Casino Royale

"That last hand. It nearly killed me."

I was impressed when I saw this movie back in 2006. At the time I hadn't seen most of the earlier Bond movies. Now I have, and I'm even more impressed.

This Week: Contact the City Bus Services

Josie Kafka: Hello, everyone! It's time for us to discuss what we've been watching and reading this week. I haven't been watching much of anything, but I did fall hard for Elena Ferrante's novels. I must read all of them before I can do anything else. All. Of. Them.

What are you up to?

Skyfall

"Some men are coming to kill us. We're gonna kill them first."

Thanks to MGM's financial troubles, it has been four years since 007 last graced the silver screen. Four years since the underwhelming Quantum of Solace. That is a long time. I did start to worry at one point that Daniel Craig's tenure as the world's most stylish spy would fall victim to the same problems that cut short Timothy Dalton's.

50 Years of James Bond: Part 2

Alec Trevelyan: "I might as well ask you if all those Vodka Martinis ever silence the screams of all the men you've killed... or if you find forgiveness in the arms of all those willing women for all the dead ones you failed to protect."

The second part of my 50th Anniversary James Bond retrospective. In this part I take a look at the twilight years of Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton's brief tenure, the rise and fall of Pierce Brosnan, and the arrival of the controversial first blond Bond.

50 Years of James Bond: Part 1

Bond: "Do you expect me to talk?"
Goldfinger: "No, Mister Bond. I expect you to die."

I was born in the 80s so I have never really known a time without James Bond. He's become like King Arthur, Robin Hood and Sherlock Holmes, an essential part of British culture and further proof that, as a nation, we are seriously lacking in great female fictional icons (this is why I like to think of the Harry Potter series as The Adventures of Hermione Granger and Those Two Idiots She Saves A Lot).