AVTAK starring Dalton as 007?
Prince Kamal Khan
Posts: 277MI6 Agent
Since general consensus appears to be that Roger Moore should have exited the series after his "All Time High" in OP, I have a question: do you think AVTAK would've been better if Timothy Dalton had played Bond?
Comments
As I have posted elsewhere, earlier on, I think TD should have had the FYEO gig, where the only changes required would have been to the pre-credit sequence, the awful Thatcher send-up at the end, and the Aston replacing the Lotus.
In my opinion, that is...
Pre title sequence: Introduce Dalton as the new 007 in a mini-adventure that has nothing or little to do with the rest of the picture(in the style of the teasers for GF, TB, FYEO and OP).
Title Sequence:(I would've retained the Duran Duran song, one of the few highlights of the actual film)
Albert R. Broccoli presents
Timothy Dalton as James Bond 007 in Ian Fleming's
FROM A VIEW TO A KILL
(I would have restored the full original Fleming title)
starring
Fiona Fullerton as Pola Ivanova
Patrick Macnee as Sir Godfrey Tibbett
Alison Doody as Mary Ann Russell
Christopher Walken as Max Zorin
and Tanya Roberts in a very small 5 minute appearance as the "sacrificial lamb" Jenny Flex
Movie opens proper: The first 20-30 mins would be a relatively faithful adaptation of the actual short story "From A View To A Kill". The SHAPE driver's murder would appear on screen and 007's subsequent investigation. He would be assigned to work with fellow agents Tibbett and lovely Mary Ann Russell(the girl in the original story), and would impersonate the SHAPE driver and infiltrate the Russian spy gang in the forest. The head assassin(who Bond is sure he has seen before) of this spy gang gets away and Bond finds a stash of Zorin microchips among the KGB spy ring materials. After a brief dalliance with the gorgeous Mary Ann, Bond reports this information to M. Bond would learn that Zorin industries are a private British defense contractor that is developing microchips that are impervious to the magnetic pulse of a nuclear explosion but they've not been put in use by the British defense systems yet. Zorin would still be of East German origin but he defected to England, became a U.K. citizen and then spent several years in New York where he made his millions. (This would explain Walken/Zorin's NY accent). M then sends Bond to investigate Zorin at a party his Chantilly estate. While there Bond meets and flirts with Zorin's mistress/secretary Jenny Flex(who Zorin brought from NY, also explaining her accent) Bond also runs into another lady at the party, his ex-lover, ballerina/KGB agent Pola Ivanova. After some brief flirting and catching up on old times, Pola mysteriously vanishes. To get more info on Zorin, Bond starts romancing Jenny which Zorin learns about and of course has her promptly executed(a la Corinne Dufour). Bond uses his gadgets to listen in on Zorin and his partner-in-crime whom he recognizes as the KGB assasin from the forest. Thru closer detection, Bond realizes that Pola and the KGB assassin are one and the same. Bond is caught spying and is captured by Zorin & put in some deathtrap from which of course he escapes but not without Zorin thinking he is dead.
Bond continues his mission in pursuit of Pola to learn more about what she and Zorin are up to. The Siberian ski chase could be inserted here where Bond pursues her but ultimately rescues Pola from an avalanche(a la Bond and Elektra). After this experience, they "warm up" in a hot tub reminiscing about old times. As Bond gets more of the information on their plan, Pola doublecrosses Bond and he is again captured by Zorin. It turns out that Zorin and Pola are planning to cause a nuclear blast in outer space over the U.K. to, as Frederick Gray put it, "paralyze us at the Russian's mercy". This will be done after Zorin installs the "nuclear-explosion impervious" microchips(which of course won't be) in all of Britain's national defense systems. In the end, Bond of course thwarts Zorin and Pola's plans with the aid of Mary Ann who Bond ends up with in the final clinch. Tibbett would also have a larger role as Bond's ally and not be killed off and May Day(who belongs in a Roger Moore Bond film only) would not be around.
W.G.
To answer your question...it might have been better. It might have been worse too.
I agree with that. You have indeed many talents!
But back to topic, I enjoyed very much AVTAK and Roger, although looking way too old, was nice there. Go Roger, Go!! The story was a little bit cut rough, but overally, it was an excellent movie. Thand God for the French Traduction who makes sound Stacey Sutton as intelligent. I'd prefer a lighter tone on electronic chips than a complex diamonds-for-opium.
story as Fleming wrote as the starting point. Make Pola his love intrest, don't kill Tibbet, and make a new villian instead of Zorin. Also I would definatly not have Stacy Stutton in my version at all.
No offence to Prince Kamal Kahns work, as it is good, and I would have enjoyed seeing it. (I too came up with an AVTAK plot somewhere on this site..) but we all know that a four year olds screenplay would have been better than what was filmed. I personally would have felt terrible if Dalton came in under AVTAK, not even his, or anyones talents could have saved this one.
Tanya Roberts 'Stacey Sutton' character wouldn't be included.
Grace Jones 'May Day' character wouldn't be included.
Pola Ivanova (Fiona Fullerton) is excellent.
Thank all of you for compliments and feedback on my "alternate universe" AVTAK treatment. TGO, feel free to steal any of it you like. As I re-read over it I think I was probably "inspired by" Ian Fleming's Moonraker novel(Soviet-backed, German-born villain is trusted with British defense but is in fact planning to destroy it). In re-reading the original "From A View To A Kill" short story I've decided to make a change, I would upgrade Patrick Macnee's Sir Godfrey Tibbett from an agent to head of Station F France and rename the character Wing Commander Rattray(Fleming's name for this character). I think that would have given Macnee a more dignified role.
I considered the idea of making Fiona Fullerton's Pola Ivanova the heroine(and she definitely would have been a much better one than Tanya Roberts' Stacy Sutton) but I thought that the idea of Bond teaming up with a lovely KGB agent would be too similar to TSWLM. In fact when I first saw AVTAK I initially thought Miss Fullerton was playing the Anya Amasova character. So I decided to tweak the formula and have viewers 1st think Bond and Pola would be allies but have them turn out to be enemies instead. Remember, this would have been 10 yrs. before GE's Xenia Onatopp and the series hadn't had a sexy Russian villainess yet(unless you count Rosa Klebb).
Since nothing except the Paris setting was used in the film version, I hope TPTB go back to the "From A View To A Kill" story and use the source material in a future Bond film, including the gorgeous Mary Ann Russell character.
Batman: "The Hammer Of Justice is UNISEX!"
-Batman: The Brave & The Bold -
Moore was perfect for the role, Dalton simply would not have worked in AVTAK
The main problem with AVTAK is the rehashed Goldfinger script. I like your alternative script Prince Kamal Kahn, but I think keeping MayDay would be better, because she is an interesting character - just don't put her in bed with Bond, because as we all saw in the film, it didn't really work.
If the script had been better, I could see Dalton debuting as Bond in this film. The fact that the current film turned out decent enough as it is, is because Moore had experience carrying Bond films with weak, rehashed stories (Moonraker anyone?), and I think Moore deserves more credit than he gets for this film.
8. TSWLM 9. TND 10. LtK 11. SF 12. TMwtGG 13. AVtaK 14. NTtD
15. GF 16. MR 17. LaLD 18. YOLT 19. DN 20. SP 21. TWiNE
22. TB 23. DAD 24. QoS 25. DaF
"...he (Dalton) portrayed Bond as a vicious killer in LTK. I know he was avenging Felix, but it was still brutal, setting Sanchez on fire!"
You sound as if it was a bad thing!
No, as much as I love dear Rog, it was clear in AVTAK that his time was up, not in terms of his acting, but in terms of his look and age. He had a great innings as Bond. In hindsight, it would have been better if he had retired after OP. Then perhaps, Timothy Dalton would have taken over in AVTAK.
I would have loved to have seen Tim in AVTAK...just as long as he didn't have to sleep with MayDay!!!
Supposing Pierce Brosnan had played Bond in AVTAK, TLD and LTK? My guess with this scenario is that it's quite probable he would have returned after the six year hiatus, but I don't believe that he would stayed on in the role until DAD. Seventeen years is an awful long time for one actor to inherit the role (legal problems or not) no matter how popular he is. I don't think Brosnan himself would have wanted to stay on that long anyway, he probably would have left after TND.
As long as he stayed for TWINE, I'm not really concernd about DAD. It was one of the few Bond films that would have been terrible irrespective of who played Bond.
Well, quite honestly I liked Dalton a little better than Moore, so IMO, AVTAK would have been better, even with no script alterations.
RM in TLD? I can't even imagine, how the opening sequence would have looked like, with good ol' Roger.
DD
I do agree there. I don't think that any Bond could have redeemed DAD. Not that I am bashing it cuz there are others that are not in my list of favorites, but it needed some help.