James Bond's Darkest Hour: An Essay on Licence to Kill (Page 5 of 6)

Hello, my agents. I saw this for the first time yesterday. I just like the films of Connery, Moore and a little Talton, because I think he is a hero who fights against the Cold War. Today I start the Pierce Brosman phase, which is certainly very good. Anyway, this 1987 film is great. Action, beautiful women, and it's because it's the 80's, my favorite phase of cinema. You have to take the AIDS era into account, why don't you see James Bond having sex. The scene of James on the plane gave me distress, just like Octopussy (1983). And about Roger Moore's last film, I really liked it. I didn't care at all about the actor's age. The villain is great, the women are beautiful (Especially the one in the bathtub), and the action scenes are good (Yes, I know they were stuntmen).

Friggin' mutated sharks with laser beams... 

LTK is one of my favourite Bond films. Much better than TLD in my opinion. Sanchez is also a favourite villain of mine.

I enjoyed Spectre of Defeat's original post and agree with much of it. However... while films like Lethal Weapon and Die Hard are said to be bloodthirsty and gritty, to my mind they simply brought the action movie into the present. More importantly, and crucially even, they had leading men in Willis and Gibson who could do witty one-liners that were also genuinely funny. Dalton really did not do that and no attempt at that could make it work.
So cinemagoers checked out his first film, saw that was the case, and only did the second one out of patriotic duty. A bit like voters going for Corbyn the first time round, second time round, nah. You lost us.
Along with that, Dalton did not seem like a young stud against the old Moore. His look was outmoded - like the 70s Gareth Hunt from The New Avengers. He did not look like the short haired square jawed stars of the late 80s - Arnie, Bruce, Mel. His torso did not look athletic and when he got his kit off in this there was no narcissism and nothing to admire. He was not ripped.

On top of all that, Die Hard and Lethal Weapon were really more like Bond films than the Bond films were. Both had better Bond villains, both played by British actors. The latter followed the set piece rule. The former looked great, sort of noirish

These films reinvented the action genre and how badly that was needed. In contrast, the Bond films still had John Glen and had been bamboozled by the fanboys saying, hey make one like Fleming! Make it serious! But without that knowing humour, it was thought back in the 50s that Fleming's stuff was a B-movie thing, the kind Rank pictures did. Saltzman and Broccoli added the knowing humour, so Dr No was above the pack. LTK omitted that - so it was a B-movie.

One final point, In another thread I'll maybe talk about the three-card trick that most Bond films require. It basically distracts you from the fact that the plot is a bit pants and has been seen before - it's money for old rope.
Even Die Hard does that. It's not just about terrorists in a skyscraper. It's set at night. Willis is a New York cop in LA - fish out of water. He's there by accident. He's trying to win back his wife - who is hostage. A white cop strikes up a poignant rapport with black cop outside. There's a lot going on. It juggles plates.
In many Bond films there's a subtext going on to make it more interesting, it's a distraction technique. LTK really doesn't have that. So if you don't go for the whole revenge plot against Leiter - never, frankly, a consistent and successful Bond character - then you don't really have much to go on. LTK is Bond with his pants down.

Last edited by Napoleon Plural (1st Jul 2020 20:12)

Thanks  , okay, I'll have a go at it this week. I do tend to overwrite though. Loads of posts I've done in my head I've never got around to doing.

I agree Dalton needed shorter hair and more muscle tone. They should've made sure Dalton was trained by someone from the SAS or SBS - that would have made him even more belivabel also. You could see the influence from Bond in other 80's action movies, but I I can't remember any villans in them where they were typical Bond villans. Their villans usually had much more limited plans and usually lacked good lairs.

There was no need to distract from a plot that was " a bit pants". LTK had one of the best plots in the series.

Was Die Hard really more like Bond films than the Bond films of the time? Die Hard had only one small  location, the villans' plots were limited in scope, the villan had no lair, the women were not noted for their importance for the plot or their great beauty, the hero was an American in a T-shirt ....

I think the main simularities were that traditional Bond movies and Die Hard were both action francihises where the hero sometimes cracked a joke. That's a bit like saying "four weddings and a funeral" and Goldfinger were alike because they both had a good looking and funny leading man.

Interesting stuff. To my mind, neither "Licence to Kill" nor "Licence Revoked" sound particularly Bondian- the former sounds a bit obvious for a Bond film, and the latter comes across as unwieldy.

Side note- I watched Pacino's Scarface again the other night and there's a curious moment where Michelle Pfeiffer's character suggests to a high-ranking drug dealer that someone might try to kill him. The drug dealer laughs and says casually, "Who the hell would want to do that?", shrugging it off. This moment is, of course, repeated almost verbatim during Bond's meeting with Sanchez at the casino...

Resigned to Revenge   

PoaL doesn't fit the plot at all and Risico fits all.
Perhaps "Eye for an eye" or some clever version of it?

No Tears for Revenge
The Dying Days