Die Another Day -- DVD MGM Home Entertainment 2003     Reviewed by Tony Buchsbaum	I always feel a certain kind of excitement as the time for a new James Bond film approaches. Ever since I was a young boy, when my father took me to see the earlier Connery Bond movies, sometimes even double features, I have been hooked by the many elements of Bond's world. The gadgets and the girls, certainly, had their draw; but more than that, there was something so undeniably classy about the whole enterprise. Much of this class, I later learned, came from Ian Fleming himself. Not literally, but, if I may put it this way, suggestively. His books had a great sweep to them, a force that moved the plot along at a clip while affording the hero choice moments with the girls, the villain and such. Fleming was also a noted connoisseur of brands and clearly felt no hesitation about mentioning Bond's preferred brands of cigarettes or liquor or car or gun. Decades before today's so-called product placement, Fleming understood that these details shaped Bond, placing him squarely in a particular world. The choices said something about the chooser (and yes, I do mean Fleming as much as Bond here). I mention all this because some of the choices made for the new 007 film, Die Another Day, say quite a lot about today's Bond and his makers. Now that the film has been released on DVD, the result is the most comprehensive look at a Bond film to date. The other films have all been single-disc affairs, filled to the byte with the various bells and whistles that have become DVD de rigeur: filmmaker commentaries, behind-the-scenes documentaries, still galleries, trailers and the like. The Die Another Day DVD goes one disc further. Here, someone has chosen to give us two audio commentaries (one featuring director Lee Tamahori and producer Michael Wilson, another featuring Pierce Brosnan and actress Rosamund Pike), a making-of doc, a half dozen featurettes, the music video, still galleries, trailers, TV spots and more. Much as I happen to love all this, I must admit that it does veer dangerously close to too much information -- a pattern that's evident all through this film. Indeed, this DVD set is almost a Die Another Day master class, and as much as I enjoyed the movie, I'm not sure it deserved this much attention. I'd much prefer to see this kind of in-depth deconstruction for some of the classic films in the series, such as From Russia with Love or Goldfinger. Die Another Day is notable because it's the 20th official Bond film, released in the 40th anniversary year of the first, Dr. No. While many of the films were classics in their own time, a few have been seriously flawed clunkers. Die Another Die, for the most part, is a winner, filled, given the anniversary, with nods and winks and homages to the earlier films. At the same time, Another Day offers a couple of departures, which is also a nice touch. The plot is a bit more convoluted than most -- and a bit more intelligent. It concerns an angry North Korean who tried to play against the rulebook imposed by his military father. When Bond steps in and wreaks his signature havoc, the North Korean is eliminated -- but not before Bond is captured and tortured for more than a year. When he's released, he seeks revenge on the operative who betrayed him. Along the way he meets Jinx, played by Halle Berry and Miranda Frost, played by Pike. There's also a central villain, played by Toby Stephens. To say any more would give too much away -- and this film does depend on a certain bit of surprise. Bond captured? Tortured? You see what I mean about choices. This is a new 007 for a new millennium. This Bond is a tough bastard, but he also has feelings. He's always been a woman's man and a man's man and the Queen's man; now he's also his own man, acting on his emotions and his loyalties without apology or compromise. Bond seems almost real here. He's still got his sense of humor, but it seems grounded, much in the way that Connery's version seemed like an actual spy all those years ago. This is part of what's great about Another Day . It's a great movie first, and a Bond movie second. That's super for audiences who love a great ride, although it's less exciting for fans who want a new Bond movie to celebrate. For all its innovation, Another Day veers from the formula a bit. The movie has its share of cool set-pieces: a hovercraft chase at the beginning of the film, a laser fight, an invisible Aston Martin (answering the oft-asked question, "How does one make a cooler car than the one with the ejector seat?"), a nifty duel with very long and very sharp swords, a glacier duel between Bond and a henchman with a diamond-encrusted face (long story), and a climactic battle inside an airplane. Amazingly, it all holds together. If there was one seriously bad choice here, it was using Madonna to write the theme song. She'd have been great as the singer, but to hire her to compose what she submitted was terribly wrong-headed. The song is monotonous and nonsensical, almost Madonna's quasi-lyrical ruminations on herself-in-a-Bond-film. The video was a joke, too, a bad one -- but even worse is the opening credits sequence in which the song is used. The credits sequence is one Bond fans look forward to, and this one was dismal. Early on, Maurice Binder's and Robert Brownjohn's work was brilliant and innovative - take a look at the jaw-dropping titles for Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger and Thunderball. Even the recent films' titles, designed by Daniel Kleinman, are both wondrous and wonderful. What happened here is a big question. Instead of being used as a way to transform the film into a visually arresting sequence of silhouetted nudes and light and form, the sequence this time around is used to convey story: Bond's period of imprisonment and torture. Kleinman's choices are great, but the whole thing feels more like a standard film opening than one for a Bond film. This should be special; it should announce to every person in the audience, "Attention, this is a 007 adventure, so fasten your seatbelts and hold on tight. We're about to thrill you with girls, gadgets and mayhem." Instead, this delivers story. Absolutely not what we want. To make matters even worse -- much worse -- there's the song. It drones on and on and seems like it's going to last forever, and that's before the first stanza is over. The music is synth trash, Madonna's voice sounds forced, clipped and electronicized within an inch of its life. She's a much better composer and performer than this song would have anyone believe. The problem is that she thinks she's bigger than Bond, and while that may be true in the real world, it's not true in a Bond film. Here, the guest tried to outshine the host, and fell flat. In a related issue, the film's score, composed by David Arnold, is almost as limp. Rumor has it that he wrote a song for the film; it was scrapped in favor of Madonna's. I imagine this took the wind out of Arnold's sails, for his work here is two hours of pounding dreariness. Usually a subtle, smart composer, Arnold's choice here to use and reuse the classic James Bond theme is senseless. After all, if it's not saved for purely Bondian moments, one or two per film, then it's no fun anymore. So, to summarize: Choices are important on any film, but they're really key on a Bond film. This time, the director was terrific and the script was tight, but even with all the references to other 007 movies, this felt like just another action film to me. There were too many things that seemed out of place. I liked it, but I wanted more. I admit, having said this, that the song and credits sequence and music are what sent me off in the wrong direction. I wish the film had kept me on track; right away, instead reveling in what was there, I missed what wasn't. Still, the Die Another Day DVD is a great buy. Brosnan is great. Berry is kick-ass. Stephens has that British villainy thing down. All my beefs aside, it's a terrific movie and a really good time. I just hope, next time around, that the Bond filmmakers make a smart, brave choice at the start and return wholeheartedly to the winning formula they've spent four decades building. | October 2003   Tony Buchsbaum is the author of Total Eclipse. At night he works on another novel and a screenplay. Days, he writes advertising copy in Lawrenceville, NJ, where he lives with his wife and sons.	He's always been a woman's man and a man's man and the Queen's man; now he's also his own man, acting on his emotions and his loyalties without apology or compromise.