James Bond celebrates a glorious golden anniversary with magazine covers, TV specials, news stories, and a brand new film, Skyfall.

I am only too happy the current Bond is Daniel Craig. I grew up with the Roger Moore James Bond—he did seven bond movies in a span of 12 years. I enjoyed watching them with my father. Having watched Connery, Dalton, Moore and Craig (sorry Niven, Lazenby et. al.), it is the last name on this list that has had a profound effect on me as Bond.

I love the way how on one hand this Bond can enjoy the fine things in life—driving in an Aston Martin DB5, traveling to the world’s finest cities and exotic locations, rocking Tom Ford suits and sunglasses—and how on the other, he can be downright brutal, cold, calculating, unafraid to get dirty, bloodied, wet, banged up, messed up, tortured and thrown in danger in the wink of an eye. Daniel Craig offers up the latter convincingly.

Skyfall has all the ingredients a fan of the franchise would expect from a Bond film and done in fine style. There’s the car—the DB5 makes a comeback (though we all know the cars in the films never quite make it out the way they came in); the chases—there’s a great motorcycle scene in Turkey; the classic fighting on top of a moving train; the mysterious woman who may be friend or foe; the super villain; the support team: M, Q and the rest of the gang at MI6; the fine liquor; the travel; the gadgets.

Villain Raoul Silva is played with extra menacing creepiness by Javier Bardem. He’s not out to control/destroy/own the world; his motivation is one of personal vendetta. Get ready for a younger (and these days, more convincing) Q played by a wonderfully geeky and disheveled Ben Whishaw who tells James, “I can do more damage on my laptop in my pajamas than you can do in a year in the field.”

The fight scenes have excellent cinematography. I quite liked the one that took place in a tower in Shanghai—all blue light with the silhouettes of Bond and baddie Patrice. There’s also an underwater fight scene and action scenes amid a gothic setting—rubble, red light and emptiness. You also know the fight choreographers have done their best and taken precious time to deliver sequences that are intense, effective and for all the roughness, it appearing strangely graceful.

Skyfall was shot digitally on an Arri Alexa camera just like The Avengers and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. I felt like I was watching the finale scenes on a giant HD TV. Incredibly clear images and great photography of the landscape, henchmen, explosion colored sky, and of course of Mr. Bond.

I know a few people may not have been fond of the drama or the “talkies” but I thought Skyfall as a whole was a great way to celebrate the 50-year milestone. If we’re lucky, we wait two years instead of four for Mr. Craig to be back as Bond.