Top Ten… James Bond Moments, Part Three!
Put Miss Moneypenny down and come in, 007. After the Moore era top ten, we’re going to be looking at the Dalton/Brosnan era. Timothy Dalton cuts Bond fandom down the middle: casual fans often call him the worst Bond, but real Bond fans (especially those who have read the books) embrace Dalton as perhaps the very best Bond and certainly the closest to Ian Fleming’s original intentions. On the other hand, casual fans love Brosnan, but the more hardcore guys dislike him. Dalton happens to be my favorite Bond and Brosan is my least favorite, so this list might be a bit Dalton-centric, but let’s take a look at the top ten James Bond moments, part three! Onward!
10. “Never let them see you bleed.”
Q is perhaps the most beloved characters in the Bond franchise acting (along with M) as a sort of father figure to Bond, M being the authoritarian father and Q being the caring father. His final bow as Q in the movie The World is Not Enough is a beautifully written and acted scene with Q giving Bond one final bit of advice: never let them see you bleed and always have an escape plan. The fact that Desmond Llelywn died a few months after completing the scene makes it all the more moving.
8. The tank chase.
Connery had the DB5 and Little Nellie, Moore had the Lotus and a speedboat, Brosnan had a BMW and a friggin’ tank. Rampaging through St. Petersburg in a T55 Battle Tank, this was one of the biggest setpeices ever seen in a Bond movie and after the relativley low key License to Kill, seemed as awesome to Bond fans in 1995 as the LALD speedboat chase seemed in 1973 or the Little Nellie sequence in 1967.
7. Bond chases Saunders’ killer.
Timothy Dalton, along with Jeremy Brett and Udo Keir, is one of the most criminally underrated actors on the planet. His time as Bond may have been an unhappy one, but the two films he made are both in my top five Bond movies. After the murder of his ally Saunders in The Living Daylights, Bond gives chase – pretty standard Bond fare, but Dalton’s performance in this one scene packs more of an emotional punch than most actors manage in an entire movie. Compare Bond’s reaction to Saunders’ death to his reaction to the death of Ferrera in For Your Eyes Only and you’ll see what I mean.
6. The death of Franz Sanchez.
License to Kill is, along with On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and Quantum of Solace, one of the most controversial movie in the Bond canon. For the first (and only thus far) time, Bond was not acting under the orders of Her Majesty’s Government, but as a vigilante out for revenge. Bond spends the film tracking down Franz Sanchez, murderer and drug baron, seeking revenge for the death of his friend Della Leiter. When the time comes there’s no Q Branch gadgets, no Walther PPK and no witty one liners, just a lighter and a lot of petrol.
5. Bond drops in.
Cinemagoers were probably not ready to see a licence to kill-less Bond commit a blantant murder in order to avenge his friend, so it’s no surprise that after License to Kill there would be a six year wait until the next Bond adventure. After such a long wait, Bond’s return to the screen had to be a spectacular one. And spectacular it certainly was with Bond bungee jumping over a dam.
4. “You earned it…”
Another example of the hard edge Dalton brought to the character comes in License to Kill when, confronted with the corrupt policeman who helped Sanchez escape, Bond pushes him so he hangs precariously over a tank containing a hungry great white shark. The policeman tells Bond that a nearby suitcase contains several million dollars and that he’ll share it with Bond if he spares his life. Bond lifts up the heavy case and hauls it towards the teetering cop, telling him “you earned it – you keep it.”
3. The Q-Boat
Both Connery and Moore took part in speedboat chases (and Dalton uses one to escape a bar brawl in LTK), so it only made sense for Brosnan to have his own. Of course, a standard speedboat simply wouldn’t do so in The World is Not Enough, Bond “borrows” Q’s latest invention, the Q-Boat. A chase on the Thames ensues with Bond performing all manner of stunts and gags in the boat, including straightening his tie whilst underwater. The scene lasts almost a quarter of an hour, making it the longest pre-titles sequence in the series.
2. “I never miss.”
For all his (for want of a better word) niceness, Brosnan did have at least one Dalton-esque moment of cold blooded brutality. After being betrayed by Electra King, Bond confronts his former lover. He threatens to put his license to kill to good use and put her out of his misery, but she turns on her womanly wiles and taunts him. “You won’t kill me,” she purrs, “you’d miss me.” Before she can say another word, Bond pumps a round square between her eyes and as she lies dead on the bed says, cold as you like, “I never miss.” Bastard.
1. Bond vs Necros.
This scene from The Living Daylights is not only the best moment from the Dalton/Brosnan era, but also the second best moment in the entire series, not to mention the best fight scene from any movie ever made ever. Bond and lead henchman Necros end up having a fight on a cargo plane, but, this being Bond, the fight spills out and onto a holding net trailing out the back of the plane. What’s incredible is to think that, this being the age before CGI, in order to achieve this scene, two stunt men had to hang out the back of a moving plane. All the safety precautions in the world can’t make that any less awesome. The fight ends when Bond gets the better of Necros who finds himself hanging onto 007′s foot for dear life. Bond reaches for his knife and cuts through the lace of his boot, sending the pleading henchman plummetting to his death. When asked what happened, Bond replies with one of his all time best one-liners: “he got the boot.”
Before anyone asks, no there will not be a fourth part to this. The Daniel Craig films are, for the most part, unwatchable rubbish and it’s hard to think of three great moments much less ten. Something about comics next probably, but until then I recommend you get out and re-watch some Bond movies. They may not all be masterpeices, but they’re sure as hell fun. End transmission.
