Thunderball (1965) threw in everything but the
kitchen sink, and was the first Bond movie to be co-produced by the infamous
Kevin McClory. Back in the late 50s, Ian Fleming had written a script with
McClory and Jack Whittingham for a pilot episode of a proposed tv series to be
called ‘James Bond Of The Secret Service’. The series never materialised, and
Fleming went on to adapt the script into a novel, renaming it ‘Thunderball’.
McClory and Whittingham were a little upset when Fleming refused to acknowledge
their contribution, but they eventually received recognition when credited on
the new film. McClory demanded to be onboard as co-producer, alongside EON’s
Albert ‘Cubby’ Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, and was allowed the rights to
produce his own film version after EON’s rights elapsed in ten years time. In
hindsight, this can be seen as rather short-sighted by EON, but nobody ever
expected the Bond movies to last more than a decade. A great pre-title sequence
saw Bond duking it out with a SPECTRE agent at a funeral. The agent, dressed as
the dead man’s widow battles furiously with Connery, throwing tables, chairs,
and a plant pot at him before being strangled with a poker. The sight of Bond
punching what appeared to be a woman in the face was a great shock, and the
fight sequence borders on parody as agent 007 trades punches with a man in a
frock. The brutal nature of the fight stifles any potential sniggering at
stuntman Bob Simmons (who had also doubled as Bond in the opening gunbarrels)
wearing a black skirt, heavy make-up, and high heels.
007 and a man in a dress.
Unfortunately we had
another drippy leading lady in the shapely form of model Claudine Auger, but us
schoolboys were amply compensated once again by the sultry Martine Beswick
returning in a different guise as a fellow M.I.6 agent; in a bikini. We were
doubly delighted by the kinky bad girl Fiona Volpe (played by Luciana Paluzzi)
who nibbled at Connery’s ears in their bedroom scenes, and tried to kill him
several times (once whilst riding a motorbike and dressed all in leather).
Adolfo Celi as Largo was a suitably sadistic, eye-patch wearing bad guy – yet
another employee of SPECTRE, and we got another glimpse of ‘Number One’ (face
in shadow, seen stroking his white cat once again).
Rik Van Nutter as 'Felix Leiter' gives Bond a hand.
Claudine Auger as 'Domino' with Adolfo Celi as 'Largo'.
Gadgets galore!
A long underwater battle
had Bond flying through the water wearing a huge jet pack, and the action was
aided enormously by John Barry’s atmospheric score. Tom Jones belted out the
theme song, and was even reported to have fainted during recording, whilst
screaming out the final lengthy note. Bond was massive now, and this movie was
the biggest yet. In the shadow of Goldfinger, the film was an even bigger box
office success but there was a noticeable dip in quality. The pace was a little
sluggish at times, and Connery was beginning to look a little tired. In real
life, Connery was growing bored with the role, and despised the intrusions on
his private life by an insatiable world press. He was also getting pretty fed
up with the larger than life stories, and the increasing reliance on gadgetry and
gimmicks to get Bond out of trouble. Thunderball, like its predecessors, was a
pretty faithful adaptation of the source novel, but everything was about to
change on the next EON film.
The sound of Bond: Music maestro John Barry.
I bloody loved the Bond films! I taped them all on
to audio cassette, and would be outraged if any of the family so much as
coughed or even breathed too loudly while recording was in progress. At nights,
I’d lay in bed listening to them through a single earphone, and remembering the
images I’d seen on tv. Only this time, I imagined them in full colour –
particularly Ursula’s blonde hair, Martine’s olive-skinned thighs, and Luciana’s
luscious red lipstick. What were these movies doing to me? I was only twelve!
Apart from the lovely ladies, exotic locations (I’d only ever left Wigan twice;
to visit Southport and Rhyl), fantastic villains, and marvellous fist fights,
the thing I was starting to love most about the films was the music. John
Barry’s music. Monty Norman’s score for ‘Dr No’ was the weakest of the series,
and that man was bloody lucky to have the hugely talented Mr Barry totally rip
apart and rebuild his James Bond theme into something beautiful, ageless, and
totally awe-inspiring. FRWL, Goldfinger, and Thunderball had superb theme
songs, atmospheric melodies, and nerve-jangling action cues. Apart from the
sheer energy, there was always an underlying melancholy that contrasted
perfectly with the epic sweep of the individual scores. Fleming’s Bond, despite
his expensive suits, exotic excursions, rich food, and devastatingly attractive
women, was actually a pretty sad individual at heart. His job had him putting
his life on the line regularly, killing people in cold blood, and enduring
hideous torture (In ‘Casino Royale’, the debut novel, Bond has his meat and two
veg pummelled by a sadistic Benzedrine-sniffing dwarf). In the novels, Fleming
had Bond regularly musing on the shallowness of his existence, and the pursuit
of instant gratification between his life-threatening missions. Barry seemed to
totally understand this, and his music gave Bond an inner life that was rarely
alluded to in the script (until, of course, Daniel Craig’s tenure).
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The young Ian Fleming.
Fleming reads the US edition of his debut novel.
Fleming meets Connery on the set of 'From Russia With Love' (Fleming cameos in the film).
Rival film
companies had begun to jump on the ‘Bondwagon’, and the sixties saw a huge
increase in spy movies, most of which failed miserably to replicate the Bond
formula. James Coburn’s ‘Derek Flint’ was a hit, but was an obvious parody of
Bond. Flint was virtually superhuman, and ultimately cartoonish. Tom Adams’
Charles Vine in ‘Licensed To Kill’ tried to be 007 on a micro budget, and
wasn’t a bad try. But Connery was head and shoulders above them all. Sean
Connery’s Bond, EON’s production values, Fleming’s original stories, and John
Barry’s music were a winning formula not easily copied.
James Coburn flashes the gnashers as Derek Flint.
Tom Adams as 'Charles Vine' in 'Licensed To Kill'.
Vine in action!
Bond was massive in Japan, which led to EON’s choice
of the next film to be Fleming’s melancholic and death-obsessed novel ‘You Only
Live Twice’.
A sombre story finds 007 seeking vengeance for the death of his
wife in the previous novel (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service), and tracking down
his nemesis Ernst Stavro Blofeld – previously referred to only as ‘Number One’-
to Japan. Fleming wanted to kill Bond off
by this point, and the novel ends with Bond presumed killed in action,
and an obituary published in The Times. Much of the novel could not be used in
the film script for various reasons (the most obvious being the fact that Bond
is a widow at the start), and so a completely new story was concocted by none
other than Roald Dahl. Yes, ROALD DAHL. The author of Charlie and The Chocolate
Factory, Matilda, The Witches, The BFG. Yes, THAT Roald Dahl. There was also
another new director onboard in the shape of Lewis Gilbert, and a reluctant
Connery back for a fifth time as Bond, and now completely and utterly pissed
off with playing second fiddle to increasingly preposterous plots and, more
importantly, long shooting schedules and endless publicity jaunts.
Connery getting fed up with Bond.
A typical Japanese fisherman!
Filming in
Japan would be the final straw for Connery, with Japanese photographers even
reportedly following him into toilets. No surprise that the actor looks surly
throughout, appears to be carrying a few extra pounds, and is mightily
unconvincing when disguised as a Japanese fisherman. Thankfully, John Barry
gave us another memorable theme song performed by Nancy Sinatra, who got the
gig thanks to her recent hit ‘These boots were made for walking’. YOLT had a
weak story which had 007 faking his own death in order to work more easily
undercover in Japan (this is a ludicrous plot device, as when we first see him,
post death, 007 is walking casually around the neon-lit streets of Tokyo, and
attending public events such as a sumo wrestling match). We finally see ‘Number
One’s face when he is revealed to be the aforementioned Blofeld, but it’s a
little disappointing to see him played by the distinctly unthreatening Donald
Pleasence (more usually cast as weasly, pathetic characters such as the
short-sighted P.O.W. in ‘The Great Escape’).
This is NOT 'Dr Evil'!
It was the end (for now) of Sean
Connery as 007, but ‘James Bond will return in On Her Majesty’s Secret
Service’. Yep, the novel they SHOULD have filmed before YOLT. Thanks to the
bright idea of exploiting the Japanese market, EON had made a rare
miscalculation resulting in a missed opportunity of dovetailing OHMSS and YOLT,
and instead had managed to give us the first lacklustre Bond film, and annoy
their star actor into quitting. Was this the end for Bond? Did EON assume
they’d be able to lure Connery back for OHMSS? It was 1967. The Summer Of Love.
Was Bond now out of step with the times?
Who will fill Connery's shoes?
Some time around 1977 I sat down to watch ‘On Her
Majesty’s Secret Service’ (1969), the first non-Connery Bond movie. All I knew
about this one was that it starred “That George Lazenby bloke. Bloody idiot!”
Well, that was what my Dad used to say about it. Apparently they’d replaced the
irreplaceable Connery with a young Australian model who’d been ridiculed for
years as the guy who failed as Bond. Yikes! Had EON done it again? Misjudged
their audience and carried on the same crazy mistakes they’d made on YOLT? This
was going to be interesting.
The trailers on tv looked great. Diana Rigg, best
known as the sexy-as-hell Mrs Peel in another of my favourite tv series, The
Avengers was playing Countess Teresa, the girl who marries Bond. Then there was
Telly Savalas as Blofeld, who certainly looked far more threatening than Donald
Pleasence. Plus the fantastic theme music (the first Bond movie without an
opening title song), and the awesome looking ski chase sequences.
"Merry Christmas, 007".
It was a
shock to see Lazenby in action as 007, but I’d already seen lots of photos of
him as Bond and he looked a pretty good substitute for Connery. Well, I sat
down to watch OHMSS (in black and white, as usual), and was absolutely thrilled
by the pre-titles scene. Here we had Bond driving his Aston Martin along a
narrow road in the middle of the night, when he’s suddenly overtaken at speed
by an attractive young woman in a sportscar. We see Bond’s hands on the wheel,
his face in shadow, and the fact that he’s wearing a trilby. He’s wearing a hat
while driving? Weird! Some superb fast-paced editing accompanies Bond as he
rescues the girl from an attempted suicide by drowning, then battles a couple
of thugs in a fabulously choreographed fight sequence , with an ace orchestral
track by the ever-present and increasingly brilliant John Barry.
Peter Hunt directs George Lazenby.
Bond wears a kilt.
This was
fantastic! Then we came to the first shot of Mr Lazenby, and his first line to
a groggy Diana Rigg; “Good morning, my name’s Bond. James Bond”. Well, this was
different. Lazenby had a bright and breezy attitude, totally lacking Connery’s
ruthless persona. Oh, dear. But he was good in a fight, and was obviously keen
to be seen doing his own stunts. When Diana then leaves him alone on the beach,
we have the first and only instance of the actor playing Bond breaking the
‘fourth wall’ as Lazenby looks out at us with a cheeky grin and utters the
immortal words “This never happened to the other fella”. What? I’m sure I must
have spluttered out my Horlicks at that moment. What did he just say? Even my
dad laughed, and he only ever laughed at Benny Hill. The Bond movies were
continuing to evolve, and OHMSS was the best yet, in my 13 year old opinion. I
loved the whole atmosphere of the film, and with the only downbeat ending in a
Bond movie (up until ‘Casino Royale’ in 2006, once again), it was certainly
unique. Peter Hunt had been the brilliant editor on all the previous Bonds, and
here he was promoted to full directing duties, and boy did he make a cracking
job of it. Tightly choreographed fight scenes, stunning Alpine chase sequences,
and a superb battle between Bond and Blofeld flying at (literally) breakneck
speed down a treacherous bob sleigh run.
'Blofeld' (Telly Savalas) meets Bond, but fails to recognise him from their previous film encounter!
True love at last.
This one had it all, and has remained
my all-time favourite 007 movie. It also happened to be the longest Bond film,
but such was the frantic pace, that I hardly noticed the time. And as for
Lazenby? Well, I didn’t mind him at all; in fact it made the film all the more
realistic to have someone playing Bond who wasn’t the all conquering Connery.
Because I’d never seen Lazenby before (or much since), I found it quite
involving to watch an unknown play Bond. I was appalled to discover, several
years later, that it had been a relative failure at the box office (compared to
the previous five films), and that Peter Hunt never got to direct another. So
that was it for the 1960s. We’d had six Bond movies culminating in Bond sobbing
at the untimely death of his new bride on their wedding day.
A bleak ending to
a fabulous decade of movies that redefined the action genre, gave us an
immortal screen hero, and created one Scottish superstar. But OHMSS was to see
the end of the (semi) serious Bond thriller. It was now the 1970s, and the
world was in need of a few laughs.
“James
Bond will return...”
