Lewis Gilbert
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Connections, in both directions
Spectre (2015)
Directed by Sam Mendes
influenced by The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), Moonraker (1979), You Only Live Twice (1967)
Characters
The train fight recalls Sean Connery's similar fight in From Russia with Love (1963), and the relentless, seemingly unstoppable henchman (Dave Bautista) that trails after Bond reminded me of Richard Kiel's "Jaws" character in both The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979).
Elsewhere, a drifty night-time car chase through the streets of Rome evokes memories of a much-loved child’s toy equipped with springy surprises and clip-on flames, while Dave Bautista’s Mr Hinx is essentially a latterday Jaws who gets to batter Bond on a train in a sequence that nods not only to The Spy Who Loved Me but also From Russia With Love .
Fans will feel a giddy rush seeing a villain's lair in a hollowed-out crater, a silent henchman with a brutal signature kill (Dave Bautista's Mr Hinx) and nods to everything from Goldfinger to The Spy Who Loved Me , but they paper over the cracks of a script that's big on plot - 148 minutes of it - and thrifty when it comes to character development.
Along the way they are both pursued by Mr. Hinx (Dave Bautista), a burly Spectre operative in the mold of Richard Kiel’s Jaws in The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979)—only one of numerous allusions to the classic Bond canon.
Meet MMA fighter turned actor Dave Bautista as Mr. Hinx, a scary bruiser who rivals Richard Kiehl as Jaws in "The Spy Who Loved Me" or Harold Sakata as Oddjob in "Goldfinger."
The train fight recalls Sean Connery's similar fight in From Russia with Love (1963), and the relentless, seemingly unstoppable henchman (Dave Bautista) that trails after Bond reminded me of Richard Kiel's "Jaws" character in both The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979).
There’s a sly nod early on to the outsize supervillain nature of his ambitions, when Natasha chills in her wilderness trailer in Norway watching the cheesy 1979 James Bond space entry, Moonraker .
A scene in which Natasha watches and recites dialogue from the 1979 James Bond film “Moonraker” (remember that clue) reminds us that films like “Black Widow” with their action, chases, gun play and comic interludes are the children of Bond movies.
Black Widow references 1979’s Moonraker and features a silly plot that largely follows the contours of a standard old-school Bond film, complete with a power-crazed villain who resides in an impressive lair while plotting to take over the world with an evil scheme.
And things do degenerate somewhat into a familiar Marvel climax — huge object crashes to Earth while superheroes do superhero things in mid-air, with a few Moonraker nods sprinkled in for good measure (someone on this film really likes Roger Moore).
Between its allusions to Moonraker and the presence of a maniacal bad guy whose fortress is a floating compound, Black Widow boasts some of the cheeky swagger of Roger Moore-era James Bond.
Not that newcomers would guess these credentials from the scene in which she sits in a rusty caravan eating dinner in front of the TV and mouthing along to Roger Moore’s dialogue in Moonraker .
No Time to Die (2021)
Directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga
influenced by You Only Live Twice (1967), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), Moonraker (1979)
Visuals
For the Bond fan, the film is simply a litany of fantastic references worked in (though the Garden of Death from Flemming’s You Only Live Twice novel is completely wasted).
That’s incredible in the context of Bond, even if the idea of a child is not a new one in series lore; in non-canonical book form, 007 has a child with Kissy Suzuki from You Only Live Twice, a story heavily referenced in No Time to Die ’s conclusion.
No , and by Donald Pleasence's Ernst Stavro Blofeld in You Only Live Twice .
That’s how you got 007 facing off against Blofeld in “You Only Live Twice” and then the two meeting for the first time in “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” two years hence.
The setting, and the chem-lab ickiness, are very “You Only Live Twice,” but what’s so good about Malek’s performance is the obscene way that he inserts his presence into the drama of Bond, Madeleine, and Madeline’s young daughter, Mathilde.
Cary Joji Fukunaga (“Sin Nombre,” “Beasts of No Nation”) leans into that history, giving us a Bond adventure with a hint of “You Only Live Twice,” a whiff of “Moonraker,” bits of a couple of others and a heaping helping of “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service,” perhaps the most underrated film of the lot.
And the band Beulah Belle's open-chord guitar cover of the theme from "You Only Live Twice" is a clue to what's really going on.
“You Only Live Twice,” the James Bond/Nancy Sinatra hit, is not only well performed (by an unknown singer), but has a purposeful meaning for its inclusion.
Ignore one “Knocked Up” sequence, try not to notice how much of what we see is handled in cute montages, smile at the sensitive pop tunes (a cover of the Bond theme “You Only Live Twice” is key), try to recall one exchange as funny as this one between the affluent brother and his sister.
Skyfall (2012)
Directed by Sam Mendes
influenced by The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), You Only Live Twice (1967), Moonraker (1979)
Characters Themes
Skyfall is also the third film in the series starring Daniel Craig as Her Majesty’s favorite secret agent, a tricky position given that third films are often turning points in this franchise: While both Sean Connery and Roger Moore cemented their respective status as 007 with their third films, Goldfinger (1964) and The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), which were also the best films of their tenure, Timothy Dalton never made it to a third film after The Living Daylights (1987) and Licensed to Kill (1989) and Pierce Brosnan’s third outing as 007 in The World Is Not Enough (1999) suggested that the wheels were starting to come off the franchise (Denise Richards as a nuclear physicist named Christmas Jones—need I say more?).
A certain pretentiousness accompanies this transformation; it's possible there never again will be a James Bond movie with the snap of "Goldfinger" or the silliness of "The Spy Who Loved Me." ("Skyfall," however, does include a nice brief homage to Roger Moore's escape from the alligators in "Live and Let Die.")
The script gives him a full spectrum to play, from a "physical wreck" that recalls the literary Bond of Fleming's You Only Live Twice, to the cocky, self-assured 007 fans have been waiting for since 2006.
While not as powerful as those characters/performances (and how could he be) morphs the suave villain with physical grotesque of the more iconic Bond villains (‘Red Grant’ [Robert Shaw – From Russia with Love] & ‘Blofeld’ [Donald Pleasance – You Only Live Twice].
Tonally, the fundamental seriousness of the film places Skyfall at the other end of the Bond spectrum from the monkeyshines of some of the silliest Roger Moore entries, such as Moonraker and A View to A Kill.
Then, when I was “coming of age,” so to speak, Bond got real silly with Roger Moore and stuff like Moonraker and Octopussy.
Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015)
Directed by Christopher McQuarrie
influenced by Moonraker (1979)
Characters
She is Ilsa (Rebecca Ferguson, reminiscent of Lois Chiles from 1979's Moonraker).
The Wolverine (2013)
Directed by James Mangold
influenced by You Only Live Twice (1967)
Characters Plot Music
It helps that Wolfie loses his powers and shows a human side, that he makes like James Bond in You Only Live Twice, and that he makes out with the lovely Mariko (Tao Okamoto).
Imagine that Sean Connery’s James Bond, in his 1967 Japanese jaunt You Only Live Twice, had to confront mutants and ninjas (no turtles) and you have a hint of director James Mangold’s mostly sober travelogue with a few zippy action scenes.
He nearly succeeds, at least insofar as replanting the character in a plot that falls closely into the tradition of such endangered gaijin thrillers as House of Bamboo, The Yakuza and even the Bond-in-Japan You Only Live Twice.
It’s You Only Live Twice without the Nancy Sinatra song—Hugh could have killed that.
The script is out of balance, wandering off into “Educating Rita” territory as Lou is exposed to things only the truly rich (and class conscious) typically experience.
Enter Lou as Will’s latest caregiver, and here come the plot references to “My Fair Lady,” “Educating Rita,” “The Bucket List,” “Pretty Woman” (Lou even wears a red dress to a musical performance, ala Julia Roberts) and even “Dying Young” (in which Ms. Roberts played a caregiver to a wealthy patient played by Campbell Scott).
Casino Royale (2006)
Directed by Martin Campbell
influenced by Moonraker (1979), You Only Live Twice (1967), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
Plot
Certainly Roger Moore was a comparatively lightweight Bond with his seven appearances in the series: Live and Let Die (1973), The Man with the Golden Gun (1974), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), Moonraker (1979), For Your Eyes Only (1981), Octopussy (1983) and A View to a Kill (1985).
Though she's as unsuccessful as the franchise itself has been in reconciling the burden that feminism places on these pictures, her homey conversations with Maud Adams (The Man with the Golden Gun and Octopussy ), Lois Chiles ( Moonraker ), Carey Lowell (Licence to Kill), and still others (the less said about Halle Berry, the better) are unexpectedly melancholy, especially as it dawns on d'Abo that, as a refugee of the thoroughly chaste The Living Daylights, she was one of the least-objectified Bond girls.
Not that the plot matters (quick, summarize the plot of Moonraker or Live and Let Die), but writers Neal Purvis, Robert Wade and Paul Haggis hew fairly close to Fleming’s original, once they get around to it, including Le Chiffre’s method of torture involving a seatless chair and a nude Bond.
Furthermore, I consider Daniel Craig to be the most effective and appealing of the six actors who have played 007, and that includes even Sean Connery, from his (and the franchise’s) debut in 1962 with Dr. No, through From Russia with Love (1963), Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), You Only Live Twice (1967) and, after a one-picture hiatus, Diamonds Are Forever (1971).
Certainly Roger Moore was a comparatively lightweight Bond with his seven appearances in the series: Live and Let Die (1973), The Man with the Golden Gun (1974), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), Moonraker (1979), For Your Eyes Only (1981), Octopussy (1983) and A View to a Kill (1985).
That trend peaked in the 70s and 80s when Roger Moore took over the Bond role and the series became more and more over the top (the best of these being "For Your Eyes Only" and "The Spy Who Loved Me").
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery (1997)
Directed by Jay Roach
influenced by You Only Live Twice (1967), Moonraker (1979), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
Characters
For one thing, it's easier to recognize the source material being satirized: He's sending up Spectre's Ernst Blofeld, 007's mortal enemy in several Bond pictures; particularly the Blofeld wearing a gray Nehru suit and cradling a white cat in You Only Live Twice.
The villainous Dr. Evil is modeled upon You Only Live Twice's version of Blofeld (played in that movie by Donald Pleasance).
Then it goes on to parody "Moonraker," but little else.
The second movie, "The Spy Who Shagged Me" (taken from the Bond title "The Spy Who Loved Me"), takes up where the first film ended.
Cue her best pals and backup singers rambunctious Rosie (Educating Rita's Julie Walters, showing a real talent for physical comedy) and thrice-married tigress Tanya (Christine Baranski of TV's Cybill) who have come to the island for some pre-wedding partying.
At times, Inception feels like a high-concept James Bond adventure; the automatic-weapon skiing sequence feels particularly ridiculous, unless you've been longing for a blast of The Spy Who Loved Me.
Director Doug Liman and screenwriters Christopher McQuarrie, Jez Butterworth and John-Henry Butterworth could have borrowed a name from any number of James Bond films — You Only Live Twice, Live and Let Die, Tomorrow Never Dies, Die Another Day — to describe its hero’s curse and gift.
One thing for sure is Nolan’s obsession with the spy genre, given his affinity for the Bond movies, having seen The Spy Who Loved Me as a young boy with his dad.
En el fondo, la estructura básica de la cinta de Nolan es exactamente igual a la de las adaptaciones de Ian Fleming en los setenta: hay una misteriosa amenaza (generalmente guiada por un millonario megalómano como Stromberg en The Spy Who Loved Me de 1977) que Bond debe descubrir siguiendo pistas puntuales que lo llevarán a viajar por el mundo hasta que, con la asistencia mínima de ciertos ayudantes casuales, logra salvar una vez más a la desprevenida humanidad.
It's very reminiscent of the opening of the original "Star Wars" with the Star Destroyer pulling in Princess Leia's Blockade Runner (with a little of the submarine capture in "The Spy Who Loved Me" thrown in with some obvious "Mad Max" elements, too).
First, the actor tries to keep his composure in a high-speed space-flight simulator and, like Roger Moore in “Moonraker,” nearly passes out.
Ghost in the Shell (2017)
Directed by Rupert Sanders
influenced by You Only Live Twice (1967)
Visuals
One gets some comfort in seeing that the way you turn a European actor Japanese is exactly the way it was done 50 years ago in You Only Live Twice, when Sean Connery was brilliantly disguised as an Asian to outwit SPECTRE.
That didn’t work when Sean Connery tried it, in “You Only Live Twice,” and it sure as hell doesn’t work here, inching beyond embarrassment into insult.
The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Directed by Guy Ritchie
influenced by The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
Plot
The forced partnership of antipodes has often proved a fertile device in storytelling, from Lethal Weapon's pairing of a black cop with a white one in 1980s LA during a period of tense race relations to that of a male spy with a female one in 1977’s The Spy Who Loved Me.
Happy Gilmore (1996)
Directed by Dennis Dugan
influenced by The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), Moonraker (1979)
Happy's girlfriend; a haughty pro (Christopher McDonald), who is embarrassed by the presence of such an uncouth player on the tour; and a hulking fan (Richard Kiel, Jaws from The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker ), who's always ready to jump to Happy's defense.
Happy's girlfriend; a haughty pro (Christopher McDonald), who is embarrassed by the presence of such an uncouth player on the tour; and a hulking fan (Richard Kiel, Jaws from The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker ), who's always ready to jump to Happy's defense.