36 replies to this topic

[Mourning Becomes Electra]

These are two films with some highlights but quite a few lowlights as well. My preference mainly hinges on Connery's performances.

Yes DAF has many weak points, too much camp, a fat pink tie, a Bond girl that loses 10 IQ points every 15 minutes of the film ( a real shame b/c I so liked the character in the novel), an ugly location in Vegas, Blofield in drag and a very dissapointing double climax but I still rank it over YOLT and lately I've actually grown to enjoy it more than several others. The main reason is Sean Connery's performance.

Yes physically he is far from his peak shape and his days as sleek panther are behind him but his is a relaxed, confident, assured, witty, strong performance. He holds the entire film together, so much so that it makes me wonder why anyone would think Moore or Lazenby would have made DAF a better film. The comedy of it may have been more suited to later Moore Bond but his earlier Bond performances in LALD and TMWTGG were not as deft and assured as Connery in DAF. Lazenby barely held it together in one of the best scripted Bond films with cut sparse dialogue to accomadate his limitations as an actor. He would have drowned in DAF as written.

In addition to Connery's skilled performance, the highpoints are the Franks elevator fight, which still showed that Connery still made a physically formidable Bond even in non-peak form, the scene in the elevator outside The Whyte House & Wint & Kidd.

YOLT for me is the nadir of Connery films because he seems completely bored by the entire exercise, he's merely going through the motions and it saps the film of energy. The late exchange of Aki to Kissy doesn't help eitherpoorit's a definite downgrading in leading lady with an actress who has even less energy than Connery. Helga Brandt is a mediocre villianess/henchwoman. The fight scenes are overly stylized, like the one at the dock and to me boring and cartoony. The Volcano is an impressive set but Pleasance is so small inside it that the combination provokes laughs instead of awe. (Evidently Mike Myers had a similiar reaction)

Japan is beautiful, the sets exotic and grand, some of Ken Adam's best, the music is lovely, and Aki and Tiger Tanaka are interesting characters, especially the later. But as a film it just drags as if it's just moving from magnificent set piece to magnificent set piece. Even when it's being chaotic, there's just no core to it, no sense of momentum and Connery isn't "there" enough as an actor to hold it together.

MBE

[BONDage]

Thanks for the welcome, General Koskov!

This seems to be a great place to hang out and talk BOND, James Bond.

Okay, in answer to your question regarding which on should be re-made I would have to go with YOLT.

In my humble opinion DAF can stand on its own as a flawed but still excellent Bond adventure. YOLT can not! With exception to the end, of course. That MUST stay! As I said before a Villain

[Connery 007]

I think it was DAF. It brought upon that kind of "were just kidding" mentallaty that would be used up until TLD. While Connery did look like he was enjoying himself in the film, he really is the only highlight in it.

[Loomis]

I much prefer "You Only Live Twice" to "Diamonds Are Forever", for some of the following reasons:
1. Both films are silly (and, as some have pointed out, monumentally campy), but of the two I find only DAF guilty of the ultimate sin of being boring.
2. YOLT has some great characters with some memorably funny scenes: Henderson, an end-of-his-tether Q complaining about having to go all the way to Japan to deliver Little Nellie, Helga Brandt and the interrogation of Bond, Donald Pleasence's manic Blofeld. And then there's the Chinese girl at the beginning, with my all-time favourite line in the movie: "Darling, I give you very best duck." There's plenty of wit in YOLT, much of it probably courtesy of Roald Dahl, which DAF seems to try hard to duplicate. However, I don't think DAF succeeds. And pretty much all of the characters in DAF are as dull as ditchwater.
3. YOLT is beautifully shot by the great Freddie Young, making the most of Japan as an exotic playground for Bond. Some great photography in the film (the first shot of Tokyo's neon lights, the aerial view of Bond being pursued on the rooftops of the port, the scenes in the village towards the end, etc.), whereas DAF is never very exciting visually.
4. YOLT has one of the best scores of the series. What a title song!

[007.5]

I love YOLT. DAF is a far worse movie. Blofeld in drag was the straw that broke the camel's back.

[Turn]

I think Mourning Becomes Elektra had some good points a few posts up.

History plays into some of why I like DAF better. Connery is more relaxed in it and seems to have some fun playing the role. We all know back in the time of YOLT there was nothing he wanted to do more than leave the role. This shows, making it less fun.

The harder edge of YOLT overall gets points. But it's such a mess in other areas. The scene when Bond is in Osato's office and sees a safe and pulls out the little safecracker thing is one of the funnier things in the series. Funny in that how did he know he would have the right gadget for such an occasion. What if he brought the rebreather instead?

Not to mention the dumping of the car into the bay by helicopter and the complete dismissal of the poisonous gas in the cave when the surviving ninjas swim out of it.

Bottom line: DAF is a soft spot for me. And I'd rather watch it and YOLT over NSNA any day.

[00Kevin]

I think YOLT is good, a bit underrated

Daf is okay, but I can't give it much credit, apart from the theme song, i didn't fiond any thing reallly good about it, It was more of a film I'ld like to see lazenby do. and blofeld was a sad attempt to give blofeld the hair he was intended to have in YOLT, who was replaced by donald Pleas.......

anywho, Daf wasn't too bad, but it doesn't compare to YOLT