Diamonds r 4eva: written commentary (part vi, I think)

James Bond steals a tiny yellow car, flirts with Ms. Moneypenny, and is off to Amsterdam. We see a boat tour down the Amstel, a dead woman pulled from the river, and Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd cackling to themselves about sending pictures of the body to kids. The two henchmen walk away, James Bond drives past them and arrives at Tiffany Case’s house.

Jill St. John is controversial among Bond fans. Sure her character is a little uneven and she’s given odd dialogue. But as much as it pains me to say it, that’s Tom Mankiewicz’s fault. You can’t deny that St. John at least gives a performance. She’s picking up the slack where Connery is lacking.

BUT, with that said, even while Connery simply rolls out of bed and into his toupee, there’s no denying his charisma. As much as I love Roger Moore, there are times when I think “Sean could have delivered that line better.” And Bond’s first interaction with Tiffany Case highlights this point; She walks in and out of the room barely wearing anything, she’s confusing Bond with her constant wig changing, and she’s a total smartass. That’s a lot! Had Roger been in the scene, he would have raised an eyebrow, gawked at her, and looked like an absolute pervert. I would have never believed their chemistry. But Connery, in his detachment, plays it dumb and cool. He lets HER carry the scene. After Tiffany Case informs Bond that she’ll finish dressing, only Connery could have pulled off the line “oh please. Not on my account.”

Can you imagine if Roger said that? 🤢

What’s unfortunate about this scene is that very little of it carries into the film. Tiffany doesn’t become the strong female character she’s established to be and the wig changing plays an only a minor role later on. So the scene is confusing if not absurd. Then again so is the rest of the movie! But I think the biggest complaint is that many find Tiffany Case annoying.

I disagree wholeheartedly. The inconsistency in the character is ironed out by St. John. The strong face she puts on in her introduction immediately melts away once when bullets start flying. Where you find inconsistency, I find relatability. Where the screenwriters failed, St. John delivered nuance. So justice for Tiffany Case!

There’s an interesting scene after the Tiffany Case introduction when Bond returns to his hotel room and has a phone chat with Q. Bond commends him for the fake set of fingerprints and Q is flattered. I like little moments like this. The relationship between Q and Bond can sometimes be quarrelsome, particularly during the Connery era, but at the end of the day I like to think these guys like each other. But what’s confusing here is that Q kinda nonchalantly tells James Bond that the guy he’s impersonating has killed a guard, escaped prison, and is presumably on his way to Tiffany Case. I guess these things happen all the time at M16, but hell, even if I didn’t LIKE the guy, I’d still be a little urgent in a phone call to my coworker that a man is probably on his way to kill him! But that’s just one of the reasons why this film is so special: it’s explicitly telling you that we’re here to have fun.

This point is driven home in the following action sequence…

TO BE CONTINUED

Aaron Taylor Johnson

If y’all can remember, Eric Bana was “officially” announced as James Bond by several major news networks prior to the naming of Daniel Craig. So while nothing, insofar as I can tell, has been released by the Broccolis or Eon Productions regarding the casting of the next James Bond, I think there’s enough smoke around Aaron Taylor-Johnson that we can safely assume he’s probably the new 007. If not, then it’s April Fools’ Day, so…April Fools.

But I support this choice for a few reasons. For starters, he has a pretty big penis. And secondly, his wife is over 20 years older than him. So salute. But that’s enough about the man himself. How would he perform as the world’s most famous secret agent?

I should state that I’ve only seen Taylor-Johnson in two movies. So maybe I don’t have the most informed opinion on his abilities. But he looks like the kind of guy that can handle the humor.

I’ve been revisiting some of the Roger Moore films. While he’s not my favorite Bond, nor my second favorite, and probably not my third favorite, he did bring a certain levity to those movies that I miss. If I have a criticism of Craig, and there’s not many, is that he might have been too much a brute. As much as it pains me to say, Craig was far from the funniest Bond. But what he restored to the part was a sense of danger which was sorely missed during the Moore and Brosnan eras. That’s one aspect from Craig years I hope the producers don’t jettison. As obvious as it seems now, James Bond needs to LOOK like he can handle himself in a fight.

Taylor-Johnson, again, coming from an uninformed opinion, appears like he’s the best of both worlds: both bruteness and levity, which seems like a nice change of pace given our current times.

And he has a big penis.

moon raker

Now hear me out:

If you get REALLY high, then Moonraker can become a decent, but not a GREAT film instead of the cocaine-fueled nightmare that is now.

What I love about the James Bond franchise is that it’s pure spectacle. It doesn’t shy away from that. In fact, it full on embraces it…at least during the 60s, 70s, and 80s.

What people don’t realize about the Sean Connery through Timothy Dalton era is that the plot DOES NOT MATTER. At all. Not in the slightest. They’re all screenplays based on story beats: 1) Cold open 2) Titles 3) Moneypenny/Q/M 4)Intro to villain, etc etc. and it always ends with the villain lair exploding and Bond fucking the Bond Girl. The facade of a story is always in service to hitting those beats.

It’s like listening to a Phil Spector produced album where the sheer scale of the production covers up the limitations of the artist.

Now Moonraker crosses the line from being spectacle to straight up insanity. It’s obvious that the producers were just throwing shit up on the screen in a desperate attempt to compete with Star Wars. But underneath all that bullshit, there is a decent James Bond film.

The scene that is often cited as being the moment Bond jumps the shark is the gondola chase. But did you know that that scene is completely useless? It advances the plot in no way. Who’s chasing Bond? Why are they chasing him? It’s assumed to be the villain’s henchmen, but that’s never made clear. As far as Bond knows, it’s just random dudes. There are no consequences for the chase either. You can cut it out completely, and nothing in the story would have been missed. Not even a story beat. The very next scene is a fight with a henchmen where a shit ton of glass gets broken. There is literally no point in the gondola chase.

Honestly, half the shit that takes place in Venice could be cut. Only two important things happen there: you learn that the villain is using a chemical agent in his diabolical plot and the Bond girl is actually a CIA agent. The death of the first henchmen takes place there, which explains the appearance of Jaws later in the film, but I’d argue that this character could be cut completely and nothing would be missed.

Could Jaws be cut out? Probably not. Unlike most things in this film, Jaws actually advances the plot. But his character could be made less ridiculous by introducing him in the Rio Carnival sequence (who cares why he’s there? It should be obvious). Unfortunately that stupid ass love interest ends up becoming useful for Bond at a key point, so that shit has to stay in. BUT all that crap afterwards can be cut out.

Now the film goes completely off the rails after Bond escapes the ambulance, and not much can be done to fix that. 007 has to go into space 🤷‍♂️. But if roughly 1/4 of the movie gets edited out, you’d have a nice little spy film.

I wish someone would make a fan edit of this.