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Comments
Yes, its parts are more impressive than its whole. It is indeed very dull in places.
Completely agree. I couldn't believe what I was reading when a member on here told me they liked the trend of giving everything a dark, gritty reboot.
What's wrong with a fun film every now and again? Not all films need to be serious.
Ok maybe LALD isn't "camp" per se but -like DAF - it is a bit too silly in places for my taste. The couple having their wedding cake destroyed, Mrs Bell, Sheriff Pepper, Rosie Carver...AND Kanangas death. It just feels very "70s" IMO and doesn't really hold up in the way some films from other eras do.
Then again I'm a big fan of OP so what do I know :p
Is "farce" perhaps a better word to describe the films of the 70s?
Indeed, @thelivingroyale. I think the "dark, gritty reboot" is a cinematic fad that will eventually run its course when the public becomes bored of the trend. Personally, I like variety in my films and find the "emo" or "emotional" elements rather tiring.
I don't dislike LALD at all. As I said its a mid-way entry for me and I find it relitively enjoyable to watch (I would certainly put it above DAF and TMWTGG). I agree that both LALD and GG are perhaps more serious than what followed (Moore definitely played it straigher in those two) but the signs that the thrillers were shifting into camp/comedies/farce began with DAF and continued with LALD and even more with GG (I admit I can't stand some of the comedy in that film).
I hear what you are saying. Funny thing about it all is most of the critics had begun to criticise Moore's films for being too cartoonish and juvenile. Yet when TLD came out the same jack asses tried to say it was "too serious". Guess we just can't please everybody. I came to accept Moore but like you I did yearn for the "old days."
I did not care for the campiness of DAF and I found TSWLM and MR very annoying. They were essentially the same film which was a ryclcle of YOLT fantastical plot.
That being said I will get back on topic: LALD. I understand that in the original screenplay Solitaire was Black and Rosie was White. Solitaire was white in the novel and I hear the studio balked at the lead girl being black so they reversed the ethnitency of the women.
@hullcityfan Yes, by all means we will do FRWL 50th anniversary come Oct...
I wasn't old enough to be a Bond fan in 1987 but from what @Bondsum has said to me it seems most of the "too serious" claims came with LTK rather than TLD. I can see their point, a film like LTK pushed things too far the other way to the point where it became virtually "po faced".
Hey, me too! Except I was 9 years old. I think it was not only the first Bond film I saw on screen but also the first non-kiddie show I saw without a parent (my younger brother went with me). We were excited to see Moore's debut because we knew him from reruns of "The Saint" and we didn't know who Sean Connery was (yet). Of course we thought LALD was great! For those reasons, I have a soft spot for LALD despite the occasional silliness. Besides, I became a Yaphet Kotto fan thanks to LALD - he ended up in my favorite TV show of the 90s: "Homicide: Life in the Streets".
Yes, I saw this one when I was very young too. I remember people talking about it at school. It may well have been the first James Bond film that I ever saw but it's hard to remember which for me.
LALD got massive ratings of 27 million viewers when it premiered on UK TV in 1980 I think, at a time before DVD or video of course. Many young fans like myself had seen TSWLM and MR and never had a chance to see LALD at the cinema. So really, didn't the producers miss a trick by not rereleasing it at the cinema in 1980? They would have cleaned up twice over.
I do find, as I get older, that Moore's delivery is a bit too arch in this, like they are making him (Brit 1950s comedy star) Ian Carmichael at times, maybe to play off against the cool black dudes. They did the same with Lazenby, giving him these insufferable British prig lines, all very affected, which really only Connery could pull off like he was sending it up a bit.
Anyway, the whole film ushered in a new style, it was a welcome break with the past, though they seemed to both copy the whole LALD style to lesser effect with the next one (same poster, same villain's mistress reeling Bond in plot) while harking back to the John Barry Shirley Bassey song stuff. It was only in TSWLM that Bond got cool and 70s again imo.
Oh, incidentally, I'm very glad this isn't being shown every other week on UK terrestrial TV, I was getting sick of it and all the other Bond flms too. It was on twice a week at one point. Sky is useful for something.
You are right on LALD and on those darned TV repeats. Time was when they were hardly ever on TV, then a gamut for a few years. It rather cheapens them, I find.
Yes, that's always puzzled me @OHMSS69. The critics pretty much always gave Bond a rough ride apart from Brosnan. Fortunately for Bond it used to be critic-proof and what was written in the press had no bearing on the BO. Maybe times have changed and today more people take notice of what the critics say? It'll be a sad day for Bond when people only go to the cinema based on the Tomatometer percentage, that's for sure.
Totally agree, though I have a soft spot for DAF even though it has its faults.
Yes, I recall reading something about that. Wasn't Diana Ross' name bandied about at one point?
DAF is not a bad film the only faults are that Charles Gray plays Blofeld and didn't look different from YOLT back on topic.
1. Skyfall
2.Casino Royale
3. Live And Let Die
4. The Living Daylights
5. Tomorrow Never Dies.
Can't believe 40 years have passed since this great Bond release came out, but what else is there to say about this. Favorite Bond movie, has just about everything you could hope for when I watch, lovely Bond girl, action, suspense, thrills, theme song, surreal villains and you never get bored. I wouldn't give any James Bond release 10/10 as I don't think such a thing exists, but for this, 9.5 and fully deserving
I think you may have been misled somewhere along the line..
I wouldn't have anyone other than Roger Moore in that years release. It was the right time for the introduction
- Live and Let Die Wikipedia
Its also on the DVD documentary according to the refrences
better fit the dinosaurs in frame. But I doubt that was the reason they shot LALD in 1:85.1. Maybe they were thinking television? You know, making it easier afterwards to have the image fit household television screens? Or maybe it was just cheaper. I hesitate to frame any more hypotheses since I've pulled these two out of very thin air as it is. ;-)
I know Kubrick played with his aspect ratios quite a bit. His last film, Eyes Wide Shut, was shot in 1:33.1 of all things! I guess because most of the film takes place inside confined rooms, it made things easier to frame.