While this was Roger Moore‘s first outing as James Bond, he had plenty of experience starring in a similar role after his TV series The Saint which ran from 1962 to 1969. So Roger was well prepared for this role, and does a strong job here.
Live And Let Die opens with a highly memorable scene where an elaborate funeral walk turns out to be dedicated to the agent who asks “whose funeral is it?”. Shortly after that, we get the classic theme tune to this movie, which is one of the best James Bond theme tunes ever made.
This movie is quite memorable in how it features a card-reading psychic woman called Solitaire – she’s the main female in this movie and is played more than adequately by British actress Jane Seymour.
The second main female in this movie is a black woman called Rosie Carver, played quite well by Gloria Hendry.
The chief baddie, Mr Big aka Dr Kananga, is played adequately by Yaphet Kotto.
25 minutes in, we’re introduced to one of the bad guys’ main goons – a man called Tee Hee Johnson, played quite well by Julius Harris. He has a big scary metal pincer for a hand, and this probably inspired the future baddie called Jaws who has scary metal teeth and is probably the most memorable baddie in the whole James Bond movie saga. Jaws appears in two Bond movies in the late 70s – The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979) – in the middle of the Roger Moore era. Incidentally, those were the only two Moore-as-Bond movies directed by Lewis Gilbert, and those were also Moore’s most successful Bond movies at the box office (both before and after accounting for inflation). Just like Tee Hee surprised James on the train in this movie, Jaws also surprises James on the train in The Spy Who Loved Me.
The other main baddie in this movie is played quite well by Geoffrey Holder – he plays a 9-foot-tall voodoo magician called Baron Samedi.
Around half an hour before the end of Live And Let Die, we’re introduced to a man who is probably the funniest character in the whole James Bond saga: Sheriff JW Pepper, played very well by Clifton James. He takes stereotypes to the extreme in a humorous way. He makes his first appearance in this movie, and makes his second & last appearance in the subsequent Bond film: The Man With The Golden Gun.
Live And Let Die was directed by Guy Hamilton, who up until this point had only directed one Bond movie – that being Goldfinger, the best one from the Connery era (and the best one till this day, according to Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic – but what do they know – they also rate Daniel Craig above Roger Moore). So we can probably expect big things from this movie, and it doesn’t disappoint. This movie is not a boring one per se, but much of it can get a bit monotonously predictable for frequent rewatchers, as the storyline is quite a basic in extended patches. Nevertheless, considering its strengths, I have to rate this an Upper-OK movie, alongside Goldfinger, making it the joint best Bond movie so far.