79 replies to this topic

[SnakeEyes]

I know it was a writers strike, but surely...surely MGW didn't have to try it himself

The basic plot is fine, but it needs to much tweeking.

Oh well, it's still a great Bond film.

[ChandlerBing]

They shoulda sprung for Michael Mann to come in and do Miami Vice for real with this movie, instead of the weak assed attempt they ended up doing.

[Simon]

Well, in just the same way that a movie's production elements can all mysteriously come together to gel and create a masterpiece, so too can it all be thrown in your face and leave you wondering what the hell just happened.

It was a combination of all of the above, competition, marketing, Mexico, MGM (again), that haircut...it was just one of those things that were not meant to be. Not very scientific, I know.

But here's food for thought, all believed at the time they were producing something very special with a very definite aim for the American market through American locations and an all American cast.

It didn't work. So why do they want an Americanisation of the series this time around?

[Blofeld's Cat]

But here's food for thought, all believed at the time they were producing something very special with a very definite aim for the American market through American locations and an all American cast. 

It didn't work.  So why do they want an Americanisation of the series this time around?

So very true.

If at first you don't succeed.....?

[Lazenby880]

Personally, the most logical explanation to Licence To Kill's poor US box office, although it was a sizeable hit worldwide, is the way in which the film was marketed, as Glen testifies. As well as MGM being in turmoil, looking through the poster artwork I can honestly say Licence To Kill's is the least inspired, a true cut and paste job, with no imagination whatsoever. In fact, The Living Daylights was similarly let down by its poster campaign, gone were the days of proper 'art' that lesser films such as A View To A Kill benefitted from. It is true to say that 1989's summer was a period of huge competition, but it still appears that the dire, and almost invisible, marketing campaign was the factor that most harmed LTK.

On the other hand, the reviews must have hurt too. More contemporary reviews, mostly of the DVD re-release, have been infinitely more positive than most reviews at the time, the latter surely dissuaded some cinema-goers from venturing to see the film. The ' poor word-of-mouth' explanation I tend to disregard, as Licence To Kill was the best rated Bond film ever in terms of test audiences. 80% labelled it outstanding, which is what makes its 'perceived' failure all the more baffling. Despite what some say, Licence To Kill was far from a disliked movie, and there had to be other factors influencing its box-office, in my opinion the most important being the dreadful marketing.

For me, Licence To Kill is up there with the best, firmly in my top ten. Tense, moody and dark, and that's just Tim's Bond. The film is a gritty, serious thriller which was a move in the right direction for the series in my opinion. Dalton's style works brilliantly, Davi potrays Sanchez as truly chilling villain, and Del Toro portrays perhaps the most menacing and dangerous, as wells as memorable, henchmen. One would have hoped that Licence To Kill would have acted as a springboard to future critical success in the Dalton era, but unfortunately iy was not to be.

Finally, to pick up on what Simon said, it is true that the producers hoped that LTK would break through into the US market because of its American locations and actors (though probably also because of the films very positive test audience feedback), but personally I find this to be highly patronising. Why would Americans flock to see a film simply for this reason? And the last thing one should do is patronise one's target audience.

Edited by Lazenby, 22 February 2004 - 12:22 AM.

[Jaelle]

Alex Zamudio:
<BUT HERE IS THE BIG QUESTION:

DO YOU HONESTLY THINK THAT IF PIERCE BROSNAN WOULD'VE BEEN 007 AT THOSE TIMES, THE BOND SERIES WOULD'VE BEEN VERY POPULAR AND COMPETITIVE??? AND BOND MOVIES RELEASES BIG EVENTS AS BATMAN???

I DO, AS MUCH AS I LOVE DALTON'S BOND, PIERCE WAS A VERY POPULAR CHOICE FOR 007 WITH THE PUBLIC, at least at the States as I recall.
Pierce face in the billboards and in people minds would've made the 007 films as trendy as Die Hard or Lethal Weapon, well that's what I think, I must point out I'm not talking quality as a factor but popularity...>

Actually, I'm always surprised that so many people seem to think that Brosnan would have been all that successful as Bond in 1986-89. The Pierce Brosnan of those years was not the same Pierce Brosnan of 1994. I remember those years well. There's been a lot of revisionism about how "everyone" seemed to want Pierce back then. People seem to forget that REMINGTON STEELE was never a hit show, it had terrible ratings. It lasted all of two seasons. Brosnan was about as familiar a face to US audiences as, say, maybe one of the kids on Dawson's Creek is to today's audiences. Most of the time when you said the name "Pierce Brosnan" to your average American they'd ask "who?" He became even less- known after the end of the show. Diehard Remington fans of course were quite vocal about him (I was one of them during the show's run, I just thought he was the best guy on TV to look at, bar none!). But general film audiences weren't all that familiar with him.

And Pierce had not yet matured into the kind of actor he'd become in 1994. I well remember the divisive responses in the fan circles then. I read mags like Starlog, went to conventions. Brosnan was considered effeminate -- he was extremely thin and extremely pretty. As a fan of his, I always had to deal with the inevitable eye-rolling of my college male friends who called him the "f" word. I remember sitting around at a SF con listening to a bunch of guys from Starlog, Locus, the Creation con organizing committe and general fans; they were all laughing at the idea of Brosnan as Bond, making really cruel jokes about him. I'm sorry folks, but he simply was not as popular or as well known as some Bond fans seem to think he was.

Cubby in his autobiography says Brosnan simply would've been "more of the same" -- meaning Roger Moore. Have you ever seen REMINGTON STEELE? If you've seen the show, you'd understand why so many (esp., young men) couldn't take him seriously as Bond. He was considered a lightweight comic, almost buffoonish. Cubby and EON were determined to go in a completely different direction after Moore, a darker and edgier direction. And Pierce was deemed inappropriate for that style. Pierce was in fact a compromise to the differing views at EON about who should succeed Moore.

Some, like Chandler, argue that that desire on EON's part to go in the direction they did after Moore was too extreme, and that Dalton was too much of a difference. That's a perfectly valid and fair argument. But it is a fact that Pierce was viewed as not being dark or edgy enough, not different enough from Roger.

Also, remember the mood of audiences at the time. They were tiring of Moore as Bond and his style. They were becoming accustomed to different heroes. Pierce would've given them more of the same. So I don't think he would've been terribly successful as Bond at that point in his career. Frankly, I think audiences back then needed a break from Bond.

Pierce's Bond films benefitted from the long absence of Bond from films and his own experience as an actor in that period, his aging into a more mature screen presence. I've always thought it would've been better for Dalton's success if there had been a longer gap between the last Moore film and his first film.

[Triton]

Fifteen years later, do we really care how Licence to Kill did at the box office? Let's look at it this way, the "poor" US box office for the film didn't kill the James Bond series, nor was it responsible for the six year hiatus.

[Triton]

PS-

Some fans seem to presume that if Pierce Brosnan had gotten the role instead of Timothy Dalton, that they would have enjoyed a film like GoldenEye eight years earlier. I believe this is an incorrect assumption.

There were many factors at work beyond the actor chosen to play James Bond. It's unfair to blame Timothy Dalton for the box office "failure" that was Licence to Kill. (If we can even call the US box office "poor", since the film did make money.)

It wasn't Tim's fault that MGM/UA wasn't willing to give the film a decent budget. It also wasn't Tim's fault that Cubby Broccoli decided to move the production from Pinewood Studios to Churubusco Studios in Mexico City. Nor was it Tim's fault that MGM/UA wasn't willing to invest in marketing the picture. It also wasn't Tim's fault that the Writer's Guild of America decided to strike and Richard Maibaum refused to finish the screenplay.

I am also not convinced that Pierce Brosnan would have fared any better if he had assumed the James Bond role in 1986. Perhaps we would be discussing the two films made by Pierce Brosnan with some posters feeling that he never got his chance?

Was Tim also to blame for Giancarlo Parretti's attempt to buy MGM/UA and the legal battles with Eon Productions that caused the six year hiatus?

These issues were bigger than any actor chosen to play the James Bond role. So let's not place the blame on Tim's shoulders.

[Simon]

I am also not convinced that Pierce Brosnan would have fared any better if he had assumed the James Bond role in 1986. Perhaps we would be discussing the two films made by Pierce Brosnan with some posters feeling that he never got his chance?

Too true.

[Loomis]

Nice to see Mr Glen not taking any responsibility. Yes, it was poorly marketed, but given what they were marketing...well...I wouldn't have bothered either.

Bingo.

I've often defended LICENCE TO KILL, and I still think it's great stuff (albeit more in a "bold experiment and interesting failure" kinda way than in a "crikey, what a superb piece of filmmaking" kinda way, admittedly), but I've finally come to the conclusion that the film was the problem, not the marketing campaign (hamfisted though I'm sure it was).

At the end of the day, LTK was simply too dark and violent, and just not the sort of lighthearted, fun-for-all-the-family Bond flick of the kind people know and love and audiences flock to see. I'm very glad it was made - the series would be poorer without it, and I hope (but don't expect) they'll go in for such risk-taking again; but, really, they might just as well have hired, say, Derek Jarman to cobble a Bond movie together on Super 8 - would have been more or less as commercial and audience-friendly as LTK (not to mention much cheaper).

[Turn]

I agree with some views I've read that say the timing of doing such a dark, off-beat Bond film at that particular time wasn't the way to go. It may have seemed like a good idea to somebody, but when you had the Die Hards and such turning the action genre on its ear at that time, the less is more approach didn't work as far as competition.

Had they gone in a different direction to counter the competition with more creative action or at least something a little closer to TLD it may have made a difference. But that slot of the summer may have been a tougher sell considering what went before it, although TLD, which appeared even later in the summer two years before, didn't appear hurt by it.

If there had been another Bond film in the summer of '91, perhaps that would have been the time to pull out an LTK. That way audiences would have been more familiar with Dalton and the only real action competition that summer, at least that I can remember, was Terminator 2. However, the drug runner angle may have been really stale by that time.

[boggles]

I agree with what John Glen said in the article about LTK not being promoted properly (he also said it in his autobiography). In the UK I don't remember seeing a single ad on the TV! I remember seeing a trailer for it at the cinema (when I went to see "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?"). There was the appearance on the Wogan chatshow with Timothy Dalton, Cubby Broccoli, and Robert Davi. Interestingly whilst LTK might not have been a huge sucess in the US, in the UK it was the 3rd highest grossing film of 1989 after Indy III and Batman.

I think the 15 certificate did hurt it a bit. There was a lot of competition at summer time (Batman, Indy III, Lethal Weapon II, Star Trek V). It is interesting that most of those films released at that time have been forgotten and only LTK and Indy III are remembered and talked about. Remember all the hype about Batman? Who talks about that film now?

I don't think that the film would have done any better with Pierce as Bond. I think the big problem was that audiences were bored with Bond. They had just become too jaded. When Goldeneye was released audiences were hungry for Bond again.

I seem to remember that most of the reviews for LTK were quite favourable (I know that people have said on this board that most were negative!). I read Leonard Maltin's and Roger Ebert's as well as James Berardinelli's, and they were all positive. I can't remember what the UK critics thought of it.

I think LTK is one of those films like Bladerunner that wasn't popular at the time it was released and over the years people begin to appreciate it a lot more.

[Loomis]

I think the 15 certificate did hurt it a bit.

Well, they certainly lost out on my pocket money. I agree with you that BATMAN appears to have been forgotten, but I also think that INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE nowadays seems viewed as a bit of a stinker (and rightly so).

[Sir Charles]

My opinion:
1. LTK suffered due to intense competition, as already mentioned in this thread.
2. As mentioned earlier, LTK has a reletively (very) cheap feel to it. As one Bond reviewer has mentioned the movie feels like a TV show instead of a movie. TLD cost the same amount, if I have read claerly, and it appeared more expensive.
3. The teaser sucked dirt. It was just so boring!
4. It basicly takes place in Mexico, which to many Americans was probably a boring location compared to other Bond Locales...or that could just be me. Probably just me.
5. The poor music. Kamen's music didn't even work well in the Lethal Weapon or Die Hard movies, so why use it in a Bond film? Add to that, the score was very short apparently as portions of it are used again and again. (having bashed Kamen's music here, I feel I must say that I love the music pl;ayed when Pam and Bond are in the baot after the barfight)
6. Bond's character became even more pissy, a turn off maybe to casual fans if they saw it.

Don't get me wrong if I ctitisize this film, I really love the idea behind it: Bond going renegade to avenge Dela's Death and Leiter's torture, but I think it was handled very poorly. In previous Bond films, Bond handles the villains with relative ease, but here he is somehow a bit inept (having said that, probably my favorite scene in the movie is when he maneuvers himself through the restaurant to the roof of the building opposite Sanchez's).
Q's over-involvement is very annoying (he should have just had a short appearance back at headquarters). The one movie I think should have nixed the gadgets gets some of the goofiest in the series history. I thought a gun that works only with the proper hand grip was a neat idea, but designing it to resemble a bulky camara?
I would have loved to see various agents sent by M to capture and/or terminate Bond, agents whom Bond would cleverly elude or defeat. I longed for interesting villains. I know the point has been brought up on this site before that drug dealers make for good film villains, but by the time of LTK that's what almost every action movie villain was!
One last thing: the action is DULL. And Bond pretty much gets his butt kicked at the bar. What's up with him ordering a beer?
I gotta say though, Dalton was a fairly good Bond (slightly better in LTK than TLD, but his clothing and hair only gets worse) and probably the best Bond to hear in an interview (he comes across so nice).
As to the promotion, I actually liked the trailers for the film. Quite frankly they make the film look better then it was. The posters were a little sad though (kind of like DAD's sad posters).

[Ry]

I tend to blame the marketing of Licence to Kill as well. Here are the B.O. numbers for 1989 top 10. Some interesting films to say the least.

1. Batman: $251 million
2. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: $197 million
3. Lethal Weapon 2: $147 million
4. Look Who's Talking: $140 million
5. Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: $130 million
6. Back to the Future 2: $118 million
7. Ghostbusters 2: $112 million
8. Driving Miss Daisy: $106 million (Best Picture winner)
9. Parenthood: $100 million
10. Deap Poet's Society: $95 million
25. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier: $52
36. Licence to Kill: $34 million

Edited by Ry, 13 January 2005 - 06:35 PM.

[Loomis]

Interesting, Ry.

[Ry]

yeah Loomis I thought it was interesting as well. I had forgotten about Look Who's Talking and Honey I Shrunk the Kids. Also some dramas did well like Driving Miss Daisy and Dead Poet's Society. It also goes to show that not all sequels did amazing business. Star Trek V did well with 52 million, but not crazy business.

[Bryan Harris]

M G Wilson's ineptitude is the cause of poor lines etc. Who ever let him near the script! Back to your cage...

It wasn't his choice nor was it planned. A writers strike very close to production start date forced Maibaum out of the production so MGW stepped in as best he could.

While I'm not in the WGA, that doesn't make sense to me; couldn't EON have just hired a non-Guild writer to finish the script, instead of leaving it the esteemed co-writer of AVTAK, who also happened to be the boss' kid?

I know that all writing for signatory productions in the US is done by WGA members, but would LTK have qualified because of MGM's involvement or the portion of the production that was done in Florida? If the latter, couldn't EON have just altered their plans and shot the Florida scenes in Mexico, where the majority of the filming was taking place anyway, and gotten around the strike?

I'm curious about this because of MGW's choppy history of attempting to take a larger part in the creative direction of the Bond films (there's a very amusing story in John Glen's autobiography about the making of Moonraker, and Wilson's fierce insistence on personally filming the scene with Bond fighting the giant python. Wilson went on to complain that Glen's cut of the scene wasn't fulfilling his vision, so Glen-caught in the middle-re-cut the scene to Wilson's specifications, only to find that Cubby's instructions upon seeing this new version were to "[p]ut it back the way it was!").

[Loomis]

[quote name='Ry' date='13 January 2005 - 18:34']I tend to blame the marketing of Licence to Kill as well.

[DLibrasnow]

Complete BS, I remember the summer of 1989 and Dalton was very unpopular. I was the only person I know who had any interest in seeing the movie and eventually I decided to just go see it by myself. Everyone was still chirping about how much they missed Roger Moore.
Now, even though I am a big Roger Moore fan I knew it was time for him to step down in 1985. I even managed to persuade my friends to go to The Living Daylights.
In fact Glen said it best in the premiere coverage on ITV for Licence To Kill when he commented that people naturally turn up for the first outing by an actor out of curiosity, but you have to tempt them back with something more than that for the second one.

Dalton was a terrible choice for the part and he almost brought the series to its knees (by his own admission in a series of post mortems on the 1989 movie). He was lucky to get the chance to make a second movie and the producers got rid of him in the nick of time.

[DLibrasnow]

I tend to blame the marketing of Licence to Kill as well.  Here are the B.O. numbers for 1989 top 10.  Some interesting films to say the least.

1. Batman: $251 million
2. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: $197 million
3. Lethal Weapon 2: $147 million
4. Look Who's Talking: $140 million
5. Honey, I Shrunk the Kids: $130 million
6. Back to the Future 2: $118 million
7. Ghostbusters 2: $112 million
8. Driving Miss Daisy: $106 million (Best Picture winner)
9. Parenthood: $100 million
10. Deap Poet's Society: $95 million
25. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier: $52
36. Licence to Kill: $34 million

Precisely, with all those big tentpole movies Licence To Kill should have done better, but it was saddled with an unpopular 007 actor.

[Donovan]

The truth about the relative failure for "Licence To Kill" is the masses just didn't give a damn. A new Bond film was out again starring Dalton, and nobody gave a damn. Dalton's Bond was not hip. Roger Moore's was. Pierce Brosnan's was. Whether I agree or not, Dalton's wasn't.

And as for the Dalton/Yoda theory, I agree:

Edited by Donovan, 14 January 2005 - 03:50 AM.

[Lady Rose]

And as for the Dalton/Yoda theory, I agree:

LOL Very Funny Donovan .... It is actually very similar to the 'How he looks today' picture !!!!!

Tim is Yoda Bond

Edited by Lady Rose, 14 January 2005 - 10:48 AM.

[Loomis]

[quote name='DLibrasnow' date='14 January 2005 - 00:25'][quote name='Ry' date='13 January 2005 - 13:34']I tend to blame the marketing of Licence to Kill as well.

[David Schofield]

Dalton was a terrible choice for the part and he almost brought the series to its knees (by his own admission in a series of post mortems on the 1989 movie). He was lucky to get the chance to make a second movie and the producers got rid of him in the nick of time.

[/quote]


Hey, so people think LTK was a crap film and Dalton rubbish. Great. It' s another film for me only, then. Licence is the best Bond bar maybe a couple of others (OHMSS and From Russia) and Dalton the best Bond. I'll keep it for me and to hell with the critics/general audience.

Then again, when I was growing up and Roger was making Spy and Moonraker and big box office and people missed Sean, I kept George and OHMSS to myself because everyone said it was a crap film and made no cash and George was garbage. And suddenly every Tom, Dick and Harry likes it now and, of course, they always knew that...

No one involved with Licence EVER needs to apologise. Goldeneye, DAD? Well there's another thing.

[Loomis]

Actually, I like the fact that LTK "flopped" - gives it more of a "cult movie" feel.

But, interestingly (or maybe not), a few of my non-Bond fan friends think LTK is the best of the series, so it's not as though it only appeals to hardcore Fleming freaks or Dalton fans. And weren't the test screening scores the highest of any Bond film?

[Turn]

Actually, I like the fact that LTK "flopped" - gives it more of a "cult movie" feel.

And weren't the test screening scores the highest of any Bond film?

Which should explain something, shouldn't it? Test screenings normally bring out the worst -- as in we get the more palatable and feel-good endings as a result as opposed to something truer to the director's vision. Examples are the downbeat original endings to Fatal Attraction and Pretty Woman, a couple films I may find more palatable had they stuck to their more downbeat endings rather than audience-pleasing ones.

Maybe with their hopes raised based on test screening expectations, MGM thought it wasn't necessarily to their advantage to advertise more. Maybe they had confidence based on this and things just happened the opposite way.

As far as the cult thing, I kind of like thinking of LTK that way, too. People can have their cookie cutter TSWLMs and DADs. I'll take something more unique where somebody at least tried to do something a little different here.

[Tarl_Cabot]

Nice Yoda Bond! LOL

[boggles]

Dalton was a terrible choice for the part and he almost brought the series to its knees (by his own admission in a series of post mortems on the 1989 movie). He was lucky to get the chance to make a second movie and the producers got rid of him in the nick of time.

When did Dalton say this? I am curious to know and he doesn't seem to mention Bond much nowadays.

[hrabb04]

That is because he is playing golf with George Lazenby and planning their new buddy movie that will have cameos from Adam West and Burt Ward.