Pass shelf-life!

Spectre (2015)

With all the hype that preceded the launch of latest of the James Bond's franchise release, it was only natural that we were all riled up to be one of the early viewers of this offering.

It started with the usual 'edge of the seat' suspense befitting of a Cold War hero who is out to save the world from despotic domination with a licence to kill! The build-up before a spontaneous collapse of building and rogue rudderless helicopter created the atmosphere for more suspense. The filming technique of a street parade in Mexico to honour the dead was quite interesting as the camera appear seamlessly be lifted off the ground and down as if the camera was mounted on a drone!

The buck stops there! After the credits rolled in, it was the same old swashbuckling display of pyrotechnics. My head grew heavy and eyes grew dim. Trying my level best to keep my eyelids open was a Herculean task. In between the eye-shut, twilight and occasional eye-opening, all I saw was frequent screenshots of the hero running hand-in-hand with a beau in distress against a backdrop of fiery hot explosive gun powder. It was interlaced with an unbelievable duel between our pint-sized saviour of the capitalistic world and the mean lean killing giants where Bond comes out unscathed, unshaken and unstirred. He even vaporises the megalomaniac's henchmen like mozzies with his single machine gun against more sophisticated arsenal at their disposal. And the ladies who drop their drapes at the drop of his bow-tie!

I think that the Bond franchise had over-lived its shelf-life. With so many new movies with so many innovative and imaginative plots, the idea of a lone man saving the whole of the civilised world seems laughable. 24th outing should be the end of an era.