TOMORROW NEVER DIES Starring Pierce Brosnan, Jonathan Pryce, Michelle Yeoh, Teri Hatcher Seen 12/21/97 at the Sony Theatres Village VII, New York, NY
TOMORROW NEVER DIES is a typical James Bond movie. Bond beds some women, uses some hi-tech gadgets, and saves the world. If you're a sentient being who's been on this earth for a decent amount of time, you probably have formed an opinion of Bond movies. If you like 'em, go see this one. If you don't, no need for you to bother.
Bond saves the world twice in the film, actually. The first time is before the opening credits, in a good action scene. Following the opening credits, which feature the terrible theme song by Sheryl Crow (whose attempt to recast herself as hip and jaded is not coming off too well), we get the "real" movie, dedicated to the second adventure. A British ship encounters two Chinese planes near the Chinese coast. The result is that one of the planes is shot down, and the ship is sunk. But is the explanation as simple as it seems? Neither the British nor Chinese government thinks so, and with the two countries on the brink of war over the incident, the answer must be known. The British send Bond (Pierce Brosnan) to investigate a possible culprit, while the Chinese send Wai Lin (Michelle Yeoh) to do the same. That suspect is Elliott Carver (Jonathan Pryce), the owner of a worldwide media empire. Thanks to some truly terrible secret agent work, Bond blows his cover in about six seconds, and the battle is joined. Bond has to contend with Carver and his goons. He also has to decide whether Paris (Teri Hatcher), a former flame who is now Carver's wife, is on his side or Carver's.
As in the BATMAN movies, the main character, Bond, is a well-known constant, so the movies are made or broken on the strength of the villains and the sidekicks. This works a little better in the Bond realm than it has in the BATMAN series for a few reasons: we've had 16 films to get to know Bond; Bond isn't as complex a character as Batman; and unlike the BATMAN series, Bond movies have wisely limited themselves to one villain (plus a "lead henchman") and one sidekick, max. Brosnan is pretty believable as Bond. He's certainly bringing more energy to the part than Timothy Dalton did.
As the villain, Pryce is average. He only really shines in a couple of moments. One is early in the film, when he checks in with the presidents of the various branches of his empire. The other is much later, when he taunts Yeoh by imitating her martial arts style. In these two scenes, Pryce shows an ability to have fun with the character. Bond villains should not be played too seriously. If they are, we begin to think about the plausibility of their scheme, and plausibility in general is never a strong point of Bond movies. Only at the very end of the film do we get any kind of semi-logical explanation of why it makes financial sense for Carver to spend the billions of dollars undoubtedly required for his plan.
I will say that a media mogul is an interesting choice of villain. Carver expresses the fear that many of us have about the power that some players in the telecommunications industry (Disney, Turner Broadcasting, etc.) have gained. The fear is that such giants will abuse their position as Carver does and use it to manipulate the news, as in AD CITY or WAG THE DOG, rather than to report it. Of course, this movie doesn't dwell on those issues, nor should it. But it's interesting to see who we fear as villains now that the Cold War is over.
The "lead henchman" here is the Aryan "Stamper", played by the wonderfully named Gotz Otto. How often does an actor in a James Bond film have an even more appropriate name than his character? Anyway, the filmmakers should have just given in and cast Rutger Hauer in this role. It's the most Rutger Hauer-esque part I've ever seen. Unlike some of the lead henchmen in past Bond films, like GOLDENEYE's Xenia Onatopp or GOLDFINGER's Oddjob, Stamper is not interesting at all.
Hatcher is wasted. She's in the film mostly to have her top taken off, and we only get a dorsal view of that. It's implied that her character, Paris, may have had more of a relationship with Bond than the expected one-night stand, and somehow "got too close." But the issue isn't explored. It's probably just as well, since Bond films shouldn't be character studies. Nonetheless, it's a silly point to bring up in the first place if you're not going to make any effort at all to explain what it means.
Yeoh, the Hong Kong film legend most familiar to American audiences from Jackie Chan's SUPERCOP (a.k.a. POLICE STORY 3), makes a very good sidekick. She doesn't really have any chemistry with Brosnan until well into the film, at which point they start to really click. A scene in which Wai Lin shows Bond her home is very funny, which is a rare moment in a film which in general takes itself a little too seriously. Unfortunately, it's already too late by then for us to fully buy into the relationship between Bond and Wai Lin. Still, if you ignore the end, where she is reduced to a damsel in distress, Yeoh kicks plenty of butt throughout.
And, indeed, the action sequences in general are well-done. A long chase scene with Brosnan and Yeoh on a motorcycle is particularly good. My only beef is that Bond makes out a bit too much like Rambo in this one. Outmanned 50 to 1, he shoots himself out of the situation, rather than finding a more creative solution involving the gadgets he's given or some other type of ingenuity. Even hand to hand combat would usually be more entertaining to watch than gun combat, unless the gunfighting is directed very well. A *lot* of bullets are fired in this film; a John Woo-like number. In fact, the film pays direct homage to Woo when a character is shown jumping while firing a gun held in each hand, all filmed in slow motion.
In another disturbingly RAMBO-esque moment, Bond disposes of Carver in a particularly gruesome way. A simple arrest would have sufficed, since Bond had already thwarted Carver's plot. I didn't think that the good guys killed for no reason, even if they had a license to do so. And in such a disgusting manner? Not cool at all.
Sum: TOMORROW NEVER DIES is a James Bond movie. React accordingly.
- Dean Carrano dean@fragment.com
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