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I personally wouldn’t go so far as to say that YOLT is the weakest on the first 6 Bond films. I think for me, I find Thunderball to be the weakest of the 60’s era. It feels very slow, and sluggish to get through. It just feels like after filming Dr. No, FRWL, and Goldfinger back to back, they lost a lot of steam on Thunderball. Not trying to dismiss your opinion or anything, nor am I going to imply that it’s a bad film, it’s a solid 7 for me because I do like a lot of elements of the film. It’s just to me, it’s always felt the least engaging of the initial 6 Bond films. I feel like You Only Live Twice improves on Thunderball by being more fast paced, more fantastical, and having more intriguing elements, but that’s just my opinion.
But like I mentioned earlier, DN, GF and YOLT are endlessly watchable for me as they are tightly paced and choke full of iconic moments. The fact they are among the shortest entries in the series probably helps them flow better in comparison to other classics, notably TB (QoS being the exception - it achieves the´feat’ of seeming interminable despite being the shortest film in the series).
For me, what holds Thunderball down is that there are a lot of unmemorable characters. Largo I feel is a weak villain, I feel his henchmen are very bland and forgettable. Fiona Volpe is the best villian of the film for me. I think having the villains plot explained, then to actually show them execute the plot, then having Bond figure out the plot, and just where the bombs are hidden just slows the film down for me. But I agree that the film is the most stylish of all the Bond films. John Barry’s score is quite awesome too. It’s also the last flawless performance that Connery gives as Bond.
Yes I agree. TB is definitely the weakest of the 60's era. I even prefer DAF to TB. The main problem I find with TB is the underwater scenes. They were ground breaking at that time, but by todays standards the film really drags now when viewing these dull scenes.
TB's saving grace is Connery in his prime, strolling round health farms and strutting his stuff in casual camp collar shirts in the Bahamas. Whenever TB goes above ground, it becomes great to watch again.
Back to YOLT - great locations, superb soundtrack, awesome Adam set. The film is let down by the latter half when Bond turns Japanese, and also the abysmal backdrop projection effects. The scene when Bond escapes the pilot-less plane is shockingly bad, even for 1967. So is the Little Nellie scenes, and the `drop in the ocean' moment when Bond is watching it all on his mini Sony car TV. I know backdrops were the done thing back then, but for some reason it looks its absolute worst during YOLT (with DAF's firing rockets and mushroom cloud a close second, and Connery's hand wave, throwing away the film reel in FRWL on a gondola coming in third).
Backdrops were used throughout much of the 60's, 70's and 80's, but never have they been so badly exposed as they are in YOLT. The ski action scenes in OHMSS are barely noticeable by comparison, which was only filmed 2 years later.
Great posts. I agree. Something about the plot, and the way Bond is behind the audience, slows it down (not to mention the underwater aspects of hiding the plane, finding the plane, etc.).
It's almost impossible to watch TB without thinking of the original audience, for whom underwater filming was exciting and new, so that they (presumably) enjoyed extended sequences of it!
It's kind of like the first time audiences saw a train on film and thought it was going to come through the screen at them. Nowadays, meh.
I prefer YOLT, although it too has its pacing issues (the wedding sequence, anyone?)--really the middle of the film.
I feel just the opposite on TB and posted previously in this thread how I feel that YOLT has maybe the blandest set of characters, at least in that classic era. The book made these figures much more interesting and their translation to the screen suffers because the creators are only interested in the setting, action, vehicles and gadgetry.
Largo isn't a supervillain, but the one-upmanship he and Bond engage in, especially over Domino, are a highlight of the film, resulting in great dialogue and a more personal stake. There's something personal there beyond two guys doing their jobs. The scene where Fiona needles Largo during their skeet shooting at Palmyra is a great example of this followed by Largo and Bond's own going at each other in a duel of wits.
No, Quist, Vargas and the other TB henchmen aren't memorable, but are any of those in YOLT, maybe aside from the sumo guy Bond takes on in Osato's office? Vargas does get a couple of character moments and is just creepy, plus he and Quist get two of the more memorable, gruesome deaths in the series. Helga Brandt is just a blatant and inferior Fiona clone. Osato is no more memorable than Hai-Fat from TMWTGG.
Tiger Tanaka is okay. It's nice to see him participate in the action at the end. But for me, he doesn't come close to similar allies such as Kerim Bey, Milos Colombo or Rene Mathis.
Blofeld is a missed opportunity. This shadowy figure who intrigued in the previous films is reduced to almost an afterthought. I can only imagine the disappointment of some fans in 1967 thinking "This is the guy pulling the strings?"
The problem with Largo is when you compare him to the villains in the previous films, he just falls flat. The one upmanship is a nice angle, but other than that, what other qualities are there to Largo? He just seems so bland when compared to somebody like Goldfinger or Rosa Klebb, he doesn’t even have the intrigue of Dr. No. He just seems to me like a glorified henchmen with nothing interesting or subtle about him. I’ll admit had Adolfo Celi not been dubbed, I’m sure there would be more personality in his performance, but as it stands I just find Largo so uninteresting, especially when he’s in scenes with Volpe, Blofeld, or even Bond himself.
As for the characters in YOLT, I think Osato is a pretty memorable character. He’s not supposed to be some henchmen who could hand Bond his arse on a platter, but his resourcefulness comes with the company that he runs, and his command over those Japanese thugs who chase after Bond on the rooftops of Japan adds a bit of flair to his character. I also like that he’s terrified of Blofeld, especially after the death of Helga Brandt, heck he’s even terrified when Bond’s revealed to have snuck into the volcano lair. I also find his death scene pretty amusing. I’ll agree with you that Helga Brandt, or Hans are generic recreations of Volpe, and Red Grant, but it’s not like those characters offend me or anything. I just find them to be more interesting than Varges, and the other generic/incompetent henchmen in Thunderball.
I disagree about Tanaka however. Yes it’s awesome seeing him in action, but Tanaka has lots of personality to his character. I find the scenes where he’s alongside Bond to be highlights of the film, because I feel those two characters bounce off of each other really well. Not to mention the ninja school he runs is another element that I like about him. I’ll agree that he isn’t on the level of Kerim Bay, Columbo, Draco, or Mathis, but I don’t think he’s a bland, boring character.
Agree with you 100% on Blofeld however. I previously mentioned this before, but it is a disappointing reveal, and I don’t think it helps that he’s been parodied so much in the years since his introduction. The sad thing is Donald Pleasance is a fantastic actor, he really could’ve done something interesting with Blofeld, but when you go from the deep voiced, faceless menace of the previous films, to the weird accented, small and meak Blofeld of YOLT, it is an incredibly huge letdown for me. I wouldn’t have even minded if they dubbed Pleasance with Eric Pholmann. It’s just that the end result is such a jarring continuity change that sticks out like a sore thumb. It’s even more jarring than the change from Telly Savalas to Charles Grey.
I think both YOLT and TB suffer from decent characters. Connery is also in auto pilot mode throughout both of these films compared to his first 3, and we know why as by then he was becoming bored of playing Bond. Thankfully he had enough swagger and charisma to detract from this, and make the character look effortlessly cool, even if he was only playing Bond in second gear.
There are many flaws in both films, and are the weakest of the 60's films, but I would prefer to watch YOLT over TB. The problem I have with TB is I find myself forwarding and skipping the lengthy dull underwater scenes (and there are many). TB is also let down by that crazy speeded up boat sequence at the end, which turns it into a comedy farce. This is when Peter Hunt needed reigning in occasionally, although I still can't believe Young gave this the thumbs up to make the final cut.
I wonder how much of Connery’s dissatisfaction came from him finding out that his pay scale was less than that of Dean Martin’s for the Matt Helm movies. I’d heard he had discovered that on the set of Thunderball. I’m sure it didn’t help too that Broccoli and Saltzman refused to give Connery more of a stake in the films as well. Having said that, I feel like Thunderball was the last time Connery was on top of his game for Bond. Things just went downhill from there.
I never knew that about the Matt Helm movies. No wonder Connery was pissed. :))
Agree with Connery's performance. TB was the pivotal turning point, the hybrid version, where we still saw glimpses of the character from the first 3 films, and then the more relaxed portrayal that would be dominant in his last 3 films as Bond.
Connery's Bond in YOLT, DAF and NSNA is quite far removed from the Bond of Dr. No, FRWL and GF. In TB, we saw both sides coming together.
The stories about the feuds between Connery and Saltzmen on the sets of both YOLT and DAF are pretty amusing as well. The sad thing is that as much as I respect Broccoli and Saltzmen, they did a scummy thing by choosing to screw Connery over like that. The man was responsible for the success of those films in the beginning, but the producers thought that he was replaceable (they were right to an extent; Bond did move on without Connery), but the way they were greedy is disheartening. I don’t blame Sean for walking away when the producers didn’t think of him as anything more than their property.
Interesting - I see Connery's performance in GF being more relaxed and his performance in TB to be a return of sorts to his more dangerous DN-FRWL form. But I agree that there is a noticeable change in both performance and character in YOLT - the rise of the world-weary Bond. And it suits the film really well.
No, I don't see that in TB. Connery strolls and swaggers his way through most of it with an air of invincibility, particularly with his quips - `I think he got the point', `could that be the front door bell?', `I'll tell the chef', `no it isn't, is it' when shooting his rifle, etc.
There is one moment in TB when the Bond of old reappears, and that is when he escapes through the street carnival and is then cornered on the dance floor. This is back to vulnerable Bond again, but really only for that moment.
Connery still has many human, vulnerable moments in GF, despite the new changes in performance - the anger at Jill's body in gold, extremely nervous while strapped to the laser table, the awkward glance at Oddjob after seeing the golf ball crush, the shocked reaction when confronted with GF on the plane for the last time, etc.
Not to mention sacrificing his own safety to check on Tilly.
I agree, the scene in Thunderball where his hand subtly trebles when he gives Domino her brother’s tags, then puts on his sunglasses to hide his emotions disproves that theory entirely.
Style over substance describes 1995 to 2002 IMO.
Great post. 100%.
In the case of YOLT, all I could find was that Maibaum was "unavailable."
The Taschen Bond book goes into interesting detail about the script genesis of YOLT:
"In November 1965, prolific screenwriter Sydney Boehm, who had written many film noirs of the '50s like The Big Heat (1953) and Rogue Cop (1954), delivered a nine-page outline. It had a similar plot to Ian Fleming's novel You Only Live Twice, with Blofeld and Irma Bunt as the villains ensconced in a deadly castle, but with the addition of more gunplay, violence, and a female spy named Chiiyono. An unfinished 139-page first-draft script was delivered in January [1966].
"Harold Jack Bloom then submitted an outline on January 21, sans Blofeld. Bloom was another established Hollywood writer, although his specialty was episodic television series like Bonanza and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. He delivered a further outline on January 28, beginning with the death of Bond in Macao, which is flashed around the world, his burial at sea, and then his resurrection on board a submarine before being assigned to meet with the head of Japanese intelligence, Tiger Tanaka. Taking elements from the novel and Boehm's script, Bloom's tale of industrial espionage included a bathhouse shoot-out, Chiyono's death, Bond's transformation into a Japanese miner to go undercover with Kissy Suzuki, and the final confrontation with the Black Dragon Society as they take over Tokyo with fear-inducing gas, only to be foiled by Bond, Tanaka, and Tanaka's ninjas."
In mid-February 1966 the crew began scouting locations in Japan, following Fleming's own research itinerary. Lewis Gilbert said they "flew the length and breadth of Japan looking for castle that was on the sea, but apparently they never built castles anywhere near the sea." Flying over Kyushu, he and Ken Adam were entranced by its dramatic volcanic scenery.
"A volcano had water on top," said Gilbert, "and one could see the possibilities of something big going on down below. That night in the hotel, we all discussed it." Gilbert, Adam, and Broccoli decided the villain would live in an extinct crater. This changed the direction of the storyline, and on February 23 Harold Jack Bloom delivered a first draft screenplay that involved villains threatening the Russian and American space programs. This was Bloom's final contribution--he was replaced by Roald Dahl, who was instructed by the producers to write a story around Bond's "death" and the volcano base.
Knowing all this only strengthens my conviction that YOLT's strengths are in its spectacle, not screenplay.
They're all style over substance really, aren't they?
I suppose. But some at lot more than others.
I take it your not a Brosnan fan then. As a Brosnan fanboy, I only partly agree with that statement. Goldeneye had lots of substance, loved the dynamic between Bond and Trevelyn, loved Natalya, loved Onnatop, Boris, and Ourumov as well. It has all the ingredients of a classic Bond film, while also setting the stage for the future Bonds that follow. Tomorrow Never Dies is meh, not the worst, nor the best. I personally liked The World Is Not Enough, all elements except Denise Richards I think work very well. Die Another Day I think is the worst of all the Brosnan films, if anything that’s too much style over substance.
I agree about GE. It's a Bond film that has a lot of good stuff--substance if you will--to deliver, and not merely style.
DAD is just an overproduced film. But not necessarily in a bad way. It's Brosnan's Moonraker, the closest thing to a video game cut scene montage in the series so far. But I don't mind that we have such a Bond film in the collection too. Variety is the spice of life.
I think DAD suffers from bad direction honestly. Tamahori, aside from Marc Forster, is the most unfit choice to direct a Bond film. I don’t think he had the tongue in cheek style of Guy Hamilton or Lewis Gilbert to pull off the ludicrous things they were going for in that film, it all seems like balls to the wall action, with little else to offer. I feel ashamed admitting this, but as a kid I loved that film because it was the first Bond film I owned on DVD, and one of the first Bond films I’ve ever seen. It is Brosnan’s Moonraker, hell it may even be Brosnan’s YOLT/DAF, but without the tongue in cheek qualities that make those films entertaining despite their flaws. I also feel like because of how bad DAD was, the film reflected on the entire Brosnan era of Bond in a way, which I think is kind of unfair. As I said, GE and TWINE are pretty good films in my book, TND is a bit generic, but DAD’s reputation seems to dragged down the Brosnan era with it, or so it appears.
If you want to get into the problems of YOLT: Maibaum being absent is an enormous issue. Spectacle is fine but YOLT actively follows Thunderball in structure and style. Terence Young is gone and so is any immediacy. The spy craze has boomed and there are so many imitators that Bond has to struggle to stay fresh.
The space capsule plot is brilliant. The setup is great even though Fleming's novel is totally jettisoned. What YOLT lacks is the audience engagement that they finally cracked on TSWLM.
I also think that Peter Hunt being away and then coming back did affect how he handled the picture as opposed to him being on it fully from the start or directing as he was under the impression he would be.