Yep, I saw 1973's Live and Let Die, reviewed here a decade ago. My opinion is little-changed:
It suddenly felt like time for me to revisit a random 007 feature. I have a list of the official 25 films in the franchise plus the unofficial Never Say Never Again. Almost all those reviews were written in 2015, a decade (!) ago. The ratings might be more important than the reviews—at least if those reviews have errors. When I do revisit them in the upcoming years, those won’t always be reviewed here but the main reason for me to select Live and Let Die: the old review has more than one mistake.
I’ll never warm up to George Lazenby’s version of Bond nor On Her Majesty’s Secret Service; otherwise, everyone officially in the role have had their quality films and those that were lousy—or worse. This first entry for Roger Moore wasn’t as goofy or jocular as his later efforts. Likely due to the film being “inspired” by the blaxploitation genre, the villain isn’t a megalomaniac looking to take over the world. Rather, it’s Yaphet Kotto as the leader of the fictional Caribbean island of San Monique who wants to become a drug lord for profit. As the scheme would greatly increase the number of those addicted to heroin… it’s still appropriate for the HONKY Bond (a term used in the film on several occasions) to become involved.
The film’s story I don’t always love; I’d bemoan the whole tarot card thing but in the past decade I’ve learned that is part of the Caribbean lore of Obeah-that was mentioned in the film yet I didn’t look it up at the time. Insulting a religion isn’t something that should be done by me; I don’t want to insult the voodoo religion either. That said, astrology, tarot cards, and similar fortune-telling claims are ones that will never be believed by me rational mind. That’s no slight on the ravishing Jane Seymour or her performance as Solitaire, the heel’s tarot reader.
There are other aspects of the plot that are worthy of complaint yet I don’t want to give spoilers, you know. The different settings (the Caribbean, New Orleans, the Louisiana swamps, the good and bad parts of New York City) are a nice change of pace, as is seeing various blaxploitation actors in this world, whether famous-Kotto, Julius Harris, Geoffrey Holder-or the more obscure to those not as well-versed in the genre, like Gloria Hendry and Earl Jolly Brown. The choice of George Martin to score the movie (along with Paul McCartney and Wings to do the title song) are a little odd yet I enjoy the former and the latter is still one of the best Bond songs.
My complaints aside, the movie is still a good time, between the nice supporting cast, Kotto as the heavy and Moore doing a swell job in his debut as 007. The action scenes were also a highlight. There’s even a bit of shark action—there was no memory that this footage was done by exploitation director William Grefe. There unfortunately was memories of the villain’s death—as it was an all-timers in terms of “WTF?” Not the idea but rather the execution. As for the Sheriff J.W. Pepper stereotypical Southern sheriff character… a little of him goes a long way. His return in The Man with the Golden Gun does strain credulity.
Given the recent friction between Eon Productions and Amazon MGM—I’m now not expecting to see new 007 adventures for many years. Sigh… at least there’s the old movies to revisit.
No comments:
Post a Comment