The Man With The Golden Gun vs. A View To A Kill

I usually considered these to Roger Moore's worse ones, usually, but they do have some highlights after watching both again recently.

I would say that as far as villains go, Zoren is the better acted villain perhaps, where was Scaramanga is the better written character, background story, and relationship wise, with Andrea Anders. As far as Bond girls go, I would say that Anders is just as good as Mayday, quality wise, and Stacy Sutton is not the greatest, but a lot better compared to Mary Goodnight.

AVTAK has better action scenes, where as the story and plotting to TMWTGG may be slightly better in terms of a villain plan, but the plotting is also clunky in sections such as the Sheriff Pepper sections.

But what do you think?

A younger Moore able to participate in the action sequences to a greater degree, Lee being Fleming's cousin (and turning in a nicely urbane performance as Scaramanga), the 'funhouse' injecting a nice dose of surrealism, Maud Adams, the still eye-popping 'barrel roll' stunt (shame about the 'comedy' sound effect) and some chucklesome one-liners ('Speak now or forever hold your piece', 'You've no idea what it went through to get here' etc) ... I'd go for Golden Gun, I think.

This was the Moore era in its relative infancy. By AVTAK, it's all looking pretty tired.

Golden Gun every time, and for every reason:

Christopher Lee as Scaramanga
Nick Nack, the untrustworthy dwarf henchman
Maud Adams and Britt Eckland in bathing suits
Hong Kong, Bangkok and Phuket
The Golden Gun
Bond chasing the villain for a change
The duel in the 'fun house'
John Barry's soundtrack

This movie made Christmas 1974 for me. Sure it had its flaws ("Gawd-dam...") but it ticked all my boxes, as did all of Guy Hamilton's entries.

Oh okay. I thought that John Barry's score was better in AVTAK kill actually. I also thought that Mayday is a better henchperson than Nick Nack perhaps, and felt that Nick Nack didn't really do as much in comparison.

I forgot to mention Chew Mee...

Chew Mi, (isn't her name spelled like that?) is only in one very brief and pointless scene though.

She's an attractive girl swimming naked, with an innuendo for a name. Not that difficult to see why she would be a highlight, surely?

Blunt Instrument wrote:

She's an attractive girl swimming naked, with an innuendo for a name. Not that difficult to see why she would be a highlight, surely?

Bottoms up!

Blunt Instrument wrote:

She's an attractive girl swimming naked, with an innuendo for a name. Not that difficult to see why she would be a highlight, surely?

Careful, you'll break its programming.

Where the bloody hell is Ambler?

I guess since she never hooks up with Bond, maybe it felt like a tease or something.

CJB wrote:

Blunt Instrument wrote:

She's an attractive girl swimming naked, with an innuendo for a name. Not that difficult to see why she would be a highlight, surely?

Careful, you'll break its programming.

Where the bloody hell is Ambler?

AVTAK for the simple reason that there's a stronger story at its centre. As such, I feel the Bond girl is also more dynamic and the villains more threatening (despite Chris Lee being "SPLENDID!" in TMWTGG). May Day is probably my favourite henchman and Zorin fights for top spot for my favourite villain.

I love the lush, Oriental flavour of TMWTGG's score (a highlight being Bond's journey to Scaramanga's Island), however John Barry's penultimate effort could just be his best in the series (and I understand how considerable that call is).

As for Bond himself, I think Moore is a lot more focused in this one, and plays to his strengths. His St John Smythe cover is perfect for his Bond and there's a lot more chemistry with Patrick Macnee than Lt Hip. When Moore can hold his own against the electric, unpredictable Christopher Walken, even despite his age, you know something's working. It's also a treat to see Bond actually doing some spy work. Stealthily snooping around Chantilly and retrieving intelligence and maintaining two covers throughout his mission are hugely welcome in a spy series where we don't really see a lot of it.

In answering the topic, I'd possibly give a slight edge to TMWTGG simply for the presence of the incomparable Sir Christopher, but I've come to admire AVTAK a lot more than I used to. There's certainly a sense of fun there and who doesn't love Grampa Rog shagging a 20 year old in the shower while Q watches.

I don't know lads. Golden Gun has progressively slipped in my eyes and yet VTAK, by virtue of my most watched film (Bondwise), though flawed somehow edges it in my book. But a little.

Each undeniably has issues of its own but both are great in differing ways and do not deserve the poor reputation bestowed by those who don't understand them.

TMWTGG is the series truly falling out of favor with audiences due to tiredness and having much more competition. The Broccoli-Saltzman partnership was dying if not totally dead, Hamilton was doing his third in a row, the budgets were getting lower along with box office returns, no one was quite agreeing eye to eye, Barry had two weeks to score the picture and the film suffers overall from those factors.

But. It has Mankiewicz's wittiest lines and the Maibaum swoop. The locale was new for Bond. Roger is beautifully pissed off throughout since 007 is now ostensibly being hunted. The tone while ostensibly comic is very darkly nasty. Barry's score is GORGEOUS. The title song is a grower despite the raunchiness and silliness.
Lee was never given a better role and this is his best work I think. The idea alone of Nick Nack was genius and Herve is so iconic and unforgettable. The fun house is iconic.


AVTAK while feeling somewhat tired is tied into Bond being older and more tired himself. It has an emerging darker tone to fit the mid 80's and this provides a nice contrast to OP-AND makes it a better film than people realize despite being a more scaled back story. Barry's score is masterful. Walken is agonizingly brilliant, Roger has a great rapport playing off of Zorin's psychotic nature, Grace Jones is truly memorable, the title song is a classic...

You can't really put Bonds against each other I think.

I like that Rog-Bond is more of a prick in Gun.

hegottheboot wrote:

Each undeniably has issues of its own but both are great in differing ways and do not deserve the poor reputation bestowed by those who don't understand them.

TMWTGG is the series truly falling out of favor with audiences due to tiredness and having much more competition. The Broccoli-Saltzman partnership was dying if not totally dead, Hamilton was doing his third in a row, the budgets were getting lower along with box office returns, no one was quite agreeing eye to eye, Barry had two weeks to score the picture and the film suffers overall from those factors.

But. It has Mankiewicz's wittiest lines and the Maibaum swoop. The locale was new for Bond. Roger is beautifully pissed off throughout since 007 is now ostensibly being hunted. The tone while ostensibly comic is very darkly nasty. Barry's score is GORGEOUS. The title song is a grower despite the raunchiness and silliness.
Lee was never given a better role and this is his best work I think. The idea alone of Nick Nack was genius and Herve is so iconic and unforgettable. The fun house is iconic.


AVTAK while feeling somewhat tired is tied into Bond being older and more tired himself. It has an emerging darker tone to fit the mid 80's and this provides a nice contrast to OP-AND makes it a better film than people realize despite being a more scaled back story. Barry's score is masterful. Walken is agonizingly brilliant, Roger has a great rapport playing off of Zorin's psychotic nature, Grace Jones is truly memorable, the title song is a classic...

You can't really put Bonds against each other I think.

Good write up. I agree with most. Most glaringly, I disagree with the idea that AVTAK was tired. It's simply too inventive to me for the film to appear "tired" or "creatively bankrupt", as I've seen others describe it.

I too think that AVTAK seems overall tired, as I don't feel that it is inventive so much as assembling together things we have seen before a lot.  I know other Bond movies do that but it feels much more apparent in this one.

However, that doesn't necessarily make it bad as I do think the movie has some good moments that stick out and did have a good climax and demise for it's two main villains. As for TMWTGG, does anyone think that the action scenes are very curiously low budget though, and possible the lowest of the series? Even more low compared to Never Say Never Again I would say.

When I used "somewhat tired" with AVTAK it is really probably more of a pacing comment that ties into the lowering of scale that makes it seem more leisurely and having less Earth shattering events.

All I can say is that the cabaret dressing room fight is a tad clunky and of course has the infamous mirror reveal that can't be unseen. Otherwise everything works fine from a choreography standpoint and it's good that the film never went into full kung-fu territory as that could have been embarrassing. The school sequence is actually quite good-and Roger does well at simply surviving whilst mocking the whole enterprise-as Bond really would.

The NSNA stuff is passable at best. Barely. The end of the title sequence has that awful stagey last bit with the particularly awful false head butt. But of course it was a training exercise so maybe 007 wasn't to Connery-punch all into oblivion.

The worst fight in the series is in the PTS of DAF. Those two guards and the false Blofeld in the mud room. After the great opening gag confrontations and the excellent staging of the killing of the intended double in the mud-we are treated to the worst fight in the series and one that you feel every ounce of Peter Hunt no longer being the editor. I like to think Bob Simmons was out sick or something as it's so bad. At least Barry's brilliant cue carries the scene to the great dumping of the bloodied Blofeld into the boiling mud but everything from the closeup of the guard's hand in the trap to 007 tying Blofeld on the gurney is the worst staging in the series...AND THEY PUT IT IN THE TRAILER!! Ugh!

hegottheboot wrote:

Each undeniably has issues of its own but both are great in differing ways and do not deserve the poor reputation bestowed by those who don't understand them...

[TMWTGG] has Mankiewicz's wittiest lines and the Maibaum swoop. The locale was new for Bond. Roger is beautifully pissed off throughout since 007 is now ostensibly being hunted. The tone while ostensibly comic is very darkly nasty. Barry's score is GORGEOUS. The title song is a grower despite the raunchiness and silliness.
Lee was never given a better role and this is his best work I think. The idea alone of Nick Nack was genius and Herve is so iconic and unforgettable. The fun house is iconic.

This.

The freshest aspect of AVTAK is the title song. After having four ballads in a row, this was a much needed jolt, especially after the respectable but unremarkable "All Time High".

I really believe had Dalton been cast for AVTAK that it would have gotten the kind of rejuvenation that TLD ultimately got. Glen probably would have toned down or eliminated some of the tired humor, like with the Keystone Cops antics that's been going on since DAF. Dalton's presence would have at least pushed everyone to work harder on getting the film just right, rather than being complacent with the reliable Sir Rog anchoring the series. And just imagining Dalton facing off Walken sounds like a delight.

I have nothing against Sir Rog. He's a pro in the film and in spite of his age he still has a charm to him that makes him endearing. But I whole-heartily agree with his summation that he did one film too many.

hegottheboot wrote:

All I can say is that the cabaret dressing room fight is a tad clunky and of course has the infamous mirror reveal that can't be unseen.

The mirror reveal is unfortunate, but at least brief. I think that this is a superior Rog fight ... he has to put a bit of effort in (they're not going down after one punch), he has to improvise (the aerosol sprayed into an opponent's eyes), and there's maybe a tougher undercurrent than with some of the others (the guy who gets his head shoved into a mirror).

Blunt Instrument wrote:

hegottheboot wrote:

All I can say is that the cabaret dressing room fight is a tad clunky and of course has the infamous mirror reveal that can't be unseen.

The mirror reveal is unfortunate, but at least brief. I think that this is a superior Rog fight ... he has to put a bit of effort in (they're not going down after one punch), he has to improvise (the aerosol sprayed into an opponent's eyes), and there's maybe a tougher undercurrent than with some of the others (the guy who gets his head shoved into a mirror).    

Yes I, too, appreciate it for this reason. It's a shame in the following film we get the rather underwhelming fist fight with Sandor, despite the excellent dispatch and quip.

MP wrote:

The freshest aspect of AVTAK is the title song. After having four ballads in a row, this was a much needed jolt, especially after the respectable but unremarkable "All Time High".

I really believe had Dalton been cast for AVTAK that it would have gotten the kind of rejuvenation that TLD ultimately got. Glen probably would have toned down or eliminated some of the tired humor, like with the Keystone Cops antics that's been going on since DAF. Dalton's presence would have at least pushed everyone to work harder on getting the film just right, rather than being complacent with the reliable Sir Rog anchoring the series. And just imagining Dalton facing off Walken sounds like a delight.

I have nothing against Sir Rog. He's a pro in the film and in spite of his age he still has a charm to him that makes him endearing. But I whole-heartily agree with his summation that he did one film too many.

There's no doubt AVTAK would be held in much higher regard had Dalton (or even a younger Moore) played Bond; his age appears to distract many viewers -- but not this one.

I personally don't think Dalton has enough charm to carry one of my favourite scenes in the film: when Bond meets Stacey. Moore's charisma, combined with Barry's music, Tanya's aloofness and May Day's villainy elevates an otherwise ordinary scene to a higher level. It's doubtful the scene would have been written in the same manner with Dalton in the role, let alone with the same musical cue from John Barry.

No, I think Tim could have done it nicely with that sort of mischievous look he can get. Of course his Smythe character wouldn't have been so dottily played as what Roger does. I've always been interested in how his voice modulates up in pitch during these scenes-yet can dial back down when Bond is poking at Zorin with the mention of flycasting.

I reiterate again that I think what makes Roger appear so old in AVTAK was the plastic surgery between films. That and the more comb over hairstyling that started on FYEO. If both of those were not in place I think the overall effect would be lessened, because otherwise Roger beautifully shows no signs of being slowed down. I think as usual he is so terribly underrated as an actor that the aging in AVTAK is very subtly played and highlighted by Barry's score. Plus the difference in acting styles between Roger and Walken provide a biting contrast that makes the typical Bond-villain showdowns far more charged.

The setup of the cabaret fight is fine, but it is in repeated viewings that the seams show in both the choreography of this fight and the Sandor rooftop fight. And I love both. Whereas the choreography of the former is hurt by the close quarters, the latter is harmed by being shot in more open fashion. That said I do like how both are staged in terms of using the environment but the Sandor fight works better overall due to the buildup, the sound design of Cairo streets in the background juxtaposed with the muffled sounds of the fight on the quiet roof and how it is two men fighting to the death or a Macguffin.
The TMWTGG fight has never made sense to me. "Oh look there's an English chap with a cigar watching Saida. Let's jump him in her dressing room."

Ugh, Moore's comb-over. They should have just applied some toupee appliance on him to cover the balding top. It's curious that EON has been okay with letting Dalton and Craig show off their receding hairlines, whereas they wouldn't let it stand with Connery in DR NO. Though by TB they were justified in covering up Connery's increasingly thinning hair.

I always thought Moore looked older in OP. Ah well.