The World Is Not Enough

“The World Is Not Enough” is a superb 1999 comic thriller, exciting and beautiful, limitlessly creative. Roger Ebert stated in his review, “Because it is also the 19th James Bond movie, it comes with so much history that one reviews it like wine, comparing it to earlier famous vintages; I guess that's part of the fun.” This is a good one.

Instead of summarizing the story, let’s check off the Bond trademarks and see how they add up: 1. Bond himself, reprised by Pierce Brosnan, who is the best except for Sean Connery. Ebert credited, “He knows that even the most outrageous double entendres are pronounced with a straight face. He is proud that a generation has grown up knowing the term "double entendre" only because of Bond movies.”

2. Regulars. There’s real sadness this time, because Q, the inventor in every one of Bond’s gadgets, is retiring. Desmond Llewelyn has played Q in every single Bond film since “From Russia With Love” in 1963 (with the exception of “Live and Let Die” in 1973, when the producers dropped Q after a bogus decision that the series needed less gadgets). Llewelyn was 85, and after showing a few nice upgrades on his latest inventions, he leaves from the screen in an appropriate and, darn it, touching way.

3. Guest stars. Who replaced Q? John Cleese, of course. “Does this make you…R?” asks Bond, after Cleese shows a BMW speedster with titanium armor “and six cup holders.”

4. M. Ebert noted, “Judi Dench is back for the third time as Bond's boss M, with the same regal self-confidence she displayed as queens Elizabeth ("Shakespeare in Love") and Victoria ("Mrs. Brown").” She does not talk down to the role, but plays it elegantly, making an intelligence chief who looks focused and serious, even in the chaos of a Bond plan.

5. Bond girls. Usually two central ones, a good girl who looks bad, and a bad girl who looks good. Both are top-notch this time. The gorgeous Sophie Marceau plays Elektra King, daughter of a tycoon behind an oil pipeline connecting the old Soviet oil fields to Europe. The hot Denise Richards plays Christmas Jones, a nuclear scientist whose knowledge can save or destroy the world. I shall not say who actually the good girl is and who is bad.

6. Chase scenes, which are a lot. By powerboat on the Thames (and across dry land, and back on the Thames) and then into a hot-air balloon. Ebert noted, “By skis down a mountain, pursued by hang-gliding, bomb-throwing para-sailers whose devices convert into snowmobiles.” By land, in the BMW. Under the sea, as Bond crashes into a submarine and later confronts a villain by jumping outside the sub and back in again.

7. Power-hungry villains. There is an excellent early appearance of the villainous terrorist Renard, played by Robert Carlyle. Ebert noted, “His oversized skull rises from the floor in a hologram, and then takes on flesh.” M explains that a bullet in his brain is slowly taking away his senses, but that “he’ll grow stronger every day until he dies.” Bond goes around the hologram and goes inside Renard’s head to find the path of the bullet. Another villain is played by Robbie Coltrane, who gets distance out of always looking like he’d really like to be a good guy.

8. Locations. Not only the oil field of Azerbaijan, but Frank Gehry’s new Guggenhim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, which looks like a nice beginning scene, and the Millennium Dome on the banks of the Thames, which becomes a landing pad after a balloon explodes. Also a Hindu temple with flames that never extinguish.

9. Weird ways to die. Ebert asked, “How about vivisection by helicopter-borne rotary tree-trimming blades? Or garroting in an antique torture chair?”

10. Amazing escapes. There is nothing like a Bond movie to make you believe a man can safely bungee-jump from a tall building, after tying one end of a window shade cord to his belt and the other end to an unconscious body.

All of these traits are put together by director Michael Apted and writers Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and Bruce Feirstein into a Bond movie that for once doesn’t look like certain things are wrongly placed together, but goes in a more or less logical way to explain what the problem and solution might be. Bond’s one-liners look more part of his character this time, and Carlyle’s villain comes off as more three-dimensional and motivated, less of a caricature, than the villains in some of the Bond movies.

Ebert admitted, “My favorite moment? A small one, almost a throwaway. The movie answers one question I've had for a long time: How do the bad guys always manage to find all their equipment spontaneously, on remote locations where they could not have planned ahead? After the snow chase sequence, a villain complains morosely that the para-sails were rented, and "were supposed to be returned."”

This is the best Bond movie that Brosnan had starred in. Every Bond movie that Brosnan acted in as Bond got better and better, and this one is no exception. If you love Brosnan’s 007 movies, and you saw the previous two, definitely check this one out because you will get pumped after seeing it.

Stay tuned tomorrow for more excitement in Brosnan’s 007 installments in “James Bond Month.”