This is the second of four outings by Pierce Brosnan as James Bond. It follows GoldenEye (1995) and is followed by The World Is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2002). He’s the fourth best Bond to my taste – not on the level of Connery, Moore or Dalton, but is still comfortable watchable in an otherwise well made action movie, unlike George Lazenby or Daniel Craig whose Bond movies I personally find insufferable.
A clever & captivating opening, leading into one of the best theme tunes in James Bond history, sees Tomorrow Never Dies get off to a pretty good start. The movie then continues along similar lines, with a script that’s focused more on an intriguing idea rather than action, but doesn’t lack action either. As a result, it does both to a fair standard, but doesn’t do either masterfully – the main weakness is the lack of strong characters in these early scenes.
The odd attempt at cheesy humour is pretty weak again, just like in GoldenEye. Sometimes even stooping to prolonged exchanges of toilet humour. The scene where Q introduces James to his new remote-controllable bulletproof shock-protected missile-clad BMW ends pretty nicely though, with a healthy mix of action and humour, even if it begins with terrible humour. As always, Desmond Llewelyn does a great job as Q.
The main baddies in this movie are Elliot Carver (brains) played quite well by Jonathan Pryce with vibes of Pope Francis, and Mr Stamper (brawn) played sufficiently but far from outstandingly by Götz Otto with vibes like a cross between Andreas Wisniewski, the KGB milkman from The Living Daylights, and Everett McGill from Under Siege 2 (Seagal’s main rival on the brawn side). Stamper could equally be described as a cross between Dolph Lundgren and Timothy Olyphant. Incidentally, McGill also played a minor role in Licence To Kill but looked quite different there.
Around the half hour mark we’re introduced to both of the Bond girls from this movie: Mrs Paris Carver (the main antagonist’s wife, and an ex lover of James Bond) played by Teri Hatcher (best known for playing Lois Lane in the epic 90s series The New Adventures Of Superman); and Miss Wai Lin (undercover Chinese agent) played by Michelle Yeoh (from Mechanic: Resurrection (2016) alongside Jason Statham and Jessica Alba). They both do a decent job here. Hatcher in her early 30s here, contributes beauty and familiarity, while Yeoh in her mid 30s here, is hardly a bombshell – she’s more of a girl next door type, but the chemistry is still somewhat believable between her and Brosnan. Yeoh is also a very familiar face to fans of Hong Kong action movies, having starred in movies throughout the 80s, 90s & 00s alongside Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Donnie Yen, Sammo Hung, etc. More recently she was in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021) by Marvel Studios.
Joe Don Baker returns as charismatic CIA logistics champ Jack Wade. He’s no Clifton James (Sheriff JW Pepper), but he’s a nice addition to the cast nonetheless. Fun fact: Joe Don Baker also played Brad Whittaker, one of the main antagonists in The Living Daylights opposite Timothy Dalton.
We know James Bond movies love a scuba scene, and this movie is no different, except this time Bond jumps out of a high altitude airplane wearing his wetsuit and oxygen tank, diving straight into the ocean to explore a wreckage.
You may also spot Simon Pegg for a second towards the end, in the smallest of vocal roles.
The ending gets a bit longwinded and one-dimensional, especially for those who have seen this movie many times before. Still, overall I rate it an OK movie, on a par with most Bond movies.
The closing credits say ‘In loving memory of Albert R “Cubby” Broccoli’. For those who don’t know, he’s been the owner of Eon Productions and the main man behind the whole saga since the start. His kids have been running the show ever since, and I guess that explains why it was able to go from something outstanding prior to Brosnan, to something respectable with Brosnan, to something embarrassingly unwatchable with Daniel Craig and has remained that way ever since Brosnan retired from the role. Cubby must be turning in his grave at the state of what the Bond franchise has become under his kids’ supervision. Having said that, the Daniel Craig era has been performing outstandingly at the box office, so I guess in killing the cool, calm & collected work of art that was James Bond, they created a commercial monster that appeals to a different but larger audience of soppy drama fans, so in purely financial terms it would be deemed a success (until it dies out, because it’s got nothing really cool about it any more). There may also be a deeper strategy at work, since the soppy new James Bond of the Daniel Craig era represents the kind of emasculated woke wetwipe that our world’s leaders seem to want to turn us all into.
I believe Pierce Brosnan makes a relatively bland & robotic Bond compared to the three greats before him; and this, probably by no mere coincidence, is exemplified in the first minute of this movie, when he does the “turn left and shoot” pose. Sean Connery holds his spare hand out to the side as a counter-balancing hand, a bit like would be done in fencing but with his hand facing down as if holding a pad for a boxer to throw an uppercut at, kind of like a surfer’s balancing pose; Roger Moore holds his gun with both hands; Timothy Dalton lets his spare hand hang to his side, with a realistic balance of tension & relaxation; then Pierce Brosnan leaves his spare hand down, similar to Dalton but more floppy, and his whole body flops round at the same time, very nonchalantly like a careless lifeless teenager or a synthetic dummy, or someone who has never trained any kind of martial art before but wants to portray dominant tactical movement nonetheless. The way he pulls the door open 25 minutes in, is no different. It’s like he’s huffing & puffing while trying to act slick, when really he’s all floppy and the door is the dominant entity between the two of them! Having said that, as bland and uncoordinated a Bond as he may be, the fact his movies are much more highly funded than his outstanding predecessors’ movies were, kind of brings his movies up to the same level as most of those Bond movies before him. The fight scene at 25 minutes in, for example, when James gets through the door on the boat he’s sneaked on, is all flashy camera switching. There’s no genuine martial arts acumen or even athletic acumen on display, but good cinematography has ways of compensating for this, and the tempo and general vibe of that fight scene was not bad to be honest.
Backtracking now – the opening scenes at the very start of this movie are a bit ‘Mission Impossible esque’ with jumping down cliffs and entering rooms through ceilings.
In the first 5 minutes we’re introduced to one of the other main characters – Alec Trevelyan (Agent 006) played by Sean Bean. I’m usually a fan of his but I’m not a fan of his demeanour in this movie – he hasn’t reached his prime as an actor yet, and he’s got a rather repulsive smug look on his face in this movie in my opinion. Either the role doesn’t suit him, or it came too early in his career for us to really see the best of him. Anyway, he’s one of the main supporting actors in this movie.
Another of the main supporting actors we meet in the first 10 minutes is Gottfried John who is best known for his performance as the main villain in this movie – General Arkady Grigorovich Ourumov, who is also head of the Russian Space Division but turns on his own countrymen and goes rogue.
After we get a ridiculously unrealistic mid-air recovery of a nosediving passengerless plane to end the opening scenes, this leads into the theme tune by a croaky voiced Tina Turner in her mid 50s. It’s a funky tune but it’s not got quite the same kick as the best Bond theme tunes, for my taste. Another singer could have sang the same lyrics to the same tune and yet done it much better than Tina, I think.
One of the main Bond girl from this movie is Xenia Onatopp, who is played quite well by Dutch actress Famke Janssen (she also played Liam Neeson’s wife in the Taken movie series, and Phoenix in the early X-Men movies of 2000, 2003 and 2006) and now she plays the main female baddie in GoldenEye – she’s General Ourumov’s sidekick, who together with him, steals a state-of-the-art EMP-proof helicopter from a miliary demo after killing and impersonating an admiral then a couple of pilots. She also makes orgasmic noises after shooting & killing people.
Before the end of the first half hour, we meet the second of the main women in this movie, Natalya Fyodorovna Simonova, who is played by Polish actress Izabella Scorupco – she’s not a bad actress and is quite pretty too – definitely above average for a Bond girl but not on a par with the best of them for my taste. She’s a non corrupt programmer at a Russian top secret base that Ourumov & Onatopp shoot up. To their surprise, she manages to survive, then gets caught, escapes, gets caught again, and befriends James Bond who she’s being held prisoner with around half way through the movie. When we first meet her, we also met her colleague, a Russian programmer & hacker called Boris Grishenko (played alright by Scottish actor Alan Cumming, the main baddie in Spy Kids) and he is working with Ourumov & Onatopp.
The script & screenplay get pretty intense & captivating as Bond & Simonova are questioned by Defense Minister Dimitri Mishkin (played pretty well by Tchéky Karyo, who also plays corrupt Inspector Jean-Pierre Richard, the main antagonist in Kiss Of The Dragon, a Jet Li classic). Simonova then points the finger at General Ourumov who then walks in, acts suspicious, tried & fails to argue, then kills the minister and tries to kill Bond & Simonova but they manage to escape. Simonova soon gets caught again, but Bond makes his way out in a tank. The scene where bond bursts through the wall in a tank, hot on the tail of Ourumov & Simonova, is quite epic. In fairness, any actor could have pulled off Bond’s role in that scene – all credit to the writers and cinematography there for making one of the most outstanding & memorable scenes in the history of the James Bond movie saga. The following scenes of Bond in his tank brushing past buildings and knocking chunks out are quite wild too.
Shortly after 90 minutes in, we’re introduced to CIA operative Jack Wade, played quite well & charismatically by Joe Don Baker. He helps Bond & Simonova with their insertion into Cuba via the United States, and he has a bit of a jolly, low-IQ, all-sorted demeanour. This appears to be another attempt to replicate the outstanding humour of Sheriff JW Pepper from the Roger Moore era, and it falls short, but it’s not a bad effort either.
In the final half hour we see a satellite dish hidden under water, which gets raised out of the water when needed to control the GoldenEye. This is reminiscent of the space rocket base hidden within the seemingly water-filled volcano in You Only Live Twice (1967) – a Sean Connery classic from 3 decades prior.
Licence To Kill has an interesting creative opening involving James Bond and his CIA friend Felix Leiter. They’re both dressed up ready to attend Felix’s wedding, but they get called to a mission at the last minute, so they give chase a drug cartel boss, who escapes in a plane, so James & Felix get back into their large coast guard helicopter and pluck the plane out of its flight path, leaving it hanging mid-air by its tail. Then they parachute back to their wedding procession which is already underway. It’s a fairly creative opening but it’s no 00 vs SAS training exercise like we had at the start of the last Bond movie, The Living Daylights (1987) which I think was far more on-genre as well as more concise and generally more on-point too.
James Bond is played very well by Timothy Dalton here, in his second of only two ever Bond movies that he starred in. His career as Bond was cut short due to the producers being busy with a lawsuit over distribution prices that lasted 5 years (1989-1994), by which time Dalton had lost interest in being James Bond. Dalton was already signed up to do another Bond movie in 1991 but the delays due to the lawsuit essentially ended his contract in 1990 and Dalton had completely lost interest in being Bond by the time the producers were ready to begin his next movie, so they got Pierce Brosnan instead, and so began the Brosnan era.
Felix Leiter is played adequately by David Hedison here, who played the same role in one other Bond movie, 16 years prior – that being Live And Let Die (1973), which was Roger Moore’s first outing as James Bond.
The theme tune to Licence To Kill is quite funky, and quite R&B compared to usual. Sung by Gladys Knight, it’s not a bad tune, but it still doesn’t quite have the same kick as the best theme tunes like the theme tune for A View To A Kill which feels much more Bondy and impactful, while the Licence To Kill theme tune, as good as it is, is relatively demure.
Not 20 minutes in and we’re already very well acquainted with the main antagonist in this movie, Franz Sanchez, played very convincingly by Robert Davi, having seen him evade capture then get caught in the opening scenes, then we see him get sprung free by a cop who took a two million dollar bribe. The crooked cop, called Ed Killifer, is played quite well by a young Everett McGill (quite memorable as the main antagonist, on the brawn side, in Under Siege 2, some 6 years after Licence To Kill, by which time he’d developed a grey-haired Clint Eastwood vibe, but in Licence To Kill he has dark curly hair, possibly dyed to cover some greys).
With the murder of Felix and his newly wedded wife, after the escape of Sanchez, then with James finding their bodies and there being an atmosphere of mixed sorrow and anger, this movie appears to be attempting to set up narratives and pull at heartstrings, perhaps to make up for a colder-hearted vibe in The Living Daylights, but in doing so, Licence To Kill is missing out on the concise action that people like me came for. It’s a step in the wrong direction, for my taste, even though it appears they’re trying to make an improvement, and undoubtedly drama lovers will like the new style, but I much prefer the previous style personally. The subsequent infiltration of the shark place is also terribly slow and suspenseful. The odd attempt at humour is also a bit awkward here.
Early in the second quarter, as Bond sneaks aboard a ship owned Sanchez’s business partner, Milton Krest (played quite well by Anthony Zerbe), we become better acquainted with one of the main Bond girls in this movie – Sanchez’s girlfriend, Lupe Lamora, played quite well by the beautiful ethnically Puerto Rican actress Talisa Soto, who we initially met in the opening scenes. Soto is Japanese for outside or outsider, so she may have some distant Japanese heritage, but it’s also Spanish for grove, thicket or small wooded area, which is an equally viable surname (think of George Groves). Either way, I’d say she’s one of the best Bond girls of all time – a nice continuation from the beautiful Maryam d’Abo in the last movie, The Living Daylights. Timothy Dalton is truly blessed with the best standard of Bond girl in his movies, while Connery and Moore suffered a terribly unpredictable variety of co-star calibres.
The diving scene around 45 mins in is pretty concise and continuously creative. Quite impressive there.
Around 50 minutes in, we meet the other main woman in this movie: Carey Lowell playing Ms Pam Bouvier – a former US Army pilot working with the CIA. She’s no stunner but she’s quite tidy (in her late 20s here) and is a pretty good actor too. She makes a fun character in this movie, but James clearly made the wrong decision rejecting Lupe to choose Pam in the end.
It’s good to see Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa – the legendary actor from Mortal Kombat (1995) with Christopher Lambert – taking on a minor role here as Mr Kwang. He’s always an entertaining character in an action movie – his simple deadly gaze alone is enough to garner intrigue. Speaking of ‘garner’, he was also in Elektra (2005) with Jennifer Garner.
Great to see Q visiting Bond, with a bag full of gadgets, while Bond’s gone AWOL on a mission to kill Sanchez. Played very well by Desmond Llewelyn – his role is quite extended here for a change, as he does more than just deliver gadgets.
There’s an interesting series of plot twists around 1 hour and 20 minutes in, as Bond gets jumped by some Japanese ninjas led by Kwang who turns out to be a deep cover agent from the Hong Kong Police narcotics squad (a cringeworthy example of cultural misappropriation). Then when Sanchez takes him out and finds Bond tied up as a prisoner (due to be sent back to the UK, but Bond tells Sanchez things were about to get nasty), Sanchez suddenly trusts & values Bond very dearly. This turns into another clever plot development as James makes Sanchez think Krest is a traitor without actually naming him (based on info James was told discretely by Lupe just seconds earlier), then Sanchez finds the stolen money planted by James on Krest’s boat. Sanchez’s right hand man, Dario, who points out James as an informant, is played quite well by Benicio Del Toro – he delivers a convincing performance, as a younger brother or son figure to Sanchez.
Wayne Newton makes a convincing and occasionally funny character too, as a televangelist personality called Professor Joe Butcher who’s merely covering for Sanchez’s large cocaine transactions.
The ending is one that’s memorable and longwinded enough to mean that I don’t look forward to it when it comes to rewatching this movie. Having said that, when actually watching the ending, it’s fairly well made – there’s no particularly dull patches and the action stays quite creative and well made, although the overall plot doesn’t change much from the time when Bond gets rumbled in the factory until the end of the truck chase – it’s all quite memorable plotwise during this time, which makes the ending a bit of a downer for rewatchers, although this is a common theme in action movies, but there are some exceptions where the ending is as buzzing & creative as the start.
Overall, I have to rate this movie about equal to the average Bond movie from the Connery or Moore era. That’s one level down from the best movies of those eras (such as Goldfinger, Live And Let Die, and The Spy Who Loved Me), and it’s a couple levels down from the previous Timothy Dalton movie, The Living Daylights, which I personally rate as the best Bond movie of all time, not because Dalton is any more convincing than an early Connery from Dr No for example, but because The Living Daylights had a much higher budget and is much more action packed – it’s a true modern action movie. Licence To Kill, by contrast, is a bit more one-dimensional and lacks a great chemistry like Timothy Dalton had with Maryam d’Abo both on and off screen. Taliso Soto is no less beautiful but their chemistry never really caught fire – I guess she’s more of a model than an actress, and she even intended to act like she couldn’t care less about switching from Sanchez to Bond and then again from Bond to President Hector Lopez (played lifelessly but I guess adequately by Pedro Armendáriz Jr) at the very end when Bond decided to reject her in favour of Pam Bouvier (Carey Lowell) for some unrealistic reason. This odd choice of woman is reminiscent of the cringe factor when Connery and Moore were overly romantic with an aging Moneypenny (Lois Maxwell) before that actress was finally replaced at the start of the Dalton era. It seems much of the smart decisionmaking that came with The Living Daylights was already absent by the time Licence To Kill came about, even though they were both officially directed by John Glen, who also did Moore’s last three Bond movies (neither of his two best ones) so the injection of good thinking in The Living Daylights may have come from someone less under the spotlight. The budget for Licence To Kill ($36M) was also slightly lower than The Living Daylights ($40M). Maybe they were distracted by looming lawsuits in 1989. They came back with massively higher and constantly increasing budgets in the Pierce Brosnan era, which kicked off with GoldenEye in 1995 on a budget of $60M then went on to Tomorrow Never Dies in 1997 with a budget of $110M and the budgets kept going up throughout the Brosnan and Craig eras (with just the odd hiccup), although I don’t personally include the emotional Daniel Craig in my list of classic Bond movies – I think he’s absolutely ruined the Bond saga for the last 20 years – I can’t personally watch a single Bond movie he’s made. He’s worse than George Lazenby who did On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969). But I’m a massive fan of Connery, Moore and Dalton as Bond, and I think Brosnan makes a bland but still quite watchable Bond. Those four eras form the complete list of Bond classics, as far as I’m concerned.
The Living Daylights is the best Bond film of all time in my opinion. Closely followed by Goldfinger (starring Connery), Live And Let Die (Roger Moore), and The Spy Who Loved Me (Roger Moore and Barbara Bach) which all compete for second place.
This movie opens with a great scene where a bunch of 00 agents pit themselves against the SAS in a mock raid of Gibraltar, which is defended by the SAS who are waiting on high alert and armed with paintball guns. Unfortunately a real enemy agent infiltrates the exercise and kills one of the 00 agents. Naturally, James Bond (played excellently by Timothy Dalton, in his first of two outings as James Bond) clocks on to this and goes after him, leaving the SAS quite confused. This set of scenes ends with James funnily landing on a boat occupied by a woman who’s on the phone saying she longs to find a ‘real man’.
This leads into the theme tune by A-ha, which is one of the best Bond theme tunes of all time.
The script unravels quite intruigingly and concisely from here on, as Bond manages to extract a defected Russian general from enemy soil, and in the course of this, non-lethally takes out an enemy sniper (played quite well by the beautiful Maryam d’Abo) after seeing she wasn’t really a trained sniper – something fishy’s going on and James intends to get to the bottom of it without shooting any seemingly innocent women in the process. Props to the writers, directors and editors, and of course actors – especially Dalton for carrying the vibe of the movie with his energy and seriousness, plus the odd dose of humour.
Good to see Miss Moneypenny is replaced by a younger woman at long last. This time she’s played by Caroline Bliss, who is in her mid 20s here. She does a fair job – nothing special but not terrible or inappropriate either. Up until this point, Moneypenny was played in all the Bond movies through the Connery and Moore eras by Lois Maxwell, who was alright when she debuted with Dr No in 1962 (in her mid 30s) – her chemistry with Bond was believable there – but when she’s still around in A View To A Kill in 1985 (in her late 50s) she seems long past her sell-by date, especially when she’s supposedly being romantic with James Bond. So it’s great to see her finally replaced – this was long overdue, I suggest.
This movie features one of the most iconic baddies in the entire Bond saga – the understated KGB agent called Necros (played very well by Andreas Wisniewski) who initially poses as a milkman after killing the real milkman, and manages to infiltrate an MI6 base to extract the defected general back to Russia. His role is continuous throughout this movie, as the main muscle on the baddies’ side. He’s a bit like John Wyman’s character Erich Kriegler, the young blonde KGB agent in For Your Eyes Only (1981), crossed with Ivan Drago from Rocky IV (played by Dolph Lundgren, who also appeared for a second in the previous Bond movie, A View To A Kill, which came out just a few months prior to Rocky IV, which itself premiered on Bruce Lee’s birthday, Nov 27, 1985).
40 minutes in, we become properly introduced to the lead female in this movie, called Kara Milovy, played quite well by half-Georgian actress Maryam d’Abo who is up there among the best Bond girls of all time. She had great chemistry with Dalton both on and off-screen. Although I’ve found no reports of them officially dating, they were occasionally pictured together in the late 80s and into the 90s. Anyway, back to the movie. So, James has a good chat with Kara to make sure she’s innocent, then helps her to shrug off her KGB tail. Shortly before this, we were also introduced to a nice Bond car – something completely missing from the last Bond movie (A View To A Kill, 1985). This time it’s an Aston Martin equipped with laser beams, missiles and bulletproof glass, as well as skis and tyre spikes for moving over snow & ice, plus a rocket-powered turbo booster. But the car eventually crashes and this leads into one of the most iconic Bond movie scenes of all time, where Timothy Dalton and Maryam d’Abo (as James Bond and Kara Milovy) slide down a snowy mountainside using an opened cello case as a twin bobsled and the cello itself as a steering rudder. They slide all the way down to the country’s border and beyond, where the militia that was shooting at them stops giving chase.
This movie gets a little slower and less exciting for around quarter an hour, towards the middle of the movie, as we learn a bit more about the baddies and their complex relationships and agendas, as well as what Bond’s strategy is. These scenes can get a bit boring for those who have seen this movie many times before, and this brings down my overall rating of this movie from what could have been Pretty Good, down to Decent which is still the highest rating I’ve given to any Bond movie – just one step better than the best Bond movies by Connery and Moore. After quarter an hour of less thrilling scenes in the middle of the movie, it soon sharpens up and becomes quite spicy when James’s colleague is killed and he regains vigour for his mission, then smells another rat and pretends to kill someone in the hopes that everyone will now show their cards.
The action heats up nicely again, around 40 minutes before the end, as James and Kara make their escape from a Russian airbase in Afghanistan, making friends with a powerful local Afghani resistance leader in the process after setting him free the day before his execution were due. The Afghani resistance leader was called Kamran Shah, and he was played quite well by Art Malik.
The ending is quite strong – it stays quite interesting and has a decent tempo. There’s good musical effects during the fight scenes towards the end too. Although it can still get a little tedious for people who have seen this movie many times before. The suspenseful scene with Bond and Necros hanging onto the ropes out the back of the plane while the bomb is counting down, near the end of this movie, drags on just a little too long for my liking, as someone who’s seen this movie many times before and remains thoroughly entertained by much of it. The entire fight scene on between Bond and Necros while the plane was in the air, only lasted a few minutes, but I would have liked it to be more concise and less prolongingly suspenseful still, personally. After that, when Bond dropped the bomb on the Russians crossing the bridge, to put an end to them chasing his new Mujahideen friends, that was a very nice touch. Props to the writers and the whole team for that level of clever detail. The plane losing fuel after that, and the escape plan in the jeep, was a nice twist too, keeping us on our toes, in a good way. After this, the very ending stays quite concise, with decent action and good humour.
We already know Roger Moore‘s James Bond loves a good ski chase, especially in the opening scenes, and this movie is no different – the opening ski chase here is as good as any, and it leads into the theme tune by Duran Duran which itself is as good as any Bond theme tune ever made. With good humour too, Eon Productions seem intent on sending off Roger Moore with a bang, in his last outing as James Bond. Naturally, Roger Moore delivers an excellent performance as usual.
The main antagonist in this movie, Max Zorin, is played very well by a young Christopher Walken, and his main muscle assistant called May Day is played by quite weirdly by Grace Jones. They both make a strong appearance in the first half hour. Aside from Grace Jones (whose I assume is a woman but wouldn’t bank on it) who stays on Zorin’s side until near the end; the main female in this movie is Tanya Roberts who quite well plays Stacey Sutton – a woman who James befriends after witnessing her being paid off by Zorin and then bumping into her again later on.
Bond’s assistant, Sir Godfrey Tibbett, is played very well by Patrick Macnee (who famously played John Steed in the action-packed 60s TV series The Avengers).
There’s a strong equine theme in this movie, so horse breeders and horse-racing enthusiasts should enjoy it more than most.
The sharp eyed among us may notice Dolph Lundgren shows his face for a second, as a KGB agent, when General Gogov (played quite well by Walter Gotell) confronts Max Zorin about his supposed unauthorised killing of 007. Dolph became a household face when he appeared as the main antagonist in Rocky IV, which was released just 4 months after A View To A Kill’s release in 1985 – on Bruce Lee’s birthday in fact, Nov 27.
Towards the end of this movie, they’ve attempted to bring back the outstanding humour of Clifton James as Sheriff JW Pepper, from Roger Moore’s first two Bond movies (Life And Let Die, and The Man With The Golden Gun), this time in the form of a police captain played by Joe Flood. Joe does an alright job, but he’s no Clifton James. In fact, he’s relatively deadpan.
The ending gets a bit monotonous for those who have seen it several times before, but it’s still generally well made throughout. The quality of this movie is generally pretty good – not quite on a par with Roger Moore’s best Bond movies (Live And Let Die, and The Spy Who Loved Me) for my taste, but it’s roughly in the running for joint third place. With a slightly better lead female, and better comedy from the police captain or someone else, plus a nice Bond car (which is completely lacking in this movie), and with a more dynamic ending, and perhaps better use of Patrick Macnee (who got killed off too early for my liking), it could have been up there with the best Bond movies of all time. But as it stands, I rate it on a par with most movies from the Connery and Moore eras – I rated most of them just OK.
This was Sean Connery‘s one-off return as James Bond after over a decade out. His last outing as Bond being in 1971 with Diamonds Are Forever and he was already looking aged compared to his debut with Dr No in 1962.
Never Say Never Again was one of only two Bond movies ever produced outside of Eon Productions – the other being Casino Royale (1967), although that was just a dull satire so struggles to even qualify as a Bond movie.
Never Say Never Again gets off to a respectable start, as a health farm used by MI6 agents seems to have been infiltrated by some enemy Spectre agents. It gets a bit slow and messy and the movie progresses, but the action & intrigue pick up nicely in the second hour, before dying down again and becoming very slow and tedious towards the end.
Interesting gadgets afforded to Bond by Q in this movie include a special motorbike and a fountain pen that shoots.
There are some scuba scenes in this movie too – one of them involves Bond needing to deal with a bunch of sharks.
Cast members
Sean Connery rolls back the years to deliver a strong performance as an aging James Bond.
Bond girls in this movie include Barbara Carrera as Fatima Blush, and Kim Basinger as Domino Vitali. They both do a fair job.
The main antagonist, Maximillian Largo, is played quite convincingly by Klaus Maria Brandauer.
Bernie Casey does a decent job as Felix Leiter from the American CIA.
We also get a minor part by Rowan Atkinson (Mr Bean) who entertainingly plays Bond’s assistant in one scene.
Rating
In summary, Never Say Never Again is a respectable movie, funded by Warner Bros, and almost of competes with the usual Bond standard, although I’d say it’s comfortably Connery’s worst Bond movie. It’s in dire need of editing to make it more concise, and some better cinematography because the angles are really lazy from time to time while the sound effects only prolong the boring bits. Because Connery’s getting so old here, he doesn’t have so much of his usual smooth & charming demeanour – although he’s still trying, it’s not so convincing any more – he looks more like a grandfather than a bachelor now. He’s still a great actor though. All things considered, I’d probably rate it So-So, slightly lower than Roger Moore’s worst Bond movie which was probably For Your Eyes Only (1981) which I rated Lower-OK.
Fun fact
Never Say Never Again also goes down in history as being the movie where Steven Seagal was hired to teach Sean Connery some Aikido, and during the course of training, Seagal broke Connery’s wrist! This may have set the filming of this movie back a bit, and it may have also set Seagal’s career back a bit too – he never made his own movie debut until Above The Law (1988). As with most broken joint injuries, Connery’s wrist never fully healed. In fact, he never actually knew his wrist was broken until over a decade later, when he discovered it was still broken in 1995, according to an interview on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in 1996.
Finally they’re catching on to the age of Miss Moneypenny and how it makes for uncomfortable viewing when James Bond flirts with her – in this episode they crack a joke about it, so it’s clearly a well understood issue by now.
Perhaps the strangest thing about this movie, aside from its ridiculously rude name, is how one of the main female characters (herself called Octopussy – the character who this movie was named after) is played by Maud Adams who was also one of the main women in The Man With The Golden Gun (1974). She’s just an average Bond girl so how she managed the lead gig in two separate Bond movies within the Roger Moore era I have no idea – it isn’t even due to anything in the storyline, since her character was killed off in The Man With The Golden Gun. I can only assume she’s either born into a very influential family, or has been doing all kinds of naughty favours for the relevant decisionmakers.
The last half hour of Octopussy is not a bad one. Bond stops an atomic bomb going off, which was organised by a rogue Russian general; and Octopussy (now on Bond’s side), with the help of her gang of circus women, raids the fortress of the guy who double-crossed her but she gets captures so James Bond rescues her. Still, having said that, it’s still probably one of the weaker Bond movies from the Roger Moore era. Either on a par with the last one (For Your Eyes Only, 1981) or slightly better but not by much. I’m going to rate it OK due to its strong back end. Still, Moore delivers a strong performance from his side as usual in this movie which is his penultimate outing as James Bond – the next one, A View To A Kill (1985) will be Roger Moore’s final outing as James Bond, and after that we enter the short but sweet Timothy Dalton era.
Note also, just a few months after the release of Octopussy, Sean Connery’s one-off comeback as Bond hit the big screen – Never Say Never Again (1983) – which was produced independently of Eon Productions who produced pretty much all the other Bond movies (except for Casino Royale, 1967, which was an unwatchably unfunny satire rather than the usual Bond genre).
The chemistry between Roger Moore (as James Bond) and Lois Maxwell (as Moneypenny) is getting quite revolting by now. They both look like someone’s grandparents. Lois even looks like she could be a cross dresser. But she’s been in that position since the start of the Sean Connery era and stays throughout the Roger Moore era. We only get a new Miss Moneypenny when the Timothy Dalton era begins. Still, better late than never.
After a nice ski chase in the opening of The Spy Who Loved Me, Roger Moore does another one in For Your Eyes Only, but this time with a bit more context. It works quite well. It includes some brushing through alpine trees, and may have somewhat inspired Timothy Dalton’s epic snow chase on a cello case in The Living Daylights (1987).
For a movie that’s trying to be more romantic than usual, there’s a lack of attractive women in this one. Still, French actress Carole Bouquet plays Melina Havelock, the lead female, and makes for a slightly interesting character.
One of the best things about this movie is when Bond teams up with a well resourced guy called Milos Columbo – someone who Bond initially thought to be his enemy – played quite well by Chaim Topol.
There’s a couple of long diving scenes in this movie, which includes the use of small submarine-type vessels as well as independent scuba diving and some completely unassisted breath-holding diving too. It initially seems to drag on a bit too long for those who have seen it before, but scuba divers and underwater explorers may appreciate it, and gets a bit more interesting after a while (when James Bond and Melina Havelock get caught and tied up but make their escape).
The ending has a nice cliff-climbing and fortress infiltration scene.
John Wyman plays KGB agent Erich Kriegler, the main antagonist in terms of brawn, while Julian Glover plays Aristotle Kristatos, the main antagonist in terms of brains. They both do a fair job but nothing amazing.
I have to say this feels like one of the weakest Bond movies, so I’m going to rate it Lower-OK, below most of the others. It lacks a great enemy or a great female or a great plot, but Roger Moore still pulls it off in his usual style. Although Roger Moore went on to do a couple more Bond movies after this one – namely Octopussy (1983) and A View To A Kill (1985) – the shortcomings in this movie (For Your Eyes Only, 1981) may have inspired Sean Connery to come back with Never Say Never Again, produced outside of the usual Eon Productions team, and released shortly after Moore’s next movie Octopussy in 1983.
Following the success of The Spy Who Loved Me which was one of the best Bond movies of all time (and brought in the best box office revenue since Goldfinger & Thunderball in the Sean Connery era) on a budget equal to 14 million dollars, which up until that point was the highest budget a Bond movie had received by far (in real terms) and was second in budget behind You Only Live Twice after accounting for inflation – the budget was over doubled for Moonraker in both real terms and after accounting for inflation. But Moonraker’s takings at the box office remained about equal to The Spy Who Loved Me, so budgets were reigned back in after Moonraker didn’t do as well as expected for the money spent – the same budget (after accounting for inflation) was not spent again until the Pierce Brosnan era nearly two decades later, and the box office takings of The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker were not surpassed until the soppy Daniel Craig era whose movies I personally find quite unwatchable.
If your tastes matches mine, don’t forget to bookmark this site for masses of carefully curated action hero movie reviews & recommendations just like this one – tailored specifically to my own taste and anyone who thinks like me – I know there’s not many of us left, but let’s still help each other out a bit!
Both movies – The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979) – were directed by Lewis Gilbert, but Moonraker lacks a woman with as much star power as Barbara Bach from The Spy Who Loved Me, and lacks an evil mastermind as convincing as Curd Jürgens. Still, at least we get the return of Roger Moore as James Bond (who performs excellently as usual) and his most legendary adversary, Jaws (another epic performance by Richard Kiel in the second of his only two ever outings as the most iconic Bond adversary of all time).
The main antagonist on the brains side, is Hugo Drax, played a bit demurely by Michael Lonsdale.
The lead females in Moonraker are played by American actress Lois Chiles (as Dr Holly Goodhead – on loan to Hugo Drax from NASA) and French actress Corinne Cléry (Corinne Dufour – personal pilot to Hugo Drax – she gets killed around half an hour in). They both deliver basic but adequate performances – both far less stunning or sophisticated than Barbara Bach from The Spy Who Loved Me, but that’s to be expected – they’re just about as tidy as an average Bond girl.
Blanche Ravalec plays the most fun female in Moonraker, called Dolly – a nerdy pigtail-wearing young woman who falls in love with Jaws and the feeling is reciprocated!
The most attractive woman in this movie is probably Emily Bolton who plays Manuela – James’s contact in Rio. She doesn’t appear until about an hour into the movie, and doesn’t get much screen time but she certainly brightens up the movie for a while.
The river boat chase after half an hour into this movie, is obviously inspired by the great boat chase in Live And Let Die, although this one is a bit cheap & nasty in comparison, but at least it’s original and not too close an imitation. And there is another boat chase in the second hour of this movie where James is given a much cooler boat. Then in turn, this movie’s boat races probably inspired Pierce Brosnan’s river boat race scene in The World Is Not Enough (1999).
When the boat becomes amphibious and drives around town about 40 minutes into this movie, that’s obviously inspired by the scene where the Lotus drives out of the sea in The Spy Who Loved Me. The reactions are a bit more developed this time round, but that’s not entirely a good thing – it’s all a bit cheesy, as if trying to be a comedy but not quite getting there, and the amphibious boat itself is a bit of a cheap looking stunt – something much improved in the second hour, and in The World Is Not Enough. Having said that, there is a nice bit of unspoken humour occasionally in this movie.
The fencing with the kendo swordsman in this movie probably inspired the swordfighting with Madonna in Die Another Day too.
It’s not till half an hour before the end when we finally see why the movie is called Moonraker – we finally see the hidden space city as James & Holly secretly board one of Drax’s shuttles.
I rate Moonraker an OK movie, like most Bond movies up until this one.
The Spy Who Loved marks Roger Moore‘s third outing as James Bond, and he does a splendid job as always.
The movie kicks off with a submarine hijack scene, followed by a quick introduction to the lead female in this movie: Russian agent, Major Anya Amasova (aka Agent Triple X), played very well by the beautiful Barbara Bach (born Barbara Goldbach), who went on to marry Beatles drummer Ringo Starr (real name Sir Richard Starkey) in 1981. I reckon Barbara has to be up there with the most attractive Bond girls of all time, considering how we’re so commonly fobbed off with a barely better than average looking woman in that role – I guess these women usually get their jobs based on how cooperative they are in giving favours to the decision makers (like the winners of most beauty pageants), but in this case Barbara was cast for the role just 4 days before filming began – she initially expected to take on a minor role but was given the lead female position at the last minute – whoever made that call did a great job, providing it wasn’t in exchange for uncomfortable favours of course. Barbara once auditioned for a lead role in the 70s TV series Charlie’s Angels, but wasn’t picked because she was deemed too sophisticated – I guess most Bond girls look less than what they should do for much the same reason – they’ve been mostly trying to push unsophisticated bimbos as goals.
From 5 minutes in, till 10 minutes in, we’re treated to a nice ski chase down a mountainside as Bond makes it exit from a chalet in Austria when he’s called to head back to England urgently. It seems like an epic scene until you realise how little of that skiing work was actually done by Roger Moore. Any time we see his face, he’s barely moving and the background is clearly overlayed using ancient video editing tricks. A stunt team of skiing experts clearly did all the work here, which is fair enough considering the risk and Roger’s probable lack of skiing expertise – it’s just work noting to observe the contrast with guys like Jackie Chan who is known for doing nearly all of his own stunts himself and that makes his work much more convincing.
The main baddies in this movie include Karl Stromberg, played by Curd Jürgens (full name Curd Gustav Andreas Gottlieb Franz Jürgens) who has vibes of Evelyn de Rothschild; and the legendary Richard Kiel playing Jaws – the very tall man with metal teeth (he seems to be wearing a glorified gumshield, but it’s quite convincing for the less observant). Jürgens makes his intro as Stromberg roughly 15 minutes into the movie, by sitting in his luxury underwater lair and putting a suspected traitor to death by feeding her to his sharks – something he must enjoy because he projects it onto a large TV – quite fitting behaviour for a Rothschild lookalike I’d say. Kiel also makes his debut intro as Jaws within the first 20 minutes, as he’s instructed by Stromberg to recover some microfilm containing a stolen copy of a submarine tracking system – he’s also told to kill anyone who comes into contact with it. Jaws gets properly down to action for the first time about half an hour in. He likes to kill people by biting their necks with his metal teeth, a bit like a vampire. This Jaws character was probably inspired by Tee Hee from Live And Let Die, who had a metal pincer for a hand instead of metal teeth, and also surprised Bond in his train cabin just like Jaws does in this movie. Both get their scary metal weapons exploited before being sent tumbling out the window.
At an hour into the movie, we’re treated to a nice Bond car in the form of a modified Lotus Esprit S1 which even goes under water, making for one of the most memorable scenes in the whole James Bond movie series.
The prisoner escape half an hour before the end, with the help of the rail system, was probably inspired by similar things in You Only Live Twice, from 10 years earlier, starring Sean Connery – but of course this time it’s taken to a whole new level since there’s so many prisoners, so there’s no need for floods of ninjas from the outside as in You Only Live Twice, but the effect is similar. The similarities continue, from nuclear threats, to describing the operations room as impregnable in both movies after Bond’s team captures the rest of the baddies’ building. These similarities may have something to do with the fact that both movies were directed by Lewis Gilbert – he only ever directed three Bond movies and these were his first two – the third was Moonraker which came directly after The Spy Who Loved Me and also featured Jaws.
Rating & reasoning
Overall, I rate The Spy Who Loved Me as an Upper-OK movie, alongside the best Bond movies so far like Goldfinger and Live And Let Die. Not because I prefer Moore over Connery, and not because this movie is extremely well polished or has any single great feature about it, but because of its accumulation of strengths – it has double star power with the help of a great lead female in Barbara Bach (one of the best Bond girls of all time) who is interestingly a top Russian agent temporarily cooperating with Bond – it has a couple of very convincing baddies, satisfying both brains and brawn, including possibly the best Bond baddie of all time in Jaws – it has some great submarine hijacking and re-taking scenes, a great underwater-swimming Bond car (possibly the best Bond car of all time), trips to snowy mountains as well as sandy deserts – it’s got a lot going for it compared to some of the weaker Bond movies. The movie doesn’t dwindle off at the end either – it stays strong even for people to who’ve seen it many times before to stay entertained till the very end (so long as you’ve not seen it too recently of course). The theme tune isn’t bad either. It doesn’t have the awesome comedy of Sheriff JW Pepper from Roger Moore’s first two outings as James Bond, but one movie can’t have everything, and on the overall balance of things I think it’s still the joint best Bond movie up until this point, well deserving of an Upper-OK rating by today’s action hero movie standards according to my taste.
Fun fact 1
I suspect the scene 40 minutes in, where James & Anya confront Jaws (filmed at Karnak Temple and Medinet Habu – both in Luxor, Egypt) was probably inspired by Bruce Lee’s coliseum scene that ended The Way Of The Dragon (1972) just 5 years prior to The Spy Who Loved Me (1977).
The Way Of The Dragon was the last of Bruce’s films that he lived to see the premiere of. He also completed Enter The Dragon but it wasn’t released until shortly after his death – who knows if he even approved of the final edit – and he was working on Game Of Death but that movie never got anywhere near completion in his lifetime – the movie eventually released by that name was mainly made by a Bruce Lee impersonator, obviously to a much cheaper standard. Indeed, Bruce didn’t even have full control over Enter The Dragon – the story was written by someone else and funded by Warner Bros – nor did he have full control over his Hong Kong made movies prior to The Way Of The Dragon, due to the status of his contract with Golden Harvest (Raymond Chow) at the time. So, The Way Of The Dragon stands alone as pretty much the only movie Bruce completely crafted and approved with his own hands according to his own best wishes from start to finish.
The Way Of The Dragon contains a great example of the latest version of Bruce’s kung fu, which he called Jeet Kune Do (JKD). Especially in the coliseum scene at the end, where he fights Chuck Norris. He actually tried to cast karate champ Joe Lewis for that role (not to be confused with Joe Louis the boxer), but Lewis was busy with other things at the time, so Bruce reluctantly settled for karate champ Chuck Norris instead (who Bruce thought had much slower hands so wasn’t ideal, but sufficed). The casting in that movie may or may not have also been affected by a private ‘friendly’ fight Bruce had with Joe Lewis: according to witnesses, they allegedly had a dispute over some technique, so they locked themselves in a room and fought it out. Lewis came out first, face all messed up and covered in blood. Bruce came out next, fists covered in blood. Rumour says they never spoke again after that incident. Rumour also says Lewis was a little too friendly with Bruce’s wife – I don’t know how much of that is true, but this rumour is often cited as an excuse for Bruce being so close to certain Hong Kong actresses while being married to Linda Lee.
Fun fact 2
Off screen, Roger and Anya both agreed that Ian Fleming’s character James Bond were a “chauvinist pig”. Roger said, around the time of his debut as Bond in 1973: “Bond, like myself, is a male chauvinist pig. All my life I’ve been trying to get women out of brassieres and pants.” Then Anya expressed a similar sentiment to the papers 10 years later – she said Bond is “a chauvinist pig who uses girls to shield him against bullets.”
Roger Moore delivers a strong performance as always, in this movie, which was his second outing as James Bond.
It’s good to see the return of JW Pepper, the funny sheriff from the previous Bond movie, Live And Let Die, making some funny appearances this time while on holiday with his wife. Just like last time, Clifton James does a fantastic job in the role of Sheriff JW Pepper here.
The main baddies in this movie are Francisco Scaramanga (played quite well by Christopher Lee) and his unforgettable midget henchman-come-butler Nick Nack played very well by Hervé Villechaize.
The lead female in this movie is Britt Ekland who plays Mary Goodnight, and the next main woman is Maud Adams who plays Andrea Anders. They’re both Swedish models, and both do a fair job here. Maud Adams returns as the lead female in Octopussy, even though she was killed off in this movie.
The mirrored maze of a duelling room within Scaramanga’s secret island lair was probably inspired by the secret mirrored room on Han’s island in Enter The Dragon which was released in 1973, just 1 year prior to this movie being released.
I rate The Man With The Golden Gun as an OK movie. Not quite as good as Live And Let Die but not far off. Pretty standard for an old James Bond flick.
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.
Diamonds Are Forever is Sean Connery’s last outing as James Bond, before the Roger Moore era began. Connery did come back one time, to make Never Say Never Again, 12 years later, independently of Eon Productions, but Diamonds Are Forever still marks the end of the main Connery-as-Bond era.
One of the most memorable scenes from this movie is when Bond steals a space buggy to make his escape through rocky desert terrain. This is followed by a charismatic car chase by cops which probably inspired similar scenes in the Roger Moore era – especially those in Live And Let Die (1973) which was Roger Moore’s first outing as James Bond and was the movie that immediately followed Diamonds Are Forever, so they probably took the interesting car chase from this movie and doubled down on the concept to make some epic chases in the next movie. It’s not so much the car chase itself that’s entertaining – it’s more the reaction of the cops in how they find Bond’s speeding & stunt-driving so cheeky & humiliating.
Another highly memorable scene from this movie, is when James kicks Blofeld’s cat, to see which of the two lookalikes the cat jumps to, so James knows which one to kill.
Another highly memorable scene from this movie, is when James enters a penthouse to find a kidnapped man and is confronted by two cute ladies named Bambi & Thumper who turn out to be highly acrobatic warrior women that proceed to beat him up until he eventually gets the better of them in the pool.
The main woman in this movie, Tiffany Case, is played fairly well by Jill St John. The main antagonist (Blofeld) is played this time quite well by Charles Gray. And of course Sean Connery does very well as always.
This movie is a bit one dimensional and void of creativity & excitement comparted to Goldfinger for example, but it’s not far from the usual standard expected from a Bond movie in the Connery era. I rate it an OK movie.
From cinematography to star power, there’s a lot deeply lacking in this movie compared to what we’re become accustomed to during the Sean Connery era of James Bond. It contains action but it has a plain & dry feel. George Lazenby has a nonchalant careless demeanour like he’s just strolled into a teenager’s house party, quite different from the smooth but mostly serious approach of Connery.
Lazenby seriously lacks that “main man in the room” vibe. He tries to act the part, but strangely he’d never done any acting prior to this movie and his microgestures were screaming he’s a follower not a leader, at least while filming this movie. By contrast, he turned up to the movie premiere with bushy beard and long hair, against the wishes of the producers – he didn’t mind rejecting their request seeing as he’d already decided not to do another Bond movie. Apparently he was dissatisfied with how few gadgets his character had been given in this movie, and mainstream critics picked up on this too so he wasn’t simply being anti-establishmentary.
Honestly speaking, I’ve tried to watch this movie many times before but gave up every time due to lack of interest, and this time seems no different – it just lacks that spark and that polished feel that prior Bond movies are known for. It just seems a bit dull and random. A big messy drama show, void of oomph. But I’m giving it a slightly extended preview for the benefit of an accurate review on this site. It is watchable if desperately bored and lacking anything else to do or watch, but it’s not what I would describe as entertaining. I rate it Barely Watchable. I managed to watch the first 15 minutes before fast-forwarding to see if I’d missed anything particularly different, and there was nothing unexpected.
The last two thirds of the movie are set in some snowy mountains and filmed in the Swiss Alps. The main Bond girl is played by Diana Rigg (from The Avengers, the old TV series that ran from ’61-’69) – she plays James Bond’s his wife in this movie, although he still fools around with other women. The roles of M, Q & Moneypenny are all reprised by their usual actors. But all this still doesn’t make it a comfortably enjoyable movie in my opinion.
You Only Live Twice is the fifth Bond film by Eon Productions and the fifth outing of Sean Connery as James Bond. He does an excellent job as usual.
This time, the movie is set mostly in Japan. We see sumo wrestlers (including one of Bond’s early adversaries – bringing back vibes of Oddjob from Goldfinger) as well as ninjas (in white gis doing mostly other Japanese martial arts – obviously expecting a naïve audience) plus plenty of beautiful Japanese women – especially the main woman in this movie – James’s initial liaison in Japan, called Aki, played quite well by Akiko Wakabayashi. Akiko seems bright and beautiful, in contrast to James’s cover wife towards in the end of the movie – an agent named Kissy Suzuki, played adequately by Mie Hama. She’s pretty but not stunning, and has a typical bimbo gaze & demeanour.
Aki’s boss (Tiger Tanaka) is played quite well by Tetsurô Tanba.
The main enemy in Japan (Mr Osato) is played well by Teru Shimada, although his company is just a front – he works for Spectre (the main enemy in every Bond movie by Eon up to this point).
Spectre’s boss – their ‘Number 1’ agent – never reveals his face until the end of this movie. Until this point we’d only ever seen his hand stroking a fluffy white cat as he sits in his chair barking orders – this time we learn his name is Ernst Stavro Blofeld and he’s played adequately by Donald Pleasence. He’s a bit of a Dr Evil type character.
Karin Dor also plays a significant role in this movie, as Helga Brandt – a female Spectre agent who Bond thought he seduced, but failed. She later gets killed by Blofeld – she’s dropped in a pond of piranhas, for unwittingly allowing Bond to escape.
This movie is responsible for one of the most iconic & memorable sets in Bond history – the lair built within a volcano, with a sliding roof that, when closed, makes it look like the volcano is full of water to anyone looking down from above. The freeing of prisoners and taking over of that volcano base probably inspired similar antics in The Spy Who Loved Me starring Roger Moore 10 years later – the similarity here may also have something to do with the fact that both movies were directed by Lewis Gilbert – they were his first two of three Bond movies he directed.
Overall I rate this movie as OK – about the same as every other Bond movie so far in the series up to this point, with the exception of Goldfinger which was probably slightly better.
Fun fact 1
My favourite movie of all time is Bloodsport, inspired by the alleged real-life story of Frank Dux who has been widely exposed as a pretender these days. When asked who trained him, he said ‘Tiger Tanaka’, and this worked his way into the movie where Van Damme’s character Frank Dux is trained by a Mr Tanaka. I guess he got the idea from You Only Live Twice and didn’t expect Bloodsport to become the massive cult classic that it became, which has had both positive and negative effects on his reputation due to this controversy.
Fun fact 2
After this movie, Sean Connery asked for a significant pay rise, but Eon Productions refused. So the next Bond movie – On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) – starred George Lazenby instead. It was a commercial success, but was still considered a flop in comparison to You Only Live Twice. Lazenby also refused to do a second movie, due to lack of gadgets in his first one. He’d also never acted in anything before this movie. And he was told by the producers not to turn up to the movie premiere unless he shaved his beard and cut his long hair, but he turned up anyway, without shaving or cutting anything. I have to respect him for that, even if he makes a weak James Bond.
So Eon eventually agreed to Connery’s terms for one more outing – Diamonds Are Forever (1971) – marking the 6th & final outing of Connery as Bond on an Eon Productions film, before eventually finding a suitable replacement in Roger Moore, whose era began with Live And Let Die (1973). Roger Moore made 7 consecutive Bond movies, which took us through to the mid 80s and was followed by a couple starring Timothy Dalton which took us through to the 90s. But Connery made one more attempt at a Bond movie, outside of Eon Productions, before the Roger Moore era had ended – Connery was commissioned to star in Never Say Never Again (1983) in the second of the only two Bond movies ever produced outside of Eon Productions. It featured Kim Basinger as well as Rowan Atkinson (Mr Bean) and a bunch of other strong but lesser known actors, and was picked up for distribution by Warner Bros, so it’s a very serious movie still.
This is the first of only two Bond movies ever produced outside of Eon Productions. It’s meant to be parody-style action comedy. It starts off looking quite unwatchable, but it’s nice to see John Le Mesurier make an early appearance (this movie was released 1 year before the first episode of Dad’s Army where Mesurier plays Sergeant Wilson very well). Unfortunately he only has a fleeting minor role here.
The humour remains pretty dead for at least the first quarter an hour. The actors all have dry personalities and aren’t at all funny for my taste, so I have to call this an unwatchable movie – I fast forwarded a bit and it didn’t seem to improve. The genre is nothing like other James Bond movies – it’s more like an old Carry On film minus the funny actors. The storyline is related to James Bond but only so far as satire goes. I wouldn’t list this movie in with other Bond movies because it has a completely different genre and its ‘comedy’ is so poor. There’s no cross-over appeal, for action hero movie junkies – even those who like fresh action comedies will find this movie terrible dull and a waste of time.
David Niven plays the Bond character in this movie, but it’s nothing like the James Bond we know & love – he just plays a Carry On style fool minus the comedy value, which makes it a pointless drama for my taste.
Other key cast members include famous names like Peter Sellers and Woody Allen, as well as Swiss actress Ursula Andress – the main Bond girl from the first genuine Bond movie, Dr No.
Thunderball is the 4th movie in the James Bond saga and the fourth time Sean Connery plays the leading role – he does a good job as usual.
This movie gets off to an interesting start, with a cross-dressing agent trying to trick James Bond, who kills him and takes time to throw some flower over his body before running away and escaping from the rooftop via jetpack to his bag-of-tricks car. We then begin to hear the Thunderball theme tune by Tom Jones, all within the first 5 minutes.
It’s good to see Desmond Llewelyn back as Q, around the 1 hour mark.
This movie is a bit slower, more monotonous and more one-dimensional and yet still messier than Goldfinger, but not devastatingly so.
The main antagonist in this movie is Emilio Largo (Spectre’s “Number 2” agent) played fairly well by Adolfo Celi although he’s probably a bit podgy and effeminate for such an active top agent in such a physically demanding role.
There are several women in this movie but none get significant enough screen time or deliver a significant enough performance to be particularly worth mentioning here, although it’s good to see the return of Martine Beswick after the strong impression she made in her minor role (in the gypsy girls’ cat-fight) in From Russia With Love – two Bond movies ago.
After Dr No, and From Russia With Love, Goldfinger is the third movie in the James Bond saga. It stars Sean Connery, as did the two movies prior – he performs outstandingly as usual. And according to mainstream review sites like Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, Goldfinger is the best Bond movie of all time, although I wouldn’t read too much into that as they both also rate a couple of Daniel Craig’s movies as being superior to anything by Roger Moore or Timothy Dalton which of course is absolute nonsense.
Goldfinger is an interesting one though. It takes Q branch to another level, with the return of Desmond Llewelyn playing Q – we met him in the previous movie, From Russia With Love, and he reprises his role in almost every Bond movie until his death in 1999. He gets some good screen time this time round, in Goldfinger, as he introduces us to a well kitted-out Bond car, with dynamic weaponary, a bulletproof rear shield and a passenger ejector seat. The knightrider/batmobile style Bond car is a nice concept that returns regularly in subsequent movies.
Goldfinger also introduces us to one of the most iconic tough-guy villains in the whole saga, called Oddjob, played excellently by Harold Sakata (real name Toshiyuki Sakata, wrestling alias Tosh Togo). He could be the second most memorable baddie after Jaws.
To its credit, this movie is packed with iconic James Bond movie scenes, from the card game with help through an earpiece from a lady with a telescope in the distance, to the golf game with switching balls, to the car tailing scene where James spies on Goldfinger from a high vantage point, while a woman with a gun spies on and shoots at James from an even higher vantage point. That’s all within the first 40 minutes, so it’s off to a more efficient start than From Russia With Love which had a bit of a messy first hour before the really good scenes came back to back in the second hour.
Further concepts coined by this movie within the first hour include Bond dressing up in all black, to stealthily infiltrate and observe Goldfinger’s base – a concept well copied by Bruce Lee in Enter The Dragon, 9 years later. As well as the very iconic scene of Bond being strapped to a table with a lazer beam pointing down, cutting through the metal table and slowly moving towards him – a classic concept that gets replicated by further Bond movies.
This movie also takes naughty female names to a new level, and introduces us to the concept of secret compartments within shoes – similar to the secret popout poison knife hidden with the shoe of the enemy in From Russia With Love, except this time it’s just a compartment for slotting things in to keep them hidden.
This movie also introduces us to electronically moving floors and tables, for elaborate displays.
This movie has a goods bit of humour too, such as the way Bond escapes from Goldfinger’s prison by tricking the guard into thinking he’s disappeared.
There’s also a couple of good examples of dropping tracking beacons, including in Goldfinger’s car, and in a random guy’s jacket pocket with a note.
We also get new music in this movie – instead of using the classic theme tune from Dr No, that was also remixed for use throughout From Russia With Love – this time we get a bunch of remixes of Shirley Bassey’s Goldfinger theme tune and it works quite well.
The main antagonist in this movie, Goldfinger, is played quite well by Gert Fröbe.
The main female roles are taken by Shirley Eaton (as Jill Masterson, who gets killed off in the first hour) and Honor Blackman (as P**** Galore, one of Goldfinger’s main assistants alongside Oddjob). They both do a fair job in their respective roles, although promoting Honor Blackman as a very attractive woman is a bit of a stretch.
The fight scene at the end between Bond and Oddjob is a bit weak – Oddjob seems to be able to take all kinds of punishment but when it’s his turn he mostly just does useless WWE style throws to make Bond stumble for a few steps while staying completely unhurt. I guess this is due to his ‘professional wrestling’ background – prior to that he was an Olympic weightlifter.
All in all, I rate this movie as Upper-OK. It may be slightly better than Dr No and From Russia With Love, but not by a significant enough margin to rate it on a much higher level, in my opinion, considering the current rating system we’re using here. When I think of the very best Bond movies of all time, I have to say this is not on that level, in terms of entertainment value for my taste – it’s still a bit old fashioned even if it’s got plenty of new cool features compared to the last two movies.
Subsequent Bond Movies
Next in the series of Bond movies, after Goldfinger (1964), is Thunderball (1965) which was promoted in the closing credits of Goldfinger just like Goldfinger was promoted in the closing credits of From Russia With Love. Then after Thunderball, Connery did You Only Live Twice (1967) although a few months prior to the release of that movie, there was Casino Royale (1967) starring David Niven, produced by a company other than Eon Productions (only two Bond movies were ever made outside of Eon Productions, of which this was one, so don’t expect it to be up to the same standard). Then we had On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) starring George Lazenby, but he was far from able to fill Connery’s shoes – he’d never done any acting before – he was also disinterested in starring in another Bond movie, so they got Connery back for Diamonds Are Forever (1971) before the Roger Moore era began. Connery eventually did one further Bond movie, a decade later, outside of Eon Productions, called Never Say Never Again (1983), but Roger Moore was still going strong and Timothy Dalton was great after him, and that took us through to the 90s by which time Connery was now an old man, looking like a grandpa – something that was already starting to show in Diamonds Are Forever, 12 years earlier – not very fitting for a hotshot active agent doing a lot of physical work while trying to look cool – something Connery was able to pull off much easier in his earlier movies from the 60s. So Connery eventually packed it in and focused on other movies of which he made many classics like First Knight alongside Richard Gere and Entrapment alongside Catherine Zeta-Jones.
This is the second Bond movie in the whole saga. Here we see a lot more gadgets & gizmos than in the first movie, Dr No – not just for Bond but for the enemy (Spectre) too. We’re also introduced to three women in Bond’s life within the first 25 minutes: the guy he’s busy making out with when called in to work (Sylvia Trench, played adequately by Eunice Gayson – the first girl we met in Dr No); plus Miss Moneypenny (a secretarial agent at MI6 HQ, played fine by Lois Maxwell); plus Tatiana Romanova (‘Tanya’ – the woman who Bond’s mission involves befriending – played quite well by Daniela Bianchi).
Ironically though, the most beautiful women in this movie were probably Martine Beswick (British-Jamaican actress) and Aliza Gur (Israeli actress) who played Zora & Vida respectively – a couple of gypsy girls who cat-fight for the right to marry their chief’s son. Why weren’t they promoted to primary bond girls? I can only assume it’s because they didn’t do all the necessary ‘favours’ for the relevant directors, producers & decision-makers. Either that or someone important had no taste, or wanted to make some kind of fashion statement by prioritising a certain look.
Bond’s demeanour in this movie is a little less suave, a little more rough around the edges, compared to his demeanour in Dr No, but not massively so. The vibe of the movie is a bit rougher in the middle too, but not in a terrible way. It’s probably a bit more detailed in its core script this time round, and the music is a bit more varied and suspenseful.
This particular movie is responsible for one of the most iconic & memorable scenes in all of James Bond history, where James is held at gunpoint on a train by his main adversary (Red Grant – an enemy agent from Spectre, played quite well by Robert Shaw). James gives him some gold sovereigns from one suitcase, then his next suitcase explodes tear gas in the enemy’s face.
Lotte Lenya plays Red Grant’s boss, Rosa Klebb very well.
You may notice the scenery looks vaguely familiar in the helicopter and boat scenes at the end of this movie, because they were both filmed in Scotland – the vegetation and rock formations here are typical of British mountainous terrain. These final action scenes were pretty well made too – plus of course the train scenes – they’re not extremely buzzing by modern standards but were still impressively smooth and captivating considering this movie was made in the 60s.
I rate this movie OK since some of it is pretty good but some of it is a bit boring as you would expect from any movie this old. It’s more action packed than Dr No, but is a bit messy in the first hour. The second hour is particularly strong, from when Bond steals the Russian device, right the way through the train scenes and the boat scenes to the hotel scene at the very end.
Interestingly, the closing credits of this movie are used to promote Sean Connery’s subsequent Bond movie, Goldfinger, which was released just 1 year later. The filming for Goldfinger began just 3 months after From Russia With Love was released, and they must have had high hopes for it. Goldfinger today is rated the best Bond movie of all time according to mainstream film review sites like Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, with From Russia With Love then Dr No being second and third according to both of these metrics. But what do they know, since they both rate Daniel Craig’s Casino Royale and Skyfall as the 4th and 5th best Bond movies of all time – what a load of rubbish – Daniel Craig is not at all convincing in the role of James Bond – no way is he better than Roger Moore or Timothy Dalton – these drama freaks need to stop reviewing these action hero movies because they just don’t understand the genre. The casting of Daniel Craig absolutely ruined the last 20 years of the James Bond movie saga. Pierce Brosnan before him was cringe but tolerable; while Connery, Moore and Dalton were all excellent at being James Bond and are the real reason it became the monster brand that we know & love today.
Dr No is a classy movie, thoughtfully made. It has more slow scenes and less exciting action than the best James Bond movies of all time, but with Connery’s charisma and the overall quality of production it still manages to sustain an action fan’s attention if he hasn’t seen this movie in at least the last few years.
This was Sean Connery’s first outing as James Bond, and was the first movie ever made in the entire James Bond franchise. This movie was followed by From Russia With Love (1963), then Goldfinger (1964) which is the highest rated Bond movie of all time according to the big mainstream review sites, but they rate Daniel Craig above Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton so what do they know! They’re neither understand nor appreciate what made James Bond the monster brand that it is today.
Dr No warms up nicely after about half an hour in, as James Bond identifies suspicious island called Crab Quay worth investigating in connection with his colleague’s murder. None of the local fisherman dare go near it, but Bond surely will.
As classy as it is, it still lacks the level of fast action that you’d expect from a strong modern movie – in this way it’s kind of like Bruce Lee’s last movie, Enter The Dragon – I guess this was the peak of what was produced in the 60s & 70s but by today’s standards I have to rate it just OK – no more, no less. It’s definitely at least a level or two below the best Bond movies by Roger Moore (who played Bond from the 70s till the mid 80s) and Timothy Dalton (in the late 80s). Budget may have also been a factor, since Dr No was also the lowest budget Bond movie by a long way, even after adjusting for inflation. The next movie – From Russia With Love – had twice the budget, after adjusting for inflation, then it was increased by the same amount again for the third movie, Goldfinger, and it pretty much kept going up with each next movie in the saga. So all things considered, they did a great job here.
Sean Connery‘s acting was superb, as the star of the show – a slick-talking, slick-moving MI6 agent who pretty much never puts a foot wrong. Near the start of this movie, James’s boss ‘M’ explicitly referred to MI6, but this was later dubbed over so what you’re likely to hear him say now is MI7 even though his lips are clearly saying MI6 still.
Ursula Andress played the lead female in this movie – a shell collecting woman called Honey Ryder – although she only appeared in the second hour. She did a fair job of it.
Earlier on, Zena Marshall did a decent job a double agent working as an administration assistant at the local agency.
And prior to that, Eunice Gayson played Sylvia quite adequately – she was the first significant female James Bond bumped into – initially at the casino, then they had a brief liaison after that.
Joseph Wiseman played the main villain, Dr No himself. He did a fair job of it.
This movie gets started with a cocktail of unpleasantries, from extreme queer exhibitionism to crying babies.
But it gets interesting shortly after 20 mins in, when Jean-Claude Van Damme gets essentially kidnapped by the agency he worked for, after disobeying a direct order. He’s held on a mysterious prison island and presented with the choice of keep working from a tight leash else be killed immediately. He manages to escape, and goes after the man who kidnapped his wife & child, with the help of his heavily pierced weird friend played by Dennis Rodman. Mickey Rourke plays the main antagonist in this movie. That’s all the significant characters already.
I rate it somewhere between So-So and OK, due to its balance of strengths and weaknesses. The last quarter an hour can get particularly boring for people who have seen this movie a few times before, even if not in the last few years.
This is one of Jean-Claude Van Damme‘s first movies – it was released just a few months after Bloodsport, in 1988. But Sho Kosugi is the real focus of this movie – Van Damme is only a supporting cast member.
The plot is very basic – it’s like a thinned-out very early James Bond movie with less of a star and less of a script. Still, it’s not unentertaining – it is Watchable, once in a blue moon. It’s mildly entertaining if you’re terribly bored and lack anything better to do or watch.
Sho Kosugi’s real sons (Kane & Shane) also take key roles, as his kidnapped sons in this movie.
Van Damme plays a Russian secret agent with slick back hair and a very similar demeanour to his character in No Retreat, No Surrender.
Sho Kosugi plays the CIA’s best secret agent, tasked with recovering weapons technology from an underwater plane wreckage in Malta. The Russians are trying to beat him to it.
Knock Off is a familiar format of action movie, but not one we would expect Jean-Claude Van Damme to appear in. His character is a bit different here to how we normally see him – it’s a bit more slapstick than usual – it’s not a comedy but there is lot of goofing around here. Still, Van Damme delivers a good balance of action, humour and seriousness like we’ve come to expect from him.
Supporting cast members include Rob Schneider who plays Van Damme’s partner quite well; and Lela Rochon who plays the main female character well; Paul Sorvino who plays the CIA boss well; and Glen Chin who plays a local mafia boss adequately.
Continuing the environmental protection theme of On Deadly Ground, this time Steven Seagal plays a federal government agent called Jack Taggart, tasked with tackling a rich businessman disposing of toxic waste in a small Appalachian town with the help of the locals who are intimidated into co-operating. Many federal agents have attempted to tackle this issue in this location before, but they’ve all been dealt with, until now.
Steven Seagal does a good job as his usual self in this movie – he’s still kind of in his prime here – well, in the latter end of it. He plays the lead role here – the whole movie is kind of based around him. This was his first movie after The Glimmer Man (1996) which is many people’s favourite Steven Seagal movie of all time. Before that, he had a brief stint alongside Kurt Russell in Executive Decision (1996) but was written out early due to conflict behind the scenes and from that moment on his level of Hollywood backing decreased, his trajectory to stardom declined, and he focused more on his own style of movie with humbler budgets from that moment on. In this movie, Fire Down Below, Seagal even showcases his guitar skills.
Kris Kristofferson (from Blade) plays the chief baddie in this movie. He does a decent job of it. Marg Helgenberger plays the lead female role, befriended by Seagal’s character – she puts in a fair performance too. Other supporting actors do alright here too – no superstars, but their performances are all respectable in this movie.
The back end of this movie is pretty well executed, which is a rare thing – most martial arts action flicks have weak endings, but this one had plenty of script creativity until the final moment – it’s not a complicated plot, but had plenty if energy continuously to create the desired vibe and plenty of scene changes to keep things interesting.
Overall I rate this movie about equal to Under Siege 2 – a bit better than On Deadly Ground, and almost as good as Under Siege 1 and The Glimmer Man. Therefore this is about the third best movie in Seagal’s career up to this point, when he’s still in his prime but not for much longer.
Seagal’s career after Fire Down Below
His following movie – The Patriot (1998) – was originally intended for cinemas but ended up being straight-to-VHS, then Seagal took a few years off and came back strong with Exit Wounds (2001) alongside DMX. Anthony Anderson (the funny fat guy from Romeo Must Die), Michael Jai White, Eva Mendes, Tom Arnold, Bill Duke, etc. Then he did a couple more movies with small theatrical releases in some countries (Ticker 2001 and Half Past Dead 2002) before focusing mainly on straight-to-VHS/DVD movies for the rest of his career, beginning with The Foreigner (2003), Out for a Kill (2003) and Belly Of The Beast (2003) all in the one year. He kept up this pace of about 3 movies a year until 2011 when he slowed down a bit, but he continued to release at least one movie a year until 2019 (when his last movie was released) and in 2016 he had a mad spell of 7 movies in one year!
This is an OK action movie, for Steven Seagal fans. It’s got some weak bits and some strong bits.
This movie stars Steven Seagal alongside Ja Rule, and they make a funny duo in how they both have a very awkward fake ghetto accent. Just like many people in the martial arts community have been making fun of Seagal, many people in the rap community have been making fun of Ja Rule – both accused of being terribly fake. Having said that, I do believe Seagal is half way legit. The YouTubers who mock him generally don’t know what they’re talking about. As for Ja Rule, I can’t disagree with the criticism. But his acting is satisfactory here – he makes a good team with Seagal – their acting is equally cringeworthy.
The plot of Half Past Dead is quite a fun concept, at least for the first half of the movie. Seagal is his usual hotshot self, but gets shot and nearly killed by the FBI while working for some gangsters alongside Ja Rule. Then they both end up in Alcatraz – a prison on an island, that’s theoretically impossible to escape from (until it gets raided by an elite squad of parachuting mercenaries). This is all within the first half hour.
Another plot twist, or revelation, occurs half way in, as we learn who Seagal’s character really is.
Style wise, a lot of the action scenes are clearly taking inspiration from The Matrix, with similar music as they rock up with machine guns, then later walking up walls and doing axe kicks in slow motion while wearing long black coats, etc. It’s like some kind of poundshop Matrix impersonation.
Supporting cast is not bad. It’s an OK movie. But the plot becomes a bit dead after half way through. It should be called Dead Past Half. After a strong story has been built, and things are starting to get really interesting, it then gets stuck in a hole and never moves on. We just get a load of white noise music accompanying meaningless flickering gunfire scenes, like kids suddenly took over the movie and made a mess of it. It has a very respectable first half, and very weak second half. Maybe they ran out of budget and cut the story short? I fast-forwarded through the last 15 minutes and didn’t miss anything worth rewinding & slowing down for.
Salt is an action packed mystery thriller with plot twists galore. It’s got a simple plot really, but it twists and turns regularly to keep things interesting. It’s got some great action and some great intrigue, but it’s also got a significant dose of gritty political drama which limits its value for those who prefer smooth action hero movies without the gritty drama.
Angelina Jolie does great as a triple agent who was trained as a Russian spy to be a double agent in the American CIA, only to trick her Russian comrades and save the world. The main supporting cast members also do great, including Chitwetel Ejiofor (the black guy from Doctor Strange, 2016) who plays her boss at her CIA, and Liev Schreiber (Logan’s evil doppelganger from X-Men Origins: Wolverine, 2009) who plays a legit double agent only revealed towards the end. Plot twists aplenty!
All in all, with its simple but twisting plot, a few strong actors, decent budget & effects, and its mood regularly fluctuating between thrilling and unpleasant, I rate this movie as just OK, which is a respectable rating – all the movies I’ve rated OK provide a fair level of entertainment – they’re more than just watchable. But as tempted as I am to rate it Decent, I can’t because there’s something missing. There’s a lack of soul & spirit to this movie. It’s all very cold and intermittently depressing, and it could certainly benefit from a more advanced plot, script and cast. Angie’s also getting on a bit in this movie – she’s in her mid 30s here, which isn’t a big deal, but she’s not in her prime any more.
Chris Pine (from Wonder Woman) stars as Jack Ryan – the lead character in this movie. He does a good job of it too.
Supporting cast members include Kevin Costner (from Waterworld) as his recruiter from the CIA, and Keira Knightley as his fiancée who discovers his line of work and ends up helping him out on a dangerous mission. Kevin does a good job, and Keira is alright. Kenneth Branagh plays the chief villain quite well too.
The premise of this movie is pushing lies from the outset – what do you expect from Hollywood? But the action and plot are still fairly captivating.
There’s an unhealthy dose of drama in the first 25 minutes. Impressionable people will end up thinking that rowing and launching insults at your partner is a way to make them treat you better. Treat them mean, keep them keen? Not for me thanks.
There’s also a bit of drug glorification in this movie, which features the consumption of illicit pills and injectables followed by depictions of feeling good. To say I’m not impressed would be an understatement.
Half way in, the action gets a bit tense & gritty for about 15 minutes. It becomes very tempting to fast forward if you’ve seen this movie before. This part may be important to the plot, but it could have been condensed for smoother viewing, especially for rewatchers. A bit later, we have a similar problem although the tense gritty drama is then mixed in with a car chase so the tempo is constantly undulating – I personally find this quite irritating. The ending is a lot smoother though, when the focus turns back to America, while still carrying a good pace, but trumpeting the same kind of nonsense as we started out with. I reckon this movie was made as a recruitment drive, encouraging simple-minded highly-strung patriotic yes-men to join law enforcement agencies. It’s like a cross between Mission Impossible and NCIS.
Overall I rate Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014) as just OK. If the grittier bits were better condensed and the cooler bits were more omnipresent, it could easily be a Decent or even Pretty Good movie, but as it stands, I rate it just OK.
Originally released under the name of ‘Teen Agent’, this is a fun action adventure involving a lot of James Bond style operatives and assassinations. It’s basically James Bond crossed with Naked Gun. Mild humour but decent quality throughout.
There’s a fair amount of action with slower scenes between. It’s a fun movie but a bit of a cheesy script, which could have been beefed up more.
It’s got a fairly strong lead cast member in Richard Grieco who fits into this role very well, but this movie could very much benefit from an additional star still.
