Bond hopeful in the mix of mesmerising new movie Bastille Day

The 14 July – Bastille Day in France,  became an annual public holiday in 1880.  In 1879 troops stormed the Bastille – a medieval fortress and prison in France and history was made. Much has been  made of this historical day and this movie – which borrows Bastille Day for its title, draws gasps and concentration from the enthusiastic audience as an unusual and very seriously political story unfolds.

This 2016 new film directed by James Watkins, and written by Andrew Baldwin stars Bond hopeful Idris Elba, alongside Andrew Baldwin, Richard Madden, Charlotte le bon, Eriq Ebouaney and Jose Garcia.  There is no place to relax in watching this story – its ridden with espionage, disobedience, misleading allies, hugely unfaithful members of the services (tax paid personnel), and death and destruction with the predictable helping of car chases, shoot outs, punch outs, chases over the rooftops and goodies who turn out to be baddies, not to mention the reverse (baddies who seem to ultimately be goodies).

What is different one might ask about Bastille Day compared with other action plots?  Well, first of all this is a highly credible story – but my guess it will cause a certain amount of objection from the French police as they are ultimately itemised as having infiltrated innocents to plant a bomb designed to only do damage to buildings and not people and try and frame the Muslim fraternity for its effect.  Of course this concept is truly inflammatory – this is a US film but what will the French reaction be?  The second reason this film is interesting is that we truly get to know the main cast as people we can pretty well identify with – there is a clever juxtaposition between Idris Elba and Richard Madden as the two technical geniuses spark each other off and ultimately work together to bounce out the culprits in the saga. It has echoes of Batman and Robin – the good old days of the action heroes being “allowed” to be friends and yet one is stronger – Idris Elba might be a good Bond but he has seriously got to get his smooth and suave persona polished as Bond is not just a thug and no-one wants him to be – ever!

Granted there are some scenes which are typically over the top – shitty shoot outs and a rugby style scrum in the back of a moving transit van which is hard to get to grips with… but the pervading element of the lovability of this fast paced movie drama is that we get to identify with and believe in the cast. At just over 90 minutes it is a relatively short film but I can 99 percent guarantee you wont feel even one second is wasted in the unfolding of the drama.

Enjoy.

Penny Nair Price