Moonraker (1979)
Directed by Lewis Gilbert
After Drax Industries' Moonraker space shuttle is hijacked, secret agent James Bond is assigned to investigate, traveling to California to meet the company's owner, the mysterious Hugo Drax. With the help of scientist Dr. Holly Goodhead, Bond soon uncovers Drax's nefarious plans for humanity, all the while fending off an old nemesis, Jaws, and venturing to Venice, Rio, the Amazon...and even outer space.
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What critics compared Moonraker to
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 .
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).
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.
She is Ilsa (Rebecca Ferguson, reminiscent of Lois Chiles from 1979's Moonraker).
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.
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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.
The Craig movies have often been critiqued for sucking a lot of the zany fun out of the franchise in favour of more Bourne -influenced realism, but each entry has gradually brought back the fun and, whilst not going full Moonraker , No Time to Die does have a far more exuberant spring in its step.
First, the actor tries to keep his composure in a high-speed space-flight simulator and, like Roger Moore in “Moonraker,” nearly passes out.
Then it goes on to parody "Moonraker," but little else.
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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.
It’s Bond’s Moonraker meets Groundhog Day meets Multiplicity with Starship Troopers thrown in for good measure.