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'Diamonds are Forever' with a Better Plot
It's not at all perfect, but it's how I envisage the ideal DAF film to be. It is a direct sequel to OHMSS.
In ‘Diamonds are Forever’, Blofeld is working with the Spangled Mob in Las Vegas, smuggling diamonds in order to use the profits to resurrect SPECTRE. However, Blofeld is planning to kill Jack and Seraffimo Spang and go into business himself. Bond protects them in exchange for information about Blofeld’s plans.
Bond is sent on an assignment by his superior, M. Acting on information received from Special Branch, M tasks Bond with infiltrating a smuggling ring running diamonds from mines in Sierra Leone to the United States.
Bond receives information from a trusted informant about a smuggling route. Bond is lured to a death trap, when attempting to follow up on this potential lead.
Bond captures and interrogates the trusted informant who tricked him into entering the death trap. It is discovered that he was being intimidated by one of the representatives of the diamond smuggling ring into misinforming Bond - who tries to elicit information from the trusted informant. Bond chases after an assassin, who killed the informant, but winds up losing him at a London train station.
MI6 links a killing to the assassin, Peter Franks, a cat burglar turned hired killer who suddenly dropped off-the-radar after being the subject of an ongoing MI6 investigation and escaping their custody. Bond tracks him down and kills him, assuming Peter Franks’ identity.
Bond undertakes contract work for the Spangled Mob, through an anonymous caller, eventually leading him to Franks’ contact, Tiffany Case, who is staying at a Central London hotel.
Bond meets with Franks’ contact, Tiffany Case, a gangster’s moll whose father was an aspiring career criminal killed in an armed robbery gone wrong. She was beaten and almost killed soon after her father’s death, but was rescued by Jack Spang and came to work for him as a courier. She also became his girlfriend.
Tiffany Case later discovers that the Spangled Mob were responsible for her father’s death.
Bond enquires about the payment of his fee, and is told to bet on a rigged blackjack game at Willard Whyte’s hotel-casino complex in Las Vegas. However, Bond keeps on betting, as he is captured and tortured by casino security. Bond fights back against his captors in the casino underground parking garage, stealing a valeted car and escaping.
Bond abducts Tiffany Case and tricks the Spangled Mob into thinking that she’s gone rogue. He offers to return the diamonds. Bond plants a listening bug in the cache of diamonds, leading him to his next point of interest: an abandoned ghost town that was bought up by Jack Spang, ostensibly as a legitimate business opportunity i.e. a theme park. Bond is involved in a shootout at a rundown motel at the abandoned ghost town, where Bond discovers the missing Willard Whyte. The Spangled Mob muscled him out of his business interests, and held Whyte hostage in the motel. They are using The Sierra Hotel and Casino as a means of facilitating payment for their subordinates and holding meetings.
Bond spies on one of their meetings in the conference room, taking photographs of all those present. They are sent off to Q-Branch, which scans the photographs and identifies the subjects. They are apprehended by the CIA when Bond passes on their identities to Felix Leiter.
Bond is informed by Leiter that one of the apprehended business associates of the Spang Brothers tipped them off to the identity of one of their receivers, a shipping magnate. Bond investigates his dealings, and discovers that the man is Blofeld himself. Blofeld has been working as a courier for the diamond smuggling ring, and worked his way up the ranks.
Bond encounters Wint and Kidd, serial killers turned American Mafia hitmen, both of whom suffer from manic-depressive disorder (the same condition that Red Grant suffered from). He learns that Wint and Kidd became hitmen for the mob as there was always a need for their services. He escapes the two killers at one of the ports that is under Mob control.
Bond discovers that they are involved with diamond smuggling from local diamond mines. Smugglers use merchant ships as conduits for undercover smuggling of raw diamonds from Freetown and precious gemstones from adjoining Guinea to Europe. From that point on, the Spangled Mob take over transportation duties.
Bond later discovers that Wint and Kidd have been contracted by Blofeld to kill Jack and Seraffimo Spang, so that he can take over.
Jack and Seraffimo Spang are taken into protective custody by the CIA, as Bond chases after Blofeld and kills him, avenging Tracy’s death.
Bond and Blofeld engage in a high-speed boat chase beginning from an old smugglers' cave that Blofeld is hiding at. CIA agents are engaged in a shootout with Blofeld's private guard, while Bond is chasing Blofeld. They eventually arrive at a nearby salt mine, where Blofeld is finally crushed to death by mounds of salt.
Bond and Tiffany Case board a cruise liner, where they are held in their cabin at gunpoint by Wint and Kidd. Bond is fighting both of them, as Tiffany stabs Kidd in the leg. Wint is strangled to death by his own suspenders, courtesy of Bond. Kidd is disarmed by Tiffany, who is subsequently knocked out by the former.
Bond and Kidd fight to the near death, as Bond hits Kidd over the head with a glass paperweight and kills him. Kidd is thrown overboard.
In ‘Diamonds are Forever’, Blofeld is working with the Spangled Mob in Las Vegas, smuggling diamonds in order to use the profits to resurrect SPECTRE. However, Blofeld is planning to kill Jack and Seraffimo Spang and go into business himself. Bond protects them in exchange for information about Blofeld’s plans.
Bond is sent on an assignment by his superior, M. Acting on information received from Special Branch, M tasks Bond with infiltrating a smuggling ring running diamonds from mines in Sierra Leone to the United States.
Bond receives information from a trusted informant about a smuggling route. Bond is lured to a death trap, when attempting to follow up on this potential lead.
Bond captures and interrogates the trusted informant who tricked him into entering the death trap. It is discovered that he was being intimidated by one of the representatives of the diamond smuggling ring into misinforming Bond - who tries to elicit information from the trusted informant. Bond chases after an assassin, who killed the informant, but winds up losing him at a London train station.
MI6 links a killing to the assassin, Peter Franks, a cat burglar turned hired killer who suddenly dropped off-the-radar after being the subject of an ongoing MI6 investigation and escaping their custody. Bond tracks him down and kills him, assuming Peter Franks’ identity.
Bond undertakes contract work for the Spangled Mob, through an anonymous caller, eventually leading him to Franks’ contact, Tiffany Case, who is staying at a Central London hotel.
Bond meets with Franks’ contact, Tiffany Case, a gangster’s moll whose father was an aspiring career criminal killed in an armed robbery gone wrong. She was beaten and almost killed soon after her father’s death, but was rescued by Jack Spang and came to work for him as a courier. She also became his girlfriend.
Tiffany Case later discovers that the Spangled Mob were responsible for her father’s death.
Bond enquires about the payment of his fee, and is told to bet on a rigged blackjack game at Willard Whyte’s hotel-casino complex in Las Vegas. However, Bond keeps on betting, as he is captured and tortured by casino security. Bond fights back against his captors in the casino underground parking garage, stealing a valeted car and escaping.
Bond abducts Tiffany Case and tricks the Spangled Mob into thinking that she’s gone rogue. He offers to return the diamonds. Bond plants a listening bug in the cache of diamonds, leading him to his next point of interest: an abandoned ghost town that was bought up by Jack Spang, ostensibly as a legitimate business opportunity i.e. a theme park. Bond is involved in a shootout at a rundown motel at the abandoned ghost town, where Bond discovers the missing Willard Whyte. The Spangled Mob muscled him out of his business interests, and held Whyte hostage in the motel. They are using The Sierra Hotel and Casino as a means of facilitating payment for their subordinates and holding meetings.
Bond spies on one of their meetings in the conference room, taking photographs of all those present. They are sent off to Q-Branch, which scans the photographs and identifies the subjects. They are apprehended by the CIA when Bond passes on their identities to Felix Leiter.
Bond is informed by Leiter that one of the apprehended business associates of the Spang Brothers tipped them off to the identity of one of their receivers, a shipping magnate. Bond investigates his dealings, and discovers that the man is Blofeld himself. Blofeld has been working as a courier for the diamond smuggling ring, and worked his way up the ranks.
Bond encounters Wint and Kidd, serial killers turned American Mafia hitmen, both of whom suffer from manic-depressive disorder (the same condition that Red Grant suffered from). He learns that Wint and Kidd became hitmen for the mob as there was always a need for their services. He escapes the two killers at one of the ports that is under Mob control.
Bond discovers that they are involved with diamond smuggling from local diamond mines. Smugglers use merchant ships as conduits for undercover smuggling of raw diamonds from Freetown and precious gemstones from adjoining Guinea to Europe. From that point on, the Spangled Mob take over transportation duties.
Bond later discovers that Wint and Kidd have been contracted by Blofeld to kill Jack and Seraffimo Spang, so that he can take over.
Jack and Seraffimo Spang are taken into protective custody by the CIA, as Bond chases after Blofeld and kills him, avenging Tracy’s death.
Bond and Blofeld engage in a high-speed boat chase beginning from an old smugglers' cave that Blofeld is hiding at. CIA agents are engaged in a shootout with Blofeld's private guard, while Bond is chasing Blofeld. They eventually arrive at a nearby salt mine, where Blofeld is finally crushed to death by mounds of salt.
Bond and Tiffany Case board a cruise liner, where they are held in their cabin at gunpoint by Wint and Kidd. Bond is fighting both of them, as Tiffany stabs Kidd in the leg. Wint is strangled to death by his own suspenders, courtesy of Bond. Kidd is disarmed by Tiffany, who is subsequently knocked out by the former.
Bond and Kidd fight to the near death, as Bond hits Kidd over the head with a glass paperweight and kills him. Kidd is thrown overboard.
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Comments
It wasn't bad per see...it was just a missed opportunity. We had a poignant ending with its predecessor OHMSS, with everyone hoping that there would be a classic revenge sequel.
Yet this was not the case. The camp Bond feel to this film was pitiful, and it seemed to lose its sense of direction. It had a promising PTS, but that was it. The car chase was entertaining, sure, but the whole film? Not exactly.
That sentence belies your youth, @hullcityfan. You'll hate it when you're older.
I find the story rather convoluted with random killings of smugglers and you're not sure why exactly. Its parts are better than its whole. The first Bond film to really be very weak, I think, and I know that there are many others that share this view.
Yes the plot was weak but the film in general is just class!
I'd beg to differ, but then I'm writing a blog piece on the nastiness of the film that will appear in due course.
May I ask about the nastiness of this wonderful film?
I'm writing a sort of a polemic against DAF entitled 'A Very Nasty Little Film Indeed - An Alternative Review of Diamonds Are Forever (1971)'. You can catch it on The Bondologist Blog when it hits there later this month hopefully.
I think DAF could have been rescued with a great climax, but it wasn't , it was ridiculous. I appreciate the movie is not a OHMSS revenge sequel, it was never meant to be, wasn't directed to be. (It was an attempt by the producers and Guy Hamilton to recapture the humour and magic of GF) But anyway, that climax. Bond has Blofeld trapped in his Bath-o-sub!!
Does he kill him for the shenanigans of YOLT and OHMSS or for the minor indiscretion of helping to kill his wife?
No, he swings him around a bit for a laugh!
A little before that Bond approaches the oil rig for the big showdown. Does he stealthy approach underwater or parachute down? No, he rolls there in a big inflatable hamster ball! Which Blofelds men just watch happily as it gets closer and Bond exits.
Can't write anymore,I'm getting wound up.
Ironically the first half of the film isn't actually too bad, apart from the fact it completely glosses over the fact Tracy's just been murdered. But once Bond gets to Vegas it falls off badly, with only the car chase to briefly pick things up.