Live and Let Die vs. The Man with the Golden Gun

I've often thought these are probably Roger Moore's least best movies cause it wasn't until the SPWLM, where his movies found their footing.  When comparing LALD to TMWTGG, LALD is all on autopilot.  There's not really much of a plot in LALD hardly.  It's mainly Bond goes to New York, which is a dead end that leads nowhere, then he steals Solitaire, then she is taken back, then he rescues her, and that's it the movie is over.  It's probably the least amount of plot of any Bond movie.

However the action scenes are pretty good and a lot of fun.

TMWTGG has quite a bit more plot and it's pulling on a thread like other Bond movies, where one thing leads to another, which I like a lot better.  However, the action scenes are a lot worse and some of the most underwhelming in the series.

When comparing the villains I would say they are both good, where as the villains in LALD are slightly better I would say.  But the villain in TMWTGG has more of a plot to work with.  TMWTGG has better Bond girls I would say.  Both Bond girls are both held captive by the villain, and I like Andrea Anders better than Solitaire.  The other Bond girls are both ditzes but Rosie Carver is a bigger ditze than Mary Goodnight.  So I guess both Bond girls in TMWTGG win that one.

So I guess to recap:

Better action: LALD
Better plot: TMWTGG
Better villains: LALD
Better women: TMWTGG

So it's a real toss up between the two for me, and which do you think is better?

Both rather weak entries in my book though while I prefer TMWTGG over LALD, I think LALD's story is more realised, even if it's summed up in one scene (which happens to be one of the better scenes in the film). LALD gets by on the intrigue in the world of espionage combined with voodoo superstition. TMWTGG gets by because of Christopher Lee's presence and there's something Bondian about Bond visiting the Far East. Since San Monique doesn't exist and Jamaica was used much more effectively in DN, I'm not tickled by the locales.

That's true I didn't compare locations before. Well Thailand and Hong Kong look more exotic than New Orleans and Jamaica and New York, but the you would expect Bond to go to a more exotic Asian location, so perhaps the more American locations of LALD are better in the sense that they are more unusual and unexpected?

I may be a bit biased since these are probably my two most watched films of all time.

LALD is based on a novel which has the most driven and direct of any Fleming story. The film manages to retain this and play it tiptoeing along a line of discretion and supporting its villains to not fall into the label of racism. And in doing so it probably managed to create the modern action picture whilst giving Roger a first entry that has the energy of DN along with certain plot similarities.

GG brings back the typewriter of Maibaum and has an ingenious plot but it just cannot gel properly despite being absolutely stuffed with brilliance, wit and memorable moments.

I can understand criticism of each but of the two LALD is unquestionably stronger as a standalone film because it has no major flaws or bumps in the road.

HGTB wrote:

GG brings back the typewriter of Maibaum and has an ingenious plot

Which one, the Solex or the manhunt?

Both actually. And that they are meant to tie in together could have been great as well a'la GF and the smuggling leading to Grand Slam etc.

Hmm, I'm not sure about that. In GF, the smuggling has a natural progression to Grand Slam, whereas in TMWTGG, Bond's on an assignment for an unrelated matter regarding the energy crisis, Scaramanga wants to kill Bond but actually wants to kill Gibson and it's revealed Andrea wants Bond to kill Scaramanga and it becomes a mess. Bond's initial mission perhaps should have led Bond to Scaramanga, or Bond should have realised that Scaramanga wants him dead (if he did in fact send the bullet) because he is after the Solex, and found out through his communist friends that Bond is investigating it.