With Skyfall dropping in theaters in just a couple months, along with the 50th anniversary of the James Bond series, a close friend and fellow film nerd, Brandon Peters, has generously offered to do a comprehensive review of the entire 007 film franchise. Today is the fourteenth entry, with a full review of my wife's favorite 007 picture, A View To A Kill (no, that's sadly not a joke). I hope you enjoy what is a pretty massive feature leading up the November 9th release of Skyfall. I'll do my best to leave my two-cents out of it, give or take a few items I have up my sleeve (including a possible guest review from my wife as she sings the praises of her favorite 007 film, you won't believe what it is). But just because I'm stepping aside doesn't mean you should. Without further ado...
A View To A Kill
1985
Directed by: John Glen
Starring: Roger Moore, Christopher Walken, Tanya Roberts,
Grace Jones, Patrick Macnee
Rated PG
“What a view…”
“…to a kill!”
~May
Day, with Max Zorn finishing the sentence
STATS
Kills: 7
Girls: Stacey Sutton,
May Day, Pola Ivanova, woman in glacier sub
Car: 1984 Chevrolet
Corvette
Locales: Siberia, France
(Paris & Chantilly), San Francisco
Odd Villain Trait:
May Day is a brute…woman
Song: “A View to A
Kill” performed by Duran Duran
A View To A Kill
is the concluding chapter in the twelve- year era of Roger Moore as James Bond
007 and a Mendelson family classic. Also
bowing out in this adventure is Lois Maxwell as Miss Moneypenny, ending a 23
year/14 film run in the role. The film
proves to be a step up from Octopussy,
but doesn’t quite bring about a completely satisfying result. The film does deserve some credit for really
wanting to go all in and find some originality, but can’t quite execute to
bring the potential to fruition.
Moore’s age also affects a lot of the action beats in this
film as well. It’s clearly obvious he’s
not involved in any of it. The rear
projection technology in this film looks like it has regressed in this
film. The effect is really bad, and it’s
shocking, because it was somewhat passable in the last few films. It doesn’t help that the opening gives us
skiing (four!) again, and the lamest one at that. Aside from that, the action scenes definitely
do try to bring something different. The
Golden Gate Bridge finale is very epic on paper and in thought. However, the execution is poor. Rear projection and the whole thing obviously
looking like it was done on a sound stage severely takes away any thrills and
suspense this was meant to evoke. All in all, A View to a Kill looks and plays very much like a big budget ABC Sunday night made-for-tv movie that were a common place in the 1980s.
Not all the action is ambitious but lacking. The jump off the Eiffel Tower is quite good,
as well as the car chase that follows. I
really like the escape from the fire on City Hall and the fire truck chase
(later done better in Terminator 3: Rise
of the Machines). The horse chase in
Chantilly does bring sense of dread and inescapable circumstances with it. The music in this film is definitely good and the main
highlight of the film. They bring back
the On Her Majesty’s Secret Service
theme (one of the series’ best) finally and its more than welcome. The title song is awesome too, if you weren’t
already aware. Duran Duran helps close
the Moore era the way it began, with a rock band full creating a song for the
film. This song is bigger in its legacy
than this film is. I still here it to
this day in stores, restaurants, radio, bars, you name it. Its funny we get this intense crazy song to
support an old aged Bond hobbling to the finish line.
Christopher Walken as a bad guy? How is this movie not insanely awesome? I don’t know.
Its almost forgotten that he was a Bond villain. He’s not bad.
He’s actually very good. It’s the
first time we actually get a Bond villain who is a complete psychopath. Walken plays it great. I can’t imagine the original choices for
Zorin, David Bowie and Sting, being able to pull this off. A lot of critics at the time did not
appreciate the scene where Zorin mows down a bunch of miners with a machine
gun, but I did. It just adds to the
insanity of his character. To add to Zorin’s insanity, his girlfriend May Day
compliments it in appearance. This woman
looks like a man. She always creeped me
out when I was younger. She was just
disturbing in appearance. And Bond
sleeps with her! However, in his
defense, he was saving his own hide by doing it. May Day tries to evoke some of the henchman
menace that Jaws brought to some of the earlier films. Also, she turns to Bond’s aid in the end just
like Jaws. I’ll go ahead and say, May
Day is kind of underrated as a henchman.
She’s not the best, but clearly far from the bottom. Grace Jones also brought her boyfriend at the
time, Dolph Lundgren on for a short little extra-like role. See if you can find him.
Tanya Roberts has garnered a lot of flack for her character
of Stacey Sutton in this film. I gotta
say it’s well deserved. She’s quite a
dingbat. She also gives a sense of being
unnecessary in so many scenes. And I’ve
always thought this, but I’ll share.
Tanya Roberts has got to be an actress that the porn industry is kicking
themselves for having not gotten to first.
I feel like she would have been a massive success as a porn star. She’s got the look and that raspy voice that
is so fitting of the adult entertainment industry of that era. Shame. A View To A Kill
wants to be that epic finish to Roger Moore’s James Bond career, but just
doesn’t fill it out. Its certainly not
as embarrassing as Octopussy and its
never terribly boring. It feels a lot
different than a lot of Bond movies. It’s
got some original action beats, but none of it is show stopping or
memorable. One thing I’ve always
remembered this film for is the scene where Bond keeps alive underwater by
breathing air out of a tire.
Roger Moore was a fine James Bond for his first five efforts. He should have hung it up after
Moonraker or For Your Eyes Only. These
last two films have tainted his run.
There’s a lot of poor memories associated with his Bond films, and much of them derive from Octopussy and A View to a Kill. Some of his early work is no different than
any Connery adventure. He hung on a bit
too long. Moore even admits he should
have let go sooner. I went into this
fearing his run as Bond, but it was only feeling tiresome or painful during
these last two films.
Brandon Peters will return in The Living
Daylights*
Follow me on Twitter – www.twitter.com/@btpeters
E-mail – naptownnerd@gmail.com
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*the film only ends on “James Bond Will Return” it does not
give the title of the next film.
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