Live and Let Die is not one of the better James Bond films. Not even close. In fact, I’d rank the 1973 outing among the worst, along with A View to a Kill and Die Another Day. (And I take these things very seriously.) However, like pizza and sex (and the ever elusive pizzasex I’ve heard so much about), bad Bond is still kinda good, and Live and Let Die is not without numerous pleasures. It opens tonight and plays through next Thursday at the Laurelhurst (times here). Here are some highlights/lowlights:
• It’s the most racist Bond flick, and possibly one of the most racist mainstream movies ever made. EVERY black character turns out to be villainous.
• It’s Roger Moore’s first time as Bond, and while he got better in later years, he still comes out of the gate strong. Interestingly, Moore is nearly three years older than Sean Connery, meaning that he’s older here than Connery was in 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever.
• Live and Let Die is also the most stereotypically ’70s of all the Bond pictures that came out in the ’70s. Pimpmobiles, crazy clothes, platform shoes, the whole works.
• One of the henchman’s name is Tee Hee. He’s called that, I think, because he smiles all the time. He has a hook for a hand. There’s a part where he fumbles while trying to remove Bond’s watch, and Bond bitchily scolds him, “Butterhook!”
• There’s the inexplicable introduction of J.W. Pepper, a redneck Southern sheriff who also turns up in the following year’s The Man with the Golden Gun. He has nothing to do with the rest of the movie. He’s stupid, annoying, and racist. I think he’s how the British filmmakers viewed Americans.
• And there’s that long, insane boat chase, where boats fly out of canals, over land, then back into the water.
• Bond is pretty shameless in this one. He totally lies to get into bed with Jane Seymour’s character, a tarot card reader who flips over the “Lovers” card and subsequently falls into bed with him. Little does she know that he stacked the deck—literally: Every single card in Bond’s prepared deck was a “Lovers” card, and so she loses her powers of clairvoyance along with her virginity.
• Alligators! There’s a stunt where Bond runs across the backs of a few alligators to get off an island. It’s a great stunt. It was performed by one Ross Kananga, and the filmmakers named the villain Dr. Kananga after him. There’s an outtake where Ross Kananga ends up with his pant leg in one of the gators’ mouths.
• There’s that guy who you know but don’t know by name: Geoffrey Holder. He plays Baron Samedi, a voodoo villain. Remember him from 7-Up commercials?
• There’s no Q in this one, but M comes over to Bond’s house to give him the assignment. We see the inside of his apartment! It’s actually kind of disappointing. He has a fancy coffee maker but everything else looks kind of chintzy.
• Jane Seymour’s tarot deck bears a 007 logo! I can’t figure out how this logically works in the world of the film; it is a huge gaping hole knocked out of the film’s fourth wall.
• The way Dr. Kananga’s character (spoiler) dies at the end is so ridiculous that I won’t say anything else about it.
• Oh! Paul McCartney’s theme song, of course.
Sweet. I love Bond flicks. And especially Roger Moore.
I watched Man With the Golden Gun recently, and that JW Ripper character stands out like a sore thumb. As much as I think he sucks, he did serve to point out the contrast between the sort of other-worldly Bond setting (where basically everyone is ultra-rich and has an accent, and all the locales are exclusive and exotic) and plain real life.
Also, lots of Bond films have goofy “fourth wall” gestures. From Her Majesty’s Secret Service begins with George Lazenby getting into a fight and then looking at the camera and going, “I bet you never saw the other guy do that!”
(NERD TRAP) Actually, Lazenby says “That never happened to the other fella.”
And I really hope the Laurelhurst includes “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” in their Bond series, too. I know it (and LALD) are available on Netflix Instant, but it’s not the same as grabbing a beer and a slice and seeing it projected in 35mm.
On Her Majesty’s, by the way, is top 3 Bond. Top 5 at LEAST. I will brook no disagreement.
I still cringe at the lyric “In this ever changing world in which we live in.” That’s some seriously clunky writing, made even worse when GnR kept it in their version of the song.
Fatboy: I totally concede that quote. I figured I wasn’t it accurately.
It struck me as a ridiculous line, since there was nothing particularly amazing about the fight, and it’s unclear to the viewer (to me, at least) what he just experienced that Connery hadn’t.
I actually didn’t make it through On Her Majesty’s when I attempted it the other day. I fell asleep. There was hardly a comprehensible plot going after 20 minutes. I’ll give it another try. At this stage I definitely disagree with you. It smelled of “bad writing.”
Example: in the first five minutes, he “prevents her from committing suicide.” Um, she was standing in 2 feet of water. It was not AT ALL clear to me that she was attempting to swim into the ocean and drown herself. He walks up to her, picks her up, and then carries her to dry sand. The action/message was expressed poorly in that scene.
But… what do I know – I’m a Roger Moore fan :p
er, I meant to say, “I figured I wasn’t quoting it accurately.”
It’s a terrible wonderful movie and a terrible wonderful theme song. (Listen to the song about a hundred times in less than a year and you’ll have an insight into what my childhood was like.)
Nevermind. I just rewatched On Her Majesty’s, and it was really awesome.
“Live and Let Die” also has an amazing car stunt where they pull off a perfect corkscrew jump– a stunt that apparently took years to perfect– and they totally ruin it with a slide whistle. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOiMvt5AIfA
@Fatboy: Don’t brook it if you can’t but the first three Connery films and both Dalton films are far ahead of OHMSS in my book, for starters.
@Fatboy. Yes.
@ROM. Glad you came around.
FtR. My jib is cut s|t:
01 – From Russia With Love
02 – Casino Royale
03 – On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
04 – For Your Eyes Only
05 – The Living Daylights
HM- GoldenEye
TK: Oh, I could brook your flim-flammery. If I wanted. If I so CHOSE. I could brook it. I SIMPLY REFUSE TO BROOK YOUR NONSENSE.
Also, that’s “Man With the Golden Gun” with the slide-whistle car jump, not “Live and Let Die.”
Following JAx’s lead
5: Goldeneye
4: The Spy Who Loved Me
3: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
2: From Russia With Love
1: Casino Royale
Honorable Mentions: Goldfinger, For Your Eyes Only, The Living Daylights.
1: The Spy Who Love Me
1: Moonraker (tie)
No other 007 movies with Richard Kiel in them, so that’s that.