release year: 1969
genre: James Bond
viewing setting: home DVD, 12/4/06 and laserdisc, 12/1/99
what I expected: not sure, but I knew this was the one with the "other" guy as Bond
what I got: decent first outing for a new Bond actor, but an unusual plot from Fleming
synopsis: Bond hunts for SPECTRE #1 man Blofeld, and in the process falls in love with a foreign countess.
impressions: It was okay, but it was a departure from earlier 007 adventures - both because of a new Bond (Lazenby) and because of a different sort of script from Ian Fleming. There was plenty of action, and there were plenty of women. It just didn't resemble the previous Connery Bond films, and that made it stand out as something different than previous Bond films. With careful viewing, though, it does stand on its own merits. Notable: Bond threatens to resign if "M" doesn't let him track Blofeld down; Bond keeps mementos from previous adventures in his desk; Bond wears a kilt as part of his guise; big feast with lots of women flirting with Bond; bad guy falls into snow machine and produces red snow; Bond uses Draco's attack forces when "M" refuses to attack Blofeld; during the final attack, the third man out of the helicopter goes headfirst; Bond gets married; and last but not least, a sad ending.
acting: George Lazenby did a decent enough job as Bond; one wonders how he'd have improved with more movies. Telly Savalas played Blofeld, and this is a head bad guy who actually fights and participates in the chases - at one point, he leads his henchmen in a ski chase of Bond. Diana Rigg made a good companion/love interest for Bond, though her good acting job was also due to the script which gave her a lot of screen time. The guy who played Draco (Tracy's father and Bond's unlikely ally) also did a good job; he was the same actor who played the train boss in Once Upon a Time in the West.
chase scenes: 1 ski chase, 1 car chase, a second ski chase, 1 bobsled chase
mass fight at end: 3 helicopters full of commandos attack Blofeld's mountain lodge
neat gadgets: not much: a photocopier that also opens safes
confirmed Bond kills: 5
confirmed Bond nooky: 3 (all of them more than once, too!)
obnoxious female name: None. "Tracy" is not an obnoxious name.
defining Bond moments:
- samples caviar after beating up bad guy
- leers at women who walked by
- makes himself at home in enemy's office, and checks out Playboy centerfold
- still checking out Playboy centerfold while walking through busy hallway
- casually lets swinging door slam back into bad guy
- uses exact same lines on different women
quotable:
Blofeld: (to Bond, who is getting groped under the table by one of the girls) "Is anything wrong?"
Bond: "Just a slight stiffness coming on."
girl: "...and she said I had a very interesting case."
Bond: "How right she was."
Blofeld: "Your stiffness of last night - it is gone?"
Bond: "For the time being."
Bond: (as he and Tracy drive into the stock car race) "Looks like we've hit the rush hour."
Tracy: (after driving through the stock car race and causing total chaos) "We didn't even stop for the prize."
final word: It's a different sort of Bond movie, but worth seeing.
rating: C+