“No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die!”
Pssst… Stranger, which one do you prefer? I enjoy your analysis but would think similar criticisms could be made about most every Bond film.
You can never please everybody. Had I left it off inevitably there would have been half a dozen complaints of “Where’s Never Say Never Again?” :rolleyes:
From Russia With Love is my personal favorite, but I have great affection for Thunderball for its elaborate underwater scenes and Connery’s last good performance in a Bond film. Plus the Tom Jones title song and John Barry’s incidentals are the best of the entire franchise.
Stranger
I knew before voting that this was going to be a cage match between FRWL and Goldfinger but FRWL gets my vote, with Goldfinger a close second. FRWL was grittier where Goldfinger was beginning to swing into camp territory. I don’t have time to list all the reasons but a few spring immediately to mind…
Women: I actually think Tatiana and Pussy (though it’s fun to hear Connery pronounce it as ‘Poosy’ over and over) are pretty even here but the gypsy cat fight tips the scales to FRWL.
Villain: SPECTRE > a blonde fat man with a laser.
Henchmen: Red Grant (Robert Shaw) >> Oddjob
Allies: Karim bey >>> Felix and company. Karim bey steals every scene he’s in. (“I’ve had a particularly fascinating life. Would you like to hear about it? You would!”)
Locations: Istanbul and Yugoslavia are more interesting and exotic locations than Florida and Kentucky. I generally hate it when Bond visits the US. (Don’t get me started on Diamonds are Forever.)
Don’t get me wrong. Goldfinger is still a very close second and is my top 5 of Bond films overall. I just think FRWL edges it out.
There’s one other thing about Goldfinger that bothers me a bit. All through the movie we’re told how much the titular character loves gold; not for its value or what he can buy with it, but merely for its own sake. He loves its color, its divine heaviness, or something like that. And yet the whole Fort Knox plot goes against that motivation. It will make his gold more valuable, yes, but won’t bring him any more of it. In fact, it will be that much harder for him to acquire more gold if the price goes up as he predicts.
To be fair, when Bond follows Goldfinger to Switzerland, he’s only out to discover how he’s smuggling gold out of England. From the time he sees Mr. Ling, he never has the chance to get a message out to HQ (leaving the grounds he surprises Tilly into activating the tripwire, more incompetence); and doesn’t know about the Mafia heads coming to Kentucky until he’s there, himself.
Must give a tip of the cap to Richard Vernon as the gold expert who briefs Bond about gold smuggling at dinner. He could go from steely cold to befuddled (Slartibartfast in the 1981 TV version of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy) without even having to restyle his mustache.
And no love for Luciana Paluzzi in Thunderball? She’d make it into the top tier of Bond girls on voice alone (although I think it was probably dubbed).
All the more remarkable since the actor, Pedro Armendáriz, had terminal cancer at the time.
Looking at the IMDB page, if I read it right, it states that Largo’s (the main villain, played by Adolfo Celi) voice, and Domino’s voice (Largo’s naive squeeze, played by Claudine Auger) were dubbed, but Ms. Paluzzi’s purr was all hers.
I think Goldfinger is a more pop-culturally known Bond movie because of its theme song, the murder by gold paint, the laser scene, Odd Job, and Pussy Galore. I admit that it was the first movie I thought of when thinking of Connery’s Bond films.
Despite that, I think From Russia With Love edges it out.
It would have been better if she’d been nude - well, a belt an a knife - as in the book.
I must be the only Bond fan alive not enamored with Tatiana. In fact her lack of appeal (sloppy, whiny) likely tempered my overall ranking of that film. I am however firmly in the Robert Shaw, Pedro Armendáriz appreciation club.
For me, it’s “From Russia with Love.” I hesitate to use this term with any James Bond film, but it is the most believable.
From Russia With Love, no question. It’s not just a Bond movie, but a genuinely good thriller.
I personally prefer Thunderball. I like the plot, I like Domino, and I prefer the villain to Goldfinger, though admittedly one of the best lines ever is “I expect you to die.”
Goldfinger is favored by critics, but I prefer Thunderball. Best two bond girls.
Auger is stunning.
I think Goldfinger’s overrated. Literally nothing the eponymous character does in the film makes the slightest bit of sense and Bond only saves the day by raping ethics into Pussy.
Now Bond villains are rarely fountains of rationality and Connery always played Bond a wee bit rapey, so I’m not really arguing that Goldfinger was a bad Bond movie, it just isn’t in the same league as From Russia With Love.
I’m going with From Russia, With Love.
I’m not a fan of the gadgets, and this was a relatively low-tech movie. The only really implausible gadget was the rifle scope, and it wasn’t terribly beyond what the real world has produced. (OK, the periscope in the embassy was a little silly, but not outrageously so, IMHO.)
Robert Shaw’s version of Red Grant was better than the novel, yet still faithful to the novel. And Kerim Bey was utterly cool.
I went for Diamonds are Forever. Love the theme, the ‘smooching couple’ disguise thing that Bond does, and the rising-music-while-being-cremated episode in the funeral home.
Then again, I went for Live & let Die as my favourite Moore film, so I clearly have a thing for trash.
Goldfinger followed by Diamonds are Forever
I downloaded the entire series from iTunes and am now watching through them all.
I’m watching Dr. No right now for the first time in a very long time (at least 20 years) and noticed they’re really giving the theme music a workout. I’m only 20 minutes in and they’ve played it at least 5 times, including the opening credits. Otherwise, I’m really enjoying the Sean Connery performance and the old-school 1960s filmmaking style.