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I started collecting them on VHS, and taping them off the TV starting with The Living Daylights in May 1998 when my dad suggested that I tape it to keep it. Didn't get them all until DVD arrived, and then between October 2000 and January 2002 I got them all on DVD.
The rest, as they say, is history.
I think the first time I became aware of Bond was when I caught a glimpse of Roger Moore hanging over the underground shark-pool (LALD) on tv when I was around the same age, must have been 5 or 6 at the time...
My first Bond experience in cinema was Goldeneye in 1995. I wasn´t so impressed but I was extremely glad to see our man of secret service back in business...
It is like asparagus making you like vegetables.
MR was the first Bond I saw in the theater. I was 12 at the time. Still a fun and beautiful film after all these years.
GoldenEye 007 came out of the N64 at the end of August 1997. At some point between then and November I first experienced it at my friends house. I remember distinctly declining a motorcycle ride with my father to play that instead. He wasn't terribly happy about that. One of those weird turning points in life.
After experiencing GoldenEye and talking nonstop about it, my parents took me to see Tomorrow Never Dies in cinemas at the ripe age of 8. The pre-title sequence at the arms bazaar left a major impression on me, as did Teri Hatcher's underwear and Carver's bloodless demise via sea-drill. For a while, the cinemas was the only place I would watch a Brosnan film, as I wouldn't own one on home video for another 4 years.
Birthday 1998 brought me two Bond films on VHS, Goldfinger and Thunderball. Purchased by my father, who was and still is a Connery purist. He begrudgingly respects Roger Moore, but thinks of him only as Simon Templar. Never asked him about the others. I watched Thunderball so much I wore the tape out. Leading both films was the famous teaser to GoldenEye and the equally important Bond Collection VHS trailer.
In addition, I was gifted my first two Bond CD's, the 30th Anniversary disc with all the title themes (and Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang) and the soundtrack to Tomorrow Never Dies. I annoyed everyone in the household by listening to one or the other every night. I was usually out once From Russia With Love (the 12th track) played. Later that year came Moonraker on VHS, my first Moore film and a movie I still have a certain fondness for. Watched it as often as the Connery films.
Between 1998 and 2001, I caught the majority of the other Bond films on VHS or cable TV. There were a few that I constantly missed, notably the impossible to find On Her Majesty's Secret Service. I remember seeing Never Say Never Again at rental stores, but never actually seeing it. The one noteworthy viewing I remember was renting A View To A Kill in 1999. I remember it mainly because my grandfather died on Halloween and I watched it on his old TV in his living room after his funeral.
In that period, my Bond VHS collection expanded greatly. New arrivals were Dr. No, From Russia With Love, Diamonds Are Forever, A View To A Kill, and The World Is Not Enough. 2002 brought the first batch of Bond DVD's, a collection that would eventually be completed two years later. The last VHS tape I bought was On Her Majesty's Secret Service, which was also the first Internet purchase our family ever made. Worth the wait, as I doubt my 9 year old self would appreciate the movie as much.
That's where the interesting stuff stops, really. Watched every Bond release post 1997 in cinemas, with multiple trips for the Craig films. Own all of them on DVD up until Quantum Of Solace, with both revisions of the Casino Royale DVD's and Never Say Never Again. Skipped the Ultimate Edition releases (didn't see them as enough of an upgrade) and haven't had the cash to get the Blu-Ray's yet.
Movies notoriously came at least a year later than the rest of the world and seem to hang around for a long time, even spilling over to one of a couple massive drive-ins for a sort of second or extended run.
As fate would have it, more than once during those years, James Bond "films-festivals" came round the circuit. Net result, my introduction to 007 was to see all the films, in release order at a rate of about one per week, on the big screen, the REALLY big screen! And not just once, but several times.
I remember looking at the posters outside, and then the lobby cards inside. The anticipation!
Seeing those Maurice Binder and Robert Brownjohn titles for the first time....I was enchanted! Back then they played trailers after the feature, in this case advertising next week's Bond. What a show.
30+ years later it is difficult, even on the most technically proficient home theater hardware, to reproduce that experience...
Not really that curious, actually. I expanded on this a while back in another thread (the 'What was your 1st Bondfilm in the cinema?' one I think...) - but it makes sense if you htink about it:
*Six year hiatus - creates a vacuum, ready to 'Bond-athise' a new generation.
*Lots of media savvy kids & teens by mid 90's, who were perfect audience for GE hyper agressive PR
* More access to cinema screens, easy Video rental, cable & sattelite tv etc. by 1995 compared to late 80's
That sounds great!
The other side of the coin is a lot of people who use discussion boards like this were right in that age group as well. The sample size is skewed, so to speak. A lot of 20 somethings on the internet with experience in the Brosnan era and Bond video games. The real fun is going to be where the new Bond fans of the Craig era got their start.
Well yes, this was also included in my original answer on that older thread - along with the fact that it has quite simply been around longer than any of the other 'modern', post 80's Bonds, hence increasing the chance that anyone in a certain age group on this forum will have seen GE before any of it's successors... didn't really have the energy to write the whole thing up again, tbh :>
I saw the film that November, really liked it, then soon I sought out the earlier ones with Connery. That solidified my fandom. I thought he, meaning Connery’s Bond, was the coolest motherf*cker I ever saw.
@Denbigh way to make me feel old. I was 27 when CR, my favorite Bond film, was released. :))
Now fast forward 24 years later and a recent binge watch of all the films in one week has made me appreciate them again after being let down by Spectre.
"We're looking through a rifle barrel," my dad explained, "and I think the shooter is supposed to be James Bond. He got us before we got him."
I wasn't so sure: "Then where does the blood come from? Did he shoot us in the shoulder? That's not very good shooting." Kind of confusing, to a kid.
So I paid closer attention to the opening bit the next time one of those movies was on TV, and I'll be darned but that guy strolling into rifle range did appear to be Sean Connery after all. Huh! Not sure how I missed that in Goldfinger, but--whatever, man. And on second thought, for Bond, armed with only a pistol, turning and drawing and shooting on the move like a cowboy, to take out a sniper with a single shot to the shoulder, making him drop his rifle... well, that's actually some pretty great shooting, and nothing to sneer at.
My first Bond at the cinema was The Man with the Golden Gun. I hadn't seen Live and Let Die yet because it hadn't come to TV yet, but I knew there was a new guy playing Bond. I swore I would not hold anything against him and I tried my best to get into the movie but I couldn't follow the plot and nothing about it made much sense. My old man and I exited the cinema scratching our heads and asking, "what the hell was that??"
When I finally saw Live and Let Die on TV I couldn't decide if it was worse than Golden Gun, or only equally as bad. At least the character of JW Pepper now made sense, which was helpful. I about gave up on Bond at that point, but thank goodness a few years later The Spy Who Loved Me came out and saved the series.
Simpler times.
But before watching any Bond films, I had already read a few John McLusky comic strips, and played the GE video game.