24 replies to this topic

[ChickenStu]

Part of the strength of the Bond movies, and the secret to their endurance over the years was the ability to adapt to what was popular with audiences. Live And Let Die was “Bond Does Blaxploitation” The Man With The Golden Gun was “Bond does Kung-Fu” and Moonraker was of course “Bond Does Star Wars. Despite the success of all these outlandish changes to suit audience taste, Broccoli’s step-son Michael G. Wilson, now on the production team, really wanted to go back to a more realistic style of Bond. Many critics felt that the Bond movies had descended almost into self parody – and during Roger Moore’s tenure in the role that much is certainly true.

Bond needed to evolve again. Two years previously, Timothy Dalton made a successful, critically acclaimed debut as Bond, in the really rather terrific The Living Daylights. However, after this, there were no original Ian Fleming stories left to adapt. For Dalton’s next adventure, the film-makers had to come up with something new.

What was going on in the world? South American drug barons and their cocaine cartels were big news. Seemed like a more realistic breed of villain for Bond to go up against.
What was popular in cinemas? Violent action thrillers like Die Hard and Lethal Weapon – these seemed to be what audiences wanted. What were Timothy Dalton’s strengths as Bond? Moody intensity, stark realism, tough, macho, charisma.

All these elements were added into a heady mix – and resulted in easily the most controversial James Bond film of all time.

Beginning with Michael Kamen’s sinister, foreboding rendition of Monty Norman’s iconic theme over the obligatory gun-barrel opening, we find Bond acting as best man at his old friend Felix Leiter’s wedding. Leiter (David Hedison) is no longer with the CIA and now instead is in charge of the DEA in the Florida Keys. As they are literally on the way to the church, Leiter is alerted that Franz Sanchez (Robert Davi) is in the keys. Sanchez is a huge drug baron, hiding in the banana republic of Isthmus where he is protected by a lack of extradition laws. Sanchez is in the keys, to track down his unfaithful girlfriend and take her home. We get the measure of this man soon enough, as he orders his henchmen to cut out her latest lover’s heart – whilst he is still alive.

As Sanchez attempts to escape from the Keys after this wicked deed, Bond and Leiter manage to capture him, put him in custody and get to the church in time for Lieter to marry his sweetheart Della.
However, one of Leiter’s fellow DEA agents Killifer, accepts a $2Million bribe to free Sanchez, and get him to Milton Krest’s underwater research laboratory – from where he can get back to Isthmus indetected.

Unaware of this, Leiter and Della marry. And after Bond says goodbye and heads off to the airport to catch a flight back to the UK, Sanchez and his evil henchman, led by Dario (Benicio Del Toro) ambush the newly married couple at the house. Knocking out Leiter they rape and murder his new bride (thankfully this is all offscreen) and when Leiter comes around, they take him to Krest’s lab where they feed him alive to a shark – in one of the most shocking sequences ever seen in a Bond film.

Just as Bond is about to board a plane, he notices a lot of police activity and instinctively thinks of Della and Leiter. He rushes to their home where he is horrified to find Della dead, and Leiter barely alive with one of his legs missing.

Bond, begins to investigate – and one of his first courses of action is to have Killifer killed by the same shark that maimed Leiter. Bond, remembering the death of his own wife Tracy (which occurred in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service) is consumed by a thirst for revenge against Sanchez. A thirst so strong that he resigns from his position with the secret service in order to carry it out. He teams up with Pam Bouvier (Carey Lowell) a colleague of Leiter’s and with millions of dollars of Sanchez’s stolen money – he puts his powerful plan into action.

Here, the story begins to take on elements of Yojimbo and A Fistful Of Dollars. Bond, no longer a secret agent, has become like a Ronin. A warrior without a master. An anti-hero with an agenda that is completely personal and self serving. After he accidentally botches an assassination attempt on Sanchez, Sanchez takes Bond into his organization after Bond is able to convince him that he’s looking for a job as one of his lieutenants. Despite Sanchez’s evil deeds, he respects loyalty and rewards it.
Bond uses this weakness to infiltrate Sanchez’ organisation and slowly destroy it from within.

We see a new side to Bond here. One of a cunning manipulator. He places seeds of doubt in Sanchez’s mind. He even goes as far as to frame Milton Krest for theft and watches impassively as Sanchez kills him in a decompression chamber (a scene which required cuts from the British Board Of Film Classification).
Soon, Bond discovers Sanchez’s plan. Sanchez has come up with a method to smuggle cocaine by dissolving it in gasoline and also has acquired stinger missiles to use as a threat against American forces if they don’t stay out of Isthmus.

The scene is set for a bloody confrontation, in which Bond must use all his wits and cunning to survive in an adventure unlike anything he’s encountered before. An adventure in which by the end, it’ll be impossible to tell the good guys from the bad.

When this movie was released in the UK, it made headlines. Due to it’s graphic violence it was awarded a 15 rating by the BBFC, rather than the usual PG certificates that all the previous films in the series had received. And watching it now, it is still quite shocking. The scene where Leiter is fed to the shark is harrowing and difficult to watch, and the scene were Bond finds Leiter’s dead bride is shocking and disturbing. The scene were Krest is blown up inside the decompression chamber is also very unpleasant (made all the more so by the fact that it was Bond himself who engineered those chain of events).
The violence in general is brutal, and the ending in which Bond finally defeats Sanchez by turning him into a human fireball is actually almost sickening.

Bond in this movie is no hero. You can’t really call him the good guy. His actions and motives are as almost morally corrupt and as ruthless as Sanchez’s – and it’s a pretty sobering light to see this character portrayed in.

Simply put – this Bond film shocked the world.

Due to the controversy over the movie’s violence, a lacklustre marketing campaign, an age restrictive rating in the U.K – and competition from other massive blockbusters like Batman, Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade and Lethal Weapon 2 this Bond film under-performed at the box office.
Plus, seasoned Bond fans at the time were disappointed by the all too realistic villain, and the lack of gadgets and innuendo laden quips. Another movie wouldn’t be made in this franchise for another six years, and Timothy Dalton never again got to wear the tux and utter that immortal line “The name’s Bond, James Bond”.

However… the years have been kind to this movie. Modern day Bond fans praise the movie now, for it’s “Fleming-esque” flavour and mesmerising central performance from Dalton. Many fans also now rate Sanchez as one of, if not THE best Bond villains. Director John Glen has also said he thinks it’s the best film he’s ever made, and the one he’s most proud of.

21 years later, the controversy has died down. Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig’s Bond films have taken the series back to the top of the tree when it comes to action franchises. Fans and audiences have forgiven and forgotten, and all Licence To Kill is now, is one more DVD in the collection.

Daniel Craig’s movies Casino Royale and Quantum Of Solace have especially enjoyed acclaim and success – for making Bond more realistic and gritty. It’s funny how that everyone thinks this is a fresh approach and a shot in the arm for the series… when the filmmakers actually attempted to take it into this direction all those years ago. Sadly back then, audiences just weren’t ready for it.

Licence To Kill is still somewhat regarded as the unruly child of the Bond series. The black sheep. The experiment that didn’t quite work. But don’t write it off. It may not be the kind of 007 movie you’re used to, but take it on it’s own merits it’s a taut, thrilling, violent and cathartic revenge thriller.

Happy 21st birthday Licence To Kill.

[Lucky]

Nice review! I rank this movie as one of my favorites.

[jaguar007]

Should have learned this lesson with Golden Gun: never have back-to-back films in which there isn't a lot at stake, particularly thousands, if not millions, of lives. With both LALD/TMWTGG and TLD/LR you had films about either drug deals, arms dealing or a solar energy gadget, none of which were particularly urgent matters.

Good point, especially when dealing with the first two films from a new actor. I know there was some public mumbling after TMWTGG that Moore or Bond was through, but he bounced back with an adventure where the world was at stake. LALD did very well but TMWTGG has the 2nd lowest adjusted US grosses.

[AMC Hornet]

Dear G.S.,

You raise a lot of good questions, but I have one of my own:

Why do you keep referring to Timothy Dalton's second Bond film as LICENSE REVOKED? Was that the title under which it was released in your country (in England and Canada it was called LICENCE TO KILL), or do you feel that that was what it should have been called? In which case, some members might prefer to call Pierce Brosnan's second Bond film TOMORROW NEVER LIES. To extrapolate (or in other words, stretch the point to breaking), some members might start referring to Brosnan's last Bond film as BEYOND THE ICE (another potential title) and thing could get a little confusing.

Please don't take offence - I'm just trying to see if your other leg has bells on.

As for the 'millions will die' urgency, don't forget that Sanchez was trying to persuade the Asian drug peddlers to help create a cartel that would turn the Pacific rim into his own personal toilet. And all Killifer knew of Bond was that he had been "along for the ride" when Sanchez was arrested. For all he knew it was Felix himself who snared Sanchez' plane. Since Bond had not been attacked when Felix and Della were, he could assume that his identity was safe (remember, sleazy parasites like Sanchez and Tony Montana enjoy going after informers' friends and families - they're basically terrorists in pastel shirts and Cuban heels).

If you've read John Gardner's novelization, you might remember that Kwang asks Bond what he thinks will happen if Sanchez is killed. Kwang says that Krest or Heller or one of the other henchmen will just step in and take over, so it becomes Bond's personal mission to destroy as much of Franz' organization and infrastructure as he can.

Unfortunately, there is always some other maggot ready to fill the void left by the destruction of Sanchez' organization. Bond may have treated a symptom (as did Chuck Norris in Delta Force II: Operation Stranglehold, but let's not go there), but the tumor lingers.

Another problem with LTK was that, while trading in things like gold, diamonds ("cigarettes, pistachio nuts" - sorry, I digress), atomic bombs and opium seems exotic, dealing in cocaine and cash (however much there may be) just seems so sleazy and low-rent. James Bond is above that sort of thing. On the other hand, that very realism is what makes Sanchez such a frightening villain - you won't find Oddjob or Jaws on your street corner, but you can find a drug peddler or one of his malicious goons almost anywhere. The character of Professor Joe Butcher seemed like an attempt to inject an element of fantasy into the story, but he seemed to be out of place - like the 'flying carpet' scene would have been in TLD.

This is all just my considerable opinion, of course (and I know that that was a malapropism). If I appear to have strong negative feelings about drug dealers, it's only because as much as I enjoy seeing them exterminated in the movies, I know that they're real monsters and I hate seeing them glorified in any way (why do so many people enjoy playing Tony Montana in GTA?).

Forgive my ranting. My main complaint about LTK is really just the lengthy truck chase at the end of the film (however proud of that scene John Glen may have been). I would have preferred to see Bond destroy the Kenworth fleet first, then burn down the Olympatec lab and Sanchez along with it (then again, I would have preferred to see Bond and Colombo take on Kristatos' men in Albania after securing St Cyril's monastary, so what do I know?).

Edited by AMC Hornet, 11 July 2010 - 05:22 AM.

[volante]

Great review - Thanks.

I believe the film stands the test of time.

I found it a great personal view of Bond; dealing with a personal vendetta.

[coco1997]

Hey Gravity, ever think of doing a treatment of your reimagined "LTK"? It seems like you have a lot of ideas on how you'd redo it.

[coco1997]

Hmm...How do you envision your take on the Mexico part of the film, Gravity?

[AMC Hornet]

You make some very good points, G.S. Thank you for responding, and for respecting my rebuttals and not taking offence to my questions (although I prefer the British printing of the continuation novels, I do wish I had an American copy of RB's High Time to Kill, as I prefer the title A Better Way to Die).

I agree, Licence Revoked was trying to be too many things at once, but then so were MR, FYEO, TWINE and DAD. That's what happens when a movie is writen by a committee.

There are a boatload of changes that I would make to Moonraker which could not be accomplished in the editing suite. Christopher Wood doesn't address many of them in his novelization, as he still had to work from the script. I could write my own, but what would be the point? If I could change anything about LR I would just reduce the nastiness and make the climax less like something from Mad Max the Road Warrior. I know that the point was to show Bond playing Iago to Sanchez' Othello and to illustrate what happens when a hero loses his perspective, but my arguement has always been: if Bond isn't enjoying what he's doing, how can we the audience enjoy watching him do it? LR wasn't a movie to be enjoyed so much as survived. Same goes for QoS, and for the same reason.

Keep up the good work. It's a pleasure to bandy with you.

Edited by AMC Hornet, 11 July 2010 - 05:05 PM.

[Gogol Pushkin]

You make some very good points, G.S. Thank you for responding, and for respecting my rebuttals and not taking offence to my questions (although I prefer the British printing of the continuation novels, I do wish I had an American copy of RB's High Time to Kill, as I prefer the title A Better Way to Die).

I agree, Licence Revoked was trying to be too many things at once, but then so were MR, FYEO, TWINE and DAD. That's what happens when a movie is writen by a committee.

There are a boatload of changes that I would make to Moonraker which could not be accomplished in the editing suite. Christopher Wood doesn't address many of them in his novelization, as he still had to work from the script. I could write my own, but what would be the point? If I could change anything about LR I would just reduce the nastiness and make the climax less like something from Mad Max the Road Warrior. I know that the point was to show Bond playing Iago to Sanchez' Othello and to illustrate what happens when a hero loses his perspective, but my arguement has always been: if Bond isn't enjoying what he's doing, how can we the audience enjoy watching him do it? LR wasn't a movie to be enjoyed so much as survived. Same goes for QoS, and for the same reason.

Keep up the good work. It's a pleasure to bandy with you.

That last point you make AC is an interesting one. When QoS came out, I remember reading a review of the film in Empire Magazine by Kim Newman and he basically remarked the same thing, that whilst he enjoyed the film, he thought, alongside that year's Dark Knight, it was basically a film that was hard to enjoy. It doesn't trouble me too much not to see Bond enjoying his mission, in fact I found it refreshing to see the character go through those experiences in those movies actually.

[The Shark]

What was going on in the world? South American drug barons and their cocaine cartels were big news. Seemed like a more realistic breed of villain for Bond to go up against.

Should have learned this lesson with Golden Gun: never have back-to-back films in which there isn't a lot at stake, particularly thousands, if not millions, of lives. With both LALD/TMWTGG and TLD/LR you had films about either drug deals, arms dealing or a solar energy gadget, none of which were particularly urgent matters. It's one thing to vary the pace and the plots up a bit from film to film, but to have back-to-back Bond films where drug dealers are the main themes is just too much realism, even for a series that is trying to "evolve" and be more modern. At some point the characters and the situations become so real that they lose all vestige of what made the series so great to begin with.

Gravity, I think you're missing the point of where the emotional investment and concern arrives at in the examples you mentioned. In LALD hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of lives are at stake, as potential targets for Kananga's huge opportunistic heroin influx he's about to provide, in TMWTGG it's not only the solex agitator that's at stake Bond's life that we think is at stake but eventually we find out it's been set up by Scaramanga's "kept" girlfriend to save her, after that it becomes a high octane chase to find the Solex, Bond's fellow operative Goodnight, and silence Scaramanga once and for all. Slide whistles and flying cars aside, it's rather clear.

In TLD, obviously the reactivated "Smiert Spionam" threat informs British intelligence that the lethal SMERSH operation abandoned since the days of Lavrentiy Beria has now been reactivated. From there it's a series of twists and turns, with Bond's final goals being to destroy the opium, Soviet base, and Brad Whitaker.

As in TLD, in LTK there's a similar sense of a impending deadline, which is where Sanchez has brokered some stingers from the contras so he can threaten to shoot down an American airliner if the DEA interfere with his operations and gradual take over the Republic of Isthmus. Also there's the clear date of the Far Eastern customers attending the presentation at Sanchez's base, a clear opportunity for Bond to strike. Essentially the catalyst for all of this go to plan is Bond's single minded aim, which is to avenged Felix's barbaric mutilation along with Della's rape and murder.

What was popular in cinemas? Violent action thrillers like Die Hard and Lethal Weapon – these seemed to be what audiences wanted. What were Timothy Dalton’s strengths as Bond? Moody intensity, stark realism, tough, macho, charisma.

Not sure the audiences bought Dalton as "tough" or "macho". Moody? Maybe. Deranged? Perhaps. Aloof? Cold? Definitely. That wasn't necessarily a compelling mix for most people. Maybe if Dalton had packed on 20lbs of muscle, gotten a spiky, edgy-haircut, and shook his moneymaker while coming out of the water like Craig did he would've gotten more of the female demographic. But, as it stands, I've yet to find a single woman outside of core-Bondage that liked Dalton.

I think he managed to convincingly portray a sort of refined masculinity, without becoming a classless American muscleman. What about the way the way he puts the knife to Lupe's neck, smashes the goons head onto the table at the Barrel-Head Bar, spearguns Clive at the Wavekrest, throws Q to the floor, pins down Pam, drowns some goon in the underwater hatch, or smothers some hapless guard in a tray of maggots, Those are the not actions of a girly man.

I say while he lacked the sexuality, mischievous wit and charisma of Connery's Bond, he was still masculine and physically imposing. It can be pretty for a 6'2 guy like Dalton to look bulky, but I think he did a pretty good job of training for the role. He was as thin as a beanpole in the late 60s/70s.

I don't think a haircut would have made much difference, and I'd actually construe that the Lugosi-esque haircut he was dealt with, infuses in his character a 19th century, Gothic quality, of a tragic, Byronic hero. Dalton's Bond is essentially a romantic, and that haircuts fits with the persona. A crew cut wouldn't have made any sense, since unlike Craig's Bond he's well into his profession as double-o and his special forces days are well in the past. After all, Connery had a brylcreamed toupee, along with a often noticeable makeup and eye shadow, but he made he do with what he got, like Dalton. That's a testament to the actor, despite questionable any choices made by the makeup/hair department.

The material in LICENSE REVOKED was beneath his talents. It was sort of like asking Dame Maggie Smith to star in a Scooby Doo movie. Great actor, poor material to work with.

As the expression goes, "if life gives you lemons, make lemonade."

He may got slightly rotten lemons, but did got with we he got.

Simply put – this Bond film shocked the world.

Shocked at how bad it was. Shocked at how lousy the acting was. Shocked at how inadequate the script was. Shocked at how cheap the film looked. Shocked at how over-edited the film was. Shocked at how poorly thought-out the title sequence was. Shocked at how lack-luster the title song was.

The violence may have shocked some who were used to a more family-friendly atmosphere, but people weren't shocked or immune to violence in general. At the end of the day people were more shocked by how awful the film is rather than the level of violence explicitly shown.

You were, without a doubt, along with many others. But also a considerably amount of people liked this film. It's considered by many to be a flawed gem among the vast potpourri of the Bond franchise.

Due to the controversy over the movie’s violence, a lacklustre marketing campaign, an age restrictive rating in the U.K – and competition from other massive blockbusters like Batman, Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade and Lethal Weapon 2 this Bond film under-performed at the box office.

Excuses. There was no age-restrictive rating in the U.S., yet it tanked. When a Bond film debuts at #4 and is out of the Top 10 two weeks later, don't go pointing fingers at others. It's time to take a long, hard look in the mirror and see what you're (EON) doing wrong and why it's not working. We can sit here all day and blame Batman or The Last Crusade or Lethal Weapon 2, but the truth is that #1 those films delivered to audiences what they wanted and #2 none of those films opened directly opposite LICENSE REVOKED. 'LAST CRUSADE' had been out 7 weeks before LICENSE REVOKED opened. BATMAN had been out 3 or 4 weeks. LETHAL WEAPON 2 opened the week before. It's an embarrassment and a disgrace that LICENSE REVOKED opened so poorly, but the truth was, is, and will always be that LICENSE REVOKED was simply just an awful film for whose fortunes no amount of slick marketing was ever going to be able to improve or revive. The film got the marketing campaign it deserved.

If that's the case, TWINE should have had a small internet campaign and a direct to video release. It would have perfectly suited the film's drab soap opera acting, scripting, direction, cinematography and score.

It's all a matter of taste.

[PrinceKamalKhan]

And Pam should really be the Camille of the story. EON should have had the guts back then to have a Bond Girl who doesn't actually sleep with 007, or at least not until the very end.

But Melina, Kissy and Stacy would've met that description.

Bond is supposedly too single minded of purpose in this film, I would imagine, to be sidetracked by a woman.

I agree that Bond and Pam got a little too mushy for me("Why don't you wait until you asked?" business) considering LTK's a film that was aiming to be a tougher and edgier series entry than usual. Would Lupe still exist in your version, GS, and if so, would she still survive or get murdered by Sanchez?

[The Shark]

Good point, especially when dealing with the first two films from a new actor. I know there was some public mumbling after TMWTGG that Moore or Bond was through, but he bounced back with an adventure where the world was at stake.

Only New York and Moscow were at stake IIRC, and one key flaw is that the villain's motives are never properly explored (at least Drax gives a more convincing damnation of humanity, with a better monologue). He's just some poorly conceived nutcase who once all of us to live harmoniously on the seabed in some sort of Neo-Atlantis city. Real 'Age of Aquarius' stuff.

LALD did very well but TMWTGG has the 2nd lowest adjusted US grosses.

It's very naive and reductivist to conclude it's down to mainly the 'lack of threat' or 'global impact' of the plots that resulted in the low box office gross, and not other franchises around at the time. With TMWTGG and LTK in particularly Gravity, you seem to develop a sort of 'tunnel vision' in that you select out one or two factors of your choosing as the reason for the films lack of box office success, and selectively ignore all others as 'excuses'.

I greatly admire as you poster mate, but this is something of a blindspot in these discussions.

What would happen if Bond fails in AVTAK? Millions of people would die as a result of an induced earthquake. Furthermore, decades of research would be lost, future innovations potentially tabled or lost forever, and the worlds best and brightest minds in the computer related industries dead, not to mention a catastrophic blow to world markets.

Millions would die that's right, but you're wrong on the industrial side of it. As Siskel pointed out in his review of AVTAK on At The Movies, he explained that Silicon Valley is for the most part a haven for the consumers of the microchip industry, but not the producers. They are mostly in Japan and various other Far Eastern nations, along with European ones at too. Though in '85, it was a Japan who were definitely at he forefront.

Conversely, what would happen if Bond fails in TLD? Well, in a sense, he didn't. He did deliver Koskov alive. But then he gets a new mission: to kill Pushkin. Once we realize Pushkin and Bond are on the same page, Bond's mission essentially changes again: stop delivery of opium. But if Bond fails to destroy the opium, it's not as if much is going to change. The drug war will still wage on...The Snow Leopard Brotherhood will continue to manufacture and smuggle opium, just as they do in 2010...Koskov is able to replace the funds he stole from The Kremlin. Nice, intriguing political back-story, but not exactly the kind of stuff that really keeps you glued to your seat.

You're right. However what is designed to glue you to your seat is Bond's own desire to hunt down Koskov, Whitaker and Necros. It's as much as a personal vendetta for Saunders, the MI6 staff killed at the safehouse and 004, as it's to put an end to Koskov and Whitaker squandering Soviet funds, and conspiring to incriminate Pushkin. From here on to 2008, every Bond film has had some sort of personal vendetta, with attempt to develop it beyond the standard "sacrificial lamb" fare from 62-85.

And then, what happens if Bond fails in LICENSE REVOKED? Well, Della would still be dead. Leiter's leg and arms would still be missing. Killing Sanchez wasn't going to bring them back. And killing Sanchez wouldn't stop the drug trade. It didn't stop when Kananga was killed. It didn't stop when Manuel Noriega was taken into U.S. custody. If Sanchez dies someone else just takes his place. If Sanchez lives he manages to stay on top a little longer.

As stated by Pam, Sanchez will proceed to blow up a US airliner with his stingers if if the DEA doesn't pull out there interference with Sanchez's drug trade.

And Pam should really be the Camille of the story. EON should have had the guts back then to have a Bond Girl who doesn't actually sleep with 007, or at least not until the very end.

But Melina, Kissy and Stacy would've met that description.

As would Goodnight, since Andrea's arrival meant coitus interruptus until they were finally alone in Scaramanga's junk.

Honeychile Ryder is another good example.

[Mr. Blofeld]

Good point, especially when dealing with the first two films from a new actor. I know there was some public mumbling after TMWTGG that Moore or Bond was through, but he bounced back with an adventure where the world was at stake.

Only New York and Moscow were at stake IIRC, and one key flaw is that the villain's motives are never properly explored (at least Drax gives a more convincing damnation of humanity, with a better monologue). He's just some poorly conceived nutcase who once all of us to live harmoniously on the seabed in some sort of Neo-Atlantis city. Real 'Age of Aquarius' stuff.

I don't remember writing that.

LALD did very well but TMWTGG has the 2nd lowest adjusted US grosses.

It's very naive and reductivist to conclude it's down to mainly the 'lack of threat' or 'global impact' of the plots that resulted in the low box office gross, and not other franchises around at the time. With TMWTGG and LTK in particularly Gravity, you seem to develop a sort of 'tunnel vision' in that you select out one or two factors of your choosing as the reason for the films lack of box office success, and selectively ignore all others as 'excuses'.

I greatly admire you as a poster, mate, but this is something of a blindspot in these discussions.

I don't remember writing that either. I think you have my arguments mixed up with someone else.

Indeed; can't believe I'm saying this, but it seems The Shark, in settling out the quote boxes, must've accidentally deleted the internal quote brackets attributing the comments to jaguar007, and thus thought that Gravity's had made them -- got to be more careful with those quotes, mate...

[The Shark]

Good point, especially when dealing with the first two films from a new actor. I know there was some public mumbling after TMWTGG that Moore or Bond was through, but he bounced back with an adventure where the world was at stake.

Only New York and Moscow were at stake IIRC, and one key flaw is that the villain's motives are never properly explored (at least Drax gives a more convincing damnation of humanity, with a better monologue). He's just some poorly conceived nutcase who once all of us to live harmoniously on the seabed in some sort of Neo-Atlantis city. Real 'Age of Aquarius' stuff.

I don't remember writing that.

LALD did very well but TMWTGG has the 2nd lowest adjusted US grosses.

It's very naive and reductivist to conclude it's down to mainly the 'lack of threat' or 'global impact' of the plots that resulted in the low box office gross, and not other franchises around at the time. With TMWTGG and LTK in particularly Gravity, you seem to develop a sort of 'tunnel vision' in that you select out one or two factors of your choosing as the reason for the films lack of box office success, and selectively ignore all others as 'excuses'.

I greatly admire as you poster mate, but this is something of a blindspot in these discussions.

I don't remember writing that either. I think you have my arguments mixed up with someone else.

Yep. Sorry Grav, I'll now correct it.

[dinovelvet]

Not sure the audiences bought Dalton as "tough" or "macho". Moody? Maybe. Deranged? Perhaps. Aloof? Cold? Definitely. That wasn't necessarily a compelling mix for most people. Maybe if Dalton had packed on 20lbs of muscle, gotten a spiky, edgy-haircut, and shook his moneymaker while coming out of the water like Craig did he would've gotten more of the female demographic. But, as it stands, I've yet to find a single woman outside of core-Bondage that liked Dalton.

Yeah, it's fair to say that Dalton was the most sexless Bond. In his two films, he got his shirt off once, briefly, and made Roger Moore look buff by comparison. Obviously in recent times we've seen that one scene of showing off the goods can work wonders.
He also appeared to be grumpy and just not having any fun most of the time. Obviously that's a tightrope you have to walk when you're doing a gritty/revenge flick, but Craig in CR and QOS still brought moments of humor and fun, there was still that factor of "men want to be him", whereas no-one really wants to be moody and depressed for the whole film. There's one great bit in LTK when Dalton realizes the plane he's hijacked is full of huge bricks of money and he grins. The film needed some more of those kinds of moments.

[The Shark]

Not sure the audiences bought Dalton as "tough" or "macho". Moody? Maybe. Deranged? Perhaps. Aloof? Cold? Definitely. That wasn't necessarily a compelling mix for most people. Maybe if Dalton had packed on 20lbs of muscle, gotten a spiky, edgy-haircut, and shook his moneymaker while coming out of the water like Craig did he would've gotten more of the female demographic. But, as it stands, I've yet to find a single woman outside of core-Bondage that liked Dalton.

Yeah, it's fair to say that Dalton was the most sexless Bond. In his two films, he got his shirt off once, briefly, and made Roger Moore look buff by comparison. Obviously in recent times we've seen that one scene of showing off the goods can work wonders.
He also appeared to be grumpy and just not having any fun most of the time. Obviously that's a tightrope you have to walk when you're doing a gritty/revenge flick, but Craig in CR and QOS still brought moments of humor and fun

Perhaps to some extent the former, but definitely not the later picture. Never for once did I want to be the grim, sexless, classless and mono-syllabic thug posing as James Bond in QoS.

Dalton still got to have plenty of fun with Pam, the thrill of the tanker chase, along with various hedonistic pleasures and imaginative Q branch toys completely absent from QoS.

[Bryce (003)]

Good points back and forth here. Nice review BTW.

I remember that summer. My buddy and I shared a student apartment and had a little get together with some friends. Summer of '89 was a blockbuster of films. Both sequels and of course the "Bat" was the MAN.

The next morning after LTK, we discussed it. He commented that it was a new turn for Bond and that he liked it and I countered that it wasn't. It was Bond of the books as far as character but just given a modern setting of the time.

Dalton was really getting into the role.

[Gogol Pushkin]

Good points back and forth here. Nice review BTW.

I remember that summer. My buddy and I shared a student apartment and had a little get together with some friends. Summer of '89 was a blockbuster of films. Both sequels and of course the "Bat" was the MAN.

The next morning after LTK, we discussed it. He commented that it was a new turn for Bond and that he liked it and I countered that it wasn't. It was Bond of the books as far as character but just given a modern setting of the time.

Dalton was really getting into the role.

Nicely said Bryce. I think it's a shame there was no third movie, although it has to be said given the negativity of some fans and critics towards the movie, you have to wonder what direction Eon would have taken Dalton's Bond. The gritty action esthethic clearly wasn't going down well with audiences, whilst the Cold War was over so they could never go back to the well TLD came from. I've read a lot of things about what was planned for The Property of a Lady, but it's hard to see if it could have been a true Dalton picture in the way TLD and LTK were. All that talk of a realistic robot seemed like it harkening back to the Moore direction which Dalton was very adament about getting away from.

[elizabeth]

With both LALD/TMWTGG and TLD/LR you had films about either drug deals, arms dealing or a solar energy gadget, none of which were particularly urgent matters.

Whoa, wait...NONE of which were urgent??? I don't know about you, but if I were living on a street where there was a massive drug or arms dealing ring going around, I'd say that was pretty urgent and my life would feel threatened. Now unless you do those things yourself, I'd say you would/should feel threatened as well.

I don't know about the Solex. There's got to be a scientific or environmental explanation for why that's harmful.

[byline]

Not sure the audiences bought Dalton as "tough" or "macho". Moody? Maybe. Deranged? Perhaps. Aloof? Cold? Definitely. That wasn't necessarily a compelling mix for most people. Maybe if Dalton had packed on 20lbs of muscle, gotten a spiky, edgy-haircut, and shook his moneymaker while coming out of the water like Craig did he would've gotten more of the female demographic. But, as it stands, I've yet to find a single woman outside of core-Bondage that liked Dalton.

Well, I'm one. Keep in mind that it's my husband who's the longtime Bond fan. I'm a latecomer to the series . . . and Dalton is actually the one who piqued my interest first. I'm old enough to remember the whole "Moore is not Bond; Sean Connery is the real James Bond" controversy, and I never really warmed up to either until I became a fan retroactively. At some point in the late '90s, I believe, hubby and I were staying overnight at a hotel, and "The Living Daylights" was on. I'd never seen Dalton as Bond, had only read the largely uncomplimentary reviews (particularly around the time of "Licence to Kill"). And yet, as soon as I started watching, I was caught by something in Dalton's portrayal. The closest I can come to it is that something moving behind his eyes which makes me care about what happens to him.

So, as it turned out, I was a Dalton fan even before I was a Craig fan . . . and I'm a fan of both for essentially the same reasons. Dalton was certainly more convincing, in terms of his physique, than Moore was (though perhaps less so than other action heroes of the day). But for me, that wasn't the important thing. I had to find the character convincing as someone whose job was to kill other people . . . and he was fully capable of doing it. Moore only very rarely convinced me of that. Connery did, of course, especially in his first four films. Lazenby was good at the action sequences, but of course he only got one film. Brosnan? I found him about as unconvincing as Moore, though in terms of physique, he and Dalton were actually quite similar. But I found Dalton far more menacing when he needed to be . . . yet also with enough humanity to make me care about him.

So I guess what I'm saying is that I may be the first woman you've encountered who liked Dalton before I became a hardcore Bond fan.

[AMC Hornet]

The Solex Agigator was supposed to solve the energy crisis of the '70s, although given the way things turned out, the British Government must have done what Bond suggested Scaramanga might do: use it to leverage OPEC into turning on the taps and giving them a lower price per barrel.

Apart from that there was the solar cannon ("no extra charge"), which Bond recognized as trouble in the wrong hands (and in whose hands would it not be trouble?). But as pointed out before, there was no urgent deadline apart from getting off the island before the whole place went up.

The deadlines in movies like LALD and LTK are simply to stop the massive shipments of narcotics before they get through, but to paraphrase DC: "I thought one less drug trafficer in the world would be a good thing."

[Gogol Pushkin]

Not sure the audiences bought Dalton as "tough" or "macho". Moody? Maybe. Deranged? Perhaps. Aloof? Cold? Definitely. That wasn't necessarily a compelling mix for most people. Maybe if Dalton had packed on 20lbs of muscle, gotten a spiky, edgy-haircut, and shook his moneymaker while coming out of the water like Craig did he would've gotten more of the female demographic. But, as it stands, I've yet to find a single woman outside of core-Bondage that liked Dalton.

Well, I'm one. Keep in mind that it's my husband who's the longtime Bond fan. I'm a latecomer to the series . . . and Dalton is actually the one who piqued my interest first. I'm old enough to remember the whole "Moore is not Bond; Sean Connery is the real James Bond" controversy, and I never really warmed up to either until I became a fan retroactively. At some point in the late '90s, I believe, hubby and I were staying overnight at a hotel, and "The Living Daylights" was on. I'd never seen Dalton as Bond, had only read the largely uncomplimentary reviews (particularly around the time of "Licence to Kill"). And yet, as soon as I started watching, I was caught by something in Dalton's portrayal. The closest I can come to it is that something moving behind his eyes which makes me care about what happens to him.

So, as it turned out, I was a Dalton fan even before I was a Craig fan . . . and I'm a fan of both for essentially the same reasons. Dalton was certainly more convincing, in terms of his physique, than Moore was (though perhaps less so than other action heroes of the day). But for me, that wasn't the important thing. I had to find the character convincing as someone whose job was to kill other people . . . and he was fully capable of doing it. Moore only very rarely convinced me of that. Connery did, of course, especially in his first four films. Lazenby was good at the action sequences, but of course he only got one film. Brosnan? I found him about as unconvincing as Moore, though in terms of physique, he and Dalton were actually quite similar. But I found Dalton far more menacing when he needed to be . . . yet also with enough humanity to make me care about him.

So I guess what I'm saying is that I may be the first woman you've encountered who liked Dalton before I became a hardcore Bond fan.

It's interesting reading your post there Byline. I have a mother who, whilst not being a hardcore Bond fan like myself, does enjoy the movies and I can tell you that her favourite movie is TLD. I think the thing with Dalton in that movie, and this is why I think Dalton can appeal to women, especially women who are not, shall we say, hardcore Bond fans, is that TLD presented a very romantic and appealing Bond. Let's not forget, for the film Bond is a one woman man, and throughout, if you imagine the film from Kara's point of view, he is the romantic hero who comes in, saves the girl, and whisks her away on a wave of adventure, taking her to Vienna, then to Tangiers, and then saves her from her duplicitous and dangerous lover in the deserts of Afghanistan. With that in mind, I think Dalton is probably the one Bond that can really appeal to women based on that one movie. Hell, if you read Sinclair Barclay's superb book The Man With The Golden Touch, he effectively describes the movie as a Bond film for women.

Edited by Gogol Pushkin, 14 July 2010 - 06:19 PM.

[Safari Suit]

I wouldn't equate LALD with LTK as Kanaga's drug dealing was just a start for loftier, more "Bond villain-y" ambitions

[dodge]

Not sure the audiences bought Dalton as "tough" or "macho". Moody? Maybe. Deranged? Perhaps. Aloof? Cold? Definitely. That wasn't necessarily a compelling mix for most people. Maybe if Dalton had packed on 20lbs of muscle, gotten a spiky, edgy-haircut, and shook his moneymaker while coming out of the water like Craig did he would've gotten more of the female demographic. But, as it stands, I've yet to find a single woman outside of core-Bondage that liked Dalton.

Yeah, it's fair to say that Dalton was the most sexless Bond. In his two films, he got his shirt off once, briefly, and made Roger Moore look buff by comparison. Obviously in recent times we've seen that one scene of showing off the goods can work wonders.
He also appeared to be grumpy and just not having any fun most of the time. Obviously that's a tightrope you have to walk when you're doing a gritty/revenge flick, but Craig in CR and QOS still brought moments of humor and fun, there was still that factor of "men want to be him", whereas no-one really wants to be moody and depressed for the whole film. There's one great bit in LTK when Dalton realizes the plane he's hijacked is full of huge bricks of money and he grins. The film needed some more of those kinds of moments.

A friend who saw the film in a theater, when it was first released, swears: When Tim took his shirt off, a woman cried: :'Put it back on!'

[byline]

It's interesting reading your post there Byline. I have a mother who, whilst not being a hardcore Bond fan like myself, does enjoy the movies and I can tell you that her favourite movie is TLD. I think the thing with Dalton in that movie, and this is why I think Dalton can appeal to women, especially women who are not, shall we say, hardcore Bond fans, is that TLD presented a very romantic and appealing Bond. Let's not forget, for the film Bond is a one woman man, and throughout, if you imagine the film from Kara's point of view, he is the romantic hero who comes in, saves the girl, and whisks her away on a wave of adventure, taking her to Vienna, then to Tangiers, and then saves her from her duplicitous and dangerous lover in the deserts of Afghanistan. With that in mind, I think Dalton is probably the one Bond that can really appeal to women based on that one movie. Hell, if you read Sinclair Barclay's superb book The Man With The Golden Touch, he effectively describes the movie as a Bond film for women.

Maybe that's the essence of it; I want a Bond with a romantic side (though subtle, not sappily so), not a Bond who sees women as "disposable pleasures" . . . and treats them accordingly.