Film Junk Podcast Episode #393: Skyfall and Wreck-It Ralph

Posted by on November 13th, 2012   Filed under: Featured, Film Junk Podcast

0:00 – Intro / Movember / Big News
8:45 – Review: Skyfall
50:20 – Review: Wreck-It Ralph
1:14:45 – Headlines: Mark Wahlberg to Star in Transformers 4, Alamo Drafthouse No Longer Allows Late Arrivals, World War Z Trailer
1:39:35 – Other Stuff We Watched: Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Ecstasy of Order: The Tetris Masters, Safety Not Guaranteed
2:02:35 – Junk Mail: Tom Cruise and Actors with a Near Perfect Track Record, Musicians We’d Like to See Score a Film, Sports / Action Heroes We’d Like to See a Biopic For, Sequels We Have No Intention of Seeing, Applause During Movies, The Effect of Film Junk on our Lives
2:18:50 – This Week on DVD and Blu-ray
2:20:30 – Outro
2:22:55 – Spoiler Discussion: Skyfall

Film Junk Podcast Episode #393: Skyfall and Wreck-It Ralph by Filmjunk on Mixcloud

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  • Indianamcclain

    Can’t wait to listen. I enjoyed both films.

  • schizopolis

    Where’s the link to Sean’s pedo-moustache photo?????? C’mon!! lol

  • patrik

    Just started listening now. Good start. What’s the status on Gamejunk btw? There will surely be some sort of discussion about Silicon Knights?

  • patrik

    Oh and personally, I liked Skyfall more than The Dark Knight and it’s not like that dark style only belongs to TDK. It fit well enough with Bond, so I don’t have any problems with them borrowing from Nolan.

  • Jonny Ashley

    yo I donated a buck to your mospace and I didn’t get any moustache pics. better give em up dude

  • Indianamcclain

    Am I the only one that’s not seeing how Skyfall is a rip off of the Dark Knight? I see how certain parts are similar but I still felt like this was a completely different film.

  • scott

    SKYFALL was so pretty and there was good action, but I felt totally unconnected and there wasno reason for the end to be so anticlimactic. James Bond is Batman-lite and they say as many terrible one liners as they did in Die Another Day just with a straight face.

    Scott
    http://www.ReconditePictures.com

  • patrik

    You guys are just digging too much into the characters and what universe they take place in. Judi Dench is there because she was a great M and to keep some consistency I think. Obviously it’s not gonna make sense when you have a 50 year old franchise that keeps moving on. There are some constants, like his car, drink, relationship with Moneypenny and his gun and he always has a flirty and playfull personality wether it’s dark Bond (Craig) or light (Moore) or anything in between.

    I don’t think Daniel Craigs James Bond remembers being in space in Moonraker back in 1979.. I think each Bond actor has his own kind of timeline. Except for Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace, the plot of one movie never carries into another Bond movie if I remember correctly so you could argue that they are all standalone movies as well I guess..

  • I think I remember reading somewhere that one of the Timothy Dalton movies makes reference to the events of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. But I can’t verify that myself as of yet.

    New Game Junk is at least a couple weeks out. Frank wants to wait for the Wii-U launch. I don’t think there will be any SK talk, however.

  • Steve

    Best show opening ever.

  • In Moonraker the movie was trying to jump into the Star Wars bandwagon. During the eighties and nineties the franchise was influenced by the action movies from the period. So the trend to incorporate the zeitgeist is something going on for a long time. Probably following the actual hits on theathers, in the next movies Bond will earn some kind of super-power.

  • Speaking of video game competition movie freakshows, has anyone else seen “Chasing Ghosts”? I know they talked about it on the show a while back before I had a chance to see it myself, so I don’t remember what the Film Junk crew thought about it, but it’s pretty uncomfortable to watch sometimes and has one of the sorriest bunch of guys in it that I’ve seen in a film like this.

  • Is the word Jay was looking for “idiot-savant”? (I am still listening so he may actually find the word.)

  • Kasper

    @Sean: Naturally you guys can’t talk about Silicon Knights too much, but you do have an unique point of view on the whole debacle. If there is anything at all that you are able/allowed to comment on legally, it would be nice to hear your take on it. Might also translate into some exposure for GameJunk (and in turn FilmJunk) around the whole blogosphere – people love gossip!

  • Jonny: Thanks for the donation. I added a photo just for you. I’ll try to add a better one later.

    http://mobro.co/filmjunk

    Derek: Yes it was. He remembered after the show.

    Kasper: There’s not much more to say… it’s all out there now! The general idea of destroying games might be an interesting topic for discussion, however.

  • patrik

    On Gregs comment that this is Frankjunk. I think, if Frank ever did a podcast by himself, the name could be Franklyjunk podcast =D

    I’m not trying to bring the hammer down on Frank or anything, I really like Frank. That name is quality though.

  • schizopolis

    Skyfall wasn’t about Bond getting “old”. The opening action sequence proves it. Bond was in top form until he fell off the train. It was only after his injury and his exile was when he lost his edge. I don’t think it was ever specified, but he wasn’t gone for years. It was more like 3-6 months. I got the sense that he failed his tests because of his shoulder injury and psych evaluation.

  • True, but the idea of field agents being obsolete is brought up numerous times throughout the film, including the clip that we played.

  • Here in Newfoundland we have Pineapple Crush soda, but I’ve never seen it anywhere else in Canada so I’m thinking it may just be a Newfoundland thing. My brother and his family lives out in B.C. and he’s obsessed with the stuff, so whenever I send them a package I end up always sending up a few 2L’s of the stuff.

  • schizopolis

    @Jay The joke about wasting scotch was to not show any weakness in front of Silva. He can’t show that he cares about the woman. Even when Silva had Bond tied up, spread his legs and made a sexual advance towards him, Bond didn’t blink. He even said something like, “how do you know I haven’t tried cock already?”. Don’t show your enemy any fear!!

  • devolutionary

    I thought Skyfall was solid and at the very least, it met my expectations. I’m still a little surprised at the 4’s and 3.5 you guys gave it as I thought there were several small things which hampered my overall enjoyment. There just seemed to be something missing on a visceral level that kept me from fully immersing myself in this installment. Maybe a rewatch would improve it for me? Still, I never once looked at my watch in the theater (unlike Quantum of Solace) so the mid-act lulls were never too overbearing. Frank hit it spot on with M’s (Judi Dench) characterisation. In the background, she’s always been perfectly fine, but when she’s put front and center for several scenes, it almost becomes a drag. After awhile I too started to side with Javier Bardem’s character (Silva) and wanted him to get his revenge.

  • Yeah I think the elevator stuff Jay keeps harping on is more from Bond getting shot in the shoulder than it is from Bond getting old. They show during the physical that he is having issues with the pull up part and after everyone leaves he slumps down grabbing his shoulder. But Bardem does make reference to him being old and broken down.

  • Brendan

    I didn’t get the whole “Bond getting old” message either. I agree that the shoulder injury seems to be the bigger part of his issues, combined with the psychological and physical toll of being an agent. It makes more sense, since most of the he still displays considerable physical skills aside from the shoulder related problems (hanging from the elevator, problems aiming, etc). He did take out all of Javier’s men right after missing the whiskey glass with the antique pistol.
    The references to agents not being needed, being relics, doesn’t necessarily mean Bond is physically aging, just that the job of being an agent is so demanding and no longer appreciated, which I think is why Bond called it quits for a while.

  • Matt

    The thing I don’t understand about all the comments about this movie “ripping off” the Dark Knight is that Nolan has said on numerous occasions that his Batman movies are very much influenced by Bond. Other than the score (especially in the Shanghai scene) hitting some of the same beats as Zimmer’s score, it certainly wasn’t in the front of my mind and I’m a huge fan of The Dark Knight. Is this just because Mendes made these comments, or are there things I missed on first viewing?

  • I agree with Greg on Casino Royale’s opening theme. The worst Bond theme I’ve heard so far (granted, I’ve only heard 6). And that title sequence is like an iPod commercial.

    I really liked the ending to Skyfall, but I think it would have worked better if it were the finale to the Craig series. I dunno where they’re gonna go from there.

  • Indianamcclain

    @ Matt, it seems like Mendes’s comments more than anything, personally.

  • I don’t know if he still listens or visits the site but The Het needs to do a voicemail for episode 400.

  • Scott

    It’s weird he’s newr in the first two reboot movies and he’s immediately old here. Also, I thought the Dalton movies were regarded as too dark and killed the franc his. They go back to fun Bond and suddenly it’s too goofy and they’re back to the dark.

    “A storm is coming.”

  • Scott

    Matt, he has a Batcave. Come on!

  • Tum Tum Tyranus

    @Sean #9

    Jay is right, everything from Dr. No to Die Another Die is one timeline with one Bond.

    Diamonds are Forever shows Connery seeking revenge as the same Bond from OHMSS.

    For Your Eyes Only shows Roger Moore visiting “the” gravesite as the same Bond.

    In The Living Daylights Felix tells his wife about Bond’s past marriage/one true love. Again, same Bond.

    Die Another Day shows Pierce Brosnan getting all nostalgic w/ the old gadgets. Same Bond.

    Fuck all geeks w/ the codename theory. It sucks.

    Casino Royale is the reboot(and yes recasting Judi Dench as M is odd).

  • Tum Tum Tyranus

    Sorry, Licence to Kill not The Living Daylights.

  • Interesting, I didn’t realize Casino Royale was a true reboot, as opposed to all the other attempts to simply continue the Bond franchise after a hiatus. I guess it makes sense, although that does make the Goldfinger callback in Skyfall seem a little weird.

  • Tum Tum Tyranus

    Just finished the episode and now I feel like a douche. Greg, the above comment about the codename theory was not in reference to you and was meant to be half-facetious.

  • Jonny Ashley

    That’s a good moustache

  • Greg

    @Tum Tum: Meh…I wouldn’t call it a theory, I just assumed it was different people. Mostly because my favourite Bond flick is OHMSS and at the conclusion of the opening beach fisticuffs, Diana Rigg takes off and Lazenby says ‘This never happened to the other guy’.

  • patrik

    I really don’t think there’s any real meaning behind the callbacks in Bond. I just think that they are aware that a lot of people like the franchise and have probably seen a few Bond movies and therefor throws out some humerous winks to the audience. If you’re in on it, it’s funny and if you’re not then you will be when they do it again in ten years or whatever. That’s the way I see it anyway.. Well, there you go.

  • Dan Day

    Patrick’s right. The nods and winks are just there for the fans. Bond is a different person after a while because the actors either quit, were fired or got too old. That’s it.

    I guarantee you none of the writers or producers ever worry about which timeline or universe the movies are in. It probably never even crosses their mind. Dench came back for Craig’s Bonds because people like her as M. End of story.

  • Matt

    Yeah I think a long time ago the writers abandoned trying to care about the details of timelines and such with the Bond series. The character is more of a spy superhero than a real person. Other than Quantum none of these movies are strict continuations of each other, and imo were always intended to be just pulp genre fun. It seems like it’s only on a few of the movies (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the Craig films) that they care much about his actual humanity, and I for one loved the nods to the old Bond films in this one as well as bringing it back to a bit of goofiness without going over-the-top. Pandering or not, I got goosebumps when the car scene happened (avoiding spoilers here).

  • In On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Bond breaks the fourth and says to the camera “This never happened to the other fella”

  • @piggystardust: So are we also to assume that this moment establishes that Bond is aware of an audience/film camera following him everywhere?

  • schizopolis

    @Matt From Russia With Love is definitely a direct continuation of Dr. No. In From Russia, Bloefeld talks about avenging Dr. No’s death and the girl Bond is with in the beginning was the same character he met at the casino in Dr. No.

  • Marty

    Ian Fleming never intended the Bond stories to be sequential.
    Also in the “Fleming vision”, Bond is ageless…and the stories could happen on the same day, throughout history.

    Although there is a backstory in the bond books, it’s never leaned on too heavily.

  • kyri

    The Het is not allowed to have Internet in Jail

  • Something you wanna tell us Kyri?

  • The het’s contributions to filmjunk a while back were some of the freshest on the show. Don’t put him off if he’s still on these forums.

  • kyri

    but he isn’t. he is in Jail. (I am not joking)

  • Vikke_AJ

    Just one thing I have to mention… Best of the Best 2 is one of the best sequels ever made. Infinitely superior to the original.

  • @Jay no, from this we are to assume that the filmmakers haven’t put half as much thought into the continuity of the series as we have.

  • Mrespony

    Speaking on the Alamo Drafthouse, it’s ridiculous that they keep announcing new rules for their cinema when they have servers walking in front of you the entire film and talking. The waiters are not stealthy, they are not ninja-like. “You don’t notice it at all” is highly rose-coloured glasses way of reviewing the Alamo Drafthouse experience. I go there because of well-curated revival showings, original material and alcohol. I don’t go to the Drafthouse because it’s quiet and I won’t get disturbed because I get disturbed every time I’m there, I expect it and it doesn’t bother me, going there is more akin to attending a concert than a church service. Public events have one critical flaw, they are filled with a lot of unpredictable people. The antidote is staying home.