September’s Bond was The Man with the Golden Gun

and what a Bond it was.

The Man with the Golden Gun has a lot of problems. The opening credits weren’t too strong. The opening credits were interesting, with everything being projected on water. But the song was super cheesy. They are still trying to improve upon sexy silhouettes and failing. On my trademark notes page, I use the phrase “the stupidest thing ever” 4 times. 4 times! But if you take the story idea – mistress of the world’s best assassin pits 007 against the assassin in a game of cat and mouse through the far east that culminates in a duel at the assassin’s island fortress. It’s a very compelling idea. No amount of contrived karate schools, boat chases, racist southern sheriffs, and fun house mirrors can ruin it. Though they try very hard.

The Man with the Golden Gun is a very fun Bond where the action moves from one location to another keeping things interesting. All of the locations are amazing. You have Hong Kong, Macau, and Thailand plus some super cool bases. Scaramanga’s island base is leading the green initiative for bad guys everywhere, being entirely solar powered. But my favorite of the movie has to be the MI6′s base on the wreck of the Queen Elizabeth. I love how everything is slanted. Reminds me of that level in Jedi Knight. You know the one.

I also enjoyed the Bond girls. Weirdly, Andrea Anders had a very unpunny name (and was sidelined for being such an important part of the story). So to address the balance, the film makers threw in an Asian girl named Chew Mee. And then there was the most amazing Bond girl yet, Mary Goodnight. She is played mainly for comic relief – a sort of ditz with values. Luckily, she doesn’t end up dead and still gets to sleep with Bond.

The Man with the Golden Gun also has one of the coolest stunts paired with a slide whistle ever

So overall, I really enjoyed The Man with the Golden Gun. Some of the movie doesn’t make a lot of sense, but the parts that do work really work and it is an enjoyable watch. There were no silly gadgets (I completely bought the flying car). Scaramanga was supremely cool, though he had the faults of your traditional Bond villain (enough with the talking, just ice Bond already). And I wasn’t bored by tedious investigation. These are all things I look for in a good Bond movie.

My trademark notes page:

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
3. Dr. No
4. Goldfinger
5. The Man with the Golden Gun
6. Live and Let Die
7. Thunderball
8. Diamonds Are Forever
9. You Only Live Twice

Raishad will return later this week with Blogalongabond #10, The Spy Who Loved Me.

Is it a good movie? I don’t know. I enjoyed watching it and I ended up giving it 4 stars on Netflix. But I don’t think I would ever watch it again, unless I’m trying to impress someone. There’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (which I’ve seen a few times), and then there’s Tree of Life.

If the Tree of Life wasn’t so beautiful to watch, I would’ve lost interest quickly. The non-linear narrative really hurts comprehension. But if it was more straightforward would we get all of the milk drop visualizations of the universe forming?

I could sort of understand what Malick was trying to get across about life, the universe and everything, but don’t expect me to write a book report about it. But if I had to, it would be one sentence:

The Tree of Life is a big swirl of life, visuals, and classical music.

I can’t watch any extras because I rented the movie? Why am I being punished?

Live and Let Die is the introduction to Roger Moore and the 70s. After the disappointing showing from Connery in Diamonds are Forever, the producers must’ve said “Fuck it” and decided to change everything. No more Aston Martin’s, instead you get big honking pimpmobiles. Could you imagine Bond wearing a reversible coat and tear away pants? Or how about constantly smoking obnoxious cigars? Well, this is what you get – plus more racial stereotypes than you can stomach in Live and Let Die. And for the most part, I enjoyed it.

Live and Let Die starts with an amazing theme song, Live and Let Die by Wings. The song is definitely too good for the so-so titles. I would say the titles were terrible, but the skulls really save it. So it’s passable.

The Bond in Live and Let Die is not really a good spy. He sort of stumbles from scene to scene. The upside of this is that you don’t get those long and boring detective sequences. Instead everything is kept light and fun. You get to see Bond get called “honky” as he tries to blend in to a club in Harlem. And it’s not a boring surveillance mission in a hang glider when you’re smoking a giant cigar.

The bad guys, aside from their general incompetence, were entertaining as well. My favorite was Whisper, a fat henchman who is a low talker. I believe he had the most attempts at failing to kill Bond. Yaphet Kotto, whom I know from Homicide, was a pretty good drug lord. I really enjoyed the way he talked. Plus, he has an underground lair with a shark tank and a monorail.

My biggest complaint about Live and Let Die is the cartoonish elements sprinkled through out. At one point Bond is trapped on an island, surrounded by alligators. How does he escape? He runs across the backs of the alligators naturally. In the opening sequence, a spy is killed by hooking up his headphones to a plunger style detonator, and then plunging. It’s too Wile E Coyote for me. And as Whisper is sitting on a couch, Mr Big shoots it with an compressed gas capsule and the couch expands in size and finally explodes. And the way that Mr Big dies is unforgivable. It really takes you out of the film. But Raishad, if that is unforgivable, how could you still say that you enjoyed the film? Well, easy.

It was the boat sequence. The boat chase at the end of the movie is exciting and really well done. I’ve never been on a speed boat before, but after witnessing that sequence. I want to be chased by bad guys on a speed boat and do amazing jumps. Again, the cartoonish elements threaten to ruin this sequence with the introduction of a local sheriff, but he’s easy to forget about when a Bond sacrifices his boat to cause a chasing boat to jump into a swimming pool and then he steals another boat! Also, Jane Seymour.

My trademark notes page:

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
3. Dr. No
4. Goldfinger
5. Live and Let Die
6. Thunderball
7. Diamonds Are Forever
8. You Only Live Twice

Raishad will return next month with Blogalongabond #9, The Man with the Golden Gun.

Diamonds Are Forever takes us into the 70s. After the amazing Lazenby reminded us how awesome Bond can be, Connery was called out of retirement for one more case (of Just for Men hair coloring). I’ve never seen Diamonds Are Forever before, but I was familiar with the criticisms. Diamonds Are Forever is definitely a step backwards and to the side. But, I did find myself enjoying it. My main criticism of previous Bonds have been the investigation, mainly how boring and tedious they were. But I really enjoyed Bond figuring things out in Vegas. In fact, it was the ending, the assault on the oil rig that really put me to sleep.

The worst thing in Diamonds Are Forever is not Bambi and Thumper or flabby Bond, it’s the opening credits. The high point in the Bond credits have been Thunderball, and since then they’ve been getting worse. The naked ladies are unimaginative and the song by Shirley Bassey is atrocious.

Here is my trademark notes page:

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
3. Dr. No
4. Goldfinger
5. Thunderball
6. Diamonds Are Forever
7. You Only Live Twice

Raishad will return next month with Blogalongabond #8, Live and Let Die.

*Phew* Finished with hours to spare

I’ll be going to Vegas in August. I’m looking forward to playing the slots with an elephant.

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service was an amazing Bond. George Lazen-bond takes over for Sean Connery, and aside from the super lame “This never happened to the other fella”, really shines. There’s something about Lazenby that works. It was kinda nice to have a Bond that didn’t have to rely on jetpacks. This is a Bond who can face a spider without a giant pane of glass between them. Fearless.

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service isn’t perfect though. I found the opening credits a step backwards. There were plenty of nudey ladies, but no amazing song. Nipples are great, but I want something to get me excited about the movie. Also, the middle investigation section does drag on a bit. OHMSS does for heraldry what The Phantom Menace did for taxation of trade routes. We do see some brilliant Bond womanizing though. So it’s not a total bore.

But you forget all of that boring heraldry nonsense because once Bond reunites with Tracy, OHMSS kicks it into overdrive. If I had never seen Inception, this would have been the finest arctic attack sequence ever committed to film. And you know what else works? The love story. Tracy is definitely the best Bond girl of the series. Bond would not have quit the service for any of his previous floozies. Also, she has a great rack.

Trademark notes:

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
3. Dr. No
4. Goldfinger
5. Thunderball
6. You Only Live Twice

Raishad will return this month with Blogalongabond #7, Diamonds Are Forever. You see, this Blogalongabond was late.

And as you can tell from the very Thunderball-like poster, it was not a groundbreaking Bond. The gadgets were uninspired. Suitcase Helicopter *YAWN* Cigarette Gun *YAWN* The best piece of hardware in the movie was the Toyota 2000GT, and all that had in it was a video phone. No machine guns or ejector seats or anything cool. And the girls weren’t particularly memorable. How am I supposed to remember a name if it isn’t a double entendre?

I think the best thing from You Only Live Twice is the theme song. You will have to click this link to experience it because I can’t embed it. But as good as the theme song is, the actual titles have taken a step back compared to Thunderball. We’re still working with sexy silhouettes, but it just feels a little staid.

Also, the main impression I get from You Only Live Twice is that in 1967, everyone was talking about cigarettes and how terrible they are for you. Cigarettes make for a better villain than Blofield and SPECTRE.

Here are my trademark notes

Thing we learn from You Only Live Twice, Bond will not eat oysters unless their is a possibility of sex afterwards. Idiot!

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. Dr. No
3. Goldfinger
4. Thunderball
5. You Only Live Twice

This ranking is tough, because I think Thunderball overall is a better movie, but if I had to choose between Thunderball and You Only Live Twice to watch again, I would pick You Only Live Twice 7 times out of 10.

Raishad will return next month with Blogalongabond #6, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.

And no, you haven’t stumbled upon a blackhole and ended up 1 month into the past. I’m just late as usual. But I have a good excuse: I was working on my class project and just didn’t have time.

So Thunderball… Everything you’ve read is true. It’s just way too long. It has some brilliant parts (rhymes with bits), but Terence Young just wanted to show off he could film fight scenes underwater. Speargun/air hose slash. It get’s tiring. I complained in Goldfinger that James Bond isn’t really a spy. In Thunderball, he spends too much time spying.

Anyways, the best things from Thunderball – silly gadgets and the start of the really cool James Bond titles with silhouettes of naked ladies.

My trademark notes page

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. Dr. No
3. Goldfinger
4. Thunderball

Raishad will return this month with Blogalongabond #5, You Only Live Twice.

And I know I promised a real review last month, but again time just got away from me. So here’s my patented iPad notebook page

Like the previous Bond films, I had never seen Goldfinger. So I can watch it free of nostalgia. And overall, I enjoyed From Russia With Love a lot more. Goldfinger had some good moments, but it didn’t feel like a complete movie. Honestly, I would recommend watching The Simpsons episode “You Only Move Twice” instead.

On the Official Bond Chart

1. From Russia With Love
2. Dr. No
3. Goldfinger

Hopefully, Raishad will return this month with Blogalongabond #4, Thunderball. I haven’t seen Thunderball either, but what a great name!

Yes, I know I’m terribly late, but if I don’t post something now, I won’t ever. So to keep it short:

I absolutely loved From Russia With Love. It blew Dr. No out of the water.

Here are the notes I took while watching From Russia With Love.

If you notice, the note is dated February 27th. This totally proves I watched From Russia With Love during the month of February, but I just never got around to writing the review because of school, work, and life.

The only thing in From Russia With Love that I felt was worse when compared to Dr. No, was the title sequence.

Unfortunately, the original title sequence isn’t on Youtube, so imagine watching this without the awesome theme song.

It feels amateurish, compared to the awesome Dr. No dots. It’s a lot more sexier, but not as cool. I’m looking forward to when the intros merge naked girls with abstractness.

BlogalongaBond will return this month with Goldfinger, I promise. And also a better post, maybe.