Connery in DAF
Muston
Huncote, Leicestershire Posts: 228MI6 Agent
I'm currently watching DAF as part of my week long Bondathon and I'm surprised to find DAF worse than I always believed. Connery really does go through the film looking bored and fed-up. The story is also just plain bonkers. I always held DAF as an underappreciated entry in the franchise but some of the decisions made in it beggars belief! Probably looking on it with a little less forgiving as I've just watched OHMSS before this and that film is a very hard one to follow.
"Thank you very much. I was just out walking my RAT and seem to have lost my way... "
Comments
Re OHMSS- looking from today's perspective DAF suffers in comparison, but it certainly didn't seem that way in 1971! DAF's job was to "correct" the perceived failings of its predecessor (didn't make enough money, too long, not "escapist" enough...) and return to business as normal, and in this it succeeded. Connery's return was seen as essential in that.
the Ken Adam sets back, SiFi space angle back.
The comedy is ramped up ( the style for years to come ) Wint and Kidd are creepy/funny
Where as, they could have been very sinister in deed almost like having two "red Grants" causing
trouble for Bond. Although I do agree Connery ( for me at least ) looks to be having fun and plays it
like an old seasoned agent., I also agree it was a poor film to follow OHMSS.
1) The studio system was coming to an end, and so were the sorts of big color, big budget films that had been the Bond series more or less to that point (On Her Majesty's Secret Service starts to signal the shift).
2) The spy craze that had dominated most of the 1960s was also coming to an end. By that point, plans for another Harry Palmer movie had been scrubbed, as well as another Matt Helm. The Bond spoofs nonetheless had already proven popular -- films like In Like Flint, for instance -- and Diamonds are Forever more or less adopted the same approach.
3) Much of the youth of the time were starting to demand other kinds of films -- smaller, grittier, often more nihilistic and featuring a new breed of actor. The classic leading man was no longer wanted -- instead, edgier and more unusual people, and actors who probably would have been cast as villains or sidekicks in past films suddenly found themselves as stars. Connery didn't neatly fit that category, but you can see how he tried to given his film choices of the period, and there definitely seemed an attempt to de-glamorize a lot of what defined him as Bond. (If he'd been taken for a fine-tailored suit, manicure, and careful grooming for the early Bonds, he seemed much more rough around the edges here).
4) Connery himself was pretty angry with the producers for any number of reasons and basically had them by the balls -- his agreement to make the film seemed more driven by spite than anything else, with his donating much of what he made on it to charity as a kind of final middle finger. I've always taken his pudginess and boredom to be a reaction to the idea that all his concerns and complaints over the years going ignored were no longer of concern.
DAF is completely blown away by the 1977-1985 era of Roger Moore. It would be like saying the Dodge Neon is a prototype for the Dodge Viper.
1. GE 2. MR 3. OP 4. TMWTGG 5. TSWLM 6. TND 7. TWINE 8.DN 9. GF 10. AVTAK
Connery doesn't pull off Camp as good as Moore. He can be witty, but when it delves into humor, Connery can look awkward and out of place (See: Moonbuggy scene). I love Connery's Bond, but he is more suited for the sexy suave agent that has a bit of wit to boot, which is mostly the case with his first 5 Bond's.
On top of that, there is no larger than life feel like most of the Moore films had. The oil rig finale was the most underwhelming finale in my opinion. The guy who says ONE MINUTE AND COUNTING... is pretty hilarious though
" I don't listen to hip hop!"
Well most of it can be said about most of the Moore 007 movies - except they have been funnier and the main actor seemed to enjoy what he was doing. -{
I for my part would prefer to see both Dalton outings in a 24 hr slope before I am giving DAF another viewing -{
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
+1! Well said!
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
Fair points. Moore's better suited to farce & I certainly can't argue with the Daltons being superior.
I just feel sorry for DAF & the stick it gets. I'll have to man up!
" I don't listen to hip hop!"
I had actually hoped after TB they were going to stay on the "serious spy film with a little dark humor" track, but when YOLT came out I was disappointed to say the least. As much as I enjoyed the spectacle, I knew the film Bond would never have anything to do with the Bond I loved reading in the novels.
When they did OHMSS, I was again thrilled and figured they had righted themselves and were heading back in the right direction, then they turned around and did DAF. Outside of the elevator fight, I never enjoyed myself less.
They had gone even campier, making YOLT seem like a David Lean film by comparison. When I found out they were doing LALD and had hired The Saint, I kept my hopes up. Unfortunately, we were in the '70s now, and until we moved out of the badly dressed, disco decade of silliness, it would be a long time before I saw Fleming's Bond again. They tried a little bit with FYEO and OCOTP, but just could not stay with away from the camp.
I will forever be in Dalton's debt.
It's funny that so many people are saying Goldfinger is campy. I never thought it quite went that far -- it's intended to be witty and extreme, but when I think of camp, I think of John Waters movies or the old Batman TV series.
In those cases, not even the characters themselves realize how silly the situation is, but Bond is constantly aware: "Ejector seat? You must be joking"; "I must be dreaming."; "He's quite mad, you know"; "I must have appealed to her maternal instincts." Camp makes fun of itself on purpose, mostly for the effect of denigrating the whole idea (and often the audience that believes in it), but Goldfinger seems more respectful than that -- if anything it acknowledges the implausibilities with a tongue-in-cheek attitude while still being respectful of what the audience wants.
I think Guy Hamilton in particular saw both the inherent silliness in the notion of a super tall, oversexed Anglo-Saxon "secret agent" insinuating himself into any dangerous world situation with leisure, impunity and success, while at the same time recognizing that Goldfinger was essentially a fairy tale, complete with its ogres and trolls and King Midas character. So his film took a lot of the already extreme ideas from the book -- the racial hierarchies (Goldfinger being Eastern European and the various Asian villains, all meant to be racially inferior), Pussy Galore, the idea of the heist, etc. -- and just turned things up a notch. But it doesn't feel to me like any of these comes at the expense of still believing in the Bond character or the universe in which his stories take place.
imo you are falling into one trap:
The cinema of the 60s was much different to the cinema in the 70s and 80s.
The producers influenced the directions more on the market than along their personal taste.
Like good businessmen do.
So most of the changes in the 007 movies at that time where necessary to follow the audience and the market and we could see with the Dalton movies how wrong it can go NOT to follow the market
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
I've tended to pre-date trends and then buck them when they finally become widely accepted. I wanted a more serious Bond for a long time, but I wanted one in the Connery vein. I didn't think I'd have to wait 30 years for that to happen, but Craig is the first actor in that time to come close. But that's also because of the prequel craze and how so much of the middle 60s fad and fashion has returned for the Millennials.
Producers decide directions then cast the main actor who follows the script and does his job.
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
DAF is the Bond film to which I most enjoy returning, along with two others markedly more serious in tone, FRWL and LTK.
I'm with you. Goldfinger is witty and entertaining, and it certainly contains elements of fantasy. But I don't think it's "campy" as I understand that term. Now Diamonds Are Forever - that's campy! Still enjoyable, though.
Diamonds are Forever goes much further. We get lines like "Hit me" and "bombe surprise," and characters like Plenty O'Toole, Bambi and Thumper, the whole gangster crew, and the hillbilly sheriff and deputy seem even more over-the-top than those in previous films. The basic concepts are the same, but they are played campily.
The same goes for many scenes, such as Bond crashing the practice moon landing and people moving in slow motion for no apparent reason, and the gadgets, like the little bear trap Bond keeps in his jacket pocket and bond's fake fingerprints, are convenient to the point of absurdity.
Camp is also associated with gay culture, and what's interesting is how much of Diamonds are Forever vamps it up, from Wint's and Kidd's much more pronounced relationship than in the book to a cross-dressing Blofeld (who bats his eyes and makes one of the most unappealing "women" I have ever seen) who doesn't seem all that interested in a mostly naked Tiffany Case running around to the way in which Wint is dispatched at the end.
The earlier Bonds may have pushed the line a bit, but this movie -- like the Moore's ones that follow -- is much less troubled to cross the line and even to be self-referential, such as when a supposedly secret agent is immediately recognized by his identification, which includes a Playboy card.
At last, a DAF ally!
It's obvious that EON felt GF was a perfect vehicle to take the series in that direction.
The very idea of robbing Fort Knox, covering a woman in gold paint and having an army of henchmen made of Koreans in Switzerland and Kentucky - along with an expensive sports car tricked out with lethal gadgets and a flying corps made up of lesbian pilots, just begged for a more campy take.
Of course, they don't go over the total edge of parody. They just dance around it with some sly humor. Bond's reaction to the Aston Martin tricks and Pussy's name and the old lady at the gate firing a machine gun at him. The humor at Bond's expense by Leiter and his partner inferring that all he's interested in are drinking and sex (playing up the playboy aspect the films invented). Bond attacking Oddjob with lethal weapons that just bounce off him that only result in a smirk. The bomb being stopped at the number 007.
I'm not saying this was not warranted. It is, considering the exaggerated plot.
I'm only saying it put the idea in EON's head they could go take this humor even further later on, which they did with DAF and Hamilton's return. TB was more like FRWL and DR in it seriousness of the plots and villains and kept the dark humor of those films. Since YOLT was basically a remake of TB ramped up, it still doesn't fall into a camp film, just less believable (even more so than GF) in many of it's scenes and the plot itself.
No, GF wasn't camp, but because it had such a huge reception with the audience, they realized they could go even further into absurdity if they wanted to...and they eventually did.
I don't think that most people will agree with this
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
They tried to make DAF kind of funny - for my part they totally failed with the humor though I enjoyed the "alimentary Dr. Leiter" line
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!