“THUNDERBALL” (1965) Review

 

“THUNDERBALL” (1965) Review

I had just viewed the 1965 Bond movie, “THUNDERBALL” for the first time in several years. And I can see why this movie is considered to be one of my all time favorite Bond flicks. But I do not think I can state why in one or two sentences.

“THUNDERBALL” turned out to be director Terence Young’s third and last Bond film. Most Bond fans consider it to be his least superior film, but I consider it to be his second best, following 1963’s “FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE”. The story was based upon an unfinished script called “Warhead”, co-written by Ian Fleming, Kevin McClory and Jack Whittingham. The unfinished script eventually became Fleming’s 1961 novel, “Thunderball”. This resulted in a major lawsuit between McClory and Fleming and eventually, EON Productions became dragged into it. “THUNDERBALL” told the story about SPECTRE’s theft of NATO nuclear warheads and how they used it to blackmail the U.S. and British government for the sum of 100,000,000 pounds. Naturally, MI-6 sends all of their “00” agents to recover the warheads before SPECTRE can carry out its threat to detonate the weapons on U.S. and British soil. Many moviegoers in 1965 and 1966 found the movie’s plot a little hard to buy and viewed it as part of the realm of fantasy. But considering the current obsession of terrorism and the high illegal weapons market, “THUNDERBALL” has probably become one of the more relevant plots of any Bond film.

Aside from the underwater sequences which threatened to drag the movie at times, “THUNDERBALL” turned out to be an elegant and exciting thriller with excellent drama with a solid plot that managed to avoid any major plotholes. It also possessed a classy score by John Barry, elegant photography by Ted Moore and a first-class cast.

Sean Connery portrayed James Bond for the fourth time in this film. Although his Bond seemed at his most human in “FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE”, he seemed to be at his top game in this one. In “THUNDERBALL”, his Bond is more mature and sure of himself. Yet at the same time, he managed to retain a good deal of wit and humanity. It was a vast improvement over his performance in 1964’s “GOLDFINGER”, in which he seemed to come off as an immature prat. And he was ably assisted by a first-class cast that included Claudine Auger as Domino Duval, Adolfo Celi as villain Emile Largo (SPECTRE’s Number 2), Rik Van Nutter as CIA Agent Felix Leiter and especially Luciana Paluzzi as SPECTRE villainess Fiona Volpe. Well, I do have a few qualms about Mr. Van Nutter’s performance.

Below is a list of positive and negative aspects of the film. I have decided to start with the negative, since there was little that I did not care about the movie:

Negative:

*Rik Van Nutter as Felix Leiter – Do not get me wrong. Van Nutter’s performance as Leiter was competent and very personable. My problem was that his role was written as a “less-than-bright” sidekick of Bond’s, instead of an ally. Bond has been assisted by Leiter in other movies, but they have never come off as some dumb sidekick . . . except for Cec Linder in “GOLDFINGER”.

*Theme Song – I will not deny that the movie’s theme song, performed by Tom Jones is slightly catchy. But I also found the lyrics to be slightly sexist and off-putting.

*Underwater Sequences – Yes, the underwater sequences had threatened to drag the movie a bit. Actually, I can point out two sequences that came close to boring me – the sequence that featured Largo’s acquisition of the warheads and the final battle between Largo’s men and U.S. Navy frogmen.

Positive:

*Luciana Paluzzi – Let us be honest, folks. The red-haired Paluzzi came dangerously close to stealing the picture from Connery. Like Honor Blackman before her, she radiated sexiness and a strong on-screen presence. She seemed to be even more of a threat than Emile Largo and his men.

*Adolpo Celi – What I like about Celi’s performance is that he does not come off as an over-the-top villain. He was elegant, intelligent, ruthless and egotistical. Perfect villain.

*Nassau setting – The setting in Nassau gave the movie an exotic, yet elegant feel that really added substance to the movie.

*Dialogue – The dialogue in this movie was unusually sharp and witty. But what really appealed to me was that Connery’s puns did not come out of his mouth every other minute, as it did in his previous two movies. In fact, the movie featured what I consider to be one of Connery’s best lines during his tenure with the franchise.

Speaking of dialogue, below is what I consider to be some of my favorite lines:

* Moneypenny: In the conference room. Something pretty big. Every double-o man in Europe has been rushed in. And the home secretary too!
Bond: His wife probably lost her dog.

*Bond: My dear, uncooperative Domino.
Domino: How do you know that? How do you know my friends call me Domino?
Bond: It’s on the bracelet on your ankle.
Domino: So… what sharp little eyes you’ve got.
Bond: Wait ’til you get to my teeth.

*Do you mind if my friend sits this one out? She’s just dead.

*M: I’ve assigned you to Station “C” Canada.
Bond: Sir, I’d respectfully request that you change my assignment to Nassau.
M:Is there any other reason, besides your enthusiasm for water sports?

*Pat Fearing: James, where are you going?
Bond: Oh, nowhere. I just thought I’d take a little, uh… exercise.
Pat Fearing: You must be joking.

*But of course, I forgot your ego, Mr. Bond. James Bond, the one where he has to make love to a woman, and she starts to hear heavenly choirs singing. She repents, and turns to the side of right and virtue…[she steps on Bond’s foot]… but not this one.

I would like to conclude with this little note: in 1983, Kevin McClory – one of the original authors of “Thunderball/Warhead”, produced his own version of the story, starring Sean Connery as Bond. The movie, “NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN” was not terrible, but it almost seemed like an overblown version of the 1965 movie.

“FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE” (1963) Review

 

“FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE” (1963) Review

Have you ever heard the song, ”What a Difference a Day Makes”? Well, the phrase – ”What a difference, a year makes” kept going through my head, while viewing 1963’s ”FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE”. It seemed such a difference from the very inferior ”DR. NO” (and would prove to be quite a difference in my eyes to 1964’s ”GOLDFINGER”. Not only do I consider ”FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE” to be one of the finest Bond films in the franchise, I also view it as Connery’s best. In fact, as with 1965’s ”THUNDERBALL”, his acting was superb in this film. James Bond not only seemed mature, but . . . [gasp] human. All one has to do is examine his interactions with leading lady Daniela Bianchi to notice this. Connery has never been so human as he was in this movie. And sadly, he was never this human again.

Connery was supported by a first-class supporting cast. First of all, there is Daniela Bianchi portraying the Soviet cipher clerk assigned to seduce him, Tatiana Romanova. What started as an assignment for Tania, ended up as full-blown love. Although, Bianchi had her dialogue dubbed by Zena Marshall (”DR. NO”), she did an excellent job in projecting Tania’s wide range of emotions – including her disgust at ex-Soviet turned SPECTRE agent, Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya). Speaking of Lenya . . . my goodness, I am speechless! What can I say? The woman was superb! Creepy in her scenes with Bianchi and Walter Gotell, yet fearful in the scenes featuring SPECTRE’s leader, Ernst Stavos Blofeld, she gave one of the best performances by any actor or actress portraying a Bondn villain/villainess. And I must say the same for the highly revered Robert Shaw. Not only did his Donovan Grant turned out to be the template for many Bond henchmen to come (with only ”THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS”’s Andreas Wisniewski coming close), he and Connery provided one of the best dramatic moments and fight sequences in the entire franchise. On Bond’s side, there was Hollywood character actor, Pedro Armendariz, who portrayed Bond’s Turkish contact, Kerim Bey. Sadly, the role of Bey would prove to be Armendariz’s last one. After finishing his scenes, he committed suicide, rather than suffer any longer from cancer. But fortunately for many Bond fans, Kerim Bey would prove to be his greatest and most memorable role. Bernard Lee and Lois Maxwell were competent as usual. And the movie would serve as the debut of Desmond Llewellyn as MI-6’s Quartermaster

”FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE”’s story centered around SPECTRE’s scheme to lure James Bond into stealing a valuable Soviet decoding machine, and unknowingly deliver it into their hands. In the process, Agent 007 is to suffer a disgraceful death, in revenge for the death of Dr. No. The movie not only had the good luck to be based upon one of Ian Fleming’s few well-written novels, the screenwriters Richard Maibaum, and Johanna Harwood did an excellent job of translating it to the screen. Rich with atmosphere and mystery, ”FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE” almost seemed like the perfect spy thriller – a far cry from the schizophrenic and inferior ”DR. NO”. A few changes had been made, but overall they seemed to serve the story very well.

Was ”FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE” perfect? No. I have a few complaints. For example, there is the Bond-Grant confrontation. From a dramatic viewpoint, it gave Connery and Shaw to exercise their acting chops. From a storytelling viewpoint, it made no sense. It just did not make any sense to me that Grant would take his time preparing to kill Bond on the Orient Express, once he got the drop on the British agent. While Grant was busy searching Bond’s jacket and putting on his gloves, I found myself screaming at my TV screen – ”What in the hell are you waiting for? Kill him!” I also found the two action sequences that preceded Bond and Tania’s arrival in Venice a bit too much. I had the feeling that the writers added an extra action sequence in order to fill in the movie’s running time. I could have done with either the helicopter sequence or the Adriatic Sea boat chase. But the addition of both – one after the other – seemed a bit too much. But despite all of this, my positive view of ”FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE” still stands.