YOLT on the big screen!
onemonk909
Posts: 65MI6 Agent
At 43 I finally got to experience one of my lifelong goals (even my lifelong goals are lame) -- seeing a vintage Bond film on the big screen. A theater chain called Alamo Drafthouse is doing a 2-year deal called Bondthology where each month they play a Bond film. I'm still kicking myself that I was unable to see TB last month, as it's my favorite ever and the top Bond I'd want to see on the big screen. But last night they played YOLT and I was able to go.
I already have YOLT and all the other Bond movies (up to the Craig years, at least) on Blu Ray, and I could've just watched it again in the comfort of my home -- though such things as "watching a movie" have become nigh impossible in the past year, since my wife and I had our first kid. But it was definitely an experience seeing it in a theater. And at $7.50 it was a heckuva deal, though now that I think of it, my Blu Ray actually cost less!
I was sitting kind of up front, so was unable to judge the turnout, but it wasn't a packed house. Respectable turnout, though. People laughed at the right places, and of course the pre-PC stuff got the most laughs ("Why do Oriental girls taste different?" and etc). However I noted that they didn't laugh in places where they should've...like when Bond carefully puts the broken statue back on its pedestal after knocking out the sumo wrestler with it, or that hilarious shot where, after Bond makes his elaborate escape from the guys on the docks, falling from level to level, some dude just steps out from behind a crate and merely saps him. I imagine those scenes got many laughs in the packed movie houses of 1967.
As mentioned I have this on Blu Ray, but on the big screen I noticed stuff I'd never seen before -- in particular the gaping crater on Blofeld's face, which was particularly ghoulish. Previously the makeup job had looked goofy to me, but seeing it on the big screen, you could really see how deep that gash was, and the grafting around his eye, and it all looked pretty horrific. So at least on the big screen I thought Pleasance's Blofeld for once came off as threatening. I also noticed the little toy figures in the volcano explosion at the end -- on the big screen you can clearly see that the "dead people" lying on the floor of the control room are just basically Fisher Price action figures. But I thought this added to the vintage charm.
The film print was good, and the audio was blasting -- it was definitely a modern remix.
Curiously though, I felt the big screen made the movie's faults a bit more apparent. I generally rate YOLT as my second or third favorite Bond, with TB always cemented in first place, and DN and YOLT juggling for second. Sometimes when I watch YOLT I'm swept away, other times it seems very disjointed and generally lacking something. Unfortunately it was the latter for me last night. I know Connery usually gets the blame for this, for his "lack of interest" in the role...and to tell the truth, I sort of saw that last night (though other times when I've watched YOLT, Connery's performance has resonated fine with me).
But it occurred to me last night that it really isn't Connery's fault -- he isn't given much to do in this one. Tough guy Bond is saved not once but TWICE by Aki (plus she also dies in his place), and there are scenes where all Bond does is sit while others talk (his first meeting with Tiger Tanaka in particular). Also, the deadpan quips are pretty blase this time -- tellingly, not a single one of them got a laugh in the audience last night.
Yet for all that, the "ninja massacre" finale is awesome, and good grief was it loud and proud on the theater stereo system. And the miniatures used in the space sequences looked cool on the big screen (plus the guy from Gerry Anderson's "UFO" as a radio operator!!).
Anyway, I definitely enjoyed it, though I know TB would've been even better on the big screen...and I bet DN would be, too. Not sure if I'll get to see any more of these, but next month they're playing OHMSS. Maybe I'll convince my wife to watch our kid all on her lonesome for just one more night! And speaking of which, here's hoping Alamo Drafthouse (or some similar retro theater) is still around in about ten or so years...my hope is to take my son to these when he's older. Of course failing that we can just have father-son movie night with my Blu Rays...
I already have YOLT and all the other Bond movies (up to the Craig years, at least) on Blu Ray, and I could've just watched it again in the comfort of my home -- though such things as "watching a movie" have become nigh impossible in the past year, since my wife and I had our first kid. But it was definitely an experience seeing it in a theater. And at $7.50 it was a heckuva deal, though now that I think of it, my Blu Ray actually cost less!
I was sitting kind of up front, so was unable to judge the turnout, but it wasn't a packed house. Respectable turnout, though. People laughed at the right places, and of course the pre-PC stuff got the most laughs ("Why do Oriental girls taste different?" and etc). However I noted that they didn't laugh in places where they should've...like when Bond carefully puts the broken statue back on its pedestal after knocking out the sumo wrestler with it, or that hilarious shot where, after Bond makes his elaborate escape from the guys on the docks, falling from level to level, some dude just steps out from behind a crate and merely saps him. I imagine those scenes got many laughs in the packed movie houses of 1967.
As mentioned I have this on Blu Ray, but on the big screen I noticed stuff I'd never seen before -- in particular the gaping crater on Blofeld's face, which was particularly ghoulish. Previously the makeup job had looked goofy to me, but seeing it on the big screen, you could really see how deep that gash was, and the grafting around his eye, and it all looked pretty horrific. So at least on the big screen I thought Pleasance's Blofeld for once came off as threatening. I also noticed the little toy figures in the volcano explosion at the end -- on the big screen you can clearly see that the "dead people" lying on the floor of the control room are just basically Fisher Price action figures. But I thought this added to the vintage charm.
The film print was good, and the audio was blasting -- it was definitely a modern remix.
Curiously though, I felt the big screen made the movie's faults a bit more apparent. I generally rate YOLT as my second or third favorite Bond, with TB always cemented in first place, and DN and YOLT juggling for second. Sometimes when I watch YOLT I'm swept away, other times it seems very disjointed and generally lacking something. Unfortunately it was the latter for me last night. I know Connery usually gets the blame for this, for his "lack of interest" in the role...and to tell the truth, I sort of saw that last night (though other times when I've watched YOLT, Connery's performance has resonated fine with me).
But it occurred to me last night that it really isn't Connery's fault -- he isn't given much to do in this one. Tough guy Bond is saved not once but TWICE by Aki (plus she also dies in his place), and there are scenes where all Bond does is sit while others talk (his first meeting with Tiger Tanaka in particular). Also, the deadpan quips are pretty blase this time -- tellingly, not a single one of them got a laugh in the audience last night.
Yet for all that, the "ninja massacre" finale is awesome, and good grief was it loud and proud on the theater stereo system. And the miniatures used in the space sequences looked cool on the big screen (plus the guy from Gerry Anderson's "UFO" as a radio operator!!).
Anyway, I definitely enjoyed it, though I know TB would've been even better on the big screen...and I bet DN would be, too. Not sure if I'll get to see any more of these, but next month they're playing OHMSS. Maybe I'll convince my wife to watch our kid all on her lonesome for just one more night! And speaking of which, here's hoping Alamo Drafthouse (or some similar retro theater) is still around in about ten or so years...my hope is to take my son to these when he's older. Of course failing that we can just have father-son movie night with my Blu Rays...
Comments
YOLT can be a bit heavy going. Almost better on telly as the ads mix it up. Yeah, the jokes were more pat than usual, as they were in most of the later films Brosnan etc. The earlier movies were genuinely witty.
I imagine it helps a lot with the volume cranked up.
The only one of these that ever made a big impact for me was Dr No. I saw it on a Connery Bond rerun in 1980 I think at the London Pavilion (long since closed). It was a proper cinema, and on a double bill with Moonraker. I also caught it at the Pool of London, a free open air showing one fine summer evening with an appreciative audience who laughed at all the jokes at the right times.
Aside from OHMSS at the BFI Imax, the other cinema reissues have fallen flat for one reason or another.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
I find the vintage Connery's play particularly well, maybe even because of the oldschool attitudes. A bit like MadMen. All the cars, the shameless smoking, that earlier time just looks very glamourous. I find even the 70s Moores look more dated, everybody laughs at the disco-era fashions.
Closest I came to your experience: when I picked up a dvd of Goldfinger, I was staying at a friend's house who lives in a trendy part of town, popular nightclubs round the corner so people park on his block. He has a projector and it was a warm summer night, so we watched it outside projected on his front wall, and passersby kept stopping and taking in huge chunks of the movie with us. I think Goldfinger would be the definitive movie to share with a random group of complete strangers. People said several times "now, this is the real Bond!"
Yes, each month -- the event was "hosted" by a dude who only showed up before the film began, dressed in a white tux and sporting a martini...he said it was a two-year event, wrapping up in September of 2019 with Spectre -- the idea being that the following month would be the release of the new Bond. He also said that this new one is "Supposedly the last one to star Daniel Craig," and I hope you all are proud of me, because I came VERY close to calling out "YAY!!" to this, but refrained. (That being said, you all have convinced me to finally watch the Craig films, and I will hold all my reactionary, preconceived notions in check.) The event started this past November with DN...I wasn't even aware of the event at the time so completely missed it. Checking the web, it seems that Alamo Drafthouse has run this Bondthology before, so it must be something they do every few years.
Funny thing I noticed again last night was that Bond doesn't actually smoke in this one, though people constantly harp on him about it (both Osato and Tiger). Curiously, it was the women in the audience who laughed most uproariously at the outdated stuff -- and yes, there were actually women there!
I took a look at my fellow audience members on the way out...pretty good mix of older people (I overheard one guy saying that it was the first Bond he saw in the theater, as a kid) to some who looked to be in their 20s, which I thought was pretty cool -- it would appear that generation isn't totally made up of snowflakes! 8-)
Now that sounds like fun, and I agree that Goldfinger is a good gateway drug to the vintage series, yet curiously while I loved GF as a kid, I've found it doesn't resonate with me these days. In many ways I think it's a prefigure of the direction the series went when Moore became Bond. But that one has all those "Bond moments" (the opening -- still the best PTS sequence in the franchise, I'd say -- and the laser ray escape, etc).
They did.
One of the advantages to being the old guy here: I've seen all of the Bond movies in the cinema, most on their first time around (not DN and FRWL, I caught them later on double-bills- I'm not that old). Nothing compares to the thrill of sitting in a darkened cinema, sitting through the usual stuff and waiting for the gunbarrel* to launch 007 into a new adventure. Seeing the "big" films such as YOLT or TSWLM in the cinema for the first time was an unforgettable experience- the reveal of the volcano
or tanker set
for example has an impact which home video doesn't capture (the sound effects help enormously at this point).
It was a wonderful sensation watching for the first time, say, this scene
as a crowded theatre erupts into spontaneous applause.
YOLT works spectacularly (and I mean that literally) well on the big screen. The beautiful cinematography
the Japanese landscapes
Ken Adam's sets (obviously the volcano, but the others too), the tracking shot as Bond fights across the rooftop at Kobe docks,
all contribute to the experience... aided and abetted by the work of John Barry, of course!
* this is why I disapprove of most of Craig's films not starting with a gunbarrel. It was forgivable in CR, not so in QoS, and just about passable in SF (the reason Mendes gave makes sense, though I'd say with a bit more thought it could have been included).
(CoolHand & I on our way to the Silencer & Bra Strap for a nice mug of hot cocoa)
I would love to see the first 7 Bonds again on the big screen.
I'm currently in the middle of The Man Who Saved Britain, so one thing I'm digging in this conversation is the question of context.
It's like a control/test experiment:
Same film projected on the big screen 50 years apart should get different reactions from the two different audiences.
And those differences are clues to how the world has changed.
The film remains the same, the audience is the only variable that has been altered.
If your Alamo is like the one near me, they are very lazy about updating their online schedule. YOLT wasn't even listed until 3 weeks ago. My guess is OHMSS will play in early April. Basically you just need to keep checking their schedule for April, and eventually OHMSS will appear on it. Hope your girlfriend enjoys the movie!
"Small world..."
It was a good print, but I only tuned in at the Death of Aki. After that it's a bit of a snoozefest, though only after much repeat viewing, as the great volcano reveal to its full extent, reveal of Blofeld and so on would have been great first time round. That stuff doesn't work its magic all those years later the way wit and charm does... the ski jump in TSWLM stands up well as it has all those factors.
Barry does well, but his score does not always liven up a heavy film and the lush cinematography does put me in mind of those exotic 50s films that Bond was meant to sweep away. Connery really looks fat and oafish in his scene with slip of a girl Kissy, in particular as he eyes her up on the walk to the volcano, incidentally has anyone figured out just how long that walk would be? I mean, probably 20 miles I'd have thought... and she does it in plimsolls. 8-)
Why not have him go up in the autogyro? Park it and have a gander. But the gal needs to be there for the final love-in, I suppose. Unusually there's no dialogue between the villain and the gal at the end, prob because she was not a great actress... Didn't she only get picked cos she was gonna top herself?
On subject of billing, I noticed on final credits that after Connery it's Aki then Kissy. Didn't notice Blofeld Pleasance's credit.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Agree about the hike up the volcano, it would be long and difficult. Then Kissy descends the same volcano, returns to her island (does she swim or did they have a boat?), contacts Tanaka, and then Tanaka must take some time to assemble his ninja team and travel to the island (picking up Kissy along the way?). Maybe time passes at a different rate inside the volcano? Because of the volcanic gases probably.
Pleasance may not have got a credit because Blofeld's face was meant to be a big reveal.
I second that request to link to those previous writeups!!
Man Who Saved Britain...isn't that the one that goes out of its way to deride and mock the old films? I'm pretty sure that's the one I flipped through several years ago, around 2006 or so, and I couldn't believe what I was reading -- just an outright attack on the sentiments of the Bond franchise. That's the one where the guy went back and watched all the Bond movies he hadn't seen since he was a kid, right, and kept going on about how bad they were in retrospect? Well, there's your benchmark on how the audience has changed...while the aggressive posturing of Connery in the vintage films clearly appealed to the men of that era -- and was appropriately hyped in the "Girls! Girls! Girls"-focused advertising and marketing -- modern men are encouraged to feel offended and horrified by the wanton "misogyny," "sexism," "racism," and whatever else is hot in the victim politics of today.
That said, YOLT is still the most lush and epic of any of the Bond films, hands down, and it is steeped in the 1960s.
I contributed some thoughts on the first 100pgs in the What (Bond Related) Book Are You Currently Reading thread
https://ajb007.co.uk/topic/46064/what-are-you-currently-reading/page/14/ post 340
I can see how you wouldn't like it, Revelator didn't like it either and he knows his stuff.
I find the authors tone snarky, at best satirical, and that is distracting. But he is a historian, I gather, and I'm learning lots I didn't know (growing up an ocean away, a couple generations later), and it is making me think.
But it is weird, if he is a proper historian, he can so smugly put down the point of view of his elders, who were living through more trying times. I wish he weren't so into his clever "satirical" digressions, and stripped it down to facts without retroactive value judgements. His tone reminds me of young people who don't care about history at all, having a laugh at how stupid old people used to be, very strange for a proper historian.
No, it was certainly a film print -- had a line occasionally running through the center of the picture and everything! Alamo is a legit theater and in fact is mainly known for showing old films, and doing themed festivals...I think Tarantino put them on the map because, many years ago, he used to do film festivals at the Alamo's main theater in Austin, TX. However, the stereo mix certainly wasn't the original mono one from the '60s.
My friend, in just a single paragraph you have perfectly described the modern liberal!
Thanks, monk, and I bet she will, the movie is just her style!
About 5 years ago I saw a 35mm print of YOLT complete with the 1967 United Artists logo. It was a bit scratchy, but the colors were vibrant. To be honest, as sharp as the Blu-ray of YOLT is, it doesn't do the color palette of the film justice. In it's original Technicolor, the flesh-tones are more rich and the overall look is far warmer. The gunbarrel has a stark black and white look with the red of the blood being particularly rich and thick. Something the Blu-ray doesn't quite capture.
I would've sworn on a stack of Flemings that what I saw last Wednesday was a film print. But after reading all your suspicions on this thread I decided to contact Alamo Drafthouse via their website and ask what exactly it was I saw. They responded with:
"While we do show some 35mm prints at our Richardson location, our BONDthology series is all 4K digital."
So basically those of you above were correct...sounds like I watched a Blu Ray projected onto a big screen. My assumption is it is the same in Alamo Drafthouse theaters around the country. Well, it still looked pretty good to me, and it WAS cool to see a vintage Bond on such a big canvas, but it would've been so much better if it really was film...
Just a quick question: Have you seen A View To A Kill on film by any chance? I really want to know if it's just me or the digital prints are actually heavily desaturated.
I think you're right. I saw it only once in the cinema when it was released. I remember AVTAK being reasonably bright in the cinemas, except for the night scenes. Mayday's red dress really stood out.
I do think when Lowery restored the films they tampered with the colors a bit on all the Bonds. I also think the Lowery gave many of the films, especially YOLT a cooler temperature than what was in the cinema. IMO, Lowery ruined the desert sunrise shot in TLD by lowering the color. The earlier Special Edition DVD of that film had looked just like the cinema prints.
In the early '90's the Bonds were digitally remastered for the first time for VHS on the MGM/UA home video. AVTAK was far more desaturated than previously. TSWLM took liberties as well replacing that beautiful golden sunset on the Nile with a bluish color. Awful.
I still feel the earliest home video releases, particularly the CBS/Fox laserdisc and VHS versions had the truest color timing to the film prints. The clips used in the Happy Anniversary 007 special hosted by Roger Moore I believe used the CBS/Fox transfers and give a decent indication to what the colors looked like. Towards the end there's a short clip of the Golden Gate Bridge fight. I always felt if the Blu-rays had the Lowery crispness, with the CBS/Fox hues we'd have faithful versions of the Bonds for home video format.
Throw in the fact that you'd get John Barry's fine score in analogue, rather than compressed digital...
All this does rather highlight that the whole digital thing has been a bit of a swizz, we all wind up trying to get back to where we were before with our Beatles vinyl in mono and Bond movies on film, not disc.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Interestingly, in '95 there were Letterbox VHS versions of the Bonds released. They looked pretty good, too. Too bad they couldn't be enhanced for widescreen televisions. One other interesting point regarding AVTAK, that morning shot of Stacey's mansion after Bond tucks her in was altered in the Lowery restoration. On Blu-ray it's still then zooms in. In the cinematic prints and ALL other versions that shot contains an earth tremor that Lowery tool away.
I also prefer the analogue sound over digital. I've never been exactly sure what "compressed" does to the sound. However, one has to crank the levels a notch or two more with DVD and Blu-ray, whereas the VHS copies all had louder volumes. I used to wonder if it was my cables, the player, the television,etc . I've had multiple televisions and DVD/Blu ray players over the years. A friend of mine who has worked in many music recording studios explained that although there is more detail in digital, analogue is much bigger, louder and warmer.
Analogue is what you hear when you hear sound in real life, with a live band or orchestra, it flows. Digital has sound divided into manageable blocks. Barry's GF is great in analogue, it's sassy, and Beatles stuff is really only listenable in vinyl imo, or analogue tape too I guess. It has vitality.
The effect of digital music has led to today's autotune and thin sounding, trebley pop as technological advances do influence the kind of music that is made, eg the microphone in the 30s led to 'crooners' who could softly and intimately murmur sweet nothings into the mic rather than having to shout above the accompanying music.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Thanks for the definition. It's no wonder then the older tapes sounded so much fuller. Even the DTS track options don't help on the Blu -rays. When watching classic Bonds I almost always go for the mono track recording, as some of the newer DTS versions have been altered: certain sound effect changes, music changes. Some DVDs have the levels so low I have to crack the volume on the television substantially. I actually have the audio graphic equalizer levels all set to 100% on my television when playing Blu-rays and DVD's.
I used to love the way my old stereo sounded with vinyl. A warmer tone with fuller bass. Shirley Bassey's Goldfinger did sound great on record.