James Bond - 1962-2021

 I had to write this down somewhere!  I would like to ideally write a review for every Bond movie, and maybe one day I will, but for now let it be said I have absolutely seen all of the James Bond movies, most of them more than, oh I dunno six times, and I am currently watching them all with my girlfriend, in order, and that has been really fun and special.

This is a brief encapsulation, notes to help me remember which movie it is, a star rating, any extra information I have about it, or thoughts or whatever, and any and all whathaveyou leftovers that make their way onto this page.

Dr.No (1962) with Sean Connery and Ursula Andress.  Surprising that the first one film feels pretty minor and nearly unmentionable, but I suppose it makes sense none of the tropes were in place yet.  There is no real Bond song, even.  Bond goes to Jamaica to infiltrate Dr. No, who has some indecipherable plot.  Iconic moments the first Bond James Bond, Andress as a beach shell collector.  Some sort of dumb side plot about a "dragon" on the beach which is really just a souped up car?  Weird movie.  Uneven.  I give it about a 3.

From Russia With Love (1963) is one of those that somehow nailed the Bond formula.  For only the second film, it is amazing the step-up this movie is.  It has the first appearance of Blofeld, unseen at this time, and Rosa Klebb is arguably the top villain even though she is not the real villain, Robert Shaw as Grant is.  Great entry, a good one to rewatch, 5 stars.

Goldfinger (1964) again nails the formula, has the first iconic Bond song, and the famous woman killed by the gold painting over her skin.  Oddjob is in this movie, tossing his hat around, and the villain Goldfinger has a very straightforward idea to bomb Fort Knox.  The plot heavily revolves around Felix Leiter, and this movie oddly enough Bond doesn't do a lot in the actual plot. 4 stars.

Thunderball (1965) has a couple cool early sequences early on where they hide a plane at the bottom of the ocean surrounded by sharks.  There's two atomic bombs on the plane and Bond has to go investigate. A lot of underwater swimming sequences, obviously the underwater camera was the hot new invention.  A really comical ending with sped up footage is weird, but then the end with having a plane pick them up from a boat is incredibly awesome.  I give this one like 3.5.

You Only Live Twice (1967)  I should be canceled for liking this one so much.  But the opening space sequence is incredible and then Donald Pleasence later, and the base built into a mountain with a fake lake...  these movies were going for it at this point.  The hilarious point in this though is when Bond dons yellow face and pretends to be Japanese, basically for no real reason...?  I don't think it has anything to do with the plot.  Also, the ninja-spoiltation in this is fucking hilarious.  4.5 stars.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) with George Lazenby.  "This never happened to the other fella indeed" as Bond gets sent to Switzerland where he pretends to be some biologist or some shit and is after Telly Savalas as Blofeld.  Bond falls in love and gets married, as well, with a very dark ending to that plot line.  Lazenby I think is generally fine, but yeah this movie is actually very good.  It moves and its shot really well.  I give it like 3.5 stars.

Diamonds Are Forever (1971) one of the ones that people don't like as much, but I like.  Connery is certainly a little bit on auto mode, but Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd are really bizarre and fun as bad guys, the movie is leaning into the cheese maybe a little bit, and it's fast paced with a great Bond song.  4 stars.

Live and Let Die (1973) Roger Moore shows up as Bond, and this movie is a little bit more dark and action than people might remember.  Moore is not a stuffy old man yet, and yet it's the plot that's the silliest(?) Yaphet Kotto is excellent as Kananga, and he is making heroin and Bond is on the case.  We introduce JW Pepper and we have black magic of course including actual(?) magic in a Bond movie???  Unexplained.  This one's all over the map but it's quite fun.  3.5 stars.

The Man With the Golden Gun (1974) a true childhood favorite of mine.  Christopher Lee is the titular villain, we have an excellent theme song and Herve Villachaize as the infamous henchman Oddjob.  The third nipple, the gun, the island, the lasers...man, this movie is quite great.  I even really like the opening with the house of mirrors and the weird mannequin.  Seriously, what is Saramanga's deal??  This is excellent, I love it, 5 stars.

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) Barbara Bach is the best Bond girl, I think, or minimally one I like the most.  Jaws is introduced and overshadows the villain, even though, the villain is again completely insane.  He's some weirdo building a ocean base so that he can flood the world or something.  This movie is a ton of fun and the action sequences with Jaws steal the show.  Also the sequences in the Egypt and the pyramids are freaking awesome.  5 stars.

Moonraker (1979) Bond goes to space!  Jaws is back helping a Elon Musk like villain that's obsessed with going to space to start a new master race or something like that.  The highlight here of course is the space stuff, which takes forever to get there, but there's fun things along the way and the comparisons to today's insane billionaires are certainly fun.  A bit of a step down though. 2.5 stars.

For Your Eyes Only (1981) This movie's a conundrum to me.  Extremely memorable beginning where Bond kills unofficial Blofeld in a comical and strange sequence.  But then every time I watch it I'm like, what is the plot of this one?  Kristatos as the villain is barely in it and it feels unfocused a lot of the time.  For a return to form it is low scale and non campy, but its also just not one that sticks with you.  2.5 stars.

Octopussy (1983) and somehow this one is a favorite?  I dunno.  Great opening a song, awesome great clown sequence, the Faberge egg plot is easy to follow and Maud Adams is great as the title character.  Good and straight forward, this one is maybe under discussed because of the title, and its a mistake I'll say it, but this movie is actually pretty solid as an entry.  4 stars.

A View to a Kill (1985) Christopher Walken as a Silicon Valley villain in San Francisco, Grace Jones is a memorable villain.  This one borders on silly again and is remembered for that a lot, but I don't think this is as bad as a lot of people say it is.  Great end sequence.  3.5 stars.

The Living Daylights (1987) Timothy Dalton takes the reins in this somewhat back to basics spy based Bond movie that is oddly memorable.  The Bond girl with the standup bass, Joe Don Baker as the main villain, and Stavros as the evil blond henchman.  Thrilling plane sequences and great martini plot points.  I think that Dalton is good and a lot more like the Bond in the books.  4 stars.

License to Kill (1989) The last outing for Dalton is, for me, sort of the beginning of what might feel like "the modern era" maybe because of the actors that I know and have seen in other stuff and are still alive, or maybe because it feels like a more straight-forward mafia against cops action movie with minimal Bond gadgets and stuffy British offices.  Benicio Del Toro is a henchman and Robert Davi as the villain in this pseudo Scarface-inspired drug-runner fare.  4 stars.

Goldeneye (1995) Pierce Brosnan in what is definitely my first Bond as a contemporary viewer. I dunno dude  this one is extremely good. Whether it’s due to the video game or it’s setting or cast, this is the best Bond in years and a standout. 5 stars.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) Bonding podcast and the fans may be split on this one, but it seems to only be about the plot, which is like, who cares.  Jonathan Pryce as the villain wants to control the news, that's still more logical than Moonraker!  Michelle Yeoh, Joe Don Baker and Teri Hatcher join, Hatcher is bad but everyone else is good and fun in the movie.  I think this one is fun, but surely a small step down.  4 stars.

The World is Not Enough (1999) Divisive for Denise Richards character primarily, I think this one gets better with repeat viewings.  She isn't a great actor and isn't believable as a rocket scientist, sure.  But the rest is good.  Robert Carlyle as the baddie, Robbie Coltrane is back, Sophie Marceau is decent enough.  Another small step down but I think this is a little better than its rep.  2.5 stars.

Die Another Day (2002) Now this is the bad one in my opinion.  World started it, this one ends it.  Halle Berry is bad, the CGI terrible, even Rick Yune looks bad and the plot is ALSO stupid.  With race swapping and with a Antartic base, like what the fuck is even going on here?  The disappearing car, its a regular list of bad.  They knew it needed a reboot even with the big box office and Brosnan saying he'd come back.  1.5

Casino Royale (2006) Daniel Craig in a origin story/reboot which you've seen if you're reading this.  Eva Green is a compelling and perhaps best Bond girl ever, Mads Mikkelsen is insanely good.  Perhaps the best modern scene in a Bond movie of him sitting with Eva in the shower.  An excellent Bond movie.  5 stars.

Quantum of Solace (2008) A direct sequel to Casino Royale, Dominic Greene is a the main villain who I think was the one who was torturing Eva Green?  Cool end sequence and some interesting stylistic choices.  Perhaps the least talked about Craig film, and in that way underrated?  Extremely well shot, I really feel like this got segmented into some subpar category due to writers strikes etc.  But this is really good!  Talk about a great director that would be fun to tap again for a future Bond movie.  4 stars.

Skyfall (2012)  This was hugely successful when it came out.  There's a little bit of return to some of the Bond tropes with gadgets and Q and such coming in.  M is targeted by an old 00 recruit played by the incredibly good Javier Bardem.  I don't love that aspect and you can see the build towards Spectre here, which is also not great considering how that movie turned out.  This one is really good though and really allows Craig to shine.  I like it, 4 stars.

Spectre (2017) Another one that I think is getting better on rewatch. At first, I didn’t like it, especially the way that they try to tie Blofeld to the other three film films before this. As I rewatch it, I care about that a little less and I enjoy the incredible action set pieces more. Overstuffed and too long, they also waste Monica Bellucci.  It’s gotta be the weakest link in the Craig era. I give it 3.5 stars.

No Time to Die (2021) Thus we end the Craig era and the modern era, without any real information about what is next I can say that.  This movie is very action sparse, and ultimately more confusing than it should have been.  Someone is killing all of Spectre with a robot virus, Bond is truly in love and even has a daughter he didn't know about with Madeline Swan.  It feels kinda like it is both a good and bad last Bond movie, I think my biggest complaint being the lack of action.  Also, heavily hampered by Christoph Waltz all but refusing to come back at all.  About 2 or 2.5 stars at the very most.

My list IN ORDER least favorite to favorite:

Die Another Day. The World is Not Enough. Dr No. For Your Eyes Only.  Thunderball. No Time To Die. Spectre.  Moonraker. A View to a Kill. Tomorrow Never Dies.  On Her Majesty's. License to Kill.  The Living Daylights.  Octopussy.  Live and Let Die. Diamonds are Forever.  Goldfinger. Skyfall. You Only Live Twice. Man With The Golden Gun. Quantum of Solace. Casino Royale. The Spy Who Loved Me. Goldeneye.  From Russia With Love.   

Urban Legends: Bloody Mary - 2005

 I had no idea that Urban Legends had another direct to DVD sequel years after Final Cut.  So, I put this on.

The original Urban Legends was a Scream ripoff, right down to a similar looking killer.  Final Cut was pretty much directly Scream 2 ripoff.  So Bloody Mary here was what, a Scream 3 rip off?   Nope.  They bucked the trend to this time to copy Final Destination.

A couple teens say Bloody Mary into a mirror 3 times and summon the ghost of a murdered girl, a girl who was killed a long time ago by some jocks or something.  The Bloody Mary ghost starts going after the kids of the jocks, in something that also felt like a Nightmare on Elm Street rip off. There's some stupid deaths here for sure including a normal tanning bed, not like in Final Destination 3 at all, where by default a normal tanning bed can kill a man?

This movie is pretty stupid in just about all ways.  Some really convoluted thing where the killers seemingly has to kill kids using methodologies described in various urban legends, and that is never explained. So now, the one girl that is onto it has to try and stop it while also convincing others of what is truly going on.

Pretty low rent and not engaging, it's clear this series was dead at this point.  1 star.

Urban Legends: Final Cut - 2000

 I'm rewatching the Scream series with my girlfriend who, when we watched Scream, said that it was her favorite slasher or maybe even indeed horror movie we've seen yet.  Good choice.

The thing about the Scream series is that, while it gets better (from my memory) when it hits 4 5 and 6, Scream 2 is pretty bad and Scream 3 is really bad.  They get deep into the lore of the Stab series and are trying so hard to comment on their legacy as they age and it really takes you out of the movie.  They also become so horribly time stamped because they were trying to be prescient, to the point where Scream 3 has Jay and Silent Bob make a cameo?  Who the fuck thought that would age well??

Urban Legends Final Cut was very clearly influenced by Scream and this movie came out the same year as Scream 3.  This time, there's a movie within a movie, which is fun, except it's similar to Stab, and its trying really hard to make the joke before you do.  Things get out of hand as actors and crew on the film shoot begin to get picked off and its a whodunit as we suspect different people.

This plays like a second tier Scream 3, especially as I rewatch Scream 3 and see how much it involves Stab 3.  ULFC is like a average enough slasher with some fun but nothing super special it brings to the table.  I'd say it's about 3 stars.  For the record, I guess Scream 3 is like a 3 also.

Solar Crisis - 1990

 Little sci fi double feature here with Star Quest. A Japanese and American co production that flopped. 

Solar Crisis begins and my jaw practically hits the floor with the cast. Charlton Heston, Michael Berryman, Peter Boyle, Jack Palance, Tim Matheson, Corin Nemec. Damn yo!

This was a big budget movie that got out of control and eventually got credited to Alan Smithee, the infamous pseudonym for bad movies. 

A ship on a mission has to go blow up the sun in this Sunshine adjacent action adventure flick. It features a talking bomb and it made me wonder, has the notion of a talking device like this ever worked in a movie? So many times a ship or a plot maguffin will talk, often for comedy, and you know, I really think it doesn’t work, just in general. 

This movie plays out pretty predictably in general and feels extremely B grade in just about every way, so I’m not surprised it under performed. It’s perfect to just kinda put on and half watch. 3 stars. 

Star Quest - 1994

 Also known as Terminal Voyage. 

Here is a Roger Corman produced movie that was made for tv. A new low? I mean at least most his stuff went to the theater!

My friend Reiss once said he was trying to watch just about every space movie. I said something like that was an awesome idea. It would be something right? And given the genre there’s not a ton like dramas or musicals. It’s space. It’s going to at least be a thriller. 

Or is it? I would defy anyone to tell me first, what genre is Star Quest and even more, who the fuck is this for? I wouldn’t have guessed made for tv because there’s nudity but I guess they edited that out for tv. Some guys wake up from a space sleep and discover the world was destroyed. They all spend ample time in the virtual reality machine and that’s a solid 25-30 minutes and then eventually conflict arises. 

This movie is stone cold boring. There’s a ton of talking and nonsense and it does eventually get moving but wow! So slow. People deal with the apocalypse in different ways, some take drugs and some become destructive. The end throws a couple twists that work I’ll say and then boom. Over. 

It’s not that bad because it picks up speed but it’s incredibly uneven and poorly acted. It looks pretty cheap but in a good way. I dunno, I didn’t hate it but I didn’t love it. Maybe a 2.5 range. 

Scanner Cop II: The Showdown - 1995

 At movie 1001 this may legitimately be the first time that this has happened. A movie where the subtitle is different on the film than what is online. Scanner cop two has the subtitle The Showdown online and then when you watch it, its subtitle is Volkin’s Revenge. 

Sam the scanner cop is back, in the track of another evil scanner who is out there. There’s an absolutely top notch body melting sequence with the villain, and a girl in a hospital who has clues in her brain. 

In a way that’s about all there is, because there’s not really a different villain or a turn of any sort later. There’s a few good kills and it’s good guys versus bad in this retread of the last movie. 

The novelty has worn off a little bit and even though this isn’t like bad it just feels decidedly middling. 2.5

Chillers - 1987

 An anthology! For blog entry 1000!

Chillers has a group at a bus station waiting and a woman falls asleep to reveal segment one, a bizarre pool based story of a woman meeting a sexy swim instructor who then she is told died 5 years ago. 

She awakens screaming to discover everyone there had nightmares. A boy tells his story, segment 2 where a group of Boy Scouts gets led into the woods to discover not all is what it seems. 

“Who’s next?” The boy asks. Segment three is told by a woman, Sharon. Sharon is in love with her television newsman and hears a telepathic message from him. She calls, he comes. Is he what she’s expecting, though?

The stories keep getting told. Now it’s the turn for a lonely and emotionally empathic story of a guy who wishes a 9 year old boy who died was returned to life. The boy appears in front of him and he returns the boy to his parents. He brings back a few more people, but he’s not very choosy about who he’s bringing back. 

Lastly a bookish teacher is leading a Olmec class. His students take the words they’ve learned and go recite them at night, causing ancient gods or something to inhabit their bodies. 

A little segment at the end that tired it together and we’re out.

This is a very fun fast paced cheap Troma release that has good music and fun effects when they’re briefly in it. This is a great one, and I rewatched Evil Clutch as well, which is a great movie also. I give this 4 stars.

Scanner Cop - 1994

 Scanners finally gave way to this Canadian production of a made for TV movie (and it’s sequel) called Scanner Cop. 

Sam is a young boy with a scanner father who gets killed in a shootout. Sam gets adopted by the cop who is at the scene and cut to him as a young police officer following in his adoptive father’s footsteps, hence the scanner cop. 

Said it before and I’ll say it again I love a movie that’s casually shot in LA. I love a movie that is quickly paced and that has fun easy plot that you can follow. And I don’t know if I love this movie but this is a very fun entertaining flick in the best sense of the word. 

It’s helps that it has one bad guy and a simple plot about police officers being killed. They’re being brainwashed and they now think they’re killing other people when they’re in fact killing police officers. San gets involved to help figure out who’s the mastermind, we go from there. 

The movie also wisely drops the “scanner fight scene” that’s been in these. Showing two guys making weird facial expressions and we don’t know who’s winning or losing isn’t that cinematically engaging let’s be honest. 

I feel like I liked this more than I should’ve. It’s low rent but it’s fuckin fun. 4 stars. 

Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later - 1998

 They sure painted a weird image of Michael Myers in this one didn't they?

At one point Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode recalls that Myers came after her when she was 17.  She looks over at her son John's birthday card, recalling he is turning 17.  She pieces it together: this means that now is when Michael is going to come for John.  ...Why?  And is Myers presumably buying calendars, clocking months and years, waiting for 17 years to pass?

An hour or so of build and 30 minutes of chase in this quick 90 minute soft reboot sort of (?)  So as mentioned in my review long ago of Halloween 5, this is the first of what I can think of in this modern vein of "pick and choose which movies are canon and which are not".  H20 chooses to call Halloween 1 and 2 canon, and forget Halloween 4, 5 and 6.  Really as I discussed in my Halloween Resurrection post, all they're really throwing away is the verbiage from Halloween 4 that says Laurie is dead and the existence and death of Laurie's daughter Jamie Lloyd.

Either way, we pick up with Laurie saying she faked her death (do I have to rewatch Halloween 2 to see if she was killed off?) so really they're almost acknowledging Halloween 4...  the only thing they don't mention then is the daughter and the thorn cult/man in black thing.  Laurie has a teenage son played by Josh Hartnett and she is an overly controlling mother figure especially as Halloween day rolls around.  

Michael Myers sorta just appears and starts coming after her leaving the typical trail of bodies in his wake.  Laurie has to balance her own traumatic tendency to see him in everything with the newfound evidence that the presence of him is actually there this time.

It works as a medium slow build late 90s slasher.  It even comments a tiny bit on Scream in a reference on screen and by having Kevin Williamson take a draft at the script.  This does not reinvent the wheel but it pairs the two together on screen again after 17 years and it ups the ante with modern effects and renewed energy. 

Altogether, this one didn't make as much of an impact as it could have, and it was easy to make another sequel to and then forget and reboot in 2018.   Trying to verbalize exactly why that is I find slightly hard, but it may be just the relative predictability and tropiness this falls into, rather than changing in the way that horror eventually did evolve to.  It may have just been too soon, too close to Scream, too eager and underwritten.  Also the grittiness of the Halloween 2018 stuff wasn't being embraced yet, it could not go full on dark, unfortunately.

I give this 3 stars.

Scanners II - 1991

 Why do we sometimes use Roman numerals still? Do we just somehow think they’re classier?

Scanners 2 stars David Hewlett of the movie Cube and picks up with him as a socially removed guy who gets thrown into the deep end of stuff as he moves to a large town. He discovers that he has Scanner powers when he’s in a store that gets robbed, and soon enough he gets recruited by a bad politician to help get the guy elected. 

The movie has a good couple believable characters and a tight, minimalistic scope while still having good head explosions and other effects. The politicians have another scanner working for them who’s the main baddie, and he’s an overacting weirdo who looks like a greasy drifter, and that works well. 

I watched Scanners 3 before this and its more fast paced and campy, which is fun, this one is slower and more like the first Scanners.  Not that that's bad, I just did actually like 3 more.  I will give this a 3.5

Halloween: Resurrection - 2002

 Here's my pitch:  Halloween is going to be rebooted or legacy sequeled or given a TV series or something again; its just inevitable.  So, unite the plots and make Halloween the longest running series with a single killer. 

Oddly enough, the longest series (by my count) is probably Hellraiser (I did count others but now I'm forgetting).  Here are my criteria:  must be the same killer (excludes Jigsaw, excludes Friday the 13th part 1 and 5 where it's not Jason, etc), must be a continual storyline (thus, the longest running Halloween storyline is 6 movies from 1 to 6 with the thorn cult, before they reworked it in H20). Excludes reboots (Rob Zombie stuff et all).  Pinhead is supposed to the same even in the soft reboot (different actors are fine) so that brings Hellraiser to 11 movies, though arguably he does not kill many people in some (this is not a body count list).

I'm rewatching H20 and Resurrection to see exactly where this series left off in the "Dimension" storyline which is canonically including Halloween 1 and 2, H20, and Resurrection.  So my pitch is:  Laurie Strode had her first kid shortly after Halloween 2, played by Danielle Harris in Halloween 4.  She abandoned that child and ran away and had another played by Josh Hartnett and a third who presumably was raised partially by her father, played by Judy Greer in Kills and Ends.  

While Laurie is off raising Josh Hartnett and Judy Greer, Jamie is stalked by Myers in H4 and killed in part 6.  Meanwhile, Strode has H20 and Resurrection happen, fakes her death in Resurrection and runs off to find her last remaking child, Judy Greer, where she lives in the woods and then Kills and Ends happens.  Its not that hard, plus then the sequel I have in mind is Halloween 7, meaning after 6 The Curse of Michael Myers, and we see the end of the Thorn Cult.

Halloween Resurrection is bad.  Curtis signed on if they agreed to kill her off and not leave it open for a sequel.  They kill her off in the cold open and then its a "haunted house" story where for some reason a reality TV group has a bunch of airhead teens staying in Myers childhood home, having sex and doing drugs.  Myers comes home and begins to kill them, while Tyra Banks and Busta Rhymes are our new main characters I guess in the house.

Kills are okay, mask is bad.  Its again one of those movies where I ask, non ironically, is this even supposed to be scary?  Its not scary.  I give it a 1.5.