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Seems like Mankiewics and Wood were both very influenced by Dahl s output.
Wood, on the other hand, was far more brilliant than he was given credit for. Terrific screenplays, terrific novelizations.
I will certainly give you the novelizations, although I haven t read his MR one, but TSWLM is the best non-Fleming I read by far.
YOLT still has some of the least memorable dialogue and some unmemorable characters. It's the overall spectacle of it that carries it.
Agreed about TWINE, though. The action there works least of all: there's no rhythm to the total idea of the action, the way tension and spectacle is dispensed. That's actually, for me, why the first half of DAD is effective: the action ebbs and flows very well, like there was some idea of how it might shape over the course of the film. But then we get to Iceland and the action veers back towards TWINE-ness.
@MaxCasino I think Dahl would've been excellent as a continuation author. He and Fleming got on well, had similar backgrounds, especially working in intelligence during the war. (He was also like Fleming a bit of a ladies man.) He was an excellent writer. I'm not sure he would ever have had an interest in writing anything like a Bond book, but I think he would've turned in something special. I wouldn't judge his potential against the evidence of YOLT. @BT3366 had it right above. He seems to have written it to Cubby/Harry's instruction, on top of which he just needed the money. He ended up calling his own script a load of BS.
He wasn't fond of writing screenplays, sadly. Give him some careful freedom and we could have more colorful adventures.
AFAK Dahl wasn't in intelligence, he flew a Hawker Hurricane from Malta against the Jerry's. After that he was send home because of the headaches he had as a result of crashing a Gloster Gladiator or Hurricane in the Egyptian desert (this was before beeing stationed in Malta).
There's also a book, which I haven't read, called The Irregulars: Roald Dahl and the British Spy Ring in Wartime Washington. The blurb: "When Roald Dahl, a dashing young wounded RAF pilot, took up his post at the British Embassy in 1942, his assignment was to use his good looks, wit, and considerable charm to gain access to the most powerful figures in American political life. Better than any spy fiction, The Irregulars is a fascinating, lively account of deceit, double dealing, and moral ambiguity—all in the name of victory. Richly detailed and carefully researched, Conant’s masterful narrative is based on never-before-seen wartime letters, diaries, and interviews."
This link possibly provides some of the details in that book:
https://www.history.com/news/when-roald-dahl-spied-on-the-united-states
Never too old to learn, and an interesting book to obtain to boot. Thank you for this, I didn't know.
Fine with me,i agree,as long as the quality matches the length.
This is part of an overall trend in the film industry toward longer movies. I don't know when I've seen so many 2:20 films that could have easily been trimmed by 20 minutes.
Try Bollywood ;-)
Agree on the story needing the length. Some very long movies pass by quickly as they're that good. SP isn't one of them. QoS sure could've used a few minutes more to flesh out the story more.
Anyway, that was clearly not the controversial opinion. A lot of people on this board, as well as people elsewhere have stated it wouldhave been the perfect Bond film had Connery starred. I have to disagree. I don't think the persona Connery had built up until that point would have matched the Bond of OHMSS.
I would take it a step further, in fact. If one was so inclined to replace Lazenby, I actually think Roger Moore would have suited the film far more then Sean.
Despite being the most obvious playboy of the bunch, Sir Rog seemed to have more earnest and sensitive relationships with the majority of his Bond girls than Sean did. I think he also seemed to have more vulnerability than Connery, which would have suited the film down to the ground.
Don't get me wrong, Connery is the ultimate Bond, but the long held opinion that he would have made OHMSS better than Lazenby, or any of the other Bond actor's is hugely missplaced, in my opinion.
I totally agree,and have always been of the opinion that OHMSS would not have worked with Connery.
I think Lazenby did a cracking job.
Personally I feel thats where they screwed things up in the 60s. Now I love OHMSS and I dont mind GL in the role, but to have the whole Blofeld trilogy done in the same order as the books with Sean doing all 3 from 65-69 is the biggest what-if missed opportunity in the series.
I dont think he would have. From my understanding he wanted to do one in the scope of OHMSS.
From imdb. Take it as you wish
Sean Connery later said that he would have preferred to do a Bond film like this one, as opposed to You Only Live Twice (1967).
But then again he was offered a million and declined.
Still should have been in 1967. Perhaps he wouldn't have been so pissy about things if he knew what the final product would be. Or we would have had a hollowed out volcano in the Swiss Alps?
I have always thought OHMSS was tailor made for Dalton. Perhaps not a coincidence that he was indeed at some point intended for the role.
Me too - I've always wished he could have had a crack at either OHMSS or Casino Royale. A story done close to the source material, with emotional depth.
I know Dalton was linked in some fashion to OHMSS, but he would have been 20ish at the time.
I think a Connery OHMSS would have been very different to what we got. Having said that, I have enough respect for him to think that he could have pulled it off. It would have given him an opportunity to show a 'trajectory' in his characterization, which he perhaps didn't get a chance to do. A mellowing on account of love could have been interesting to see.
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I have mentioned this before, but I believe these sort of 'romance' style Bond films are best left to 'one off Bond actors' like Lazenby. The reason I say this is because I think they leave such an indelible impact that they could potentially influence and cloud a tenure or our perceptions of it. I think one of the reasons OHMSS is so respected is because we see it as Lazenby's Bond film. Could we readily have seen him as a 'bullet-proof' or more insouciant Bond had he continued in the role? I wonder. Perhaps not.
Looking at it another way, would a Connery OHMSS (close to end of his run) have changed our judgment and perceptions of his entire tenure?
Interesting observation. I never thought of it that way.
Had Lazenby had a longer run as Bond, it probably would have been tough for him to shake off OHMSS in terms of changing up his portrayal.
Puts him in nearly an impossible situation.