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I suppose not having him return for future Roger films could be seen as a missed opportunity. They do feel like actual friends in a way that James & Felix arguably never really did in the movies up until that point, and not again until Craig & Wright.
I completely agree. While I think Moore would have benefited from a more memorable introduction, to take a Flint approach with M visiting him at his place was a good idea.
Again, I completely agree, even though it's more a Moore era missed opportunity than a LALD one. Hedison definitely should have been Moore's Leiter.
In my opinion, not to have the same young Leiter in the two Dalton films is the true missed opportunity. While Hedison gives a better performance than John Terry, I think LTK would have been more striking if Leiter was the same age than Bond, strengthening the friendship between the two and making it all the more shocking to see a young man, with all his life in front of him, being destroyed by Sanchez.
Which also makes me think they should have killed off Leiter in LTK.
I think they should have too, but we're perhaps skipping ahead a few films! :)
We move to the next film in the series! Rushed somewhat into production due to the success of LALD, this film was released one year after LALD. In some ways this rush to production shows. John Barry is on record saying that the soundtrack was a bit un-inspired. (perhaps a missed opportunity?)
The last film to have Harry Salzman as a co-producer, lets talk about the missed opportunities of The Man with the Golden Gun.
Remember this is not about critical thoughts, this is where did this movie miss an opportunity? Is there a character that was forgotten or story arc was not concluded? Is there an aspect of the script that wasn't developed? Should a character received more screen time? Or less?
Scaramanga survived because Nick Nack see that he going to lose... Or delay the meeting between him and Bond a bit longer and in mean time he Killing more people. This also made more dangerious.
Are Fleming even consider The Return Of The Man With The Golden Gun novel and keep him alive.
That makes a great deal of sense.
Now that you mention it Bond does seem rather flippant about double-o-2 and in the previous film wasn't too upset about Baines? Making the comment "I rather liked Baines we shared the same bootmaker."
Yes, it is a bit odd that Bond seems flippant about 002’s death. But then again Bond seems to have a rather frosty relationship with the majority of his superiors at MI6 in this film (M, Tanner and whatshisname literally stare at him coldly when he says ‘good morning’ at the start of the film). In itself that’s actually an interesting idea too - that Bond is at odds with certain members of MI6. But again not much is done with it.
1. In the book, Scaramanga didn't hunt Bond by himself, it's Bond who came to his place, so there's nothing of this famous celebrity aspect of Bond being so much known and being a villain's trophy, instead there's a build up before Bond meets Scaramanga, they've got to know each other first because when Bond arrived there, Scaramanga had no knowledge who he was, until he gets to know him as the book goes further, he's still an assassin in the book, but he would kill if someone triggered him to do so, and that makes him a lot more scarier and unpredictable than hunting down various people whom we had no idea how did he got to know them in the first place, Bond for example in the film.
2. In the book, Scaramanga is described as being dangerous with lots of connections and influences, like the KGB, for example, he's a powerful man who has control of Cuba's economy, Christopher Lee's Scaramanga is interesting and could've been more great with that motivation.
3. I'm not sure about Mary Goodnight though, as I think she's really played up that way, the original plan was not including her there but Ekland herself insisted that the character should've been there, I think their main plan was to make Andrea Anders the main Bond Girl? But I think the film would've been better without her though as much as I understand Ekland's efforts though.
4. That stunt whistle, is this John Barry daydreaming of scoring the next Willy E. Coyote show? It ruined an otherwise unbelievable stunt, it turned into a joke instead.
All in all, it's a film that's intentionally bad in every way, so I don't know if JW Pepper's involvement, Bond's portrayal in this film is somewhat a missed opportunity.
I think the biggest missed opportunity with TMWTGG is not focusing enough on the opposition between Bond and Scaramanga. While it has an interesting starting point with Bond trying to get ahead of his opponent by finding him before he finds him, by going to Beirut (this scene is really bad though), the movie loses its focus by adding the Hai Fat and the Solex plot.
I actually find that a bit far fetched really, it makes Bond somehow a popular trophy for the villains, after Tiffany Case's remarks in DAF: "you've just killed James Bond!, then here comes the other, like everyone in the world knows Bond as this fearful and dangerous person, and the villains wanted him.
I don't get it, maybe a bit more polishing in terms of concept by not making Bond such a legend or a myth to many, he's too famous in this film, he's almost like a celebrity, that it takes Bond encountering an ordinary man in the street who would say, "Hey you're James Bond! That dangerous agent of MI6, man, you're my idol, you're great! Can I have an autograph or a photograph with you?".
And that's exactly the reason why Scaramanga wanted him, "Battle of the titans, killing you would be my greatest achievement, to us Mister Bond, we are the best", so is Bond really that known?
The Solex Agitator plot I think was supposed for a different villain other than Scaramanga, like in TLD or in OP where there are two villains with different intentions but connected to each other.
While I do agree, I think it could have worked by saying that Scaramanga is after 007 rather than James Bond. He doesn't know the name James Bond, but he does know the codename 007 and is after that agent. More than any other villain from the series, Scaramanga is the one that is the most relevant for this "Bond being hunted" type of plot. And he could be hunting 007 rather than James Bond.
I guess it was indeed the idea, but while it may work for OP (even though not making Octopussy herself the main antagonist is the biggest missed opportunity of this film in my opinion), it doesn't work so much with TMWTGG. Not only is this not very relevant as a subplot, but it basically becomes the main plot point at some point in the film. TMWTGG is centred around Scaramanga himself and I think it's a shame to lose the focus on him in favour of a subplot that's neither interesting nor well handled.
In fairness though is Bond being somewhat known in that world of spies and assassins different to Bond being known by SPECTRE or the Russians in the previous films/books? In FRWL (the novel) they literally have a whole file on him including his photos. He’s generally known by name/the 007 number - pretty much due to his previous missions, and with a healthy dose of ‘myth’ in there too - although few would recognise him by appearance (worth saying that in TMWTGG it’s pretty much the same situation with Bond feeling as if he can convincingly pose as Scaramanga with only a fake nipple). Bond’s almost a version of Scaramanga in that sense - his exploits as an agent/assassin are known in that world. Terrible for an actual spy certainly, but it’s very much in line with the heightened reality, if not fantasy, of James Bond stories.
I actually think TMWTGG has one of the most interesting premises in the series - Bond potentially being targeted by a faceless but legendary assassin. It’s a shame it’s not better handled.
SPECTRE/SMERSH in FRWL makes sense because it's still inside the espionage business, MI6 does have the same with the Russian agents (it's shown in TLD at the briefing with Q for example).
But in Scaramanga's case, it's not, he's just a wealthy assassin who should not know who Bond/007 is.
Scaramanga knowing 007/Bond is just far fetched, it doesn't helped that there's no prior build up to it, to help explain things.
Still, the question is how did he knew him? Even if a codename, it's still a mystery how did he knew Bond/007, there's no prior build up to this to make it plausible and even then, it's just far fetched, unless one may create a build up in which the scenario where he's clearly involved in a natural way, not shoehorned.
I'm not talking about Octopussy herself but General Orlov and Kamal Khan, both have different intentions but they're connected to each other.
I think that's the thing with Hai Fat and Scaramanga, but they've dropped the idea in order to build Scaramanga more as a threat more than anything personal to Bond.
Yes, I understood. My point was that while the Orlov and Kamal Khan duo works, I think the biggest missed opportunity was not making Octopussy herself the main antagonist. She should have been the villain, and it's a shame she wasn't.
Regarding TMWTGG, I think the creative team went back and forth with the antagonists. The Hai Fat plot was clearly written following the 1973 energy crisis and I doubt the character existed in the previous versions of the script. So, initially, Scaramanga was probably the sole bad guy. But again, as you say, after creating Hai Fat, they probably dropped the idea in order to build Scaramanga. Even if Hai Fat is indeed sidelined, the movie still spends a lot of time developing a story that doesn't fit well with the character of Scaramanga; thus, it's a missed opportunity to not just focus on him.
I suppose it plays into the idea that Bond and Scaramanga are these mirror images of each other. Both are known as dangerous killers in name but are also ‘faceless’ in a sense. I think it has more impact by the climax that we know Scaramanga has this obsession with killing Bond in order to create his ‘masterpiece’. Bond really has to have some sort of reputation in those circles in order for that to work. Honestly, I rather wish they’d leaned into Scaramanga’s obsession with Bond a bit more earlier on (he seems to claim he has ‘nothing against’ when they first meet despite having a mannequin of him in his fun house). Another missed opportunity I guess…
Anyway, it’s like I said, we’re very much in the realm of heightened reality with Bond. The world of spies and assassins often overlap here. I also feel it’s a ‘problem’ with this film that’s been over-exaggerated (even Moore joked about how Bond could walk into a bar and the barman would know him - obviously this never happens in any of the films, and we’re talking about Bond’s reputation in a very small circle of spies and assassins). If it works for the story I don’t see why Scaramanga ‘should not’ know who Bond is (pure realism and even airtight logic doesn’t always mix with Bond unfortunately, and it’s better that it doesn’t).
The missed opportunity for this film was the rushed production. If only they had given themselves more time to fully flesh out the film. We know they were looking at the film in 1968, we know that there was drama with the screenwriting here. I think we ended up with a film that had both of their thoughts but not neatly tied together. As someone mentioned the energy crisis and the solex is a cool idea and very much in the back burner, until suddenly it's the plot. Andrea Anders and her attempt to kill Scaramanga is a total coincidence as she's viewing Bond as her ticket out of her life, while Scaramanga is working for Hai Fat.
There is a good film in here, with more time I feel that film would have been a banger.
For me the biggest missed opportunity is that your villain is the best assassin in the world, so the plot should be about an actual assassination. That just makes sense, doesn't it? Instead of Bond trying to find a little box, he should be racing to stop someone, or group of people, being killed. An assassination which will presumably lead to world war or something like that. If he's going to pose as Scaramanga, then have his bluff called and put him in a situation where he has to assassinate someone or risk being killed himself. There's so much they could have done with the great concept which they themselves came up with, but instead we get the little box.
At the very least we have the big laser gun which Scaramanga makes with the Solex - have that be his actual objective, not the boring power plant. He needs a giant (golden) laser gun to shoot down a space shuttle or something- so the final showdown is him using his marksmanship but moreso. The laser gun in the film is just thrown away, nothing more than a toy.
Even the final duel feels a bit underheated and not really explored enough. Equally Britt Ekland is great, and her and Roger bounce off each other well, but her character is terrible stereotyped stuff.
There's so much potential in this film than it ever delivers.
Really good points here! Andrea sending Bond the golden bullet is a very good hook, so you're right...it makes little sense why he needs another bullet in Beirut.
The entire script needed a fresh overhaul. There are good elements (Scaramanga, the fun house, Andrea, Nick Nack and even Goodnight, if recast) but boy is the film a mess.
I mean, nobody cares about the plot of Octopussy. It has action and that's all that matters.
Nice @mtm … love the idea of racing against time and trying to stop a series of assassinations which would lead to some kind of destabilization and then to potential war. Perhaps a story thread to introduce the new 007?
Great post.
I suppose we should feel for Andrea, but she is almost treated as this trophy. I believe Scaramanga makes comment of that kill. It would make more sense to have an assassination or attempted assassination where more stakes occur.
Hell TLD has a couple of assassination scenes that are more powerful than what we get here. I love your concept and it certainly would make for an interesting movie. The thing that your post highlights is the wasted opportunity with Lee in the villain role. He nails it but could have brought more if the script allowed it.
Even the PTS opening to LALD has more assassinations than this movie does!