The Living Daylights brings a new James Bond: my first one in four films. Timothy Dalton would play Bond twice, and for the first time in this marathon, I'll be going through a Bond's films in the order they actually came out. (Though I will watch two other films before getting to License to Kill.) I liked him. My wife said he was very "smiley"; I can't say I noticed that per se, but I did notice that he was more genuinely-- or at least seemingly genuinely-- emotional than Roger Moore's smarmy charm. There were a couple key scenes in this regard for me: one is when he's trying to get Kara Milovy, the villain's girlfriend, to accompany him out of Czechoslovakia. She's a cellist, and insists they need to go back for her cello before leaving the city. Bond forcefully says they don't have the time because the KGB is already on their tail. Smash cut to: Bond loading the cello into the car. I bet Sean Connery wouldn't have done that!
The woman on this poster represents
no actual film character, though.
The sequence that really made it stand out to me, though, is one where Bond is accompanying Kara on a day in Vienna. There's a sort of film-romance-style montage of them doing things like going on fun fair rides and Bond winning teddy bears at the shooting gallery and them going on a roller coaster. It's hard for me to imagine any previous Bond doing this, except for George Lazenby. But then Bond's MI6 contact in Vienna is killed-- and he becomes all seriousness and business, snapping at Kara as he tells her what they're doing next. Unlike with some other actors, it's not entirely clear to me which is meant to be the "real" Bond, which I like.
The Living Daylights takes the short story of that title as its jumping-off point. The short story is about Bond facing down a Soviet sniper so he can help a defector cross the Berlin Wall; after a pre-credits sequence, the film opens with a similar set-up, though with a number of changes. While in the story, a KGB sniper uses a cello case to smuggle her sniper rifle, in the film, Kara is a real cellist acting as a sniper in order to trick MI6 into believing a fake defection is real. The film mostly concerns the consequences of that fake defection.
It's decent, a solid mid-tier Bond film. Like the better Roger Moore films, it starts a bit goofy but gets serious as it goes. Near the beginning, there's a chase scene through the snow. I'm a sucker for a Bond ski chase, so at first I was disappointed because there were no skis in sight. But then a bunch of KGB skiers show up... then I was disappointed that Bond wasn't on skis. But then Bond and Kara begin sledding on her cello case while Bond uses the cello itself to steer! Amazing. The later parts of the film, though, get more serious, with Bond helping break up an opium-smuggling operation in Afghanistan. (There are still some moments of levity, though, such as when Bond and Kara use a baggage loader to escape a Soviet airfield.) The progression works well, as does the plot. I called early on that the defection was fake, but it was still enjoyable for Bond to work out the villains' plan and begin to foil it. I especially liked the way Bond actually had to team up with the head of the KGB.
The plot-- as far as these things go-- even feels vaguely plausible. There are no death lasers or space bases. The villains in this one are a Soviet general who wants to become head of the KGB and an American arms dealer. They're okay, and probably the weakest part of the film, but their plans make sense: political aspirations and greed. I did think it was a bit hard to swallow when the film tells us that Bond will feel bad about having to kill the head of the KGB because he doesn't think he's as bad as he's been told! John Rhys-Davies plays General Pushkin, but this development makes more sense when you realize that the part was originally scripted for Walter Gotell as General Gogol, who appeared in seven previous films, and was often portrayed-- most notably in For Your Eyes Only and Octopussy-- as a voice of sanity against those who wanted to escalate the Cold War. (Gotell was sick when The Living Daylights was filmed, and just has a one-scene cameo.)
A lot of Bond films go from place to place seemingly at random, but I felt this one's globe-trotting felt quite natural; Bond gets Kara out of Czechoslovakia to Vienna, then takes her to where her boyfriend is in Tangier, and then both are taken to Afghanistan. It makes things feel big without feeling arbitrary. (In some films it's like, "And the villains is hiding in [rolls dice] a Chinese casino.") Art Malik was good as the Mujahideen leader, though I felt like he was underused.
 |
| This is the Wiener Riesenrad, the same Ferris wheel that prominently appears in The Third Man. |
The end deflates it a bit: Bond must stop a shipment of opium; initially he plans to blow it up, but then he ends up trapped on the same plane as the opium, so he must defuse the bomb and kill a henchman, and then the plane is crashing, etc.... it all goes on a bit, and then there's a whole second (but smaller) climax, in the style of Octopussy, where Bond then takes down the American arms dealer. I like that the film avoids some of the usual overdramatic Bond perils, but that comes at the cost of a suitably grand climax; once everyone knows the villain plot, it seems like they could really be stopped at Bond's leisure.
But on the whole, like I said, this film was solid, and I enjoyed it. People say License to Kill is Dalton's good one, so I look forward to getting to see it!
- This is the first pre-Daniel Craig film I've see where someone other than Lois Maxwell plays Moneypenny. (She had finally given up the role of the flirty secretary at the age of 58 after A View to a Kill.) Caroline Bliss debuts as her replacement. Moneypenny was (arguably) the last of the recurring Bond characters to be recast, lasting an astounding fourteen films and twenty-three years with one actress.
- Virginia Hey, of Farscape fame, appears as Rubavitch, Gogol's mistress. I would not have recognized her! A few of the Roger Moore films gave Gogol a mistress and secretary named Rublevitch or Rubelvitch played by Eva Rueber-Staier; presumably this is the same woman.
- John Terry appears as Felix Leiter, the eighth guy I've seen play him in seventeen films. We'll generously dub him "not the worst" but he doesn't make much of an impression as per usual. Give me book Felix any day.
- Casino Royale
- Dr. No
- From Russia with Love
- For Your Eyes Only
- On Her Majesty's Secret Service
- Thunderball
- The Living Daylights
- Spectre
- You Only Live Twice
- Goldfinger
- The Spy Who Loved Me
- Moonraker
- Octopussy
- Never Say Never Again
- A View to a Kill
- Live and Let Die
- Diamonds Are Forever
No comments:
Post a Comment