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He was given an opportunity during his 4 film tenure to vary the take on the character, as all the actors, perhaps bar Lazenby (since he only had one shot) have done. When you get 4 kicks at the can, you have a chance to bring the entire acting repertoire to the table.
Well you found one, no one is a bigger Brosnan fan than i am hehe.
But yes ofcourse his Bond would have been totally different if the producers would have given him the freedom to be that Bond.
But I can't blame the producers.
The 90s called for the type of Bond Pierce made and maybe they were a little afraid to do the dark Bond.
So iguess its like Mendes4life said
Bad timing for Pierce
And following from what @Szonana said, you couldn't expect the producers to continue with the gritty LTK formula after that film flopped in the US, and again, after a six year gap where everyone's idea of Bond reverted to Goldfinger and TSWLM, they had to play it safe. And Pierce was tied to that safe interpretation and not given a chance to make it what he could have.
Thanks for explaining and i now see your point much better but yes for Mnay Connery started to get bored since You only live twice so for many fans it was like they changed The actor of the first 4 films still i think his good oned have more weight. So 2 bad films against 4 great ones i think we can ignore the bad ones.
There are 6 actors, all of them brilliant in their way. Not one failure.
Dalton will always be my No 1.
Then it gets tricky. Before Spectre it was Brosnan/Moore on 2nd place and then Connery, Craig and Lazenby.
Now Craig is my No 2 after Dalton.
Any Bond actor ranking is fine. I even could understand if someone would have Lazenby first. After all the only reason he doesn't get higher is because you don't have anything to compare OHMSS to, imho.
Definitely my first time here, but thanks!
Ahem. ME! :D
Excellent first post. Welcome.
Of course, being a child who grew up with Moore, it's natural for me to not be able to see Dalton as perfection, but in my opinion, he really didn't have that level of effortless suave that Connery & Moore had. Even Craig could be more effortless than him at times, and Dalton was the victim of overacting (although he also had some pretty bad cast mates). I liked his portrayal in The Living Daylights, where he fit the image of Bond that I had grown used to by '87, but a more serious one, while his portrayal in Licence to Kill felt strangely hammy and just not Bond-like in my opinion.
I agree on Dalton as well. He was excellent in some areas, but not so good in being naturally suave. I never saw him as a ladies man either. I do like his turn in LTK though. Intense. Only Craig in QoS runs him close for that kind of sustained intensity
My take:
1. Dalton - nobody has done it better.
2. Connery - his first two were astounding.
3. Craig - up there with the best.
4. Brosnan - shined in even the thinness scripts.
5. Moore - surprisingly Bondian at times; a definite asset to the franchise!
6. Lazenby - awesome newcomer.
Really, they're all good.
Absolutely, I think Moore was quite Flemingesque in LALD, TMWTGG, FYEO and OP.
I agree, they are all good in their own right.
2. Daniel Craig. Although I'm not the biggest proponent of the new, darker, more serious, more emotional portrayal of Bond, no one could have made it work like Craig. In cinematic Bond, I generally want a relatively flat, simple character who exists to shoot people, pop off with quips, and have fun while doing it. Obviously, the direction EON has chosen to take Bond means giving the character more depth and flaws. The thing Craig has done is manage to achieve this goal in an expert manner that I wouldn't have thought possible; making the audience get to know, care about, and like Bond even with his flaws. After watching the story of Craig's Bond over the past 4 films, I feel that I know this Bond fella pretty well, to the point that, after watching the end of Spectre and seeing Bond with Madeleine, I have never felt so genuinely happy for a person who doesn't exist.
3. Roger Moore. A supremely fun, light-hearted Bond. As stated by chrisisall above, Moore can be surprisingly Bondian. This shines through especially well in the dinner conversation between Bond and Scaramanga in TMWTGG.
4 Sean Connery. The essence of Bond style. The prototype upon which every other Bond was built in some way or another.
5. Timothy Dalton. I rather enjoy TLD, but I can't stand LTK. TLD seems to be a transition between what Bond was, and what Dalton wanted him to be. I enjoy Dalton's Bond the most when he was displaying the older qualities of Bond, but by the time LTK rolled around, and Dalton's take on the character was set free, he had lost me.
6. George Lazenby. Not at all a bad Bond, but basically a discount version of Connery-Bond. I can't help but wonder how much more powerful OHMSS would have been with Connery, in particular the final scene.
Wow you expressed my thoughts on Craig and Pierce better than i do lol. That's why those two( Pierce and Craig) are in my top 3.
Id just put in the middle of those two Sean Connery who had everything needed for the cinemmatic Bond as well and he did it first but i prefer pierce a little more because he is the one i saw first and my first Bond film was with him.
My ranking explained in short sentences
Top 3
1. Pierce Brosnan: he brought sexy Back to the franchise
2. Sean Connery- got The character right from his very fisrt film
3. Daniel Craig- He made Dark and gritty Bond look good
Followed by....
4. Timothy Dalton - Flemingesque Bond 100%
5. Roger Moore - way too goofy for me
6 George Lazenby- way too cute and sweet for Bond
Ok, I shouldn't have said the original Pierce Brosnan but I just wanted to say i loved Both Pierce and Connery for the same reasons its just Pierce has the small edge because i watched him first
what I meant is everything i loved from Pierce Connery did it first.
It just looked terrible.
I just saw a little more 'swagger' in him in DAD, and he was more assertive with the ladies ("put your back into it", "too strong for you" etc.) rather than relatively wimpy/unsure as in the previous films. That's the Bond I like to see, and I thought he pulled it off nicely there although the film is a joke (literally). I think he was better in DAD than Craig in SP (who seemed almost creepy in some instances to me - especially with Bellucci), truth be told.
There was some of the old melodrama at the end with Halle's Jinx at the Ice Palace, but still, I wish he'd been more this kind of Bond during his tenure. It shows that it really was all up to him and not the films (since DAD is not really a positive poster boy for Bond films either).
This shouldn't come as a surprise. Right of the pages of the books. Dalton is moody, intelligent, dislikes his job, has believable love interests and remains a bon vivant throughout. Tim is playing it straight and it's not too difficult to suspend one's disbelief. Nevertheless, the escapism is still there as both his films have some of the best and most outrageous stunts of the series.
2. SEAN CONNERY
This man is the personification of class. The way he moves on screen, the mannerisms, the playful look and the way he is dressed make for the ultimate gentleman spy. DAF does cost him some points, he should not have returned looking all out of shape. Still, those 60's films are the pinnacle of stylish entertainment and thanks in no small part to Sir Sean's charming suaveness.
3. PIERCE BROSNAN
Yes, I put Pierce third. The Brozza was born to be wearing a suit, he's elegant and stylish. Might not feel as British as his predecessors, though I like his internationality (German cars, Italian fashion). He has a self-confident swagger to him and I adore the sarcastic look he sometimes gives in the more comedic scenes (Q scenes especially). I know his films aren't always loved around here and even I put DAD at the bottom. It says a lot though I still think he did great despite the awfulness he was put in the middle of.
4. GEORGE LAZENBY
Even fans of OHMSS put him dead last sometimes and I don't really get why. Physically the most impressive and confident almost to the point of arrogant. Yet at the same time he has a vulnerability about him that makes him more human than the others (except maybe for Tim). Besides, that last scene is heartbreaking and that's definitely thanks to him.
5. ROGER MOORE
I don't dislike Rog, I just don't like him as much as most of the others. That's predominantly because of the way he was used by the writers. There is a joke behind every corner and certainly in his last outings those jokes had become the essence of the films. The parrot, the Tarzan yell, that noise he makes when he's falling over. I admit Moore was great in the 70's, in the 80's not so much.
6. DANIEL CRAIG
I'll be the first to admit that Daniel Craig is a good actor. It takes more than a good actor to be a good Bond though. The man's got a working class vibe to him. Bond has lost his refined nature in the last outings. That's mostly because he looks like a bodybuilding Everyman. If such a man would enter a bar, I would think he's there to pick a fight. Anyway, he has some fine moments too and delivered two good films for sure. Still my least favourite of the bunch though.
Good but a little strange ranking. It looks contradictory that you love the realistic portrayal of Dalton but Have Daniel at the bottom. I feel their portrayals were quite similar woth the only difference that Craig had the good luck of having better budgets and his films look much more up scale.
And physically I think Daniel is more appropriate for that much more real action oriented Bond.
But I admit my top 3 looks contradictory as well.
I always claim how much i have a preference for cinematic Bond and how care more for the ladies man traits over the more believable spy assasin traits and yet i have poor Roger at the bottom With Pierce Brosnan, Sean Connery and Daniel Craig in my top 3.
I even sometimes think my ranking doesn't make much sense.
It might seem contradictory that I have both "realistic" Bonds on both ends of my rankings. The difference is that while Tim can be a classy gentleman, I don't feel that with Craig. He's too brutish to me. I can't see Craig's Bond as an Eton alumni. I find the refined nature of 007 very important and Craig doesn't convince me on that account.
Craig lacks that sophisticated touch that all the others naturally master. That scene after Vesper's demise when he's breathing like a wild animal is far away from the subtle reaction of the much maligned Lazenby at the end of OHMSS.
So realism has not really anything to do with why I prefer Dalton to Craig. Tim can be angry and moody too, but he does so with a touch of class. Cubby sure knew which kind of man to pick for the role, not so sure about his offspring though.
http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/7199/bond-polls-2015-every-bond-actor-s-1st-bond-film#latest
And these were the actual results:
However, I agree that he is not able to sell sophistication or classiness quite as well as the others. The films help him out a lot in this respect, because they have been very upscale and stylish offerings with refined costars in comparison to what the others had to endure on occasion.
Well yes I totally agree. Craig is a good actor but for me he is more convincing as a soldier or a detective. He is also good as a cold blooded assassin but I always thought James Bond was more than that. He should also be an intellectual gentle man with a sense of irony and humour.
I agree that even a Bristish super spy should show at least a few emotions but in the Craig era it is a bit too much. But I also don't think that the overly emotional portrait of Craig's Bond makes him a relaistic spy.
Yes he fell in love with her but I mean this man has been trained to work effectively in ectremely dangerous situations, he is trained to kill another person in cold blood and to cope with extreme psychological stress.
BUT Craig finally showed us he can be as good as Moore in TSWLM, Brosnan in DAD or Connery in TB.
SPECTRE shows him in spectacularly relaxed, moving cool and smooth and having fun. He delivers the lines and the looks like Moore did at his best time.
It's just a shame it took him four movies to finally get there.
It's obvious it's my opinion.