Above Average Joe Blogs

The Guardian posted an article this week, compiling readers' votes on who they considered to be the best Bond actor. I was slightly shocked with the results, from best to worst being Connery, Dalton, Brosnan, Moore, Craig, Lazenby. I've a lot to say about this list but worse was when I repeated my preference of the Bonds to a friend, I completely, unintentionally, forgot to list Brosnan. And this really sums up his third film as the superspy - The World is Not Enough, despite a bevy of interesting ideas is at best interesting, and seeds some ideas that would be used better in future films, but is mostly forgettable, and at worst downright outrageously bad.  The plot itself is the most interesting aspect of the film, with the longest pre-credit sequence of the series setting up a conspiracy to kill oil heiress Elektra King, after the assassination of her father in the opening. Potentially behind this plot to kill is terrorist, anarchist, Renard, with an underused villain gimmic...

Brosnan's arc of quality over the course of his 4 films as the super spy is a fairly gradual decline, and by movie two, Tomorrow Never Dies, the decline is certainly noticeable (and nowhere near the avalanche of nonsense in his final film), as it hues too close to its predecessor. What it lacks in innovation, it makes up for with wonderful prescience as to its villain, and bombastic non-stop action. Let's talk plot and prescience first. Tomorrow Never Dies, nicely mixes Bondian spectacle - having a third act evil villain assault, and car chases - together with a wonderfully satirical stab at the power and influence of mass media. The film was originally entitled Tomorrow Never Lies, in a reference to the chief bad guys paper "Tomorrow," but it is alleged that in faxing the title to MGM, a typo occurred and the film instead earnt the more grim name.  Elliot Carver is our chief villain, played with scenery chewing glee by Jonathan Pryce, sporting a classic evil genius n...

A lot in the world changed in the years between Licence to Kill and Goldeneye, the most significant event being the fall of the Berlin Wall. Combine this with the seemingly immortal legal fights surrounding the Bond series, and Timothy Dalton unwilling to come back to the role if it meant signing up for several more films, and the series yet again found itself at a crossroads to make an impact and strive for relevance.  With Dalton out, the search was on yet again for a new Bond, and some familiar names were touted again, including Mel Gibson, as well as new names including Hugh Grant (I can almost see it - although I also learnt this week that he was the studios choice for Hannibal in the tv series!) and Liam Neeson. However, it was second time lucky for Pierce Brosnan, who having fallen afoul of his previous TV contract managed to seize the role.  Brosnan tenure as Bond is often difficult to describe, as unlike his predecessor and successor, it is hard to identify a uni...

Timothy Dalton only got two goes at playing Bond, but for his last shot at the role, it feels like he more or less gets to play the character as he intended: a furious, brutish spy, on a bloody path of vengeance after the maiming and murder of his loved ones (Daniel Craig takes notes in the corner). If Licence to Kill was released today, it would have probably been box office smash, but released 1989 the film did fine, with audiences  turned off by its darker take. A surprising reaction, considering that in that same year, we were also gifted with the supposedly dark vision of Batman, courtesy of Tim Burton (FYI, the Burton films are dark only stylistically, rather than in tone - I mean, his two films have scenes involving the Joker smashing an art museum backed by Prince, and another with the Penguin leading an army of penguins with missiles strapped to their backs). But perhaps, Licence to Kill was one step too far in terms of what Bond fans were prepared to put up with at th...

With Roger Moore bowing out after A View to a Kill at the grand old age of 59, it was up to the film makers to pick up the unenviable task of casting Bond again.  Various names were tossed around, including Sam Neill (cannot see it at all), and Mel Gibson (thankfully that didn't pan out). Eventually the role was first given to, not the Welshman who would go on to lead The Living Daylights but an Irishman, Pierce Brosnan. This also didn't quite work out, as the reason he was chosen was for his starring role in Bond-esque Remington Steele. At the time of casting him, Steele had been cancelled but the sneaky people at NBC immediately picked up the show for a further series when Brosnan was picked. This irked the Bond big-wigs who ditched Brosnan, not wanting a star caught between two roles, leading head honcho's daughter, Dana Brocoli to suggest Timothy Dalton. Much like Daniel Craig would go on to do himself, Dalton brought with him the history of the books, bringing a ...

A View to a Kill is often regarding as one of the worst, if not the worst film in the entire series. Sir Roger Moore, 57 at the time of filming, confirms that he was too old for the role by being older than the leading lady's mother, said leading lady gets very little to do bar scream "JAMES!", and the plot is more or less a retread of Goldfinger. However, despite all this, the film, out of the 4 or so VHS copies of Bond films that I had available as a kid, was the one that got played most Why? Hard to say, but it likely has something to do with Christopher Walken and Grace Jones doing heavy lifting comparable that of the mythical Atlas. Together, the pair easily rate as some of the best villains in the series, visually iconic and wonderfully psychotic - any time that either one is on scene, they set fire to the script and all those around them. The Joe who has always had a soft spot for the bad guys saw a duo showing many other villains how it is done. Walken plays t...

So here we are, at what in my memory, was one of the worst Bonds. More cartoonish than ever before, Moore even older, an incomprehensible plot, the worst title of the series coupled with a meh title track, Octopussy is all those things and more, it just isn't quite as bad as I remember. I'll make a stab at explaining the plot: 009 is assassinated trying to escape East Berlin to West Berlin, whilst dressed as a clown (it is actually surprisingly effective and sinister scene), with a Faberge egg clutched in his dying hands. Turns out it is a fake and the first bread crumb of a trail that zigzags between a rogue Russian general, seeking Soviet domination (notably against the orders of his superiors, lest the series actually paints all Russians as evil), to an exiled Afghan prince hiding out in Rajasthan, India, aided by the titular tentacular temptress, Octopussy. I can make out the broad strokes, and what the villains are up to - it looks like they are using Octopussy...