The What if NTTD is the last EON produced Bond film? page 62

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  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 16,359
    mattjoes wrote: »
    You know what would have been fun to me as an idea for Warhead? A movie where SPECTRE is a red herring and, following their weirdass code of honour, would have had SPECTRE and Bond working together.

    Example: SPECTRE has developed an economical warhead and wants to sell to the highest bidder, including the States, the crumbling USSR or CIS, the UK, Japan, China, North Korea, India, France... There's even a NATO representative. During a tense auction in the most awesome underground lair ever, the warhead in display blows up, killing everyone there.
    Bond is called to action and meets Blofeld early on. Blofeld swears by the honor of SPECTRE he's also a victim of this conspiracy, and points Bond in the direction of the hottest Hollywood mogul: Alexis Largo, a yuppie with lots of connections... And from then on the action follows suit.
    I can imagine McClory doing endless remakes of TB...

    Trailer narrator: Largo... Largo... Largo... these are just some of the formidable adversaries 007 has faced over the years, but now comes the most dangerous villain of them all!
    M: 007, you will be investigating Donovan Largo, a shady businessman with connections to SPECTRE.
    Bond: SPECTRE? How many employees do they have, anyway? And all of them are named Largo?
    M: Never mind that. You will make contact with Largo aboard his yacht, the Flying Volante, currently off the coast of Acapulco.
    (cut)
    Bond: Moneypenny, I'm not enjoying 00 work as much as I used to. It feels somewhat... repetitive.
    Moneypenny: Have you got an assignment, James?
    Bond: Yes, I'm to eliminate all free Largos.
    Trailer narrator: This summer, Kevin McClory's Largo Productions presents Pierce Brosnan as James Bond 007 in... Never Say Largo Again.

    And that was the problem with McClory's idea. Because he was limited to do versions of TB, didn’t he?

    It was Brosnan’s idea.
  • mattjoesmattjoes Julie T. and the M.G.'s
    edited June 2020 Posts: 7,021
    mtm wrote: »
    mattjoes wrote: »
    You know what would have been fun to me as an idea for Warhead? A movie where SPECTRE is a red herring and, following their weirdass code of honour, would have had SPECTRE and Bond working together.

    Example: SPECTRE has developed an economical warhead and wants to sell to the highest bidder, including the States, the crumbling USSR or CIS, the UK, Japan, China, North Korea, India, France... There's even a NATO representative. During a tense auction in the most awesome underground lair ever, the warhead in display blows up, killing everyone there.
    Bond is called to action and meets Blofeld early on. Blofeld swears by the honor of SPECTRE he's also a victim of this conspiracy, and points Bond in the direction of the hottest Hollywood mogul: Alexis Largo, a yuppie with lots of connections... And from then on the action follows suit.
    I can imagine McClory doing endless remakes of TB...

    Trailer narrator: Largo... Largo... Largo... these are just some of the formidable adversaries 007 has faced over the years, but now comes the most dangerous villain of them all!
    M: 007, you will be investigating Donovan Largo, a shady businessman with connections to SPECTRE.
    Bond: SPECTRE? How many employees do they have, anyway? And all of them are named Largo?
    M: Never mind that. You will make contact with Largo aboard his yacht, the Flying Volante, currently off the coast of Acapulco.
    (cut)
    Bond: Moneypenny, I'm not enjoying 00 work as much as I used to. It feels somewhat... repetitive.
    Moneypenny: Have you got an assignment, James?
    Bond: Yes, I'm to eliminate all free Largos.
    Trailer narrator: This summer, Kevin McClory's Largo Productions presents Pierce Brosnan as James Bond 007 in... Never Say Largo Again.

    And that was the problem with McClory's idea. Because he was limited to do versions of TB, didn’t he?

    It was Brosnan’s idea.
    Isn't it more accurate to say McClory had the idea to do another Bond film, and knowing that, Brosnan approached him? In the TND interview, Brosnan says he knew McClory had a script, after all.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 16,359
    mattjoes wrote: »
    mtm wrote: »
    mattjoes wrote: »
    You know what would have been fun to me as an idea for Warhead? A movie where SPECTRE is a red herring and, following their weirdass code of honour, would have had SPECTRE and Bond working together.

    Example: SPECTRE has developed an economical warhead and wants to sell to the highest bidder, including the States, the crumbling USSR or CIS, the UK, Japan, China, North Korea, India, France... There's even a NATO representative. During a tense auction in the most awesome underground lair ever, the warhead in display blows up, killing everyone there.
    Bond is called to action and meets Blofeld early on. Blofeld swears by the honor of SPECTRE he's also a victim of this conspiracy, and points Bond in the direction of the hottest Hollywood mogul: Alexis Largo, a yuppie with lots of connections... And from then on the action follows suit.
    I can imagine McClory doing endless remakes of TB...

    Trailer narrator: Largo... Largo... Largo... these are just some of the formidable adversaries 007 has faced over the years, but now comes the most dangerous villain of them all!
    M: 007, you will be investigating Donovan Largo, a shady businessman with connections to SPECTRE.
    Bond: SPECTRE? How many employees do they have, anyway? And all of them are named Largo?
    M: Never mind that. You will make contact with Largo aboard his yacht, the Flying Volante, currently off the coast of Acapulco.
    (cut)
    Bond: Moneypenny, I'm not enjoying 00 work as much as I used to. It feels somewhat... repetitive.
    Moneypenny: Have you got an assignment, James?
    Bond: Yes, I'm to eliminate all free Largos.
    Trailer narrator: This summer, Kevin McClory's Largo Productions presents Pierce Brosnan as James Bond 007 in... Never Say Largo Again.

    And that was the problem with McClory's idea. Because he was limited to do versions of TB, didn’t he?

    It was Brosnan’s idea.
    Isn't it more accurate to say McClory had the idea to do another Bond film, and knowing that, Brosnan approached him? Brosnan says he knew McClory had a script, after all.

    It's a fair point, yes. It was both of their ideas! :)
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,181
    I think Brosnan’s idea was just wanting to play Bond, remake or not. McClory was just his only option at the time, until it became clear it was too much of a hassle.
  • echoecho 007 in New York
    Posts: 6,287
    A competitive film may have forced Eon to try harder to get another Bond film made.
  • Posts: 15,110
    mtm wrote: »
    You know what would have been fun to me as an idea for Warhead? A movie where SPECTRE is a red herring and, following their weirdass code of honour, would have had SPECTRE and Bond working together.

    Example: SPECTRE has developed an economical warhead and wants to sell to the highest bidder, including the States, the crumbling USSR or CIS, the UK, Japan, China, North Korea, India, France... There's even a NATO representative. During a tense auction in the most awesome underground lair ever, the warhead in display blows up, killing everyone there.
    Bond is called to action and meets Blofeld early on. Blofeld swears by the honor of SPECTRE he's also a victim of this conspiracy, and points Bond in the direction of the hottest Hollywood mogul: Alexis Largo, a yuppie with lots of connections... And from then on the action follows suit.

    That's fun! :)
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Revelator wrote: »
    Ludovico wrote: »
    Someone corrects me if I'm wrong, but from what I understand fan community is a fairly new concept.

    Yes and no. Comics fandom for example took off in the 1960s. You had fan-produced magazines about Batman and large fan-conducted conventions starting in that decade. But though fan communities existed they weren't truly organized. That had to wait for the internet. If you were a disgruntled Bond fan, you didn't have a platform to share your opinions on, since the mass media wasn't interested. But by the early 70s there were organizations like the James Bond 007 Fan Club, which in 1974 began publishing an official magazine, Bondage. The James Bond International Fan Club followed suit in 1979 with OO7 Magazine. Were it not for the internet, many of us would probably be writing to (and for) such magazines instead of chatting on this board.


    @thedove This is a very difficult "what if" as I always think Brosnan had his eyes on the big price, the role of Bond in the franchise itself, not a competing product. He'd never have dared angering EON.

    @Ludovico What makes you say that? He did. He has said so himself, it's on video and everything on that link above. He and a team of producers approached McClory (not the other way around note: he went to McClory) with a view to making a rival Bond film starring Brosnan himself: it was his idea, not McClory's. Presumably from his point of view at that point he'd already lost the gig in '86.

    I didn't know and I'm VERY surprised. Never thought he'd have dared such a move.
  • Posts: 1,917
    It's advertising may have looked somewhat like this fan art by Stephane Tron. Just swap out Dalton for Brosnan and the EON production crew credits for McClory and company:

    st_warhead_4.jpg

    No, they can't bring Renard back!

    Sorry, that Blofeld image reminded me more of him. Otherwise it's a very cool piece of fan art.
  • Posts: 623
    I wonder what Brozza meant when he said he'd seen Licence to Kill and "what had happened with that".

    What did happen with that, in his opinion?
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    edited June 2020 Posts: 8,181
    He’s likely referring to LTK’s disappointing box office results, and how the franchise had been put in critical condition.
  • thedovethedove hiding in the Greek underworld
    Posts: 5,417
    It was well reported and known that it didn't perform well. There was talk about this being the end of Bond as several 80's franchises had seemed to over take Bond. It was felt that the series was tired and out of fresh ideas. Dalton wasn't well received.

    Bond had always been a summer franchise and a move that many don't talk about is how the producers moved the premieres to winter going forward where there is a bit less competition. I believe both of Dalton's films were summer releases.
  • Posts: 1,009
    thedove wrote: »
    It was well reported and known that it didn't perform well. There was talk about this being the end of Bond as several 80's franchises had seemed to over take Bond. It was felt that the series was tired and out of fresh ideas. Dalton wasn't well received.

    Bond had always been a summer franchise and a move that many don't talk about is how the producers moved the premieres to winter going forward where there is a bit less competition. I believe both of Dalton's films were summer releases.

    It's my fav film of all time, but, yes, it must be said that when LTK was released, it had to compete with the likes of Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade, Batman or Die Hard 2. At least two of these films are excellent. I think that should it had been put on hold like No Time To Die has been now, it would have fared a bit better.

    That and the release of a better marketing campaign. EON and MGM/UA got lazy here for some reason.
  • thedovethedove hiding in the Greek underworld
    Posts: 5,417
    They tried to play up the revenge angle but the movie lacked the big stunts that the other films were able to show in their teaser. Grabbing a plane by it's tail? An oil tanker chase? Not exactly good for a trailer where the big and spectacular were meant to be highlighted. I believe the water skiing behind the plane was shown but it's not clear or shown that Bond is doing this barefoot.

    Plus the cast didn't have any sizzle and looked more like what you would find in a TV show. Many were regulars on American TV. No colourful characters outside of Wayne Newton.

    LTK is not one of my favourite films so I may be sharing more of the problematic elements of the film. Oh and John Glen, he of Iron Eagle 3 was the director and couldn't compete with Spielberg, and Burton. Even Reny Harlin of Die Hard 2 had a more impressive resume then Glen.

    It would be a long time before Bond found his way out of the wilderness. I think a McClory film at this dead time might have meant the series jumping to another studio.
  • Posts: 1,009
    thedove wrote: »
    They tried to play up the revenge angle but the movie lacked the big stunts that the other films were able to show in their teaser. Grabbing a plane by it's tail? An oil tanker chase? Not exactly good for a trailer where the big and spectacular were meant to be highlighted. I believe the water skiing behind the plane was shown but it's not clear or shown that Bond is doing this barefoot.

    Plus the cast didn't have any sizzle and looked more like what you would find in a TV show. Many were regulars on American TV. No colourful characters outside of Wayne Newton.

    LTK is not one of my favourite films so I may be sharing more of the problematic elements of the film. Oh and John Glen, he of Iron Eagle 3 was the director and couldn't compete with Spielberg, and Burton. Even Reny Harlin of Die Hard 2 had a more impressive resume then Glen.

    It would be a long time before Bond found his way out of the wilderness. I think a McClory film at this dead time might have meant the series jumping to another studio.

    And maybe the end of EON? Just wondering...

  • Posts: 1,917
    thedove wrote: »
    They tried to play up the revenge angle but the movie lacked the big stunts that the other films were able to show in their teaser. Grabbing a plane by it's tail? An oil tanker chase? Not exactly good for a trailer where the big and spectacular were meant to be highlighted. I believe the water skiing behind the plane was shown but it's not clear or shown that Bond is doing this barefoot.

    Plus the cast didn't have any sizzle and looked more like what you would find in a TV show. Many were regulars on American TV. No colourful characters outside of Wayne Newton.

    LTK is not one of my favourite films so I may be sharing more of the problematic elements of the film. Oh and John Glen, he of Iron Eagle 3 was the director and couldn't compete with Spielberg, and Burton. Even Reny Harlin of Die Hard 2 had a more impressive resume then Glen.

    It would be a long time before Bond found his way out of the wilderness. I think a McClory film at this dead time might have meant the series jumping to another studio.

    I'd quibble a bit with some of your points. First, nobody cared who directed a Bond film back then, many probably don't care now, so bringing up people going to see Indy or Batman because of their directors was much less of a selling point than the characters themselves in 1989.

    Also, I think you and bigladiesman meant Lethal Weapon 2. Die Hard 2 wasn't released until the following summer and I really doubt anybody cared who Reny Harlin was, just that there was another Die Hard movie, aside from some hardcore film fans.

    And was the cast really a factor? How many of the previous films were successes with little-known or unknown actors? Sean Bean was also the only real recognizable face in GE and it was huge.

    The trailers weren't great, but they had enough action and girls highlighted Bond is famous for and that shouldn't have necessarily turned anybody off. I agree the other franchises were more fresh at the time and the marketing in the U.S. was lacking, as if they just thought putting the franchise name out there would automatically mean a large audience and it didn't work, at least here in the U.S. Didn't LTK actually do good business around the rest of the world?
  • thedovethedove hiding in the Greek underworld
    Posts: 5,417
    I have vague memories of a big deal being made about Tim Burton and his "vision" of Gotham and the themes explored in Batman Returns. Same thing with Spielberg and his themes and style with Last Crusade. I grant you not many directors were involved with the publicity or marketing. LTK had Glen doing a workmanlike job with the film but aside for slow motion running I don't think there are any stand out directorial flourishes in the film.

    Yes the cast was a factor. Sean Connery in an Indiana Jones movie was a big deal! Danny DeVito and Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns a big deal. Joe Pesci in LW2 a big deal. We've got Robert Davi, the bit character actor from the Die Hard films. We have Carey Lowell. you could argue that Talia Sotto was the biggest "star" in the film. I remember Wayne Newton making the rounds on the talk shows to talk up LTK. You certainly can't send out Don Stroud or any of the other made for TV actors that make up a good deal of the cast. Even Hedison wasn't going to generate much interest.

    I think the producers felt the name and the change to a revenge piece was enough to get butts in the seats. They were wrong in the USA. It got lost in the shuffle.

    Premiere weekend at the Box Office and it came 4th!

    GE had the stunts. The dam stunt was profiled many times. Sure the cast wasn't A list but it had a known director and pent up demand. Plus it took Bond back to fun and entertainment.
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,181
    And, like him or not, Brosnan generated a lot more interest as Bond than Dalton did, especially in the US.
  • edited June 2020 Posts: 2,917
    thedove wrote: »
    Bond had always been a summer franchise and a move that many don't talk about is how the producers moved the premieres to winter going forward where there is a bit less competition.

    Bond was not a summer franchise until TSWLM--before then it just as likely that a Bond film would open in the winter in the US. After LTK the franchise moved to fall opening dates, which undoubtedly helped the Brosnan and Craig films, since they stayed out of the summer tentpole season.
    thedove wrote: »
    Grabbing a plane by it's tail? An oil tanker chase? Not exactly good for a trailer

    The tanker chase remains one of the greatest chases in the series. It certainly had more explosions than the bungee jump in GE and explosions never hurt a trailer. Furthermore, none of three Bonds preceding LTK had stand-out single stunts but they did fine.
    Plus the cast didn't have any sizzle and looked more like what you would find in a TV show.

    And the public was drawn in by the obscure European character actors in Goldeneye?
    Oh and John Glen, he of Iron Eagle 3 was the director and couldn't compete with Spielberg, and Burton.

    And the public was drawn in by international auteur megastar Martin Campbell? The public doesn't care who directs a Bond film unless it's a very big name. Campbell wasn't.

    Regarding Glen's post Bond film--you can easily go through the resumes of Terence Young, Guy Hamilton, and Peter Hunt and also find embarrassing films they made after leaving the Bond series. It doesn't mean anything besides the fact that directors can get typecast and sometimes work on low budget projects to stay in the business.
    Sure the cast wasn't A list but it had a known director and pent up demand.

    Pent-up demand, a bigger budget for the film and marketing (thanks to new corporate leadership at United Artists), and a fall release date. And contrary to your disdain for television actors, the presence of a well-known TV star as Bond undoubtedly helped.
  • MakeshiftPythonMakeshiftPython “Baja?!”
    Posts: 8,181
    Revelator wrote: »
    And contrary to your disdain for television actors, the presence of a well-known TV star as Bond undoubtedly helped.

    Twice, in fact!
  • thedovethedove hiding in the Greek underworld
    Posts: 5,417
    Revelator wrote: »
    thedove wrote: »
    Bond had always been a summer franchise and a move that many don't talk about is how the producers moved the premieres to winter going forward where there is a bit less competition.

    Bond was not a summer franchise until TSWLM--before then it just as likely that a Bond film would open in the winter in the US. After LTK the franchise moved to fall opening dates, which undoubtedly helped the Brosnan and Craig films, since they stayed out of the summer tentpole season.
    thedove wrote: »
    Grabbing a plane by it's tail? An oil tanker chase? Not exactly good for a trailer

    The tanker chase remains one of the greatest chases in the series. It certainly had more explosions than the bungee jump in GE and explosions never hurt a trailer. Furthermore, none of three Bonds preceding LTK had stand-out single stunts but they did fine.
    Plus the cast didn't have any sizzle and looked more like what you would find in a TV show.

    And the public was drawn in by the obscure European character actors in Goldeneye?
    Oh and John Glen, he of Iron Eagle 3 was the director and couldn't compete with Spielberg, and Burton.

    And the public was drawn in by international auteur megastar Martin Campbell? The public doesn't care who directs a Bond film unless it's a very big name. Campbell wasn't.

    Regarding Glen's post Bond film--you can easily go through the resumes of Terence Young, Guy Hamilton, and Peter Hunt and also find embarrassing films they made after leaving the Bond series. It doesn't mean anything besides the fact that directors can get typecast and sometimes work on low budget projects to stay in the business.
    Sure the cast wasn't A list but it had a known director and pent up demand.

    Pent-up demand, a bigger budget for the film and marketing (thanks to new corporate leadership at United Artists), and a fall release date. And contrary to your disdain for television actors, the presence of a well-known TV star as Bond undoubtedly helped.

    Guess my opinion is invalid since you have gone point by point and refuted each one. That's okay. We see this film differently.
  • edited June 2020 Posts: 440
    The most likely reason for the drop in LTK's US box office is also the most simple; it just looked cheap and lacklustre compared to the other blockbusters on offer that summer.

    Regardless of how one feels about them now, the later Moore films and Dalton's first got fairly mediocre reception in the US upon their initial release and that does eventually affect a franchise.
  • Posts: 1,009
    We are going on a tangent here, and there's something I wanted to ask: If McClory wanted to make an original Bond, with new characters and situations, could he?
  • Posts: 2,917
    We are going on a tangent here, and there's something I wanted to ask: If McClory wanted to make an original Bond, with new characters and situations, could he?

    Doubtful. There would have been a replay of the courtroom drama that preceded TSWLM and deep-sixed the script McClory had co-written with Connery and Len Deighton. If McClory could have made an original Bond, he would have--instead he was stymied, made Never Say Never Again, and then couldn't even remake that. His final stand, with Sony's backing, was an attempt to capture the entire Bond franchise by claiming he was the co-author of the cinematic 007, and that shows how desperate he had become by the end.

    I would like to think that as Irishman Pierce Brosnan had an inbuilt blarney-detector, and it probably rang very loud after his first couple of meetings with McClory.
  • edited June 2020 Posts: 440
    Revelator wrote: »
    We are going on a tangent here, and there's something I wanted to ask: If McClory wanted to make an original Bond, with new characters and situations, could he?

    Doubtful. There would have been a replay of the courtroom drama that preceded TSWLM and deep-sixed the script McClory had co-written with Connery and Len Deighton. If McClory could have made an original Bond, he would have--instead he was stymied, made Never Say Never Again, and then couldn't even remake that. His final stand, with Sony's backing, was an attempt to capture the entire Bond franchise by claiming he was the co-author of the cinematic 007, and that shows how desperate he had become by the end.

    His only post-NSNA attempt that ever looked like it might have some actual merit, optioning the rights to Sony so they could make new adaptions of it and CR, turned out to be a bust.

    I doubt whether he was ever going to have lightning strike twice again. Having Sean Connery on board for NSNA was pretty much the only reason it got the studio funding necessary to push through the legal red tape in the first place.

    I suppose one has to admire the man's tenacity but it's clear that while he was a very charismatic individual, an experienced maker of blockbusters he was not.
  • edited June 2020 Posts: 1,009
    Revelator wrote: »
    We are going on a tangent here, and there's something I wanted to ask: If McClory wanted to make an original Bond, with new characters and situations, could he?

    Doubtful. There would have been a replay of the courtroom drama that preceded TSWLM and deep-sixed the script McClory had co-written with Connery and Len Deighton. If McClory could have made an original Bond, he would have--instead he was stymied, made Never Say Never Again, and then couldn't even remake that. His final stand, with Sony's backing, was an attempt to capture the entire Bond franchise by claiming he was the co-author of the cinematic 007, and that shows how desperate he had become by the end.

    I would like to think that as Irishman Pierce Brosnan had an inbuilt blarney-detector, and it probably rang very loud after his first couple of meetings with McClory.

    Well, this is more or less what I imagined. McClory had no right to interfere on TSWLM and pretty sure Cubby would have sued his ass in retaliation if he tried to pull an original history on.
  • echoecho 007 in New York
    Posts: 6,287
    Revelator wrote: »
    We are going on a tangent here, and there's something I wanted to ask: If McClory wanted to make an original Bond, with new characters and situations, could he?

    Doubtful. There would have been a replay of the courtroom drama that preceded TSWLM and deep-sixed the script McClory had co-written with Connery and Len Deighton. If McClory could have made an original Bond, he would have--instead he was stymied, made Never Say Never Again, and then couldn't even remake that. His final stand, with Sony's backing, was an attempt to capture the entire Bond franchise by claiming he was the co-author of the cinematic 007, and that shows how desperate he had become by the end.

    I would like to think that as Irishman Pierce Brosnan had an inbuilt blarney-detector, and it probably rang very loud after his first couple of meetings with McClory.

    Well, this is more or less what I imagined. McClory had no right to interfere on TSWLM and pretty sure Cubby would have sued his ass in retaliation if he tried to pull an original history on.

    I think McClory may have had a point about the SPECTRE aspects (of which he was joint author) originally in TSWLM ("Number One" references), which is why Cubby scrubbed the film of them. This is also, IMHO, why Stromberg is a weak villain. He's truly a watered-down Blofeld.

    NSNA and any other potential remakes had the challenge of how would McClory disassociate the character of Bond (from Fleming) and the tropes of the first three Bond movies (from Eon) from whatever McClory was owed by co-creating SPECTRE and the Thunderball story. It was not a bright legal line.
  • Posts: 9,846
    I just dont know why WB didnt try and build an alternate bond era with Thunderball and trying to get the rights to Casino Royale...
  • edited June 2020 Posts: 628
    The most likely reason for the drop in LTK's US box office is also the most simple; it just looked cheap and lacklustre compared to the other blockbusters on offer that summer.

    And yet I think it's aged better than some of those others. A good chunk of the budget of BATMAN went to Jack Nicholson's paycheck, and -- seen today -- I think the fashions look dated and the massive, clunky sets pretty shoddy. GHOSTBUSTERS II never looked good, not even in 1989. I also think that some of those other blockbusters (including LETHAL WEAPON 2) have inferior scripts.
  • Posts: 9,846
    I feel a third Dalton film would of either cemented him or killed him sadly the plot of The property of a lady with sex bots etc Just seems well like instead of Dalton's goldfinger or The Spy who loved me it would of been Dalton's Skyfall (completely out of character but likely would of made a ton of money)
  • Posts: 2,917
    Risico007 wrote: »
    I feel a third Dalton film would of either cemented him or killed him sadly the plot of The property of a lady with sex bots etc

    I haven't read this script, but those who have say the robots have been exaggerated. Furthermore, what came closest to being filmed was a substantial rewrite of this script that very few people have read.

  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited June 2020 Posts: 16,359
    thedove wrote: »
    I have vague memories of a big deal being made about Tim Burton and his "vision" of Gotham and the themes explored in Batman Returns. Same thing with Spielberg and his themes and style with Last Crusade. I grant you not many directors were involved with the publicity or marketing. LTK had Glen doing a workmanlike job with the film but aside for slow motion running I don't think there are any stand out directorial flourishes in the film.

    Yes the cast was a factor. Sean Connery in an Indiana Jones movie was a big deal! Danny DeVito and Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns a big deal. Joe Pesci in LW2 a big deal. We've got Robert Davi, the bit character actor from the Die Hard films. We have Carey Lowell. you could argue that Talia Sotto was the biggest "star" in the film. I remember Wayne Newton making the rounds on the talk shows to talk up LTK. You certainly can't send out Don Stroud or any of the other made for TV actors that make up a good deal of the cast. Even Hedison wasn't going to generate much interest.

    I think the producers felt the name and the change to a revenge piece was enough to get butts in the seats. They were wrong in the USA. It got lost in the shuffle.

    It's an interesting point. Obviously Davi does a great job in LTK, but if he'd been a Jack Nicolson or someone could that have attracted the audience a bit more? Maybe.
    Revelator wrote: »
    thedove wrote: »
    Bond had always been a summer franchise and a move that many don't talk about is how the producers moved the premieres to winter going forward where there is a bit less competition.

    Bond was not a summer franchise until TSWLM--before then it just as likely that a Bond film would open in the winter in the US. After LTK the franchise moved to fall opening dates, which undoubtedly helped the Brosnan and Craig films, since they stayed out of the summer tentpole season.
    thedove wrote: »
    Grabbing a plane by it's tail? An oil tanker chase? Not exactly good for a trailer

    The tanker chase remains one of the greatest chases in the series. It certainly had more explosions than the bungee jump in GE and explosions never hurt a trailer. Furthermore, none of three Bonds preceding LTK had stand-out single stunts but they did fine.
    Plus the cast didn't have any sizzle and looked more like what you would find in a TV show.

    And the public was drawn in by the obscure European character actors in Goldeneye?

    GoldenEye had audience curiosity from Bond being away for 6 years and a rebooted series as a result, plus the ultimate attractor: a new Bond. People want to see the new James Bond.
    LTK didn't have that, and in fact had a possible minus in that the Bond in it was one that hadn't really set the world on fire the first time around.


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