The Best 100 Films of All Time: The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951)

Science Fiction was not yet in vogue when director Robert Wise (who would later direct the films West Side Story and The Sound of Music) and producer Julian Blaustein set out to make a film that would deal with the fear and suspicions during the cold war. Blaustein searched for a suitable story to adapt among more than 200 science fiction stories and stumbled upon the short story`Farewell to the Master by Harry Bates. Blaustein hired Edmund North to write a screenplay called The Day The Earth Stood Still and Darryl Zanuçk greenlighted the production.

The film starts with the sighting of a UFO in Washington until a flying saucer lands in President’s Park in Washington DC. The arrival of Klaatu, an alien humanoid visitor, is not received well and a nervous soldier gets jumpy when Klaatu shows a gift. The soldier discharges his gun and Klaatu is hit. His robot accomplice, Gort, steps up and disintegrates all guns in sight without harming the soldiers around them until Klaatu tells him to stop. Klaatu is taken to hospital where he expresses the wish to leave a message for Earth’s Leaders. However the White House representative says this would be practically impossible since it would be impossible to get them all together even in one room.


Klaatu expresses a desire to learn of the humans around him and leaves the hospital by stealing a uniform of a Major Carpenter and he ends up in a boarding house in Washington DC. Helen Benson, widow and mother of one son, Bobby and her friend Tom Stephens are among the occupants of the boarding house and when Helen and Tom go on a day trip, Major Carpenter suggests he will remain with Bobby and together they go on a tour around the city. Bobby shows Carpenter the Lincoln Memorial, which impresses Carpenter greatly. However, when they visit the grave of Bobby’s father at Arlington Cemetery, Carpenter notes that those buried there were killed in wars.


When talking to Bobby about great minds, Carpenter asks the lad who would be the smartest man around now. Bobby suggests Professor Jacob Barnhardt, who lives close by, might be up to his standards. They go to Barnhardt’s house but the professor is not at home. Carpenter however leaves a note on the professor’s blackboard that will help him solve an advanced problem in mathematics. When Barnhardt later has Carpenter brought to his home, Carpenter identifies himself as Klaatu and explains his intentions. He talks of peoples of other planets becoming concerned now that the Earth humans have developed atomic power and declares that Earth must grow up and get with it. Or else. When Barnhardt asks aobut the ‘or else’, Klaatu resolutely says “Planet Earth will be eliminated”. Barnhardt agrees to set up a meeting with many scientific minds who can take his message to their respective leaders but does ask for a demonstration of his powers. Klaatu goes back to his spaceship and implements the demonstration but is not aware that he is being followed by Bobby.

The next day Klaatu finds Helen, takes her into an empty elevator and in the midst of their descent, the elevator stops. All of the Earth the world has come to a halt, with exception where this would harm the humans involved (like in operations in hospitals or planes in the air). After the world starts to move on again, Tom tells the authorities he suspects Carpenter is the alien Klaatu and the search for Klaatu intensifies. On the road to Professor Barnhardt, Klaatu tells Helen that if something is to happen to him, she is to say to Gort: Klaatu Barada Nikto. Not long after, Klaatu is shot by the military and Helen escapes to his spaceship. Gort awakens, kills two guards (off screen) but then Helen gives him the message and Gort carries her gently into the ship, leaves and returns with the body of Klaatu. Putting Klaatu in some machine, Klaatu revives and at the designated time he exits the spaceship and addresses the scientists that Professor Barnhardt has alerted. Saying that Earth must learn to grow up and forget about its violent ways, Klaatu points out that if Earth does not comply, robots like Gort will destroy Earth. “The decision rests with you”, Klaatu dramatically ends. He then nods to Helen, enters his spaceship and leaves the planet Earth.


Robert Wise directs the film very matter of factly, as if it were a news bulletin brought to the audience without embellishment, but this greatly benefits the seriousness of the threat implied by Klaatu. Of course, the message is metaphorical and can be interpreted in many ways but the main message “Grow Up” remains at its core. With minimal yet effective special effects (for its time, certainly) the film brings the message across with maximum efficiency.

The wonderful music by composer Bernard Herrmann also greatly assists in this. Herrmann immediately created a characteristic sound for flying saucers by using two Theremins, but his taut rhythms and exciting themes make for a impressive score.

Sure, if you look at the film with the perspective of 2010, it is hopelessly dated but if seen with the glasses of someone from 1951, it is not hard to see why this film was a great movie of its day, maybe one of the best Sci Fi films of the decade. The remake that was released with Keanu Reeves in the role of Klaatu fails to live up to its predecessor’s fame so never mind that one. The Robert Wise film is the one to see!

The Best 100 Films of All Time: John Carpenter’s The Thing (1982)

In the late 1970s director John Carpenter built a solid reputation as Master of the Macabre with his films HALLOWEEN and THE FOG. These films were made independently with smaller production companies so Carpenter would be able to make them without interference from the money people. His first big studio film was at Universal with THE THING, a remake of the classic science fiction film The Thing from Another World from 1951.


The original film was based on a notorious short story “Who Goes There?” written by John W. Campbell jr. but could at the time not fully live up to its potential because there was no way to film the implications of the story in 1951. Carpenter intended with his remake to stay true to this original story, by having the screenplay of Bill Lancaster (son of Burt Lancaster) heavily emphasize the terrible implications of an alien invasion on a cellular level. Lancaster wrote his screenplay in 1981 and the preproduction of the film involved building the Antarctic research camp out near Stewart, British Columbia, where lots of snow in the winter was assured. Of course, studio shooting took place in wonderfully warm California, meaning they had to refrigerate the sets.

Carpenter casted the film for a wholly male cast; unlike in the original film, there were no females at his research camp. The main lead would be Kurt Russell as R.J. MacReady, the helicopter pilot. Russell wanted to break free of the Disney image he had previously enjoyed in the early years of his career and with roles like Snake Plissken in ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK and MacReady in THE THING, he clearly succeeded in this. Secondary roles would be filled in by Donald Moffat as Camp Commander Garry, Wilford Brimley as Medical Doctor Blair, T.K. Carter as the cook Nauls, Richard Dysart as physician Dr. Copper, Peter Maloney as Bennings, Keith David as Childs, Charles Hallahan as Norris, David Clennon as Palmer, Joel Polis as Fuchs, Richard Masur as Clarke, the dog wrangler and Thomas Waites as Windows, communications expert. Although a group bond was created fairly quickly amongst the men during filming, Carpenter allowed certain frictions to play up when the paranoia in the story sets in. This also facilitated an original look on how to shoot a moving group of men continuously without repeating one self.

The music of the film would be scored by the legendary Italian composer Ennio Morricone, who composed a masterfully cold score for this nihilistic horror thriller. Carpenter added some synthesizer cues of his own here and there to emphasize the drama. Dean Cundey would be the director of photography, just like he had been before with Carpenter’s films HALLOWEEN, THE FOG and ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK.


The film opens with a dog being chased by a helicopter, over the icy landscape of Antarctica, until the dog reaches an American research camp. The dog tries to find cover while the chopper lands and two men exit, one pilot and one man firing on the dog.



Due to an accident with an explosive, the helicopter is destroyed and the pilot killed and when the other man continues to fire at the dog, even hitting one of the men in the American camp, station commander Garry shoots and kills the man with the gun. The dog is adopted in the camp by the dog wrangler and when it becomes clear that the helicopter is from the Norwegian camp not too far off, Dr Copper and pilot MacReady fly to this Norwegian camp to find out what is going on.

They find the camp in ruins, burned and destroyed and the personnel is missing or found to be horribly mutilated. They also find a hideous creature with semi-human traits that has apparently been burned and MacReady finds a tomb of ice where something has come out of as if something has arisen from its sleep.

Having returned to the American camp, the dog starts to transform into an alien entity in order to absorb the other dogs. The barking of the dogs alert the camp personnel and when they arrive some THING crawls out thru the roof before the remainder is burned with a flame thrower. The remains are examined by Blair and he concludes that these remains are from some organism that tries to imitate other life forms and assimilate them before becoming them. He also notes the remains aren’t quite dead yet.

When the remains are quarantined, a tendril is seen infecting Bennings and assimilating him but the others arrive in time to see he is not yet completed and MacReady burns him. The situation worsens when the men start to distrust each other and paranoia sets in, keeping them from forming a steady front against the thing. But before the film is over, the situation goes from bad to even worse, towards a strongly nihilistic conclusion.The wholly original and outrageous special effects were designed and executed by Rob Bottin, with the exception of the dog creature, which was created and manned by Stan Winston and his team.

Bottin kept in mind that it was a wonderful thing not to know what one could not do but the immense pressure to produce his effects and pull things off correctly did end him up in hospital once the shoot was over.

When THE THING opened in 1982, it opened against Steven Spielberg’s ET THE EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL and Ridley Scott’s BLADE RUNNER. Reviews in the press were mixed (most reviewers did not appreciate the negative ending nor its nihilistic atmosphere) and box office results remained poor. People preferred their aliens sweet, apparently and were not prepared to spend money on films with bleak endings. (It is therefore very ironic that THE THING now belongs to the highest rated Cult Favourites, but it finally found its audience on video and DVD later on.)

Also, part of the problem was that Universal did not know how to market the film. When the studio commissioned artist Drew Struzan to design a poster for the film, Struzan’s design turned out to be rather mystifying. Apparently one had not told what kind of horror Struzan should go for in his design. His art work is beautiful but somewhat odd when referring to this film.


Carpenter had filmed a scene showing that MacReady had survived, sort of as a happy ending after all but this scene was never included in any performance of the film. Although Carpenter has stated he had a good idea for a sequel, Universal never expressed any interest in it. The Thing has had sequels in American published comics though and a prequel is being produced with basically the same title: The Thing. (However it will not be John Carpenter’s The Thing. The director is Matthijs van Heijningen jr and the film will be released in 2011.) It will feature a lot of practical effects like the Carpenter film and deal with the Norwegian camp and what their personnel experienced. Carpenter’s stance on this is rather ambivalent. Since he had never been contacted about it, he does not really care. He was only the ‘hired gun” on the Universal film back in ‘82.

Despite the lack of success back in the day, John Carpenter’s The Thing is a Masterpiece of Modern Horror and Suspense. It dares to be original and unconventional, is totally ruthless in its dealings with the victims and ultimately does not care to bow to the audience with a happily resolved ending. The imaginative creature designs by Rob Bottin are both hideous and aesthetically beautiful yet in the audience’s recollection, it is exactly these designs that are recalled afterwards because they are totally original and in no way derivative of other designs.


Finally, Carpenters steady, controlled direction allows the film to calmly go from controlled calm to utter nihilistic chaos and paranoia. John Carpenter’s The Thing is a tough film to digest but as such it ranks among the best films he has ever made. It is unfortunate that at the time of its release it was not appreciated more. But I remember seeing it in the cinema at the time and being amazed at its incredible and ruthless beauty. It has been a favourite film of mine ever since.

So thank you, John Carpenter ! I look forward to your upcoming film The Ward.

The Best 100 Films of All Time: Dirty Harry (1971)

The early seventies was a violent time in our culture. This is also reflected in the films of the time. The French Connection and Dirty Harry are two first rate examples of films that delineate the rise of crime in urban societies and the effects on general populace.

‘Dirty’ Harry Calahan was a character devised by Harry Julian Fink, R.M. Fink and Dean Riesner to represent a burned out cop in his mid fifties. Fed up with having the punks go free half an hour after booking, he would do what was necessary for the welfare of society and kill them in the act. This of course would also save the justice system some money.

Originally written for Frank Sinatra, the singer bowed out when he, after having just lost his father and finding the big gun too heavy to lift (he’d suffered a broken wrist some years before), opted to do some lightweight material. Offered to Robert Mitchum, John Wayne and Burt Lancaster, these stars all turned it down and the role went to younger actors like Marlon Brando and Paul Newman. Newman said no too but offered the advice: “Why don’t you ask Clint Eastwood?” Eastwood requested the location be changed from New York to San Francisco and Don Siegel being hired as the director and subsequently said yes.



I know what you’re thinking: “Did he fire six shots, or only five?” Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I’ve kinda lost track myself. But being this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: “Do I feel lucky?” Well do ya, punk?



Harry is assigned to investigate a murder case which turns up a ransom demand of one million dollars by a serial killer called Scorpio. Scorpio, a disturbed young man who intends to keep on killing if he isn’t given the money, says he has buried a girl at a location he only knows. The girl has a limited amount of breathable air left so they need to find her quickly or she will suffocate. However, after Harry gets the information from Scorpio by torturing him following a gruelling ordeal for the money drop, they find the girl dead in her grave. While the police brass are all over Harry because of his improper conduct in obtaining necessary information, the killer is released and he pays a punk to beat him up severely. Scorpio blames it on Harry, who is taken off the case. When Scorpio then kidnaps a school bus full of children, Harry does not hesitate to follow him and deal with him the only way possible.



Harry Calahan would have been a significantly different character had Sinatra still played him but the attitude and indifference (to bureaucracy and red tape) that Eastwood exhibits as Harry Calahan make him a unique character to cut thru red tape when necessary and do that which is right. This is why his character is so successful. In a time where police brutality seemed to be rampant and crime seemed to be on the rise, this is the kind of police officer people would rather see on the job. But the press was also very critical of what message this would bring to the world. That made Dirty Harry a highly controversial film when it opened in 1971.

The music was composed by Lalo Schifrin, who previously had done the theme and music for MISSION IMPOSSIBLE. Schifrin wrote in a style that would only later be described as acid jazz and included many popular instruments and orchestrations in his score. Schifrin would alternate later Dirty Harry films with fellow composer Jerry Fielding, who would emphasize the jazz roots of Eastwood more.



Made on a paltry 4 million dollar budget, the film made more than 30 million dollars in its domestic release and gave rise to 4 sequels (none of which however enjoy the same quality as this excellent film). Don Siegel made a great urban thriller and even now, with Clint Eastwood too old to even act anymore, there is talk of a new version of Dirty Harry.

It is doubtful if a reboot would do justice to what Harry was in the past but apparently there is talk of one to be made. I wonder what Clint Eastwood will think of that when it comes into production. Even though he has stated he is done with the character (when GRAN TORINO went into production, there were rumours that this would be Dirty Harry’s return to the cinema but this was quickly denied by studio officials), his approval would seem to cast a heavy vote in a new version.

James Bond: For Your Eyes Only (1981)

Despite the incredible worldwide success of MOONRAKER, it was decided in the pre-production phase of the next Bond film to return back to basics and make a serious attempt at a Bond-style cold war thriller. When John Glen was hired as the director of FOR YOUR EYES ONLY, he would make choices for the Bond films that would redefine the character of James Bond. Bond would go back to being a tough professional and be less of a playboy. (Still, Glen directed all of the Bond films of the 1980s and would allow a varying degree of humour to influence the story.)

In order to do away with the past, the film opens at a grave site where Bond is visiting the grave of his late wife. Being picked up by a helicopter, an unidentified villain overpowers the controls of the helicopter via remote control and nearly crashes Bond with the helicopter on several locations. The unnamed villain looks very much like (Telly Savalas’s) Blofeld but no mention is made of his name. The reason for this of course is that Blofeld was part of the Thunderball legacy awarded to Kevin McClory after THUNDERBALL. 10 Years after the release of this film, McClory would regain the film rights of Thunderball and McClory would try again and again to remake the film. He finally succeeded in 1983 with NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN (more on that film later) but EON of course wanted to make a statement that they could do without the legacy of Blofeld and SPECTRE. So a humorous ending for Blofeld was devised in the opening sequence of FYEO, in which Bond drops the unnamed villain off in a chimney, finally doing away with him in a rather undignified way.



Going back to a more serious note, the film then moves to a British spy vessel apparently being sunk by an old second world war mine, which is being brought aboard in its fishing nets. As the ATAC technology aboard this vessel could be used to target NATO vessels and/or planes, Bond is ordered to recover the ATAC unit but finds his efforts thwarted by different parties, who also have designs for this technology. And this wouldn’t be a cold war thriller if the KGB wouldn’t finally show up at the finale as well.



FOR YOUR EYES ONLY was a solid hit for EON to start the 1980s off with and although Roger Moore did admit he had a bit of a problem with the tougher depiction of Bond, (Moore objected to coldheartedly kicking a car off a precipice, condemning the marooned driver to death but relented after being convinced by the director it fit the story) he probably was at his best in this film. However from this moment on, Moore was contracted per film and this allowed Broccoli to be on the lookout for other actors to take over the part of Bond.



(Interesting side note to this last bit is that Pierce Brosnan’s (then) wife was in the cast of the film and when Brosnan was visiting the set, Broccoli was eyeing him heavily as a possible contender for the Bond role later on. Unfortunately, when Moore was out of the picture after VIEW TO A KILL, Brosnan was still stuck on a contract to the American television show REMINGTON STEELE, so the part went to Dalton. When Dalton called it quits in 1994, the offer went out to Brosnan again.)



Despite the more serious nature of the film, the story does allow for quite some humour in the plot to come through, but nevertheless the film stays off the comedic path. Memorable moments with humour include the car chase in a Renault 2CV thru the mountain roads of Spain, a spectacular bob sled and skiing chase and the phone conversation of Bond with the Prime Minister at the end of the film.

Sheena Easton’s title song was a big hit on the radio yet Blondie had also been approached to record a title song for the film, which can be found on a 1982 album of theirs. The dramatic music of the film was this time handled by Bill Conti, previously famous for his scores for the ROCKY films. Conti handled the score with a contemporary feel but injected quite some 80s pop music influences here and there as well.



One tragic note during the production was that Bernard Lee, the actor who had played M in all of the previous films, had died shortly before this film went into production. Instead of recasting him, they merely hinted M was on leave.



FOR YOUR EYES ONLY was the biggest box office hit for United Artists of 1981 and saved the studio from a disastrous loss over the previous year’s HEAVEN’S GATE. However, United Artists would merge with MGM and henceforth the Bond films would be presented by MGM/UA from Octopussy on. Marvel Comics also did a comic book adaptation of the film that was quite successful.

James Bond: Moonraker (1979)

After THE SPY WHO LOVED ME turned out to be not only a box office hit but a revalidation of Roger Moore as the James Bond of the 1970s as well, it was decided to make the next film even bigger and more spectacular.

In the meantime, however, a man named George Lucas had released a film called STAR WARS, while his friend Steven Spielberg had struck it big with CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND, about a visitation from outer space. So someone at Broccoli’s HQ apparently suggested: why not have Bond go out into space?


Of all of the Fleming novels MOONRAKER comes closest to having something to do with rockets (and possibly space) but of course, for the 1970s the novel was far too outdated. So, like with SPY, a totally new story was concocted, in which Bond investigates the theft of a MOONRAKER SPACE SHUTTLE. He goes to exotic locales, meets up with gorgeous ladies to face off a global threat but if all we encounter is JAWS (from Spy, now employed by the current villain of the week), the drama in the film sort of goes out of the window.


And as the Gondola chase in Venice, Italy shows in this film, there is a definite sense of overkill here as to the humour. This does affect the dramatic storyline somewhat but all in all, the film does present a very nice balance of suspense with wit, as well as a nice balance of the visual highlights of the movie.

The movie starts out with a spectacular sequence in which Bond is thrown from a plane without a parachute. He manages to get his hands on a parachute but then sees JAWS come after him. The sequence ends in humour, before Bond is briefed about the baddie of the week, Sir Hugo Drax, an aristocrat who wants to create a whole new human order by destroying human life first and then repopulating the earth. (Gee, where did I hear that one before?) This sets off a series of events both humorous and exciting on different locales before we end up in a magnificent space station of Mr Drax himself.


And wouldn’t you know? The Marines show up to engage in a spectacular laser battle, while Bond wrecks the space station, kills Drax and stops his plan to kill all human life on earth. You might understand that the film at times strains credibility beyond the breaking point, but one cannot miss the fact that it does so entertainingly. When Jaws for instance sees there will be no place for him and his lady love on Drax’s new world order, he simply switches sides and helps Bond out. Forget logic !

Ken Adam’s space station is a sight to behold. Beautifully designed and constructed, it turns out however that space stations without force fields (like the ones they use as shields in Star Trek) are incredibly fragile and it is no big deal at all to blow it to kingdom come. The presence of John Barry no longer presents the usual jazzy Bond sound. No, it plays slow, lush themes heavily orchestrated for strings, percussion and brass with one of Barry’s biggest orchestras this side of Dances With Wolves. Barry delivers a gorgeous score and a great Shirley Bassey song, even if it was originally intended for Johnny Mathis.



All in all the film is very entertaining and Moore is wholly at ease in this somewhat ludicrous tale. But is Bond going into space like this not a little bit too far fetched? Yes it is, but MOONRAKER still scored big at the box office. Well, why not, it’s just very amusing bullshit!?!

James Bond : The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

The mid seventies were troublesome times for Albert R. Broccoli. The disappointing results of The Man with the Golden Gun and the breakup of the partnership with Harry Saltzman took their toll on him. Yet, despite many problems in the development of the tenth Bond film and the financial worries Broccoli had to deal with, in 1977 BOND was back in THE SPY WHO LOVED ME.

Ian Fleming’s original story told about a bad situation a lady had come into, and how a man called James Bond happened to arrive on scene and extricated her from this predicament but due to an unusual story structure, the story differed greatly from the other Bond novels and Fleming may have been disappointed with it himself. In any way, he wanted nothing from the story to be used, but the title was free for use.

The story of The Spy Who Loved Me had gone thru many changes but what ended up on the screen seemed to be the perfect blend of action, suspense and humour to define Bond for the 1970s. (Interestingly enough though, one can make an argument that it is basically a better made version of You Only Live Twice, think it through, even down to the same director.)



Roger Moore was certainly at his best in this film, which was initially written by veteran screenwriter Richard Maibaum. When director Lewis Gilbert was brought in, he suggested screenwriter Christopher Wood to do a rewrite on it to resolve some issues. Afterwards, the story told of nuclear submarines disappearing off the face of the earth. Both the Russians and the British send out their best agent, pitting Anya Amasova (Barbara Bach) against Bond in a competitive race for the knowledge and control of the facilities to make these disappearances possible. Bond impresses Amasova not only with his cool but also with his LOTUS ESPRIT, which turns out to have many additional features, probably not intended by the original designers. They soon identify Karl Stromberg as the villain and inside his lair, Stromberg shows himself to be a megalomaniacal sociopath who wished to destroy the world and create a new world order from his nautical bases. It is then up to Bond and Amasova to take out Stromberg and destroy his operation.



It is unfortunate however that John Barry is absent from the film but Marvin Hamlisch manages to update the Bond theme adequately and underscores the film to a T, even quoting Lawrence of Arabia in the Egypt sequence. The production design by Ken Adam is again sumptuous and spectacular, certainly in the latter half of the film.



Richard Kiel plays JAWS, a tall metal-toothed henchman in the services of the villainous Stromberg. Jaws was one of the few villains to pass over to the next Bond film and although it was thru no fault of German character actor Curd Jurgens, it is unfortunate that Stromberg comes off as a weak caricature of Auric Goldfinger, the prototypical villain. But because Roger Moore’s Bond films favour a tongue in cheek style of humour, both Jaws and Stromberg do not negatively affect the high level of entertainment value this film brings to the series.



For many, THE SPY WHO LOVED ME is the best Bond film that Roger Moore ever starred in. (Roger Moore believes so himself as well, as he says in his recent autobiography.) For me, it was the first Bond film I ever saw in the cinema or outside the cinema. So I also carry a soft spot for this Bond film.

JAMES BOND: THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN (1974)

Roger Moore’s second outing as Bond always seemed to me to have culture, wit and sophistication but I was pretty young when I saw it and much of the criticism aimed at the film at the time of release passed me by. What it came down to, and composer John Barry also said this in an interview, is that it never seemed to get to the actual point. It never seemed to come together and just meandered from one entertaining situation to the next.



The presence of Christopher Lee as Francisco Scaramanga did not seem to matter much in this. Au contraire, there were moments that, once Scaramanga was (quite easily) taken care of, the true villain showed itself in Herve Villechaize, playing the diminutive servant of the earlier mentioned hitman, but this was of course a notion quickly set aside.



While it seems indeed to be the case that the story is almost looking for a raison d’etre, screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz had taken a turn at it and begged to be let off of the film because he had run out of steam for Bond, in his own words. Richard Maibaum, veteran of 6 earlier Bond film scripts, had then looked it over and delivered his take on the story but it wasn’t until Michael Wilson added the McGuffin to the script with the SOLEX AGITATOR as a solution to the Energy Crisis, that things seemed to fall together into a coherent whole.



A quickly added reappearance of Sheriff J.W. Pepper ( a humorous note from the previous film) did not present any jewel in the crown of a merely adequately set up entertaining film but to me the film’s style was indicative of the direction chosen with the arrival of Roger Moore as Her Majesty’s Hitman. Meaning: don’t try to think it thru too deeply; take it easy. That is where the Roger Moore films are best: they are lightweight entertainment, taking off the edges that were dulled already by the years passed. The Result: some highly entertaining moments when Pepper sees Bond again and recognizes him, and subsequently tries to make the gig his own by tacking along with Bond when he highjacks a car to chase after Scaramanga and Nick Nack. Brilliant, no. Funny, sure.

Considering the titular threat, Scaramanga is done away with awfully easily and quickly but after having seen this film, nothing much remains of it in one’s mind anyway as a masterpiece of it’s time. Sure, there is a wild car stunt where computers did some groundbreaking numbers crunching for a sideways flip. Sure, the finale on Scaramanga’s isle is quite spectacular in setting. But despite the beautiful Asian background and the attention for it’s culture, Bond (and opponent) seem(s) to have lost (their/his) edge in this film.



Moore seems to sail thru the film with great confidence, making the part more his own and redefining what the Bond for the 1970s was to be: a sophisticated ladies man, who’d much rather bed them than kill them. Christopher Lee, who was a nephew to Ian Fleming, plays the villain Scaramanga with great panache but somehow the film seems to get bogged down by the wonderful scenery and the weight of it’s own wittiness.


It would be a while before the next Bond film was to appear due to several ongoing problems plaguing EON. But with THE SPY WHO LOVED ME, Bond would return with wit and edge all intact.