007 fans would experience the biggest lull so far in between Bond pictures at two and a half years between The Man with the Golden Gun and the tenth film, 1977’s The Spy Who Loved Me. As the old adage says, good things come to those who wait.

The Spy Who Loved Me is easily the best Bond movie since Connery’s heyday. The excitement starts right away in the pre-title credit sequence, with Bond performing an awesome ski stunt complete with the British flag parachute.

We then move immediately to one of the greatest Bond theme songs, “Nobody Does It Better”, by Carly Simon.

And this one actually has a cool plot no less, unlike Roger Moore’s first two entries in the series. The main villain, Stromberg (in a fine performance from Curt Jurgens) intends to use two nuclear weapons to destroy the world. The twist this time around? He doesn’t want ransom. Stromberg is a madman who wants to start the world over with an underwater civilization. His main henchman is Jaws (7’4″ actor Richard Kiel) who is the best secondary villain since Oddjob in Goldfinger. 

Then there’s the Bond girl Anya. She’s a Soviet spy who can hold her own with Bond. The writers (veteran Richard Maibaum and first-timer Christopher Wood) give 007 the best female counterpart since at least Diana Rigg in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Barbara Bach is solid in the role. The character of Anya also provides a dynamic never seen before in the series. It turns out Bond killed Anya’s lover in that cool opening ski scene. Anya vows to kill Bond after they complete their mission. This adds another new twist in Bond world and it’s a great development in the screenplay.

Again, it’s very necessary to focus on the production design of Ken Adam. Stromberg has an underwater hideout called Atlantis. Simply put, it’s really sweet looking. And the interiors of Atlantis and all the other sets prove once again that Adam is the best in the business and such an important figure in 007 history.

Of course, that scene shows that Stromberg likes to use sharks to off his victims, but once again, they do not have giant laser beams attached to their frickin heads.

Besides the wonderful looking Atlantis and submarine sequences, the early part of the film set in Cairo is gorgeously shot and they put that locale to perfect use. We even get a cool scene at the pyramids. And this great scene where 007 tries to find out the whereabouts of a key contact. It never goes quite as planned.

Piling on, we get a now-classic Bond car in The Spy Who Loved Me: The Lotus Esprit which turns into a freaking submarine! We discover this in a kick-ass action sequence.

The great usual Bond composer John Barry was unavailable this time around so the late Marvin Hamlisch was brought in to replace. He does a first-rate job, even though we do get a bit of disco mixed in occasionally. It’s a little disconcerting at first, but hey it was 1977! That’s the year Saturday Night Fever came out and there’s a couple of moments in Spy Who Loved Me where I thought the Bee Gees might start harmonizing over the soundtrack.

The budgets of 1965’s Thunderball and 1967’s You Only Live Twice were in the $9 million range, before the next three (Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die, Man with the Golden Gun) all were around $7 million. The Spy Who Loved Me was the most expensive Bond by quite a margin at $14 million. We see it on the screen. The action sequences are top notch as always. It looks like the most expensive Bond flick so far. Lewis Gilbert returns to direct his second 007 feature, ten years after You Only Live Twice. 

If you’ve noticed I haven’t complained in this post… you’re right. The fact is that The Spy Who Loved Me clicks on all cylinders. I found it to be most compatible to Thunderball for a couple of reasons. First, the underwater elements, but more than anything else it’s just a hell of a good time and a wildly fun popcorn movie.

The last element of my highly complimentary ramblings: it’s Roger Moore’s finest performance as Bond we’ve seen so far. Moore would say in later interviews that Spy is his favorite Bond movie and he seems to relish having a good script, something that can’t really be said for his two original go-rounds.

Moviegoers really liked it as well. It grossed $185 million worldwide, nearly double the amount its predecessor, Golden Gun, made. Earning $46 million in the United States, it was the 10th highest grossing picture that year.

The Spy Who Loved Me is a triumph. I highly suspect it will rank right up there with some of the early Connery entries when I do my rankings upon this blog series concluding.

Here are the facts:

Film: The Spy Who Loved Me

U.S. Release Date: July 13, 1977

Director: Lewis Gilbert

Screenplay: Christopher Wood and Richard Maibaum

Bond: Roger Moore

Main Bond Villain: Karl Stromberg (Curt Jurgens)

Main Bond Girl: Anya Amasova (Barbara Bach)

Theme Song: “Nobody Does It Better” – performed by Carly Simon

Budget: $14 million

Worldwide Box Office: $185.4 million

My James Bond blog series will return in “The 007 Files: Moonraker”

In The Man with the Golden Gun, Roger Moore’s second appearance as 007, we get a real mixed bag of a movie. It contains some solid elements but also a lot of weak stuff, from a poorly written Bond girl to a truly dull and nearly non-existent plot.

Moore’s first outing Live and Let Die certainly had some issues, too. It did have a classic Bond theme from Paul McCartney and Wings, though. This film’s theme song by Lulu? It’s pretty bad and definitely the worst Bond theme so far.

Let’s start positive. The villain character of Scaramanga is well-regarded among Bond fans. I give most of that credit to Christopher Lee, a fine actor who brings a lot to the character. He’s a world-famous assassin who happens to have his own island that happens to be a disguised solar power plant . Scaramanga’s plan is to sell the plant to the highest bidder or let the oil barons buy it so they don’t have competition. Or something like that. The plot is not the movie’s strong point. Not that specific story elements are ever extremely important in a 007 picture, but I’ve been struck how thinly plotted both Moore entries have been so far.

Oh, Scaramanga also kills his victims with a cool looking golden gun, in case you were wondering where the title came from.

And he also has a midget sidekick named Nick Nack (Herve Villechaize) who provides some memorable moments. The villain also has an elaborate funhouse set up on his island, which he and Nick Nack use to trap people who Scaramanga intends on killing. The funhouse element likely stems from Scaramanga’s past, where he was raised by a traveling circus ringmaster. As he explains to 007 at one point in the picture, his interest in becoming an assassin originated from an abusive animal trainer when he was a kid. You see, the mean ol animal trainer hurt an elephant that Scaramanga had made friends with, so Scaramanga killed him. Oh, and Scaramanga also has three nipples for some reason. Moving on…

The film’s main Bond girl is Mary Goodnight, played by the gorgeous Britt Ekland. Her character represents the low end of the spectrum for Bond girls. The writers (007 vets Richard Maibaum and Tom Mankiewicz) repeat the same mistake they made in Diamonds Are Forever. Goodnight is played as a total ditz. It’s even worse here because we’re supposed to believe this girl is a secret agent. Call it personal preference, but I’d much rather the Bond girl be someone who’s got some intelligence and adds a little to the story, like in the Connery pictures. Here, it’s as if Chrissy from “Three’s Company” somehow managed to become a spy.

In the role of Scaramanga’s mistress who ends up assisting Bond (in a couple of ways), actress Maud Adams is better and she has a cool demise. Adams would actually later appear as the main Bond girl in Octopussy nine years later. We’ll get there soon.

And then there’s the inexplicable return of the Sheriff J.W. Pepper character from Live and Let Die. Apparently, audiences must have responded positively to the redneck Louisiana sheriff, portrayed by Clifton James. Not sure why. When Bond discovers the hick lawman is vacationing in Bangkok (really?), 007’s reaction is: “Oh no!”. So was mine.

There’s also a few karate related sequences that were clearly put in to capitalize on the kung fu craze that was happening in the early 70s, due to Bruce Lee and others. While these scenes are mildly entertaining, I couldn’t help but think of how Live and Let Die also borrowed from the popular at the time blaxpoitation genre. The early Bond films set the trends that filmmakers in the action genre would follow. The first two Moore features seem to often be following whatever trend was hot at the moment.

The Man With the Golden Gun does make good use of its beautiful island location in the last half hour. In fact, the last act of the film is quite entertaining because Lee gets a chance to shine more than a lot of other Bond villains. Also, the funhouse showdown between Bond and Scaramanga is fun.

However, other than one nifty car stunt and a few other moments here and there, the first three-fourths of Golden Gun is forgettable and by-the-numbers.

Audiences, to an extent, seemed to agree. The picture’s worldwide gross was just under $100 million. In America, it earned $21 million, giving it the distinction of being the lowest grossing 007 picture so far and placing it 19th on the year’s list of moneymakers. With a $7 million dollar budget, don’t get me wrong: it made tons of money. Nevertheless, considering that its two predecessors, Diamonds Are Forever made $116 million and Live and Let Die made $161 million (in just the year before, no less), Golden Gun‘s numbers were subpar.

This would be director Guy Hamilton’s fourth and final go round as a 007 director. He started with a classic, Goldfinger. His other three entries – Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die, and this… not so classic.

Bottom line: for me, the final half hour almost made me forget the first hour and a half that I sat through. There’s a lot I didn’t like in Golden Gun, but like all Bond flicks, it’s watchable. How’s that for a sterling recommendation?

Here are the facts:

Film: The Man With the Golden Gun

U.S. Release Date: December 18, 1974

Director: Guy Hamilton

Screenplay: Richard Maibaum and Tom Mankiewicz

Bond: Roger Moore

Main Villain: Francisco Scaramanga (Christopher Lee)

Main Bond Girl: Mary Goodnight (Britt Ekland)

Theme Song: “The Man With the Golden Gun” – performed by Lulu

Budget: $7 million

Worldwide Box Office: $97.6 million

My James Bond blog series will return in “The 007 Files: The Spy Who Loved Me”

Live and Let Die, released in 1973, began a new 12 year era in the James Bond franchise with the casting of Roger Moore as 007. Sean Connery made it clear during the filming of 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever that this was a one film return, so the producers turned to Moore, an actor they’d had on their minds for a while.

Unlike Connery, Moore was far from an unknown when he landed the Bond role. From 1962-70, he gained worldwide fame in the television series “The Saint”. And unlike George Lazenby, producers seemed aware that the casting of Moore would necessitate a number of changes in the franchise. By Moore’s own admission, he did not bring quite the tough guy persona that Mr. Connery delivered. This would be a softer Bond. And a sillier Bond. Moore’s main strength was the gift of very good comic timing and he is certainly convincing with classic 007 quips and one-liners.

It is definitely Moore’s casting, though, that has divided 007 fans for years. My history with Moore is simple: he’s the James Bond I grew up watching the most. It wasn’t really until later that I discovered the wonder of Connery. And truthfully, the often comedy oriented style of the Moore pictures probably translates better to kids. It’s not until you get a little older that the Connery pics can be truly appreciated. At least that’s my story.

Upon receiving the Bond Blu Ray set, I was and am most curious to rediscover what I now feel about the Moore movies. It’s been a while and we start with Live and Let Die. I’ve already surprised myself once with On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. It had been years and years since I’d viewed it. Frankly, my recollection of it seemed to coincide with what a lot of Bond fans now feel about it: that it’s one of the greatest 007 adventures. Upon viewing it a few days ago, I discovered that I didn’t really feel that way. I have a feeling Majesty will fall somewhere in the middle of the pack when I finally rank them.

I have fond memories of watching Roger Moore as 007 as a child. But would they translate as an adult? So far, with Live and Let Die – the answer is a mixed bag. First, let’s get the obvious item out of the way. The theme song to the film, performed by Paul McCartney and Wings, is undoubtedly one of the greatest Bond themes ever. When regular Bond scorer John Barry was unavailable for the film, longtime Beatles producer George Martin took over the reins. And so we have a Bond theme by an ex-Beatle. Ironic, considering Sean Connery’s well-known line in Goldfinger: “That’s as bad as listening to the Beatles without earmuffs!”. Guess the new Bond was a little more hip.

Live and Let Die also contains some very memorable sequences, most notably an extended boat chase that is really terrific. Before that, we have a great sequence from 007 must deal with some nasty alligators. I remember loving these scenes as a kid and I still do.

We also have a truly beautiful Bond girl this time around, Solitaire, played by Jane Seymour. She’s a tarot card reader who also happens to be a virgin, until very shortly after meeting Mr. Bond, naturally. She’s certainly a major improvement over the Tiffany Case character in Diamonds Are Forever.

However, not all is well with Live and Let Die and there are some major issues. Much like in Diamonds, we get one character – loudmouth Louisiana Sheriff J.W. Pepper that seems to have wandered in from a different movie. A really dumb movie. Surprisingly, at least to me, this annoying character would prove popular and make a return appearance in the next 007 feature. Go figure.

And then there’s the matter of the plot. What Live and Let Die is most known for nowadays is the influence of the blaxpoitation genre on the film. Very popular in the early 70s, screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz chose to make the villains African-American and set the film in New Orleans and the Caribbean. Also, New York City in the early part of movie, where James Bond chases a “pimp mobile” (the script’s words, not mine). Watching the film today, trying to mesh blaxpoitation and 007 is an often uncomfortable mix. Lots of the African-American characters in the picture are pretty badly drawn stereotypes. While you come to expect that in blaxpoitation flicks, it’s a little disconcerting to see here. And frankly, it seems kind of unnecessary.

The influence of that genre leads to a rather unexciting plot. Instead of world domination, Bond is basically just trying to stop heroin dealers here. The main villain is Dr. Kananga, the dictator of a small country in the Caribbean who plans to give away two tons of heroin to put his competitors out of business. Then, of course, he gets lots of people hooked and can charge whatever he wants. Little different than nuclear annihilation, eh? Kananga is played Yaphet Kotto, who gives a solid performance even if the character isn’t too memorable.

Not that everything is totally different. Kananga does have an underground lair (with, as always, fantastic production design). He even nearly kills Bond and Solitaire at the end with his sharks… but Bond has time to outwit him due to the unnecessarily slow-moving dipping mechanism. This leads to a final encounter between Bond and Kananga that’s pretty darn memorable and cool. And utterly ridiculous, but that’s OK.

There is another quibble: Where’s Q??? In the history of Bond, from the second feature in 1963 to the third Brosnan feature in 1999 (Llewelyn passed away that year), Live and Let Die is the only 007 film that Desmond Llewelyn does not appear in. Apparently, he was shooting something else, but would’ve been let out in order to shoot his part in this. Producers decided to drop the character from Live and Let Die. They wouldn’t make that mistake again.

Producers had to be worried about how audiences would respond to the new James Bond, especially after the negative reaction to Lazenby. Things would be different this time, however. Live and Let Die was a hit, earning over $160 million worldwide. Clearly, crowds were much more accepting of Moore in the iconic role. In the U.S., it made $35 million – a decent number but less than the majority of the Connery films. It placed eighth on the list of 1973’s earners.

Director Guy Hamilton takes his third turn behind the camera here. For that third entry, it’s safe this one ain’t his best so far (Goldfinger) and ain’t his worst (Diamonds Are Forever).

There are some big problems I had with Live and Let Die including a dull plot and silly characters. Quite a bit of it, though, is just a hell of a lot of fun with some truly inspired action sequences. It’s a mixed bag, but it’s certainly an improvement over Diamonds Are Forever.

Here are the facts:

Film: Live and Let Die

U.S. Release Date: June 27, 1973

Director: Guy Hamilton

Screenplay: Tom Mankiewicz

Bond: Roger Moore

Main Villain: Dr. Kananga (Yaphet Kotto)

Main Bond Girl: Solitaire (Jane Seymour)

Theme Song: “Live and Let Die” – performed by Paul McCartney and Wings

Budget: $7 million

Worldwide Box Office: $161.8 million

My James Bond blog series will return in “The 007 Files: The Man with the Golden Gun”

At the close of all my “007 Files” blog posts, which will conclude whenever Skyfall is released on Blu Ray, I will reveal my list of Bond films in order of preference. This will likely not be an easy task, but I can tell you one thing so far without a doubt in my mind: 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever is the seventh picture of the franchise and it is unquestionably the worst of all I’ve watched so far. It simply pales in comparison to the six that came before it.

After it was decided that George Lazenby would not be invited back for a second engagement as 007, Bond producers Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman thought it was time to find a new Bond. American actor John Gavin, most known for playing Janet Leigh’s lover in Psycho, was actually signed to a contract to play 007. However, United Artists had a different idea. They wanted Sean Connery back. Big time. And they were willing to pay an (at the time) astronomical sum of $1.25 million to get him. Connery obliged and Diamonds Are Forever marks Connery’s last time as 007 in an official capacity. He would return 12 years later in the role in Never Say Never Again, which is not considered an official film in the Bond cannon. That picture will not get a write-up in “The 007 Files”, though I’ll likely blog about it at a later time.

Critical and audience reaction to George Lazenby was tepid, so I’m sure it was a very welcome announcement that Connery would return. Added to that: Diamonds Are Forever basically brings back the Goldfinger team – director Guy Hamilton and screenwriter Richard Maibaum. The film is co-written by Bond first-timer Tom Mankiewicz. Even Shirley Bassey, who sang the classic “Goldfinger”, returns for this film’s theme song. It’s a good one.

The conventional wisdom among some Bond aficionados is that the franchise took a turn for the silly when Roger Moore took over the role, two years after this movie. I would respectfully challenge them to watch Diamonds Are Forever again. This is the movie where the 007 franchise practically turns to self parody. It’s often not a pretty sight.

The examples are many: the main Bond girl Tiffany Case (Jill St. John) is portrayed a total airhead. While earlier Bond girls have often been integral in helping 007, the character of Tiffany is just a dumb girl who seems to mess up anything she touches. She’s the most badly written Bond gal so far and St. John’s performance is, frankly, annoying. Blofeld is the main villain again and while Charles Gray’s performance is decent, it doesn’t match the impression that Donald Pleasance and Telly Savalas left in the previous two pictures. We also are subjected to the very unfortunate of Blofeld in drag. Not pleasant.

None of that matches even more unpleasant elements in the film. First, the ridiculous characters of Bambi and Thumper, two gymnast bodyguard villains. They have a fight scene with Bond that is notable for one thing… the absolutely atrocious acting of the women playing the girls. Watch for yourself if you don’t believe me.

And then there’s the characters of Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, played by Bruce Glover and Putter Smith. They are Blofeld henchman who happen to be a gay couple. I’m not sure how un-PC the way the film portrays them went over in 1971, but there’s no escaping it: these characters are just awfully written. The actors do a terrible job. The only function of their roles seems to be an excuse for homophobic stereotypes to be portrayed on screen. I read of a Bond poll that listed their two characters as the worst villains in 007 history. That is not a surprise.

As for the plot, it’s about Blofeld’s dastardly plan to use diamonds as a method to build a giant frickin laser and hold the world hostage for ransom. That old chestnut. There are moments to enjoy: a truly well-done car chase sequence through downtown Las Vegas is a clear highlight.

The pre-title credit sequence is solid as well, as Bond beats up baddies to find out where Blofeld is at. It’s mostly downhill from there.

The majority of the picture is set in Las Vegas, but the filmmakers don’t seem to take full advantage of what seems like a dream location for 007. Other than the car chase scene, Diamonds Are Forever actually looks more drab than previous Bond entries. On the other hand, the production design of Ken Adam is, as always, impeccable. The picture did manage to do robust numbers at the box office, no doubt due to Connery’s return. It earned $43 million in the U.S., placing it third on 1971’s top grossers.

Connery is always rock solid, but he certainly isn’t given the type of high quality material we’ve come to expect for him. Diamonds Are Forever is a major disappointment. It’s hard for me to not recommend a Bond movie to friends. If you’re a fan of the franchise, I would say to see them all. However, if you’re one of the rare people in the world who have yet to see a 007 flick, I’d probably name a lot of other 007 adventures to view before this one. The film is definitely the first of the series, so far, that I found a lot more to complain about than praise. For a swan song in the official 007 series, Connery deserved better. A lot better.

Here are the facts:

Film: Diamonds Are Forever

U.S. Release Date: December 14, 1971

Director: Guy Hamilton

Screenplay: Richard Maibaum and Tom Mankiewicz

Bond: Sean Connery

Main Villain: Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Charles Gray)

Main Bond Girl: Tiffany Case (Jill St. John)

Theme Song: “Diamonds Are Forever” – performed by Shirley Bassey

Budget: $7.2 million

Worldwide Box Office: $116 million

My James Bond blog series will return in “The 007 Files: Live and Let Die”

1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (which shall be known as OHMSS) in this blog post is by far one of the most intriguing entries in the 007 series for a host of reasons.

The most obvious is that, for the first time, someone other than Sean Connery plays the super spy. George Lazenby is perhaps the most famous movie trivia answer of all time. He got the unfortunate assignment of replacing a legend. It would be his only portrayal of 007. During the filming of You Only Live Twice, Connery announced his decision to step down from the role.

OHMSS is also notable for its lack of gadgetry. Longtime Bond editor but first-time Bond director Peter Hunt purposely chose to stick closer to the Ian Fleming novels for this outing than previous entries. The film’s budget is $7 million, a hefty budget for the time but less than the budget of its two predecessors, Thunderball and You Only Live Twice. 

Another major departure: 007 really falls in love with Bond girl this time around. The character of Countess Tracy di Vicenzo is played by Diana Rigg, already a well-known at the time due to the TV series “The Avengers”. Rigg give us one of the best Bond girls in the franchise’s history. Uncharacteristic to Bond from the other features, he falls hard for her. So much so that she becomes Mrs. James Bond at the end (!). Of course, this turns out to be an even shorter marriage than Kim Kardashian’s.

The picture opens with Bond saving Tracy’s life as she attempts suicide. This begins a bond (pun intended) between them. Soon, 007 learns that Tracy’s father is a wealthy criminal who may be able to lead Bond to his arch nemesis, Blofeld. He continues to romance Tracy because of that, but as mentioned, Bond’s usually cold heart turns all gooey for her.

Bond is eventually tasked with going undercover as a genealogist in order to meet with Blofeld. This all takes place in the Swiss Alps at an allergy research clinic for beautiful young women. Sound bizarre? Oh, it is. It really, really is. So is Lazenby’s acting as the undercover genealogist. So is a scene that shows the young women eating the food they were once allergic to. Of course, it’s not really an allergy research clinic. Blofeld is brainwashing the women for a later biological attack that SPECTRE has been planning.

If that last paragraph didn’t prove it, let me just state OHMSS is often just a strange movie. That’s not necessarily a bad thing for the film, but the sequences at the clinic simply go on far too long (the picture itself feels bloated at 140 minutes). This stretch provides little action and Lazenby’s performance just isn’t strong enough to keep it moving.

Once this protracted section of the film closes, OHMSS really does pick up quite nicely, with an exciting ski, car, and bobsled chase. There’s also an extremely impressive snow avalanche sequence.

You have to credit the producers for trying something different with OHMSS. Particularly, the dynamic of Bond falling in love turns out to work very well. The dissolution, so to speak, of his marriage gives the franchise its first and only truly downbeat ending.

When the movie was released, it did not perform up to expectations. Part of it had to be the audience’s disappointment with Connery’s exit. Worldwide, it grossed just about half of what You Only Live Twice did. In the U.S., same story. You Only… gross: $43 million. OHMSS: $22 million. That placed it only 10th for 1969’s biggest releases.

Then a strange happened as the years went by. OHMSS began to have the reputation of one of the finest 007 entries in the franchise. Some critics have gone as far to say it is the best. Simply put, this is not an assessment I concur with. The final half hour of the picture is near great. Telly Savalas (best known as TV’s Kojak) is solid in his turn as the evil Blofeld. And it does have one of the very best Bond girls.

However, there are problems, most especially with the movie’s pacing. The plot, too, is often just plain weird. And also, we simply cannot ignore the fact that George Lazenby doesn’t make much of an impression as 007. I don’t want to criticize him too much because probably no one could properly fill Connery’s shoes. Still, Lazenby is mostly just bland. When he delivers his one-liners, they suffer badly in comparison to his predecessor, who had impeccable comic timing.

The theme song this time around hearkens back to the first two 007 films in that it’s instrumental, from longtime Bond composer John Barry. As usual, Barry’s score throughout the film is lush and memorable.

In closing, OHMSS has the curious distinction of probably being an underrated Bond flick when it was released, due to the tepid audience response in 1969. Since then, it’s become a rather overrated movie. Don’t get me wrong – if you’re a Bond fan, it’s a must-see. However, I don’t believe it reaches the level of any of the Connery pictures that came before it.

Here are the facts:

Film: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service

U.S. Release Date: December 18, 1969

Director: Peter Hunt

Screenplay: Richard Maibaum

Bond: George Lazenby

Main Villain: Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Telly Savalas)

Main Bond Girl: Tracy di Vicenzo (Diana Rigg)

Theme Song: “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” – composed by John Barry

Budget: $7 million

Worldwide Box Office: $64.6 million

My James Bond blog series will return with “The 007 Files: Diamonds Are Forever”

You Only Live Twice, released in 1967, marks a few firsts in the Bond franchise. First Bond not written by screenwriter Richard Maibaum. First Bond directed by Lewis Gilbert, who would return later for two Roger Moore entries. First Bond where we finally see SPECTRE head Blofeld. First Bond film not to be released after only a year – 007 fans had to wait an entire year and a half for this entry.

It also marked what audiences believed would be an extremely substantial last. During filming, Sean Connery announced that his fifth 007 appearance would be his swan song. Of course, this piqued the interest of filmgoers who wished to see his last 007 performance. Not that You Only Live Twice needed the extra attention. After Goldfinger and Thunderball‘s massive grosses, audiences were more than ready for the next outing.

You Only Live Twice has quite the straightforward premise: SPECTRE steals spacecraft from the U.S. and U.S.S.R. in order make them both believe they’re messing with each other in hopes of starting a global war. This is all, of course, the brain child of Ernst Stavro Blofeld, who we see for the very first time here in full. He’s played by Donald Pleasance, who many of you may know for his later role as the psychiatrist tracking down Michael Myers in Halloween series. Much like with the original villain Dr. No, we don’t actually see Blofeld until quite late in the film. Unlike Dr. No, the character of Blofeld will appear in more than one 007 entry.

The opening sequence shows the American spacecraft hijacking and then moves on to 007 getting killed. What???? Well, we think (not really) that’s what happened until after the opening credits, but it turns out Bond was just faking his death so he could be sent on his mission to Japan without SPECTRE following his every move.

Nearly the entire picture is set in Japan and we get a taste of Japanese culture, 007 style. There’s sumo wrestlers. There’s a school of ninjas that Bond has at his disposal. We even get the appearance of Bond having to go undercover, which means he must looks more Japanese. Of course, this seems to consist only of Bond’s hair being dyed just slightly darker.

Bond’s gadgets this time around include a tricked out helicopter and a cigarette that kills you right away.

It’s hard to watch You Only Live Twice today without chuckling at its clear influence of another British super spy, Mr. Austin Powers. Even more than From Russia with Love, this may be the film that influenced Mike Myers the most. When we do finally see Blofeld, his uniform is the one that inspired Dr. Evil’s and the two share a striking resemblance to one another. Blofeld’s lair happens to be a hollowed out volcano.

Speaking of the hollowed out volcano, my previous posts haven’t done enough justice to Ken Adam’s work as production designer on the Bond films. You may not think of set design immediately when thinking of 007, but the work of Adam has inspired film for 50 years. His sets are amazing, from Fort Knox in Goldfinger to the volcano lair here. Adam would also work with Kubrick in Dr. Strangelove and Barry Lyndon. The guy is a master and he excelled at the great details of making Bond sets look immaculate. The final showdown at the volcano site shows his fine work.

You Only Live Twice is unique because there’s two main Bond girls. For the first half, it’s Aki, a Japanese agent played by Akiko Wakabayashi. She meets a rather unfortunate end when some poison meant for Bond ends up in her mouth instead of 007’s. For the second half, we have Kissy, played by Mie Hama who must act as 007’s wife as part of his cover. The character of Kissy is unique because she manages to actually turn down Bond’s sexual advances, something we don’t see too often. It doesn’t last long though.

Bond fans may remember one particular bit of trivia about this picture: the screenplay is by Roald Dahl! Yes, that Roald Dahl. The children’s author who wrote Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, and many other classic books.

The theme song “You Only Live Twice” performed by Nancy Sinatra is a very solid one. I must confess that every time I hear it now, though, I think of the Robbie Williams tune “Millenium”, which samples it.

You Only Live Twice is definitely a bit sillier than the previous entries, though isn’t anywhere near as ridiculous as some of the Roger Moore entries would get. It’s also a whole lot of fun and puts to great use the Japanese locales. It had roughly the same budget as Thunderball and the action sequences are highly entertaining, though not quite as astonishing of what we saw in Thunderball. 

The picture is certainly an influential Bond flick, even if it’s main influence might have been on the Austin Powers series. It did great business at the box office, though not quite Thunderball numbers. Earning $43 million in the United States (lower than its two predecessors), it placed seventh in 1967’s top grossers. While Connery would claim this would be his finale, it wouldn’t quite turn out that way after all. However, the next Bond adventure would introduce us to the second 007. More on that very soon.

Here are the facts:

Film: You Only Live Twice

U.S. Release Date: June 12, 1967

Director: Lewis Gilbert

Screenplay: Roald Dahl

Bond: Sean Connery

Main Villain: Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Donald Pleasance)

Main Bond Girl (s): Aki (Akiko Wakabayashi) and Kissy (Mie Hama)

Theme Song: “You Only Live Twice” – performed by Nancy Sinatra

Budget: $9.5 million

Worldwide Box Office: $111.6 million

My James Bond blog series will return in “The 007 Files: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”