Yeah, I saw that with my 90-year-old Dad on TV the other night, I've always liked AVTAK and he enjoyed it til the end, recognsied Grace Jones though more likely from her encounter with the chat show host Russell Harty back in the day. She and Zorin are great villains, surely the best of 80s.
The whole thing just plays out in a very smooth, likeable way.
At one point my Dad asked, doesn't someone get shot out of a tree at this point and of course the whole Chantilly stuff has echoes of Moonraker, with Bond's notcturnal snooping. In MR he uses seduction to advance his spying around, in AVTAK he uses 'seduction' to get out of his spying around, though there understandably isn't much chemistry between him and May Day (understandably from her pov, as he's 58 and square really) and maybe that marrs the idea that later she and Bond would cooperate to spite Zorin.
Always thought Moore looked younger in this despite the carpers, but not this time round - maybe film flatters more than digital, in particular Blu Ray. He looked better a few years later popping up to give Cubby Broccoli his honourary Oscar. But that's often the way, Connery looked better after both his 'final' Bond films, in films like The First Great Train Robbery and then The Rock, and so did Brosnan after DAD.
Re NSNA, I forgot to mention Largo's dialogue during the Tears of Allah or whatever it's called sequence. Something like 'The people who used to run this place had power, but not like we have now got!' which seems straight out of the Ernie Wise school of scriptwriting.
While Lorenzo Semple Jr wrote the screenplays for some fantastic films, like Three Days of the Condor, he also wrote for the 1960s Batman. NSNA is along the lines of the silly Batman show/film.
Last night watched From Russia With Love. Blu-ray on 100" projector screen.
A bit slow, but has an elegant sense of style.
A few minor thing that never occurred to me before:
I wish Bond would have killed Krilencu as it would have been one of the coolest shots in the series. Instead Bond gets to be a monopod which is not going to make any 007 highlight reels.
Despite the title, not much of a Russian vibe to this film. Goldeneye and Octopussy have far more Russian influence.
Bond should keep the film strip at the end for his personal collection! )
My current 10 favorite:
1. GE 2. MR 3. OP 4. TMWTGG 5. TSWLM 6. TND 7. TWINE 8.DN 9. GF 10. AVTAK
ITV showed all the Craig films over Christmas. I dipped in and out. Spectre is the only one I like.
I enjoyed Casino Royale a bit more than before. There are some interesting things and the cinematography is more colourful and lovelier than in QoS and SF. The score is like John Barry at times, especially in the beach scenes in Nassau. It isn't as bogged down as the later films.
Weren't Daniel Craig's eyes blue back then?
Generally, the film suffers from being a 4-part Neflix films squeezed into a movie. You feel it's a bit like The Irishman - there's this, and you can catch up with the unedited cut somewhere.
If it were a series, it would go like this:
Ep 1: Bond gets his license (this could be five mins longer than in the movie) and then there's the running chase... Bond is back in the office, we pick up on the atmosphere a bit like in the novel Carte Blanche, it's established that Bond is a gambler and it counts against him. He meets Vesper in the office, under some pretext, and it's flinty, they don't get on. Ep 1 ends with Bond's dressing down. Then he gets hold of some info about the villain...
Ep 2 - Bond goes off to Nassau under his own steam, perhaps to redeem himself but off the grid. This too ends in the Miami runway chase, but some balls up means that even though he's the hero, he is stripped of his license, not necessarily down to M. Reduced to the minor ranks, I always imagined a scene reworked from the film Buffalo Soldiers would work here. Bond is back in the ranks, in training, and at shooting practice one morning the target is revealed... it's his glistening personal Aston Martin DB5. As the soldiers open fire on it, Bond holds back and then joins in, detonating the fuel tank!
However, Ep 2 ends when it turns out they need a gambler as Le Chiffre's new situation is revealed. So...
Ep 3 - Known gambler Bond is dispatched to Montenegro to beat Le Chiffre at cards, assisted by Vesper. This is one whole episode, ending with Vesper being snatched.
Ep 4 Bond tortured, then off to Venice, etc Ends.
Watching CR puts me in mind of stocky Craig squeezing into his tight suits, it doesn't quite fit. Not only that, the script is written for a 27-year old, like Henry Cavill. It's like the writers aren't in contact with the director. Young Cavill getting mistaken for a car valet makes sense, as does his petulant, contemptuous response. Craig getting mistaken for a car valet, and the joke is on him at that age. Behaviour that seems forgiveable in a young buck just makes the older Craig look a bit backward, a bit oafish.
Incidentally, we all carped about Craig's looks back then, but in fairness... I mean, I'm not saying he's had some work done, but let's just say that since the fire of 2019, Notre Dame has been in touch with his agent...
QoS - this was immediately a lot better than I remembered. This is because ITV cut the murderous assault scene where the intruder Craig slowly knifes a man to death. And it's a lot better for it, the cut is seamless.
Now, I like the pre-credit car chase, it's stellar stuff and breaks new ground, even if we don't get any lovely bird's eye view of the locale.
The song is not so bad but the recording is awful, it makes the ears bleed. Something went wrong in the production, it's rank.
The silly contrivance between the horses on the track and the footchase doesn't really work, though Mr White always gets some nice lines.
But the whole thing is just sapped of life, not surprising when it's from the team behind the worthy Kite Runner.
It shouldn't have been too hard to follow up CR, even if they couldn't get back the same director. Just fake it a bit, hire someone with the same style, same cinematographer really, go for the same look and get in Wade and Purvis. Have locations in Moscow and Scandinavia. Instead I hear the producers went straight to Haggis, and his treatment got rejected, though I understand he trousered the cash!
It feels like a very depressing film, and I didn't stick with it. Really, it follows on from CR in terms of plot but with a different team, it seems a bit incongruous.
I feel considering all the issues with the writers strike, it's not really fair to compare it against the other Craig films, where they have had a longer time to work on them.
There's a lot of nice Bondian moments that don't feel like they're obsessed with the past. That's why Skyfall and Spectre don't work for me, aside from the soapiness. Craig's dramatic performances in CR and QoS felt believable and both had powerful endings.
I see what you mean - but it was the producers' idea to go with Paul Haggis to do the script - and this I don't get. They didn't like his big idea - that Vesper had a kid, and at the end Bond hands him/her over to the authorities - and that's before you get on to the realisation that British Social Services are totally corrupt! (See the Rotherham/Rochdale/Manchester pimping out scandal). Gee. But you do wonder how on earth the producers let someone do this, pay them, and then have to start from scratch again when they don't like the big reveal. Same thing happened with Danny Boyle and the upcoming Bond film.
I agree that after QoS they sort of went back to the Brosnan way of doing things almost, where the jokey past Bond is referenced a lot. It feels like whatever they started with CR they couldn't really finish, they just didn't quite know where to take it.
So, SF: I watched a bit of this but again, like QoS, it's very depressing, only not the bleached out summer look, now it's autumnal. Worse, it just looks fake to me. That Oriental location - where is it? I dunno, Japan or Shang-hai maybe, but it never really looks like that, it looks like Blackpool, where it was set. You have lots of aerial nighttime shots of the city, okay, great, but so does the cheap British sitcom Not Going Out. Craig gets put in so many morally dubious and frankly despicable situations that one starts to lose interest, and indeed wonder if the whole thing isn't some covert anti-imperialistic tract.
Also looking fake: Bond's ancestral pile. The Aston Martin having guns like in GF. And it's not even from Q branch.
Now this is the difference with Spectre. We see the Aston Martin getting retooled, and it works, it makes sense. Everything, the script, the look of it, works for me. This is a purely enjoyable film, and I can see that okay, it's a bit off to have Blofeld introduced in this way... but the way they make Spectre's meeting in Rome like the grouping of a mad cult, which abhors gatecrashers - a bit like any meeting of your local authority or local NHS CCG as it happens... it's just right. It's eerie and frightening.
The final scene, with Bond at the wheel of his old Aston - just perfectly done. I like the jokes in this film, too. That sort of thing helps to redeem a lot actually. I'm heartened by news of the person touching up the dialogue in the new film, also. It bodes well.
Thunderball for our upcoming movie review podcast. I enjoy it, but it is one of my least favorite Bond movies (I know, blasphemy). Luckily, two of my co-hosts love it to bits, so who knows, maybe they can convince me of its greatness.
Glad to see the bright colour seen in flashes of the trailer are very much in evidence. It's a vivid, pacey movie for sure, and Craig looks good. As I studiously avoided the pre-publicity, it was a surprise to see Rosamund Pike here, though dressed in army combats and looking more like she did in the recent bite-sized State of the Union than in DAD.
There are nods to other Bonds - the climax sees the GoldenEye-type dam break, with the azure green water tipping through as jet fighters duke it out over ahead in an old-school take down.
At one point I was busting for a pee so headed out and found myself in a schoolroom with young lads - I was forced to piss in a latrine only to find to my horror it was actually a school desk! As I was mopping it up, I noticed the lack of any teacher - it was down to Tory austerity cuts, the kids said, who had been left to get on with their own work.
At that point I did wake up and headed out to the loo.
The above is what happens when you have a fitful sleep on the night of the election reshuffle and having seen snippets of the Bond trailer in your local cinema...
Last week we were going to watch Spectre and my sister-in-law who had never seen a James Bond movie before sat down and watched too. She is now hooked! Say what you will about Spectre, for someone who's never seen a Bond film, it is a really good introduction to the series...sure we had to explain some stuff, but as fun, exciting movie, it's really good!
So now we're going back to the beginning of the Craig era with her and watched Casino Royale the other night...Quantum up next!
Caught the last 20 minutes of 'Thunderball' on ITV4 this evening. With obligatory 'lockdown' bringing television back into focus for the time being as one remaining option for diversion and recreation, this broadcast reminded me of happier days when classic Bond on TV used to be an event worth choosing to stay home for (in the mid 70s).
Critics and material I don't need. I haven't changed my act in 53 years.
Thunderball but for some reason the schedule had it later and when I turned on it was still showing The Pink Panther.
Now it's odd how long it took me to figure this, both have a widescreen luxurious feel and there's an almost identical woman in bathtub scene only with Sellers not Connery.
TB is known as having a lot of dreary in and out shenanigans at Shrublands but audiences would have been used to this if Pink Panther has anything to go by, a lot of bedroom hopping bell hop farce going on.
Robert Wagner turned up in the Austin Powers spoof of course, as did Sellers and Niven in CR.
TB is okay to watch with family around adding commentary ('Isn't the shark pool small - those poor sharks!) but pretty dull on its own.
I too watched TB and recorded The pink panther for later when work comes to end on Friday and I'll be at home for weeks.
TB is one of my favourite Bonds, I just don't get the criticism, each to their own of course but for me the tempo of the film matches the style and feel.
I too watched Thunderball over the weekend. It’s my favourite Connery Bond film. I was thinking that back in 1965 those Bahamas location scenes must have looked simply wonderful to the audience.
I too watched Thunderball over the weekend. It’s my favourite Connery Bond film. I was thinking that back in 1965 those Bahamas location scenes must have looked simply wonderful to the audience.
Absolutely agree, it all just looks so sundrenched and exotic, OK there are some editing issues here and there, but the score is spectacular and it just has all the right elements and so many quite unique scenes, like Bond at Shrublands and M's acceptance of Bond going to Nassau, the meeting with all the 00's almost mirroring the Spectre meeting. Connery is at his best in this film, the villains are wonderfully villainous and the underwater scenes must have been ahead of their time..... Though I don't know that as it was released when my dad was a boy.
I watched some of For Your Eyes Only. I was looking for some detail which I now forgot. Still fun movie. Never forget the influence of Roger Moore on this series.
Comments
The whole thing just plays out in a very smooth, likeable way.
At one point my Dad asked, doesn't someone get shot out of a tree at this point and of course the whole Chantilly stuff has echoes of Moonraker, with Bond's notcturnal snooping. In MR he uses seduction to advance his spying around, in AVTAK he uses 'seduction' to get out of his spying around, though there understandably isn't much chemistry between him and May Day (understandably from her pov, as he's 58 and square really) and maybe that marrs the idea that later she and Bond would cooperate to spite Zorin.
Always thought Moore looked younger in this despite the carpers, but not this time round - maybe film flatters more than digital, in particular Blu Ray. He looked better a few years later popping up to give Cubby Broccoli his honourary Oscar. But that's often the way, Connery looked better after both his 'final' Bond films, in films like The First Great Train Robbery and then The Rock, and so did Brosnan after DAD.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
A bit slow, but has an elegant sense of style.
A few minor thing that never occurred to me before:
I wish Bond would have killed Krilencu as it would have been one of the coolest shots in the series. Instead Bond gets to be a monopod which is not going to make any 007 highlight reels.
Despite the title, not much of a Russian vibe to this film. Goldeneye and Octopussy have far more Russian influence.
Bond should keep the film strip at the end for his personal collection!
1. GE 2. MR 3. OP 4. TMWTGG 5. TSWLM 6. TND 7. TWINE 8.DN 9. GF 10. AVTAK
The last bond movie I have watched and I think my favorite one is Dr. No, and I must have to say that Sean Connery is the best Bond.
I enjoyed Casino Royale a bit more than before. There are some interesting things and the cinematography is more colourful and lovelier than in QoS and SF. The score is like John Barry at times, especially in the beach scenes in Nassau. It isn't as bogged down as the later films.
Weren't Daniel Craig's eyes blue back then?
Generally, the film suffers from being a 4-part Neflix films squeezed into a movie. You feel it's a bit like The Irishman - there's this, and you can catch up with the unedited cut somewhere.
If it were a series, it would go like this:
Ep 1: Bond gets his license (this could be five mins longer than in the movie) and then there's the running chase... Bond is back in the office, we pick up on the atmosphere a bit like in the novel Carte Blanche, it's established that Bond is a gambler and it counts against him. He meets Vesper in the office, under some pretext, and it's flinty, they don't get on. Ep 1 ends with Bond's dressing down. Then he gets hold of some info about the villain...
Ep 2 - Bond goes off to Nassau under his own steam, perhaps to redeem himself but off the grid. This too ends in the Miami runway chase, but some balls up means that even though he's the hero, he is stripped of his license, not necessarily down to M. Reduced to the minor ranks, I always imagined a scene reworked from the film Buffalo Soldiers would work here. Bond is back in the ranks, in training, and at shooting practice one morning the target is revealed... it's his glistening personal Aston Martin DB5. As the soldiers open fire on it, Bond holds back and then joins in, detonating the fuel tank!
However, Ep 2 ends when it turns out they need a gambler as Le Chiffre's new situation is revealed. So...
Ep 3 - Known gambler Bond is dispatched to Montenegro to beat Le Chiffre at cards, assisted by Vesper. This is one whole episode, ending with Vesper being snatched.
Ep 4 Bond tortured, then off to Venice, etc Ends.
Watching CR puts me in mind of stocky Craig squeezing into his tight suits, it doesn't quite fit. Not only that, the script is written for a 27-year old, like Henry Cavill. It's like the writers aren't in contact with the director. Young Cavill getting mistaken for a car valet makes sense, as does his petulant, contemptuous response. Craig getting mistaken for a car valet, and the joke is on him at that age. Behaviour that seems forgiveable in a young buck just makes the older Craig look a bit backward, a bit oafish.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
QoS - this was immediately a lot better than I remembered. This is because ITV cut the murderous assault scene where the intruder Craig slowly knifes a man to death. And it's a lot better for it, the cut is seamless.
Now, I like the pre-credit car chase, it's stellar stuff and breaks new ground, even if we don't get any lovely bird's eye view of the locale.
The song is not so bad but the recording is awful, it makes the ears bleed. Something went wrong in the production, it's rank.
The silly contrivance between the horses on the track and the footchase doesn't really work, though Mr White always gets some nice lines.
But the whole thing is just sapped of life, not surprising when it's from the team behind the worthy Kite Runner.
It shouldn't have been too hard to follow up CR, even if they couldn't get back the same director. Just fake it a bit, hire someone with the same style, same cinematographer really, go for the same look and get in Wade and Purvis. Have locations in Moscow and Scandinavia. Instead I hear the producers went straight to Haggis, and his treatment got rejected, though I understand he trousered the cash!
It feels like a very depressing film, and I didn't stick with it. Really, it follows on from CR in terms of plot but with a different team, it seems a bit incongruous.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
There's a lot of nice Bondian moments that don't feel like they're obsessed with the past. That's why Skyfall and Spectre don't work for me, aside from the soapiness. Craig's dramatic performances in CR and QoS felt believable and both had powerful endings.
I agree that after QoS they sort of went back to the Brosnan way of doing things almost, where the jokey past Bond is referenced a lot. It feels like whatever they started with CR they couldn't really finish, they just didn't quite know where to take it.
So, SF: I watched a bit of this but again, like QoS, it's very depressing, only not the bleached out summer look, now it's autumnal. Worse, it just looks fake to me. That Oriental location - where is it? I dunno, Japan or Shang-hai maybe, but it never really looks like that, it looks like Blackpool, where it was set. You have lots of aerial nighttime shots of the city, okay, great, but so does the cheap British sitcom Not Going Out. Craig gets put in so many morally dubious and frankly despicable situations that one starts to lose interest, and indeed wonder if the whole thing isn't some covert anti-imperialistic tract.
Also looking fake: Bond's ancestral pile. The Aston Martin having guns like in GF. And it's not even from Q branch.
Now this is the difference with Spectre. We see the Aston Martin getting retooled, and it works, it makes sense. Everything, the script, the look of it, works for me. This is a purely enjoyable film, and I can see that okay, it's a bit off to have Blofeld introduced in this way... but the way they make Spectre's meeting in Rome like the grouping of a mad cult, which abhors gatecrashers - a bit like any meeting of your local authority or local NHS CCG as it happens... it's just right. It's eerie and frightening.
The final scene, with Bond at the wheel of his old Aston - just perfectly done. I like the jokes in this film, too. That sort of thing helps to redeem a lot actually. I'm heartened by news of the person touching up the dialogue in the new film, also. It bodes well.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
but tonight, it will be "Diamonds are Forever" ...
Cheers everyones ... -{
Its just about my top film, although pretty much a daily duel with 'The Spy who Loved Me'.
Maybe some 70s nostalgia creeping in here...
cheers. -{
L.
Glad to see the bright colour seen in flashes of the trailer are very much in evidence. It's a vivid, pacey movie for sure, and Craig looks good. As I studiously avoided the pre-publicity, it was a surprise to see Rosamund Pike here, though dressed in army combats and looking more like she did in the recent bite-sized State of the Union than in DAD.
There are nods to other Bonds - the climax sees the GoldenEye-type dam break, with the azure green water tipping through as jet fighters duke it out over ahead in an old-school take down.
At one point I was busting for a pee so headed out and found myself in a schoolroom with young lads - I was forced to piss in a latrine only to find to my horror it was actually a school desk! As I was mopping it up, I noticed the lack of any teacher - it was down to Tory austerity cuts, the kids said, who had been left to get on with their own work.
At that point I did wake up and headed out to the loo.
The above is what happens when you have a fitful sleep on the night of the election reshuffle and having seen snippets of the Bond trailer in your local cinema...
Roger Moore 1927-2017
The first ones i revisited this week were Octopussy and TMWTGG. Wanting to watch them again so soon is a good indicator of my true favorites.
1. GE 2. MR 3. OP 4. TMWTGG 5. TSWLM 6. TND 7. TWINE 8.DN 9. GF 10. AVTAK
So now we're going back to the beginning of the Craig era with her and watched Casino Royale the other night...Quantum up next!
https://sistraininggear.com
KH
Now it's odd how long it took me to figure this, both have a widescreen luxurious feel and there's an almost identical woman in bathtub scene only with Sellers not Connery.
TB is known as having a lot of dreary in and out shenanigans at Shrublands but audiences would have been used to this if Pink Panther has anything to go by, a lot of bedroom hopping bell hop farce going on.
Robert Wagner turned up in the Austin Powers spoof of course, as did Sellers and Niven in CR.
TB is okay to watch with family around adding commentary ('Isn't the shark pool small - those poor sharks!) but pretty dull on its own.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
TB is one of my favourite Bonds, I just don't get the criticism, each to their own of course but for me the tempo of the film matches the style and feel.
Roger Moore 1927-2017