 40 years, Q-branch has managed to produce spy toys that pushed the envelope just enough that they could be fun if you didn't get too deconstructive. This movie blasted through the envelope with an invisible car and a holodeck, reducing Bond from a suave, almost believable secret agent to this decade's next sci-fi character. I was skeptical about Halle Berry being a Bond girl, as she is so well established and distractingly beautiful, but she held the movie together. I only hope that Ms. Broccoli is through with her experimentation, will fire her director, [fire] her writers, and continue the tradition of James Bond in a spirit more becoming of the legacy set before her.
Rating:
Summary: Long, loud, laborious mess
Review: Diamonds, DNA or doomsday? Writers, please make up your minds. This story feels like the nervous (or lazy) agglomeration of too many ideas, too many opinions, and not nearly enough good sense. Had the very surprising anti-British/American angle taken up in the opening scene been retained, this could have been a vastly more entertaining night out. But it's a Bond film, after all, so provocative subtext is quickly swept aside to make way for hot chicks, cool gadgets, and a one-dimensional megalomaniac villain with - surprise, surprise - some freakish henchmen and a doomsday device up his sleeve (this time, quite literally). But while it hits all the traditional Bond notes, it somehow just doesn't play. Halle Berry is wasted, as are Rick Yune and relative newcomer Rosamund Pike ("Grace Kelly bio-pic, here I come.") Brosnan goes through the motions capably enough (copious chest-hair notwithstanding), but Toby Stephens is simply laughable as the villainous Gustav Graves. It doesn't help that he plays him uncannily like Rik Mayall's Lord Flasheart from "Blackadder". Even the trademark, innuendo-laced dialogue is surprisingly flaccid - ironically, it now sounds like an "Austin Powers" script, but without the nerve go all the way. The digital effects are far too obvious (only the climactic sequence really impresses), but it's the "stunts" they're used to create that really annoy - Bond's escape from the iceberg goes too far, even for this franchise of cinematic impossibility. As in the "Star Wars" prequels, it isn't so much the quality of the effects which grates - it's the low quality of the writing they're trying to represent. With so many Bond parodies and knock-offs crowding the market these days - from the deliberately funny ("Austin Powers") to the unintentionally hilarious ("xXx") - the original franchise is going to have to do much more than just trade on its name. It can't be that hard. Just start with a decent script.
Rating: 
Summary: It Hurts.
Review: The Bond series has produced some fine movies, such as "You Only Live Twice", and some awful ones, such as "Moonraker", possibly one of the worst movies ever. And this one almost beat it. ... There is a difference, folks, between the need for suspension of disbelief (especially for sci-fi films) and being cretinous. Mainly, I mean to say this: the laws of physics exist, whether you like it or not. If a car falls 30,000 feet, AT LEAST the windows will break. Also, surfing a super-sonic wave just can't happen, folks. .... P>And never mind the acting. The only two who save themselves are Brosnan and Berry, who do satisfactory jobs. I understand Bond films aren't dramas of the highest order ... Toby Stephens, who plays Gustav Graves, is so bad it isn't even laughable. It is indeed true that the 007 series is made with the must-shut-off-the-brain gospel which our dear friends at Hollywood have been piously spreading since Day One, and they no doubt influenced the makers of all the Bond movies. .... I never write reviews but this one deserved it.
Rating: 
Summary: Die Another Day - An action flick that'll make you smile!
Review: Die Another Day, Pierce Brosnan's fourth outing as James Bond 007, has obviously been thought out well; and as a result, it's probably the most enjoyable action film of 2002 (blasting the awful XXX into orbit). With a popular Madonna theme song to back this new direction in a Bond film, D.A.D. deserves praise for daring to be different, while keeping all the right traditional elements at the same time. Halle Berry and Rosmaund Pike are good choices as good and evil Bond girls, and the ice lake car chase between Bond and enemy Xao (Rick Yune) is incredible. Just the sight of Bond using his ejector seat to return his overturned Aston Martin to upright can make anyone smile!
Go see it! You won't regret it. Trust me.
Rating: 
Summary: Die Another Day-Loads of Action (Mainly that is)
Review: Die Another Day, is the latest installment in the Bond series, being Pierce Brosnans' 5th film and the 20th in the actual series. The film costars, Halle Berry, Rick Yune, Toby Stephens, Rosamund Pike, Dame Judi Dench as M and John Clesse as the new gadget guru, Q. The film does actually have a story, but
is mainly about action and violence. Though, Brosnan does a fine
job as Bond....James Bond.
The plot of this film is essentially simple and obviously pointless, a wild North Korean agent named Zao (Rick Yune) has a laser like satelite, which can basically obliterate anything it touches. WOW! Of course Bond and his new follower, Jinx played by gorgeous Halle Berry, team up to defeat the evil villan. Also there is another villan named Gustav Graves (Toby Stephens) who is the leader of this operation, Zao is his main follower. The film from here takes on a course of chaotic and vociferous action/violence. From gunplay to explosions to fistfights. That's what you pretty much get. The film was decent, it was an average Bond film, my favorite is Goldeneye and will probably remain that way until the next Bond film which is intended to be Brosnan's final film. Only time will tell. Though the film did feature some memorable and commemorative action sequences, such as the car chase in Iceland, and the hovercraft chase at the very beginning of the film. As for Bond, he is still the sophisticated and suavy MI6 agent you know. Lee Tamahori (Along Came A Spider, The Edge) does a fine job directing, but it could be better. ONE CAN ONLY HOPE FOR THE NEXT BOND FILM! As for now if you must, go see Die Another Day. Rated PG-13 for Action Violence and Sexuality. Now playing in theatres.
Rating:
Summary: The weakest Bond film since A View to a Kill
Review: After 40 years maybe Bond should retire. This is indeed Brosnan's weakest film as James Bond. It's a shame because the film starts off very promising showing a more human and vulnerable James Bond, but this development quickly diminishes into a ridiculous plot and even more ridiculous action sequences that make the film seem more like a parody on the Bond franchise; including multiple unneeded references to the previous Bond films. This film try's to breath some fresh air into the standard James Bond plot with bond becoming a rogue agent to extract his revenge, but this fails to work and quickly becomes the cliché plot that the majority of the films follow. This was done in a much more effective way in 1989's License to Kill. The villains and the women are some of the least interesting in the entire franchise. Denise Richards even made a better Bond girl then Halle Berry, and do we really need to see the image of a bikini glad babe slowing coming out of water yet again on film? The action sequences have always been the backbone of the series with each film trying to outdo its predecessor. But the action in this film is so ridiculous that it could not be filmed with stuntmen but instead with Brosnan on a green screen and CGI effects added. Nothing is memorable and the scenes are quickly forgotten. Something new has to be done with this series, because if it continues the way it's going, a James Bond film will be no more interesting then it countless imitators. Maybe it's time for a more serious Bond movie like the early Connery films or even the Dalton films. I hear Brosnan is going to make one more film. Roger Moore made his best and what should have been his last film - For Your Eyes Only after his worst and the most ridiculous film in the entire series - Moonraker. Maybe history will repeat itself; or the Bond films wont be worth watching.
Rating:
Summary: James Bond has died
Review: Frankly, I haven't watched Bond's movie since "Golden Eye" which disappointed me, as a protest, I did not pay to see the two following Bond movies. After seeing the trailer of the latest one, I can say that "James Bond has already died", so there's no need for "Die another Day", he was dead since "Golden Eye", Brosnan is the worst Bond, even David Nivan and Peter Seller in "Casino Royale" were better than him. Brosnan has only one facial expression, he has no fear, no pain, no hesistation, no nothing, it seems that he knew everything in advance and can escape from danger within his control. I vow that I will not pay to see any other Bond movie, I am sticking to my collection of the Bond movies starring Sean Connery, George Lazenby, Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton.
Rating:
Summary: Back to bond
Review: In this the 20th installment of the wonderful series we see tons of action and "women" that make a bond film great. I noticed that this is Brosnan's best work to date and he is JAMES BOND. he has got the syle that has been missing since connery left the franchise. Halley Berry is wonderful. This movie is great for many reasons, go and see what I am talking about. If you are a fan of bond or enjoy and action movie with a cool story see this movie, NOW !!!!!!!
Rating:
Summary: The Best Bond Movie, Ever!
Review: I have seen all of the Bond movies and up to now, I thought, nobody was able to match Sean Connery. Pierce Brosnan finally does it. His Bond character is believeable. His scenes as a prisoner for 14 months opens up another side of Bond that we have not seen before. The action and gagetry lives up to expectations. In fact the car scenes are awesome. The ice palace (or whatever it was) was a bit much but it didn't last that long, before the movie moved on to other action that brought some simulance of believeability back to the scenes. Halle Berry is the new Bond girl. She is sexy, capable and deadly. She fits the 21st Century Bond female film fatale perfectly. I also liked the updated villains. They don't just hire people to do the dirty work like Blofeld, but they have personal martial arts capabilities and driving skills that allow them to get into the action. There are scenes of head to head combat between Bond and the Mastermind of this newest plot to take over the world. If you haven't seen it, and you are a Bond fan, by all means, see the movie. This is a keeper. I can't wait until it comes out on DVD
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