Casino Royale is a bad Bond movie, but a good 60's one. Look out for Peter Sellers playing Evelyn Trimble, an Austin Powers in embyro....great costumes, sets, Dionne Warwick sings, and Herb Alpert gets horny. Plus a truly explosive finale.
I have now watched Casino Royale 1 1/2 times (my husband insisted on watching it), and I will again insist that it is terrible! Not only is the plot incoherent but it's not funny. It has Peter Sellers and Woody Allen but they never generated more than a few chuckles. That just pathetic!
I really like Moonraker simply for Jaws, one of the best 007 villains, although The Spy Who Loved Me is much better. A View to a Kill definitely deserves to be on this list, Tanya Roberts cancels out any positives provided by Christopher Walken. Timothy Dalton was not as great as Brosnan for the role, but Dalton's Bond movies had better stories. The 3 Brosnan films have gotten progressively worse; they are decent films, but pale in comparison to the superior early Connery films.
Jaws is frankly one of the reasons I hated Moonraker. They took a great, menancing villian from The Spy Who Loved Me and transformed him into an insulting joke in Moonraker. Add the stupid, look-we're-the-new-Star-Wars laser fights and Roger Moore (the worst Bond ever), and you have a Bond film I hope I never see again.
I also think Dalton was fantastic; unfortunately, Moore had already prepped audiences for a silly Bond who tells lots of dumb jokes, so people weren't expecting or wanting a great Bond who was human and who echoed the tough guy in the early Connery films. Dalton's Bonds (excepting the silly semi-on-4-wheels stunt toward the end of LTK) are the best since Connery's early films, and I am sad everytime I see a terrible Brosnan Bond and realize THIS is what the audience now wants.
I also love the Fleming novels, which are essential elements of the Bond legend. I read them over and over again in junior high, and I know entirely too much about Bond now (more than John Gardner, the worst Bond author ever, knew (Bond drinking tea?!?!); at least one can finally find in Benson's latest Bond novels the real Bond so lacking in the films today...).
Casino Royale is a bad Bond movie, but a good 60's one. Look out for Peter Sellers playing Evelyn Trimble, an Austin Powers in embyro....great costumes, sets, Dionne Warwick sings, and Herb Alpert gets horny. Plus a truly explosive finale.
Ah but so much wasted potential! What else could you do with such a God-awful mess of a movie but blow everything up at the end.
I have now watched Casino Royale 1 1/2 times (my husband insisted on watching it), and I will again insist that it is terrible! Not only is the plot incoherent but it's not funny. It has Peter Sellers and Woody Allen but they never generated more than a few chuckles. That just pathetic!
Oh, surely Moonraker can find a comfortable home on this list...
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
Moonraker will always have a special place in my heart. First Bond movie I was allowed to see in the theater.
While I kinda liked Timothy Dalton, I found all his Bond movies to be completely forgettable.
However, my all-time worst Bond experiences are easily The Man With the Golden Gun and The World is Not Enough. Boring beyond belief.
I really like Moonraker simply for Jaws, one of the best 007 villains, although The Spy Who Loved Me is much better. A View to a Kill definitely deserves to be on this list, Tanya Roberts cancels out any positives provided by Christopher Walken. Timothy Dalton was not as great as Brosnan for the role, but Dalton's Bond movies had better stories. The 3 Brosnan films have gotten progressively worse; they are decent films, but pale in comparison to the superior early Connery films.
Sigh... Alone again...
Jaws is frankly one of the reasons I hated Moonraker. They took a great, menancing villian from The Spy Who Loved Me and transformed him into an insulting joke in Moonraker. Add the stupid, look-we're-the-new-Star-Wars laser fights and Roger Moore (the worst Bond ever), and you have a Bond film I hope I never see again.
I also think Dalton was fantastic; unfortunately, Moore had already prepped audiences for a silly Bond who tells lots of dumb jokes, so people weren't expecting or wanting a great Bond who was human and who echoed the tough guy in the early Connery films. Dalton's Bonds (excepting the silly semi-on-4-wheels stunt toward the end of LTK) are the best since Connery's early films, and I am sad everytime I see a terrible Brosnan Bond and realize THIS is what the audience now wants.
I also love the Fleming novels, which are essential elements of the Bond legend. I read them over and over again in junior high, and I know entirely too much about Bond now (more than John Gardner, the worst Bond author ever, knew (Bond drinking tea?!?!); at least one can finally find in Benson's latest Bond novels the real Bond so lacking in the films today...).
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs