The Living Daylights (1987)

A lot has been said about Timothy Dalton being the worst James Bond. Of course, many others point to George Lazenby and his one-and-done stint as 007 as being the worst. This just goes to show you how wrong people can be.

While Roger Moore’s campy pretty-boy antics may have worked during the escapist cinema of the 70s, Timothy Dalton’s turn as James Bond seems to more accurately reflect the grittiness that was the 1980s. For starters, Dalton actually looks like a killer. The challenges Bond faces are also not as simple as Moore’s Bond faced. The Living Daylights places Bond in a world that is much more like our own (or was at the time). Things are complicated, and Bond can’t afford to side-step physical confrontation.

The story is truly labyrinthine, featuring double-crosses, deception and a murky picture of what’s going on until the final portion of the film. This all works to its credit though. Dalton’s new take on Bond is a breath of fresh air, despite a few disparities between what James Bond would really do and what he ends up doing (aka- not shooting a sniper because it happens to be a gorgeous woman). Granted, those disparities come back to help the story in the end, it still nags me in the back of my mind.

With The Living Daylights, the reinvention of James Bond has gotten off to a very good start.

RATING: 3.25 out of 5

A View to a Kill (1985)

For me, this is the bottom of the barrel for James Bond films. The plot is bad (megalomaniac plots to destroy silicon valley so his micro-processing company can take over the computer industry- I bet Bill Gates enjoyed it, but he’s probably the only one), the acting is bad (even Christopher Walken, as said megalomaniac, can’t save this festering mess), and just when you thought Roger Moore was getting better at this Bond gig, he delivers the worst performance imaginable.

At least when Connery was tired of 007 he let is bad attitude show through in the character. Roger Moore just looks bored and tired, as he should, since he was 57 years old when filming took place!

I think the main reason that this is the absolute worst Bond film is that it doesn’t even feel like a Bond film. Everything about it just feels generic, and James Bond is anything but generic. Fortunately, this was Roger Moore’s final appearance as 007.

RATING: 2.5 out of 5

Octopussy (1983)

For some reason, and I don’t know why, but this is my favorite of Roger Moore’s Bond films. There’s action and adventure, and I don’t even mind the camp this time around.

Similar to For Your Eyes Only, Octopussy presents a more plausible setup- a power-hungry Soviet general plans to gain the upper hand in the Cold War by setting up a nuclear explosion in West Germany to look like an accident. With Europe already uneasy over the issue of nuclear proliferation, the accident will spur Europe to pursue disarmament, allowing General Orlov to sweep through Europe, increasing the might of the Soviet Union.

To stop this all from happening, Bond approaches their main accomplice, a circus owner and smuggler named Octopussy. She had no previous knowledge of Orlov’s plan and, as it turns out, she owes Bond for letting her father commit suicide instead of facing a court martial. Convenient for sure, but still a very intriguing way to turn the tables.

Bond and Octopussy work hard to prevent the nuclear strike and Bond eventually has to dress up as a circus clown in order to gain access to the circus transporting the bomb, saving the day at the last possible second. I find it personally satisfying to see Roger Moore dressed as a clown in the final act, because it highlights just what he turned the character of 007 into with his stint as Bond. Call it poetic justice.

RATING: 3.25 out of 5

For Your Eyes Only (1981)

Certainly an improvement from Moonraker, For Your Eyes Only also turns out to be one of the best performances by the aging Roger Moore as super spy James Bond.

The film is also another back-to-basics installment for the series, seeing 007 using far fewer gadgets and much less camp. There are double-crossings and revenge plots, all of which surround the recovery of a device that could make the Cold War go hot in a heartbeat. Kristatos, an ex-KGB agent is trying to recover this device, which enables the user to target virtually all enemy craft, but his accomplice ends up joining James Bond in thwarting him, after learning that Kristatos means to use him as a fall guy.

Bond is also joined by a young woman intent on killing Kristatos in revenge for his murdering of her father. All of this may seem a bit overwhelming, but it heightens the stakes for putting an end to this installment’s bad guy. The final battle is more or less well done, with Bond’s band of warriors ascending a nearly sheer rock formation to reach the enemies hideout at the top.

The only things that keep For Your Eyes Only from getting a higher rating are: 1) A completely out of place re-emergence of Ernst Blofeld in the beginning, in which Bond seems to vanquish the man responsible for his wife’s death (which audiences had all but forgot about by this point); 2) A completely annoying and unnecessary character named Bibi, (who somehow creates an alibi hiding all the badness that chief bad guy keeps doing) who tries unsuccessfully to prove to Bond via sex that she’s not so innocent as everyone thinks she is; and 3) A completely out of place ending sequence, featuring Bond receiving a thank you call from Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Subtract these elements, and you’d have a pretty good Bond film.

It’s assuring, however, to know that James Bond is willing to draw the line at having sex with minors. Cheers for that one.

RATING: 3 out of 5

Moonraker (1979)

It’s like The Spy Who Loved Me, only in outer space and with Bond teaming up with an American spy hottie. This was the 007 franchise’s answer to Star Wars (if that’s conceivable). The end credits of The Spy Who Loved Me promised us the next outing would be For Your Eyes Only, but Star Wars came out, and since space adventure was on every cinemagoers mind, they took Ian Fleming’s novella Moonraker and put it on the big screen.

It’s goofy! It’s tacky! It’s Bond in Space! I think by this point in Roger Moore’s stint as Bond I had resigned myself to the fact that he wasn’t going to pull an about face and be cool like Sean Connery. Being a NASA nerd, I enjoyed the whole outer space bit, even if it was ridiculously cheesy by 70’s standards, let alone today.

It’s fun if you let it be fun, but Moonraker falls more under the banner of ‘guilty pleasure’ than anything else. It’s a Bond film I know I shouldn’t have liked, but did anyway. Compared to the series origins, Moonraker is absolutely terrible, but it’s more enjoyable than most of Moore’s films to this point. My eyes still roll when I think of two of the characters- Dr. Holly Goodhead and Jaws. Yeah, that’s right, Goodhead. Having a woman named Pussy Galore was funny for innuendo’s sake in Goldfinger, but the string of lousy names has outstayed its welcome for me. Holly Goodhead is the last straw, hopefully.

Jaws, on the other hand, is one of the few minor characters to appear more than once in the series. He was the highlighted henchmen over the main bad guy in The Spy Who Loved Me, and he returns in Moonraker for this new bad guy. How he got there, I don’t know, but Jaws has steel jaws and can bite through metal and stuff, so I guess he was popular enough to be brought back. I think he’s hokey, but that’s just my natural reaction to a guy with steel teeth.

The theme song is even forgettable in this film. All flash and no substance, but fun all the same.

RATING: 2.75 out of 5