OCTOPUSSY

OCTOPUSSY (1983). Director: John Glen.

Ian Fleming wrote a short story featuring James Bond for Playboy magazine and gave it the provocative title of "Octopussy." The film that emerged uses only the title and little else. The renegade Russian General Orlov (Stephen Berkoff) has a diabolical plan to cause world-wide chaos by setting off a devastating bomb at a circus in Berlin. Orlov's allies include the exiled Afghan Prince Kamal (Louis Jourdan) and the woman only known as "Octopussy" (Maud Adams), who has a bevy of beautiful gals doing her bidding in both criminal and legitimate enterprises; she is unaware of the bomb plot. Then there's her ally, Magda (Kristina Weyborn), who engages with Bond (Roger Moore) over a certain suspicious Faberge egg.  Much of the movie takes place in Delhi, where we're treated to a variety of typical Indian stereotypes and cliches. There's a suspenseful climax with the circus and the bomb, and an excellent and harrowing epilogue with Bond trying to survive on the wing of a plane. Never considered the greatest of the 007 movies, Octopussy is nevertheless a very sleek and entertaining picture, extremely colorful, and with opulent settings and interesting set-pieces. Moore is fine, Jourdan is excellent, Adams is not bad as Octopussy, and Kristina Wayborn is lovely as Magda but isn't given enough screen time to really show what she can do, acting-wise, although she's a trifle stiff in her dinner scene with Bond. Vijay Amritraj scores as Vijay, an ill-fated agent, and Kabir Bedi makes an impression as Kamal's rather striking assistant, the master assassin, Gobinda. Another assassin uses a kind of buzzsaw/yo yo as a weapon. The theme song "All Time High" [Barry/Rice] is one of the best for a Bond movie, although Rita Coolidge's voice isn't quite sexy enough to do it justice.

Verdict: This seems to get better each time you see it. ***.

FOR YOUR EYES ONLY

FOR YOUR EYES ONLY (1981). Director: John Glen.

For Your Eyes Only begins with Bond putting flowers on his late wife's grave [see On Her Majesty's Secret Service], a nice nod to 007 history. After that there's a semi-comical prologue with Bond caught in a helicopter remote-controlled by old foe Blofeld. After a credit sequence which almost functions as a music video [we see the singer of the title song, Sheena Easton, something that was never done for Shirley Bassey], the story really begins and it's a convoluted one. An important encryption device has been lost in a shipwreck. When a couple who are searching for it on behalf of the British government are assassinated, their daughter Melina (Carole Bouquet) wants vengeance on everyone in the chain of responsibility, to which end she teams up with a hesitant Bond, and uses her crossbow weapon on anyone who gets in her way. Bond winds up at the Olympics where there are a number of chase/battle scenes connected to various sports, including a brief one on a bobsled that doesn't compare well to the bobsled sequence in the aforementioned Majesty. There are no real "Bond girls" -- super sexy beauties -- as such in the movie, although that's not to say the women are not attractive. In addition to Melina, Bond has to fight off the advances of teenage skater Bibi Dahl (Lynn-Holly Johnson, a real-life skater who became an actress), and dallies erotically with Countess Lisl (Cassandra Harris). For Your Eyes Only has a handsome Bond-villain for a change instead of the usual plug-uglies, embodied by Julian Glover [Theatre of Death] in the role of Kristatos, Bibi's sponsor and a man who wants to sell the encryption device to the Russians. Topol is cast as a criminal, Columbo, who becomes one of Bond's allies after Kristatos' henchmen kill the countess [it is never recorded if Columbo knows that Bond slept with his girlfriend the night before!]. Jill Bennett of Hammer studio's The Nanny plays Bibi's guardian and coach.

The underwater photography in For Your Eyes Only is excellent, and figures in two memorable sequences, an eerie one when Bond and Melina dive into the shipwreck with its drowned corpses; and a splendid scene when Kristatos has the couple tied together and towed behind his ship through sharp coral not to mention the sharks attracted by their blood [this sequence actually comes from Ian Fleming's novel Live and Let Die, but was not used in the film version thereof]. However the movie's most outstanding sequence takes place when Bond climbs up to the abandoned monastery at St. Ciro's which Kristatos is using as his headquarters, especially a taut and beautifully-edited passage when Bond tries desperately to get to the top even as a man overhead keeps knocking out the pitons that hold his rope to the rock.

For Your Eyes Only was a deliberate and successful attempt for the popular 007 series to become a little more down to earth after what some saw as the absurd sci fi excesses of The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker. Although it's by no means a perfect Bond outing, and is a bit overlong with a few slack stretches and chase scenes that fall a bit flat, when it is good it is very good, and proof that an entertaining Bond movie could be made without Jaws and high-tech special effects in outer space. Bill Conti's theme song is not bad at all; otherwise this is definitely one of the lesser Bond movie scores.

Verdict: Flawed but often invigorating Bond adventure. ***.

A VIEW TO A KILL

A VIEW TO A KILL (1985) Director: John Glen.

Roger Moore's final Bond film plays better on TV than it did in the movies; on the small screen its low-key (as opposed to epic or grandiose) quality can be better appreciated. Christopher Walken is an Americanized ex-KGB agent who wants to dominate the computer market by manipulating [via flooding] the faults near Silicon Valley. Walken is fine as the psychotic villain, although the scene with him gleefully machine-gunning the mine workers is a bit over the top. While the movie is more serious than other Moore-Bond adventures, there is a cartoonish early scene on the Eiffel Tower, and late in the movie some San Francisco men in blue chase Bond in a long and inappropriate scene like something out of the Keystone Kops. A deadly steeplechase race isn't bad, however, nor is the flooding of the mine and the subsequent draining of the lake above. The finale involving a dirigible and the Golden Gate Bridge is a knock-out. Patrick Macnee is very appealing as Bond's associate, as is pretty Tanya Roberts as a normal girl caught up in the nasty business. Grace Jones is also fine as Walken's exotic bodyguard and hit woman.

Verdict: While the picture is entertaining and holds the attention, it just isn't special enough to be a classic. **1/2.

LICENCE TO KILL

LICENCE TO KILL (1989) Director: John Glen. Written by Michael G. Wilson and Richard Maibaum. 

This is perhaps the grittiest and, for lack of a better word, most “realistic” of the Bond films. Bond (Timothy Dalton) is in Florida for the wedding of his old friend Felix Leiter (David Hedison), who nearly misses his wedding to go after his number one target, drug lord Sanchez (Robert Davi, pictured). Sanchez, unfortunately, escapes -- with the aid of a traitorous colleague of Leiter's -- and takes revenge on Leiter by murdering his bride and feeding Leiter to a Great White. [This scene is actually taken from Ian Fleming's novel Live and Let Die. As in the book, Leiter does not die but loses a couple of limbs, and is delivered back home with a note that reads He disagreed with something that ate him.] Bond makes up his mind to take down Sanchez, but both American drug agents and M himself order him to back off. Enraged, Bond resigns and goes AWOL, teaming up with drug agent Pam Bouvier (Cary Lowell), who also has an interest in Sanchez. In Isthmus City in Panama, Bond and Pam are up to their necks in Sanchez' associates, Japanese drug merchants, counter-agents who are out to get Sanchez, and even Q (Desmond Llewelyn), who comes to Isthmus City with gadgets for Bond and plays a larger role than he does in most Bond movies. Although Llewelyn plays Q, M and Miss Moneypenny are essayed by different actors than those in the earlier films. Licence to Kill is romantic, darkly amusing, and quite exciting for the most part. Dalton plays Bond like a heroic human being and not a Superman. Lowell's character is feisty, independent and liberated; only her jealousy of Bond's “relationship” with Sanchez' girlfriend. Lupe, is stereotypical and silly. Lowell is perfect as Pam, but Talisa Soto betrays very little acting skill as Lupe. Robert Davi is a major Bond villain with equal parts charm and menace, and Benicio Del Toro is slithering, sociopathic, almost sexy prime evil as Sanchez' lead assassin. Anthony Starke scores as Sanchez' fresh-scrubbed Wall Street-type associate, Truman-Lodge, and Wayne Newton is amusing and inspired casting as an evangelist who helps Sanchez distribute his drugs. Don Stroud, Anthony Zerbe, David Hedison, Priscilla Barnes and others also turn in solid performances. The film has superior production design and good photography from Alec Mills. The title song is a snappy one, although not particularly well sung by Gladys Knight. Michael Kamen's score is functional, but doesn't compare with John Barry's romantic music, which may have been considered unsuitable for this grittier approach to 007. Licence to Kill was filmed on location in Mexico and Florida. Although this is a very good Bond adventure, there are – surprisingly – no particular scenes that one can point to and pronounce a “knock-out.” The film works on a cumulative level. This is not to say that there aren't memorable sequences, such as when Bond takes over the small plane being piloted by drug runners or the ironic death of the traitor at the teeth of the Great White. But some of the scenes are not edited as tightly as they should have been. The climax is marred because they keep cutting away from the main action too often, and the fight to the death between Bond and Sanchez, while clever, is much too brief. Dalton really had a handle on the character – too bad he wasn't allowed to play Bond for a few more films. 

Verdict: While flawed, this is a highly satisfying and entertaining 007 outing. ***.