Wait, what’s this? Sean Connery is back as James Bond again? And in the same year as Roger Moore’s James Bond is gallivanting around in ‘Octopussy‘?! What is this madness?! Well, yes, due to some complicated legal battles, 007 is back in an ‘unofficial’ James Bond movie and a remake of ‘Thunderball‘. But is it as good?
Much the same as it’s source material, the plot sees James Bond tracking down SPECTRE agent Largo, who has stolen a couple of nuclear warheads and is planning to hold the world to ransom or maybe even blow something up! It follows pretty much the same formula as ‘Thunderball‘, down to the slow and boring underwater fighting scenes. But there are added scenes too, including a particularly hilarious scene in which Bond and his lady jump and horse off a cliff-side castle down a few hundred feet into the water to escape some Arabs. It’s ridiculous.
A lot of this film seems to be an effort by the filmmakers to make their own James Bond movie that fits in with the others. There’s no cold open but there is a theme song over the opening credits, sung by Lani Hall. It’s a very boring song and the unused version by Phyllis Hyman is much much better. There’s an M who isn’t that great, a Q who seems a bit more working class, a Felix Leiter who is quite good actually, a Moneypenny who barely does anything and then Max Von Sydow as Blofeld, who only appears in a couple of scenes but does a decent job as the supervillain, though he isn’t a patch on Donald Pleasence or Telly Savalas.
But the main draw here is Connery, back again to stick it to the producers of the main Eon series of Bond films after having parted ways in a not so friendly way. He’s significantly older, but he hasn’t lost any of his action chops or charm. He’s still great and my personal favourite James Bond. He’s just perfect as the nice, charming chap who will kill you without a second of hesitation. He nails it and it’s like he’s barely been away. Baddie Largo is played by Klaus Maria Brandauer, who gives the strangest performance of a villain I’ve ever seen in these movies. He’s kind of camp and extravagant, but also has a bit of a mean streak. You’re never fully sure what to make of him.
Kim Basinger plays Domino, Bond’s love interest and near-constant damsel in distress. She’s good enough and certainly looks the part of a Bond girl. her character has some interesting enough motivation, but she’s never much more than just a pretty face and someone who gets mixed up in all the action. The other leading lady here is a real oddity. Barbara Carrera as Fatima Blush, an agent of SPECTRE who will hold off on killing an enemy agent just to get him to write down that she’s the best lover he has ever had. I mean, seriously? It’s like this movie is just handing every situation to Bond so he will always come out on top. He barely has to work for anything! And he even gets some help from Rowan Atkinson as a weird little guy working for the foreign office.
Honestly, everything about this movie is really weird. The music isn’t very good, the action is decent, the acting is a bit all over the place in terms of performance and the story isn’t anything new. It might be a little better than ‘Thunderball‘ though in that it never feels quite as slow or dull. It is more exciting and probably does work a little better. That being said, it loses points for the ridiculous wink from Connery to the camera at the end after say ‘never again’.
JACK’S SCORE: 3/5
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