Bond 50th

My favorite? From Russia with Love, hands down. 

The movies from You Only Live Twice thru Moonraker really were the “serious” equivalent of an Austin Powers movie, in my opinion (though I have a soft spot for The Man with the Golden Gun).

I liked For Your Eyes Only (the closest one to a straight-up action movie during Moore’s tenure), but found his last two to be lame and sad (Moore was way too old to be Bond at that point, and even he admits that; it’d look as weird and creepy as Chad Everett trying to pull the leading man thing like he did in his only scene in Mulholland Dr.). 

I remember I wasn’t fond of Dalton’s movies when they came out initially, but have warmed to them since then (especially as I’ve since read a few of Fleming’s original books).

As far as Brosnan goes, I was so happy with GoldenEye that it made my disappointment with his next three movies that much worse (it’s like after the first good Brosnan movie, they listened to the peanut gallery way too much – “Why aren’t there Q gadgets wall to wall? Can’t he make stupid quips every five minutes? Can the musical score sound more like a parody of a John Barry score and underline everything that happens onscreen in an almost cartoon-like fashion?”).  I always felt bad, as I think Brosnan personally made for a very good Bond – and I think that marketing and focus groups cheated him out of more than one really good Bond film.

Craig is quite good, better than I had hoped, though it would be nice to see him do more than simply be the British equivalent of Jason Bourne.

As far as the lone Lazenby movie, I’ll say this: I think, up to that point, it was the best looking and best made film. If it had starred Connery, as opposed to a 28-year-old Australian guy who had literally never been in a film before, we;d probably be talking about whether or not it was the best Bond film. Why? Because, I would argue, it has the best idea for an ending (SPOILERS, for those who have either never seen – or flat out refused to watch): Bond not only loses, but he loses in as personal a way as can be (Blofeld kills his wife within minutes of leaving the wedding reception – and gets away). It’s the only time in the series where he’s not “on” as a hard-drinking sex machine badass; the only time in which he is a vulnerable human being. Has Connery been in the film as Bond, the scene would have been, probably, one of the most memorable in the entire series.

The link below is the ending scene. Picture it with Connery:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgndOK2zuY0