There’s been big speculation surrounding Sam Mendes‘ potential return to the James Bond business because his blend of character beats and surprising action acumen is rightly noted as the main reason Skyfall worked so well. Unfortunately, his particular balance won’t be back. According to Empire, Mendes will not be returning for Bond 24: Whatever It Gets Titled. Citing other professional commitments, the director said, “It has been a very difficult decision not to accept Michael [G. Wilson] and Barbara [Broccoli]’s very generous offer to direct the next Bond movie. Directing Skyfall was one of the best experiences of my professional life, but I have theatre and other commitments, including productions of ‘Charlie And The Chocolate Factory’ and ‘King Lear,’ that need my complete focus over the next year and beyond.” So it’s bad news topped with bad news for anyone who doesn’t plan on buying a play ticket anytime soon. Mendes is still attached to produce several movies — most of which have been stalled out for a while — but this statement makes it seem likely that we won’t see him direct again for a while. He’s attached to direct Netherland, based off the Joseph O’Neill novel, and it’s still at Focus Features, but it’s unclear whether or when it will move forward. Thus, it looks like the filmmaker is going to wear some different hats for a while, and the next installment of the 007 franchise will have to find a suitable replacement. Isn’t J.J. Abrams available?

We’re entering Awards Season, folks. For most of you, that usually means seeing your favorite films of the year lose to what you’d consider the “lesser” Weinstein picture. It’s always very frustrating, but one of those movies you may be cheering on — and has Oscar nominations written all over it — is Ben Affleck‘s Argo. The movie is a shoe-in for both the heavy hitter nods and countless spots on year-end top 10 lists. To GQ, this makes Affleck the director of the year, considering how he went from “loathed, frat boy Ben Affleck” to “esteemed filmmaker Ben Affleck.” It’s a transformation, for sure, and one to be proud of, but does continuing an epic comeback we all knew about really make him filmmaker of the year for 2012? Affleck proved himself as the director of the year in 2010 with The Town. That doesn’t mean he made the best movie of that year — and he certainly didn’t — but it was a big statement for Affleck the filmmaker. He proved Gone Baby Gone was no fluke — that he was the real deal. Although Argo is the best of these three films, it doesn’t say as much about his directorial career as his first two features do.

Warning: this post contains mild spoilers for Skyfall. At some point during the middle of the first decade of this century, it felt like the practice of rebooting franchises would not see an end anytime soon. A gritty, realist new Batman origin story was followed quickly by a new blonde James Bond who, supposedly modeled after the new spy paradigm of the Bourne series, seemed as messy as he was vulnerable.

Skyfall is the conclusion of James Bond’s coming-of-age story. At the end of Casino Royale, he may have declared himself Bond, but the young .00 wasn’t there just yet. As shown by the divisive Quantum of Solace, Bond was still a rebel – a guy who took advantage of having a license to kill. He was dangerous. The Bond we see in Sam Mendes‘s Skyfall is still a “blunt instrument,” as producer Barbara Broccoli calls him, but he’s wiser and older now. By the end, all three films tie together nicely, even if you’re not a fan of Quantum of Solace. Broccoli and her fellow producer, Michael G. Wilson, say that was the intention. Here’s what Wilson and Broccoli had to say about now bringing in auteur directors, how James Bond has grown since Casino Royale, and why Steven Spielberg hasn’t made a Bond film yet:

Skyfall feels, in many ways, like the last film in Daniel Craig‘s tenure as James Bond. It’s only his third go round as the British secret agent, but he’s already haggard, unshaven and tired of the back-stabbing, gun-toting rat race. When a list of MI6′s undercover agents is stolen (that’s right, it’s the old NOC list chestnut!) Bond and Agent Eve (Naomie Harris) are tasked with recovering it, but the mission goes awry and Bond is left for dead. He’s not, obviously, but he’s enjoying the peaceful anonymity and seaside screws too much to give a damn about anything else. But when MI6 is attacked back in London Bond rises from the dead and returns to duty. He tries too anyway, but injuries, indifference and a battered spirit threaten to keep him on the bench. It’s only when the stakes get personal for him and M (Judi Dench) that he musters the will needed to fight back. But will it be too late? Skyfall is big, beautiful entertainment that delivers the expected action set-pieces but adds truly artistic visuals and multiple odes to Bond films of the past fifty years. It’s never dull, occasionally surprising and unafraid to delve into Bond’s life more than any film since On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Unfortunately (and unnecessarily), all of that comes at the price of gaping plot holes and staggering lapses in logic.

Any way you slice it, we’re all happy Sam Mendes got his crack at a James Bond film. The man has made compelling dramas using different styles and techniques in his storytelling. But it was probably his take on the American gangster movie that shines as his best work of motion picture art. Road to Perdition stands now, 10 years after its release – as if you didn’t feel old enough already – as one the most stellar father/son relationship movies in recent memory, and it’s a damn fine shoot-em-up, too. So we couldn’t wait for this week, when Skyfall finally sees its release, and the wonderful information we would be gathering from Mendes’ commentary for Road to Perdition. He’s flying solo, which is usually a hit or miss on commentaries, but as with Mendes film career, we’re willing to give him all the benefit of the doubt in the world. He hasn’t let us down yet. Without further ado, let’s get into it.

Skyfall returns to the Connery days of the James Bond franchise, where nearly every frame would drip with coolness. Martin Campbell’s Casino Royale was a step in the right direction, but it wasn’t until director Sam Mendes and cinematographer Roger Deakins showed up that the series began to feel at its most alive, cinematic, and stylish. This world of Bond is lavish and bold, and to a degree we have never seen from this series before. Deakins achieved all that slickness with his new favorite storytelling tool, the ARRI ALEXA. Deakins used the camera on his previous film, In Time. After two outings with the ALEXA, Deakins fails to see any shortcoming with the camera. As the man said a few years ago, don’t expect him to return film, unless the Coen Brothers come calling. If you call that sacrilegious, as Deakins tells us, he doesn’t really get what your problem is. Here is what Skyfall cinematographer Roger Deakins had to say about working with Sam Mendes, the film’s stunning Shanghai fight sequence, and how anything rarely comes easy for him:

October offered up plenty of films to give this awards season a proper start. Ben Affleck once again showed he’s got one of the best eyes for tension working today; John Hawkes gave another year’s best performance in Fox Searchlight’s The Sessions; Martin McDonagh made another wicked, original dark comedy with real bite; and, who could forget, The Wachowskis and Tom Tykwer made a huge box office smash which received unabashed praise up the wazoo, especially for the seamless makeup work. While I wish Cloud Atlas did fit that description, at least for a few more years the trio’s daring and moving film will go down as a box office bomb which may or may have not been ahead of its time. No matter how Cloud Atlas stands up in a few years, it was the type of ambition which served as another reminder of how important going to the movie theater is and to truly have experiences while you are there, be they good or bad. With November 2012, there are plenty of movies to have a similar experience with, from Ang Lee‘s Life of Pi to a triumphant new Bond movie. Keep reading to find out what other eight movies you must see this month.

After hearing a few filmmakers go back and forth about whose work is less important, it feels really good to see a noteworthy director give such praise and credit to a peer. In an excellent piece at IndieWire, Sam Mendes explains why Christopher Nolan‘s The Dark Knight helped influence his take on James Bond in Skyfall. “It would be a tragedy if all the serious movies were very small and all the popcorn movies were very big and have nothing to say,” said Mendes. “And what Nolan proved was that you can make a huge movie that is thrilling and entertaining and has a lot to say about the world we live in, even if, in the case with The Dark Knight, it’s not even set in our world. It felt like a movie that was about our world post-9/11 and played on our fears, and discussed our fears and why they existed, and I thought that was incredibly brave and interesting. That did help give me the confidence to take this movie in directions that, without The Dark Knight, might not have been possible.” That topical relevance is something that’s been building in the franchise ever since Daniel Craig took over, although it’s certainly the case that older 007 outings spoke specifically to the era they were made in, for better (From Russia With Love) or for pop culture worse (Moonraker). Mendes’ further comments seem to confirm that studios have caught on to the reality of making darker films during a time when

God help whatever poor soul is given the task to follow up Sam Mendes‘s work on Skyfall. Mendes has brought the James Bond franchise to a level beyond what we would hope and expect from a fifty-year-old series. Most characters couldn’t endure that lengthy amount of time, but Mendes and the brass behind the franchise have made a bold reason to believe that Bond is far from dead. Even looking past Roger Deakins‘ rich cinematography, Thomas Newman‘s intense but subtle score (which I’m listening to/fawning over as I write these words), and the magnificent locations milked for all their beauty, there’s still plenty more to love about Skyfall. Mendes has brought his voice to the franchise while also preserving Bond’s greatest traits, making the film one hell of a character-driven action movie. But just how did he do it?

For a long time, Steven Spielberg has expressed interest in making a James Bond picture. From the start of his career and even until after he hit it big time, Spielberg has wanted to bring his Spielbergyness to Bond. Unfortunately for both Spielberg and Bond fans, that dream hasn’t come to fruition. The idea of the mega director and Bond coming together sounds like a perfect match, both artistically and financially. With an idea this good, it’s a little baffling Spielberg hasn’t gotten a crack at Bond yet. Now, we sort of have an answer why. Speaking with producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli at the press day for Skyfall – which completely lives up to the hype – we had the chance to ask them if there’s ever been serious discussions of bringing Spielberg in. In response, Broccoli did share a story regarding conversations between Spielberg and her father, Albert R. Broccoli, over the matter:

Last night a bunch of critics in the UK were treated to an early screening of Skyfall, and while nobody invited any of our diehard 007 junkies, I figured it’s worth our while to take a look at the first reactions to the new James Bond blockbuster. To do so, I’m using the recent breakdown of elements by one of FSR’s resident Bond experts, Kevin Carr, in order to dissect the reviews and highlight their takes on each individual ingredient. What about overall opinions? It seems they’re generally of a simple consensus, that Skyfall is not only a great return for the series following the disappointing Quantum of Solace but it may be one of the best Bond installments yet. This feat is achieved, apparently, in director Sam Mendes‘s balance of serious and nostalgic tone, brought about with a script (by Neal Purvis & Robert Wade and John Logan) pays tribute to the past films and franchise conventions while still also delivering a lot of fresh ideas. And Roger Deakins‘s cinematography sounds like a real highlight of the film — even Oscar-worthy, according to some critics. Check out what the reviews (linked at the bottom of the page) have to say about Bond’s fit with the 10 main ingredients of a 007 film after the break.

With the new trailer for Skyfall, director Sam Mendes and the hairstylists have recognized the true method to ensuring Javier Bardem is a terrifying villain: give him the most ridiculous haircut possible. There’s no telling what sort of dastardly work he’s up to here, or what James Bond will have to do to stop him, but none of that matters because it’s all overshadowed by the kind of blond wig Dave Chapelle used when he was doing whiteface. It’s like what Donald Trump would look like if he never went thin on top. How do those back goosebumps feel? Of course the real star of this trailer is Roger Deakins‘ cinematography, followed closely by Daniel Craig in a death-defying turn as 007. Check it out for yourself:

One of this fall/winter’s more anticipated films for action junkies is the new James Bond movie, Skyfall. This time around, Bond’s 23rd to be exact, the titular agent is tasked with protecting M and looking cool while doing it. He may also get to slip in a quick shower or two with an attractive woman between all the shooting, running and falling out of things. The official synopsis is here: Bond’s loyalty to M is tested as her past comes back to haunt her. As MI6 comes under attack, 007 must track down and destroy the threat, no matter how personal the cost.” Sam Mendes directs Daniel Craig in his third go round as Bond, and they’re joined by Javier Bardem, Judi Dench, Ralph Fiennes, Albert Finney, Naomie Harris and Ben Whishaw. Check below for the new Skyfall teaser that aired during last night’s Olympic Games opening ceremonies. It was a nice pairing with the Bond-themed video featuring Craig escorting the Queen to the games by helicopter before the duo skydived down to join the masses.

The most striking thing about the new Skyfall trailer is the beauty. Yes, there’s the beast. The brawn. Daniel Craig still looks hulking and dark as James Bond, but the trailer shows off some truly gorgeous shots without giving them all away. That’s what happens when you hire Sam Mendes to direct and Roger Deakins to director photography. The latest entry in the Bond franchise sees M’s past coming to haunt everyone and 007 attempting to kill the people trying to kill him. This time, you know, it’s personal. Now see if you can spot any shaky-cam. Check out the trailer for yourself (as if you’ve bothered to read any of this anyway):

I invite you to imagine a scene for a minute: a handsome man, with the kind of chiseled chin you could sharpen spoons on in an embarrassingly fine suit whose intricate detail blinded three tailors in the making sits at a Texas Holdem table, sucking daintily on a Vesper and with a cigarette lit for ornamentation. A gun presses into his ribs, another comfortably into his calf, and about his person are secreted millions of pounds worth of the British Intelligence Service’s most impressive, and most secret inventions. His smile cuts knowingly across an impeccably handsome face, eyes taking in infinitely more than his lush demeanor lets on as he imperceptibly stalks his prey. He is Bond, and no matter what you do about it, he is always going to be cooler than you. So, why the hell wouldn’t you want to make your life as close to his as possible? Your paunch might say more Gandalfini than Bond, and your social awkwardness would probably be the first, largest stumbling block in your application to MI5, but through the magpie-like acquisition of many fine pieces of James Bond merchandise, you too could pretend like a boss. And wouldn’t you know it, that’s precisely what this week’s Merch Hunter column is devoted to…

Who has time to trim whiskers when you fighting international terrorists with only bullets and charm? Exactly. No one. Not even James Bond. The proof comes in the first image from Skyfall where Daniel Craig reprises the character with Sam Mendes in the director’s chair. The production also boasts a hell of a cast, including the return of Judy Dench and the inclusion of newcomers like Albert Finney, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw and Javier Bardem. With Helen McRory cast and Maggie Smith rumored, it’s half of a Harry Potter reunion. The steel eyes are definitely there, but Bond looks downright haggard here. Old. Weathered. Hopefully it’s from heavy amounts of ass kicking that we’ll get to see on-screen. [007.com]

Could a first-look photo be more dull than this? It’s just James Bond sitting poolside, like any other Joe Shmoe. Where’s the excitement? Where’s the guns? Where’s, I dunno, James Bond’s face? This is a photo which could be from almost any type of film, nothing screams “Bond.” It’s such an odd photo to release, but, then again, it’s a still for a film almost a year away. By looking at this photo, a part of me can’t help but to imagine the parody version of Sam Mendes‘s Bond outing, since it only features the character staring down all sad-like. Imagine Bond narrating, “My name is James Bond. This is my neighborhood. This is my street. This is my life. I’m 42 years old. In less than a year, I’ll be dead,” as a whimsical but sad Thomas Newman score abruptly plays over Bond’s snark. If the franchise character gets even an inch mopier than what we saw in Quantum of Solace, I could see it being something along those lines. Or maybe Mendes will get the franchise back on the right track, which I feel fairly confident about. Take a look at Bond seriously debating if he should go back in the pool or not:

Thomas Newman had his first feature job as an Orchestrator on Return of the Jedi, and has since crafted a career scoring more movies than you can shake a stick at (go ahead, try it). His most recent work includes moving music for Wall-E, The Help, Revolutionary Road and Little Children. He’s got a moderate spectrum of style, but it’s clear he focuses on dramatic, sweeping work. Beyond the third entry on that list, he also composed for American Beauty, Road to Perdition, and Jarhead; it looks like his working relationship with Sam Mendes has brought about a job on Skyfall. According to MI6 HQ, the ten-time Oscar nominee has been hired to maestro some notes for the forthcoming Bond film. Fantastic news all around. His work for Shawshank Redemption might be one of the best scores in modern movies, and anyone who helped make Real Genius should get every job ever. However, this move also means that composer David Arnold, who has worked on Bond from Tomorrow Never Dies through Quantum of Solace will have to skip this one. Apparently, he’ll be unavailable due to his duties with the London Olympics in 2012.

This might be the kind of casting rumor that some might see as a spoiler so be forewarned. MovieWeb is reporting that they’ve heard through the questionable, pinch of salt-style grapevine that Ralph Fiennes‘s claim that he’s “a government agent,” in the new Bond film Skyfall means a lot more than he’s allowed to say. Their estimation, and confirmation (for what it’s worth) from an insider source at EON, is that Fiennes will be playing M as a replacement for Dame Judy Dench who is bowing out after this installment. Doing the math, that means they’ve gotten a younger M, a much younger Q (Ben Whishaw), and that the whole thing is sponsoring Sesame Street. If this is true, it comes as bittersweet news because Dench and Fiennes are both amazing in different ways. It was refreshing to see a strong female presence commanding respect over Bond, and it’s about to turn back into a Boy’s Club, but there’s no denying the forcefulness of Fiennes. Which is the new fragrance he’ll be putting out next year. Seriously, it’s good news/bad news, but hopefully the movie involves a knife fight between the two of them. Don’t let us down, Mr. Mendes. The people demand a knife fight between Queen Elizabeth and Lord Voldemort.