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Regarding the grain structure i believe the grain is not real as in from the original print which had too much damage and it's been added by Lowry and as Robert A Harris said in some forum it's from a "later vintage" thus the grain they added isn't even from 1963 film stock.

If i'm wrong i'll eat my keyboard.

(Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 at 5:54 PM)

For your reference, Bond movies have always been packed to the brim with sexual innuendo. However, the least you could have done for your loyal readers is include that seductive oral shot (you know which one).

(Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 at 7:06 PM)

Yes, an incredible blow-job reference. Also the helicopter action sequence is another nod to North by Northwest.

SPECTRE does get a bit ridiculous in the next films, especially when they are able to build enormous hide-outs and hidden fortresses, yet are always doing their schemes for money (???). Also in Thunderball they wear rings in public, which help Bond identify them (If terrorist organizations did that in real life, this world would be a lot safer). Even so, I quite enjoy their presence in the series.

Watch for Thunderball, though not as good as this one... one of the best entries in the series IMO, the third and last Terence Young-directed Bond movie.

I am not exactly sure what your memories are, but Roger Moore is very fun IMO. He always made his films entertaining and unlike Connery never got "lazy", out of shape, and thinking he could portray the character naturally (Example: Diamonds Are Forever). It helps to watch his debut Live and Let Die right after Diamonds Are Forever, that one had a very annoying lazy Connery turn, so Roger Moore came as a breath of fresh air despite the flaws of the film: Looking younger (a bit scary since Moore is older than Connery), in shape, and looking good in action.

Once again, even Moore-haters will enjoy For Your Eyes Only which completely restrains him (his one-liners are cut down) and the script gives him plenty of dark moments (including one scene at the top of a cliff which he refused to do, but did so brilliantly).

(Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 at 8:51 PM)

Daniela Bianchi is soooo gorgeous.
FRWL - my second favorite Bond film and my possibly my favorite Bond girl.

(Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 at 11:28 PM)

Interesting claiming about grain being re-added. I always did find the grain on the Lowry Bonds a bit... interesting. To me it looked too fine to really be from a film from the 60s/70s. I guessed Lowry had some filtering process that "reduced", but didn't remove, the size of the grain particles to something finer and less detracting to average viewers. However being completely degrained and then regrained for texture also seems possible now. The style of the grain in the Bonds doesn't look too dissimilar from the "add avih noise algorithm" option in some video software I've used.

Michael when you get to the Moore Bonds you can expect a dip in picture quality along with movie quality. Lowry probably got sick of having to do all the Bonds for MGM after a while and got lazy, heh. Frozen grain and contrast boosting sometimes become noticeable issues in some Bonds as you progress (Moonraker for example being one of the most severe).

(Posted on Monday, December 14, 2009 at 11:45 PM)

Regarding the opening sequence of For Your Eyes Only. Thats most definately a follow on to one of the best Bond movies ever made. On Her Majesty's Secret Service and indeed just as Blofeld is wearing a neck collar at the end of that film he is also wearing it in the opening sequence to For Your Eyes Only ( that gives nothing away as to what happens )

I actually viewed that sequence as the producers way of saying there will be no more Blofeld in any Bond movies and that they were moving on from the sixties and early seventies plots.

For me some of the weakest Bond movies are A View To A Kill and The World Is Not Enough and Thunderball. For A View To A Kill we get a pretty good opening title sequence and song but Moore is too old for the character at this point and i think Walken hams it up terribly as the villian. I just think it's a weak entry.

Thunderball is fine until you get to the final underwater scenes and then it becomes very badly edited and bloated. Those scenes ruin for me what could have been a fantastic movie.

I really enjoy You Only Live Twice though. I love the scenery and music score in that one and i actually love the whole ninja scaling volcano end sequence. I also thought Donald Pleasance made a fine Blofeld.

The World Is Not Enough was universally praised when it was released and critics thought Robert Carlyle was a great villian. I disagree. I just couldn't buy Carlyle as a Bond villian. It just didn't work for me at all. The good thing about that movie was Sophie Marceau. other than that i thought it a bloated overlong bore and even the opening title sequence goes on too long.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service has the best music score of any Bond movie and i also think it's a fantastic entertaining Bond movie.

I don't care for many of Moore's Bond movies. I do like The Spy Who Loved Me and For Your Eyes Only ( Best Bond theme by Sheena Easton i think )

I enjoyed Dalton's entries in the series although enjoyed The Living Daylights better than Licence To Kill. How times change. In both The Living Daylights and Rambo 3 we see the west helping the Taliban defeat the nasty Ruskies but now they are the enemy. What can you say about politics other than it's a strange world.

For me my favourite Connery Bond movies are From Russia With Love, For Your Eyes Only and Goldfinger. His weakest is Thunderball although Diamonds Are Forever wasn't great but then the seventies as a whole just has a certain look that does not age that well in my opinion.

For Brosnan i thought Goldeneye and Tomorrow Never Dies were fab and the first half of Die Another Day was good. I actually thought the Korean guy was better as a villian than the face changing english guy he became.

Ok i think i typed enough. Must go to bed as heading to Edinburgh tomorrow.

(Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 at 12:45 AM)

I should have said Thunderball has poor pacing in the underwater sequences.

Interesting to note Connery did almost become a meal for a shark in a scene where he goes into the swimming pool and the reaction on his face of terror is real.

(Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 at 12:48 AM)

Oh and before i go to bed.

My mistake. I didn't mean to type For Your Eyes Only as a favourite Connery Bond. That should read You Only Live Twice.

( groan ) i'm tired.

Night all.

(Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 at 12:50 AM)

Michael, in order to understand the opening sequence of For Your Eyes Only you have to have seen On Her Majesty's Secret Service or at least understand the legal reasons why EON dropped the Blofeld character (hey, I am making it sound deeper than it actually is...). Since they couldn't mention him by name and left the Blofeld arc open-ended after Diamonds, they included this PTS as a wrap-up of the story (the original script for FYO even had "Blofeld" say "Hello Mr. Bond, it's been 10 years...") and finally see Bond getting his revenge. Even so, I agree it's a pretty silly sequence with terrible dialogue despite the first minute where Bond visits Tracy's grave, and it should have been dropped from the film. I should also mention it was written to introduce a new actor in the role of Bond (Moore was suppose to leave the role after Moonraker).

The opening and closing sequences of For Your Eyes Only are pretty silly and out of touch with the rest of the film, but trust me, the film is Moore's darkest and most restrained (and perhaps finest) performance. I can also add: Believe it or not it is the only (and I repeat, the single one) Bond film where the Soviet Union is the enemy, though they hire a third party to do the dirty work. It could have easily starred Dalton and Dalton is my favorite Bond, so take my word for it.

(Director John Glen wanted the PTS to be the sinking of the spy ship and the murder of Melina's parents, having the close-up of Melina's eyes lead to the title sequence, but producers wanted an aerial stunt involving Bond to open the film a-la the last two entries, fearing the poor reception PTS sequences not involving Bond get).

You might have a point regarding the hard edge aspect, but please watch The Man With the Golden Gun and For Your Eyes Only before dismissing Moore as simply a "funny" Bond. Although it is one of the worst Bond films, TMWTGG had Moore as a near equivalent of Connery when it comes to being a cold-blooded bastard (the scene where he interrogates Maud Adams especially) and For Your Eyes Only... well, you have the Blu-Ray so check it out. He is also especially politically incorrect in Live and Let Die, check out one sequence involving a deck of tarot cards.

I would take Moore over Brosnan any day. At least he knew where to go with the character.

(Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 at 1:57 AM)

"Thunderball is fine until you get to the final underwater scenes and then it becomes very badly edited and bloated. Those scenes ruin for me what could have been a fantastic movie."

You have to understand that this was 1965 and Thunderball was the first "big production" Bond movie (hence, the first Bond movie to try to be "bigger and better" than the last entry). It's hard for today's audiences to see what was special about the underwater footage at the time, but Thunderball pushed the edge of underwater filming in non-documentary production. No one had seen underwater battles that spectacular up to that point and it got the film an Oscar for best special effects.

Personally I love those final moments. The editing is off a bit, but it's no worse for example than the final battle in You Only Live Twice for example, only no one says anything about that one because it's not underwater. The only only underwater sequence that I would have cut out is the hiding of the plane carrying the warheads. I miss these battle sequences actually, anyone else notice how they have been absent since The Living Daylights?

Compare the massive ending of Thunderball for example with the ending of Never Say Never Again where a bunch of people just shoot each other inside a cave and the Bond fights ONE PERSON underwater. Zzzzzz...

(Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 at 2:07 AM)

"I actually viewed that sequence as the producers way of saying there will be no more Blofeld in any Bond movies and that they were moving on from the sixties and early seventies plots."

Sorry for the third post in a row, but I have a personal friend who agrees with this. He says the opening sequence was supposed to be a self-aware dismissal of the "silly" Bond films as For Your Eyes Only was meant to be a return to the early Connery and OHMSS days. Hence why the "Blofeld" substitute has terrible one liners (there is no way they were not intentional IMO) and Bond dumps him in chimney with Bill Conty's pulsating 1980s rendition of the James Bond theme playing.

Once again, it works much better when you see that it was supposed to introduce Ian Ogilvy as Bond before Roger Moore accepted to come back. Curiously Ian Ogilvy was famous at the time for playing the same character that Moore tailored for the Bond role: Simon Templar in Return of the Saint.

(Posted on Tuesday, December 15, 2009 at 2:15 AM)

Was Ian Ogilvy really going to be given a chance as Bond ?

I thought Pierce Brosnan was in the frame even back then in the early eighties.

Regarding Thunderball. I can see your point about the underwater scenes but even if i saw it in 1965 i would still view it the same way.

From Russia With Love has aged beautifully and is my favourite Bond movie. It helps that Robert Shaw was such a fantastic actor.

(Posted on Wednesday, December 16, 2009 at 2:44 PM)

Yes, Ogilvy would have probably played Bond in FYEO had Moore not accepted to come back. James Brolin was also ready to play the role in Octopussy (the DVD allows you to watch his tests) as well before Moore returned once again.

John Gavin (from Hitchcock's Psycho) was actually cast as Bond and I believe he was actually paid for Diamonds Are Forever, but then Connery accepted to come back and Broccoli called him saying he would no longer be needed (would that ruin your day or what?)

Pierce Brosnan indeed was set to play Bond in 1987, but Remington Steele was renewed for a final season. Sam Neill was briefly considered and then came Dalton.

Nearly all actors who have played Bond villains are good actors IMO (Adolfo Celi in Thunderball for example)... most of their problems come from writing. From example, Christopher Walken is a fantastic actor, but a pretty mediocre Bond villain IMO.

(Posted on Friday, December 18, 2009 at 3:30 AM)

"I thought Brosnan was in the frame even back in the early 80s."

Sort of. Brosnan visited the set of FYEO because his wife played the Countess. Broccoli liked him and said he wouldn't be bad in the role. Then Brosnan became a TV star with Remington Steele and was only seriously considered for the part in 1987.

Before Roger Moore accepted to come back in 1985 for A View to a Kill, Broccoli had his eyes on Anthony Hamilton (later famous for playing Max in the shortly lived Mission: Impossible revival series) who would have beaten Daniel Craig as the first fair haired James Bond. He would have also been the first gay actor to play the role and the first James Bond to kick the bucket since he died of HIV complications in the 1990s.

Another cool casting story: Timothy Dalton was offered the part in 1969 for OHMSS but refused since he thought he was too young (Lazenby got the role instead, who was only a few years older). Another actor seriously considered at the time was Patrick McGoohan (Danger Man, The Prisoner), perhaps the greatest Bond that never was since he would have kicked ass in the role. Sadly McGoohan didn't like working with actresses (he strictly refused to do love scenes or any sort of romantic touching on camera due to his conservative Catholic beliefs and his jealous wife) and passed on the role.

Are you planning on checking out Thunderball, Michael? IMO it's the last great Connery Bond movie. You Only Live Twice is fun and all, while Diamonds Are Forever might be Connery's only Bond failure (Never Say Never Again? What is that?).

(Posted on Friday, December 18, 2009 at 3:43 AM)

Goldfinger is good. It has all the classic characters, classic sets, and classic lines, though a tiny bit overrated as the quintessential Bond film. Surprisingly (given its reputation) it's the film where Bond is at his most vulnerable, always failing and with the villain always one step ahead of him.

Thunderball IMO is a little bit better with a larger scope and its glamorous and grandeur scale despite not being as iconic. Both are must-see Bonds though.

Licence to Kill you've already seen. I like it, but I think it's the weakest of the two Daltons. Still a solid and underrated 80s action film, and perhaps the best "you killed my partner you son of a bitch" movie ever made. I have a feeling you'll be more critical of it a second time. It happens when one rewatches a Bond film after a long time. For years I've considered The Spy Who Loved Me the best "fun" Bond film and always placed it ahead of Goldfinger. I rewatched it the other day and it's still one of the most entertaining Bond films (as well as Roger Moore's best outing) but I finally admit that Barbara Bach's performance is indeed awful.

(Posted on Saturday, December 19, 2009 at 1:35 AM)