Up in the Air (2009)

Drama (with just a hint of romantic comedy) about a man (George Clooney) who travels the USA to fire people. Despite the upsetting nature of his work, he loves his life of transience and deliberately avoids attachments. That all changes when he meets Alex (Vera Farmiga) and, despite everything, falls in love with her. Will he get in touch with his sensitive side and finally settle down?

There are two parallel plots: he begins to re-engage with his estranged family owing to an unexpected role at his sister’s wedding. And he is accompanied on his travels by his colleague Natalie (Anna Kendrick), who aims to implement a video-conferencing facility that will remove the need for him to sack people face to face, therefore threatening his untethered travelling existence.

Without wishing to spoil the ending, it doesn’t pan out the way you might expect.

It’s a witty and intelligent script and the bland, faceless, corporate aspects are so well observed that you begin to understand their seductive appeal.

Clooney is perfect in the part of the endlessly charming but rootless HR “terminator” getting to know his emotions.

Goldfinger (1964)

Third James Bond film. Lots to enjoy this time around, not least a strong storyline with a clear narrative arc. The Aston Martin DB5 is iconic and looks stunning on those winding mountain roads. Shirley Eaton’s death by gold paint remains memorable. There are convincing villains in the form of the hat-throwing OddJob (Harold Sakata) and the blandly evil Goldfinger (Gert Fröbe). There’s an amusingly extended golfing scene that seems more about macho one-upmanship than anything else. There’s the absurdly named Pussy Galore (Honor Blackman) leading a daft flying circus of glamorous girls who drop poison gas from tiny planes above Fort Knox.

This line from Sean Connery stood out as jarring and extraordinary: “My dear girl, there are some things that just aren't done, such as drinking Dom Perignon ’53 above the temperature of 38 degrees Fahrenheit. That's just as bad as listening to The Beatles without earmuffs!” Clearly Bond was pitched at the parents, and not at the kids. He was still part of the old order.

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

Roger Moore’s third Bond film is probably his best.

Pros:
• A different kind of story arc. It seems to turn into a war film about two thirds of the way through.
• The Bond girl has a better-written role than usual. Unfortunately, Barbara Bach (later to marry Ringo Starr) doesn’t act that role very convincingly.
• Jaws is the most compelling henchman of them all and I like the fact that he survives, even if they ruined the character by turning this brutal killer into a soppy fool when he returned in Moonraker.
• In places, it’s like a horror film and there are a couple of genuinely frightening surprises.
• Iconic scene in which Bond skis off a cliff and opens a Union Jack parachute.
• Bond’s underwater car.
• Theme song “Nobody Does It Better” sung by Carly Simon.

Cons:
• Roger Moore is still ridiculous.
• The villain (Curd Jürgens playing Karl Stromberg) is killed rather too easily by Bond shooting him. I was expecting him to be sent down the shaft in his sci-fi sub-aquatic base to the shark tank so that he would suffer the same fate as his victims. Instead, Jaws gets that treatment so that they can have a Jaws vs. Jaws battle, which – brilliantly – henchman Jaws wins.
• The usual racism and sexism.
• Bond’s evident knowledge of marine creatures is never explained. Is he just an expert at everything?

Live and Let Die (1973)

The first Roger Moore film in the James Bond series is a slick effort. Roger tends to act with his eyebrows, and there’s a strange awkwardness about his manner. It’s as if he’s never quite right for whatever each scene demands.

The plot is easier to follow than usual and the baddie, drug lord Mr. Big (Yaphet Kotto), is one of the better villains. Jane Seymour is pretty but fairly weak as the Tarot-reading Solitaire. Oddly enough, it’s suggested that she actually can read Tarot cards – a hint of the supernatural (presumably a first in the Bond universe) that is backed up by the inclusion of a witch doctor and magical rituals elsewhere.

The speedboat chase is fun and the crocodiles-as-stepping-stones moment is a classic. The presence of Sheriff J.W. Pepper is an unfortunate blemish. He’s a “comedy character” who just isn’t funny. But he was apparently so popular that they brought him back again for The Man with the Golden Gun.

Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)

Sequel to the first reboot, again directed by Jar Jar Abrams. The characters are just as strong as before (even if the Spock/Uhura romance fails to convince and Spock can be both emotional and emotionless as the story requires), but the plot is somewhat tortured. It’s not entirely clear what the motivations of the villain are and parts of the story just don’t make sense. Even the title is bafflingly random. 

Some of the dialogue is a little clichéd, which is a shame because a better script could have lifted this out of “adequate sci-fi thriller” mode and let these interesting characters develop further. 

Leonard Nimoy appears one last time (he died in 2015) although seemingly just to appeal to the fans. There are many other reference points apparently thrown in as crowd-pleasers (Khan, Tribbles, etc). As with the Star Wars sequels, you wonder why they have to endlessly rehash old ideas rather than creating new mythology and iconography of their own. 

Despite amazing visuals, some thrills and some welcome humour (mainly from Simon Pegg’s Scotty), it doesn’t work quite as well as the first film. And once again it frustratingly ends where the TV series begins, with the crew about to “explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilisations, to boldly go where no man has gone before” (although “no man” has now become “no one”). Odd that it has taken two films to get to this point.