The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

M: 007!
General Anatol Gogol: XXX!
Sir Frederick Gray, Minister of Defence: Bond! What do you think you're doing?
James Bond: Keeping the British end up, sir.

Sheikh Hoseim: Are you, eh, quite sure I can't persuade you to stay the night?
James Bond: When one is in Egypt, one should delve deeply into its treasures.

The Spy Who Loved Me (SWLM) is, for my money, a classic of James Bond -if not the best that I've seen. (Judgement and ranking to be done after seeing them all.)

SWLM is just the right level of ludicrous to be enjoyable fun. The Carly Simon song is a great fit, setting the mood, just right.

I could go on about the specifics of SWLM; the submarine car holds up really well, it was good to see a female counter part to 007, and the indestructible Jaws; but what I really want to talk about is production and its history.

SWLM was released in July of 1977 a full 3 years after MWTGG. Bonds, at the time, were coming out every 1 or 2 years.  So why the delay? My answer comes from understanding a little about movie history. I'm betting that the writers scrapped a whole different movie after seeing the success of Jaws in 1975. The studio wanted to capitalize on public interest in sharks and all things ocean. So, the producers/writers went back and created a story about a mad villain who wanted to live in a post-nuclear holocaust Atlantis. They even included character called Jaws.

Unfortunately for them, while SWLM was well received, it was swallowed by the release of Star Wars in late May of 77. Underwater terror was out. Space was in. -hence the idea of Moonraker.

On a scale of Nick Nack to Jaws, I give The Spy Who Loved Me 3.4 out of 5 stars.

The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

James Bond: I mean sir, who would pay a million dollars to have me killed?
M: Jealous husbands! Outraged chefs! Humiliated tailors! The list is endless!

Lazar: Mr. Bond, bullets do not kill. It is the finger that pulls the trigger.
James Bond: Exactly. I am now aiming precisely at your groin. So speak or forever hold your piece.

Everything about The Man with the Golden Gun is mediocre.  Passably so.  It is the bread and room temperature water of Bonds.  It doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy it, I simply feel bland about it.

The song is forgettable. The plot standardly Bond. The production adequate, and the cast knows the drill. So, there's nothing to get excited or feel bad about.

In the chronology of Bond, I would say with Roger Moore this is the beginning of the era where the script has to be simply bursting with ribald puns and crude jokes told in a classy way. My less than precise accounts puts the jokes for Moore at 2x over Connery per film. (They are generally better jokes, too.)

This Bond is slightly unique in that Bond doesn't so much travel to one place as many.  I think they just figured...yeah let's just send him to.....Asia....  My count was Macau, Hong Kong, Thailand, and somewhere in China. I am guessing that Red China at the time was none too keen to allow extended filming within their borders. I also noticed a Pan-Asian theme in that the business man's lair in Thailand was full of Chinese Architecture and allusions to sumo wrestlers. My own tastes would have been to let Thailand be Thailand.

Lastly, the inclusion of the loudmouth sheriff from Louisiana in Thailand was simply dreadful. I really hope he doesn't come back.

On a scale of pho to phuyuck, I give The Man with the Golden Gun 2.86 out of 5 stars.

As a child of the 80's, I basically think of Christopher Lee as old. I'd really only seen him when he was old. It was refreshing to see him as a spry 50 year old.

Live and Let Die (1973)

Rosie Carver: But you couldn't. You wouldn't. Not after what we just done.
James Bond: Well, I certainly wouldn't have killed you before.

James Bond: Butterhook!

Ughhhh so yeah Live and Let Die (L&LD) is the worst of the Bond films as I watch them all. -Others could still yet contend, but....it would be tough.

In his continuing Amero-crentrism, James Bond takes on Voodoo in New Orleans. It's not exactly a world crisis....just a heroin monopoly plot. I would say the only thing going for L&LD is James Seymour. Whose role as Solitaire kept the movie strange and hokey. I think the costume designers were trying to go for the Ming the Merciless or  Evil Unaloq look.
  

The song by Wings -AKA Paul McCartney is fun, if not iconic, vastly superior to the movie.

In short, it was interesting/intriguing/difficult to watch Bond immerse himself in "highly stylized" African American culture of the early 1970s. L&LD seemed to approach the community through the lens of exoticism and magic power -Voodoo, etc. I'm sure they said it was made for "Global" consumption.

I also learned that I had been mispronouncing and misunderstanding Baron Samedi (There is no pronunciation guide to GoldenEye for N64)

Lastly, the addition of the fat, racist, stupid, and unintelligible Louisiana sheriff with a brother-in-law named Billy Bob was just painful to watch. Suddenly, James Bond became Smokey and the Bandit (and this is 4 years before Smokey and the Bandit). [Hey, maybe this is where Buford T Justice and Boss Hog came from?]

On a scale of I just stopped watching to I came back because I wanted to complete the journey, I give Live and Let Die 1.95 out of 5 stars.

Diamond are Forever (1971)

"Refreshing to hear that there is one subject you're not an expert on!" -M

[looking down] "Exceptionally fine shot." -James Bond
"I didn't know there was a pool down there." -Slumber Inc. Attendant

This is not a dig at Diamonds are Forever (DAF) so much as an applaud for the song.  The Title Song: Diamonds are Forever is better than the film it plugs.

Finally a James Bond with plot I can get behind. 1. Steal diamonds. 2. Build diamond refractive solar laser satellite. 3. Extort world. I get it. It's simple. Understandable even -despite its obvious flaws.

Connery is back for DAF, but he looks old; gray hairs even. They also seemed to have let him grow out his eyebrows. Caterpillars. And age seemed to be a theme for DAF.

It's only 1971, but Bond looks stunningly out of place in his white tux on the floor of the casino. It's like he's wearing a tie to a party where the mandatory attire is sweatpants. He being proper, gentlemanly, and groomed only serve as a counter point to the background Americans but to Vegas and his advisaries.  The world went and got itself rather uncouth and ugly in a short amount of time. Bond did not change with it. That is both admirable and rather strange.

This is second Bond to rather brazenly spend an entire movie in the USA. I can only guess that if you were thinking about from where the end of the world would come in 1960-70's the logical choice would be the United States as British films would have had a hard time filming in the USSR. Also, I guess is that the USA was the biggest market for feature production paying audiences. I don't fault Bond makers for these decisions, but for me Bond is European and British, his natural element is in Europe or an exotic local, not Vegas.

It's a shame that I couldn't do anything but laugh at Charles Gray as Ernst Blofeld...all I can think is that he is going to break into the Time Warp.

On a scale of "knowing what IT is" to "having what IT is change", I give Diamonds are Forever 3.5 out of 5 stars.    

On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969)

"This never happened to the other fellow." -James Bond

"He had a lot of guts." -James Bond (A man just fell into a mulching snow blower)

Thesis:  On Her Majesty's Secret Service (OHMSS) is a bad movie, but nowhere near it's reputation.

Yes, this James Bond does not star Sean Connery. That's what I think people don't like about OHMSS. Sean Connery was Bond. George Lazenby is not Connery; therefore he cannot be Bond.

And I think ol' Georgey is done a great disservice for being the Bond flung into the dark fan shadow created by Connery. Anyone would have failed -especially with this movie.

All in all George Lazenby was a completely acceptable if not capable James Bond. Certainly no flash...but certainly little to complain about.

Now the less said about the movie, the better.

The best things about it are....Diana Rigg....and maybe Telly Savalas.

It took 6 movies, but I think I will declare Diana Rigg as the Contessa Tracy Di Vicenzo to be the most/first complete female character of the series.

Yet, I cannot deny the utter failure of the rest of the OHMSS. I think ski based spy films, or even just winter films in general, face an uphill battle, based on geography, weather requirements, and the technical challenges of filming on white; yet something about winter activities and their required gear betray a certain class that just has a shallower appeal. -beaches are free and casual, skiing is about money, gear, glasses, skill, and it's cold.

I just want to take a moment to laugh at the plot. Evil Man moves from Volcano Lair to Chalet of Doom to conduct experiments on beautiful women from across the globe to make them carriers of crop infertility. Then he tries to extort the world.

*Spoilers* And to my knowledge, Ernst Stavro Blofeld was captured when he ran into that tree after the harrowing bobled chase.....but somehow that didn't seem to matter when he showed up to kill the Contessa as a stinger.

So yeah, it's just a bad movie...not spectacularly so.

On a scale of Contessa Tracy Di Vicenzo to Queen of Thorns, I give On Her Majesty's Secret Service 2.4 out of 5 stars.

You Only Live Twice (1967)

Tiger Tanaka: Place yourself entirely in their hands, my dear Bond-san. Rule number one: is never do anything yourself - when someone else can do it for you.
James Bond: And number two?
Tiger Tanaka: Rule number two: in Japan, men come first, women come second.
James Bond: I just might retire to here.

Tiger Tanaka: I must say I am disappointed with the ease with which I could pull you in. The one thing my honourable mother taught me long ago was never to get into a car with a strange girl. But you, I'm afraid, will get into anything. With any girl.

You Only Live Twice (YOLT) is simultaneously a pretty good movie and wasteful garbage. In terms of how to tell a story, the special effects of 1967, the gadgets, the rising action of the plot, and the pacing of intrigue, YOLT is first rate. It is the first of what could/should be/are snappier Bonds with less time between action. So, this is when that started. I also liked the aerial photography for the helicopter sequences, as well as the miniatures of the Volcano lair.

In terms of dialogue writing, story climax/resolution  and my own social feelings, YOLT is pretty abysmal. *point of order in that I am not Japanese, but have spent considerable time there. This is from my perspective. I would welcome the perspective of others.*

1. Roald Dahl as in the BFG, The Witches, and James and the Gian Peach wrote this...so I am kinda at a loss. The best oneliner they had for when a man gets eaten by pirañas is "Bon Apetit".  No good. Such a waste.
2. Japan is a pretty sexist place. Japan in the 1960s most certainly was more so. This account of a handsome Englishman's journey of sexual discovery in Japan was so blatant and I kinda cringed. It was as if the perfect combination of orientalist perspective and male gaze came together in an odious blend. 
3. Bond has to go "undercover" as a Japanese man. 
4. There are ninjas.  Because, of course, there are. No real need for them, but it's Japan so gotta have ninjas.
5. Finally, final act of the raid of the Volcano lair spirals off into the hysterical. It jumps the shark like 4 times while humming Bolero. Color-coded ant like men in jumpsuits fight on a miniature set, and then, for no reason, things start to explode. It also seems to take forever. They fight for what is a solid 13-17 minutes.  It could have been done in 10 -I think. 
6. Also- Bond's Japanese wedding doesn't seem to count. He is unmarried in the next one and Mrs. Bond (Kissy Suki) isn't assassinated so....huh?
7. The geography/local knowledge of Japan is pretty suspect.
1. No one can race through any streets in Tokyo. There are just too many turns and there is always traffic. Always. Even in the 1960s. 
2. The go from Tokyo to Kobe in 1 shot like it could be done in a run. It's an 80 minute-ish flight or a 160 minutes by the bullet train which didn't exist in 1967. 

But all in all if I put on my 1960s blinders YOLT is a fun if silly time. 

I have this lingering question for the film makers? Were they considering the percentage of their audience that was a GI in WWII or Korea and might have spent considerable time in Japan? Did they see YOLT as an introduction to Japan or as reheating the memories of Japan that those GIs had? 

On a scale of Tsuki Tawdry to Kissy Suki, I give You Only Live Twice 3.18 out of 5 stars. 

Oh and the Nancy Sinatra song ain't half bad. 

Thunderball (1965)

Fiona: You look pale, Mr. Bond. I hope I didn't frighten you.
Bond: Well you see, I've always been a nervous passenger.
Fiona: Some men just don't like to be driven.
Bond: No, some men just don't like to be taken for a ride.

Night 4 of 25

Thunderball has a silly name. But, it is clearly the best of the first 4 Bonds. One of those rare franchises where each one actually builds up. -It also has a jetpack. Hard to beat a jetpack.

OK so what I didn't know about Thunderball is that about 25 to 35% of the movie takes place underwater.  Scuba gear and fins. The more I thought about this the more I came up with how hard the shoot must have been. -especially for Connery.

1. He has so many underwater shots! Days and days of shoots in the ocean, shoots in the pool, and virtually every take then requires either a re-up of oxygen, or instructions.
2. Then they bring in the underwater melee at the finish. -more people doing more underwater on cue.
3. I assume you have to pay everyone more for acting in alternative environments
4. The weather seems like a huge factor in determining the outcomes. It's not like you can drag big lights out into the reef to ensure constant usable light? -oh wait maybe you can.  But, if you do the costs spirals up.
5. The cameras that shoot underwater were probably temperamental and expensive.

So my big question for Thunderball was why.

Why even bother to have an aqua spy adventure when there are so many unexplored (see the next 21 films) ideas on land, or at least above the water?  I would try hard not to do this. Here are some reasons I came up with for why they chose this difficult concept.

1. Connery said "yes", but only if it was all located in the Bahamas
2. This is made in 1963-4 so this would have been right when scuba diving became cheap enough and vacations to tropical locations became attainable for Americans, perhaps there was an idea to have Bond ride that affordable aspiration.
3. Maybe the producers selected that they just wanted to be in the Bahamas.
4. They were going to include sharks. (that's it.)
5. Someone bet a creator that they couldn't

Secondarily, This is the first Bond that really could have captured the terror of a post Cuban Missile Crisis world. And here we have an example of a non-state actor (SPECTRE) stealing nukes and planning to extort everyone with threat in example after example of escalation dominance. I can only think that this plot was concocted as kind of shadowy doomsday scenario. It would be one thing for the USA to lose control of its stockpiles to a 3rd party, but an entirely different one for it's ally Great Britain to let nukes escape.

 On a scale of Chubby Checker to Fats Domino, I give Thunderball 3.5 out of 5 stars.