16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Classic Bond, May 26, 2001
By A Customer
I know this one doesn't usually appear near the top of many critics' Best Bond Movie lists, but it's near the top of mine. Roger Moore was really in his prime in this one, and this was one of his tougher, more physical Bond performances. Moore has always been suave, and he posesses perhaps the best comic timing and delivery of any of the Bond actors, and he uses that well in Golden Gun. Also, in regards to the melody of the title song, and it's use throughout the movie, this is, IMO, the most effective scoring in the whole Bond series. There are great, exotic locales, exciting stunt sequences, and definitely one of the strongest villains in the whole series. I thought Lee's character of Scaramanga was perhaps a bit more realistic than many Bond villains, as he was more of an intelligent, psychotic loner rather than some megalomaniac set on world domination As a fan of the series, I also appreciated the Bond vs. Scaramanga final showdown as a nice change of pace from the common large scale "good commandos" vs. "evil army" battle that's used in a lot of Bond films. I also find the J.W. Pepper character to be one of the funniest in the series, so his appearance was a plus for me--this Bond movie had just enough humor to enhance the action and make it fun, without it going overboard and getting too cheesy, as they did with some of the later Moore movies. I just found this movie to be incredibly entertaining, and it just had that great Bond "feel" to it. Great picture and sound on the DVD, and a really cool documentary on the stuntmen and stunts from the whole series.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
22 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
The stangest Bond film of all, April 4, 2005
`The Man with the Golden Gun' is an interesting Bond film that stands out from the rest although not necessarily for good reasons. There is a definite cheapness to the film that becomes apparent right from the opening scene which features a gun battle between Scaramanga and an unremarkable thug. The gunfight is held in Scaramanga's funhouse which looks like the set of a 1960's freak out movie. At one point the gangster is startled by a quintuplet of mechanical wax manikins dressed like prohibition era gangsters including Al Capone. The problem is that when the manikins' fire blanks at the thug Capone CLEARLY blinks... TWICE. Rather than pony up for actual wax manikins or re-shoot the scene they kept it as is. Near the end of the battle Christopher Lee's Scaramanga does some kind of sliding move down an incline in order to quickly retrieve his Golden Gun. The stunt looks ridiculous and that's the problem with the film, lots of parts look cheap and silly. Even the title song seems goofy. The song is sung by `Lulu' and features double entendres like `HE has a powerful weapon' and `he COMES just before the kill'. The pinnacle of silliness has to be the corkscrew jump half way through the film. It's one of the most amazing stunts in film history and the first one ever calculated on a computer. Unfortunately it's ruined by the playing of a cartoon slide whistle as the car soars and spins.
Want to know how cheap the film is? Bond's car is an orange AMC Hornet Hatchback.
Somehow, miraculously Roger Moore and Christopher Lee manage to retain their dignity throughout all the silliness. Christopher Lee's Scaramanga is nothing like the book version but in this case the movie vastly improves on the original character. Scaramanga's henchman, Nick Nack, is like a diminutive Oddjob but he certainly is unforgettable. I also enjoyed Scaramanga's island hideout which resides in a beautiful section of East Asia featuring huge towering rock outcroppings jutting from the sea.
Love it or hate it you won't forget it. `The Man with the Golden Gun' is a polarizing film and I place its quality below average for a Bond film but there is some greatness that still shines through as in the scene where Scaramanga kills boss Hai Fat. Hearing a gunshot one of Hai Fat's men rushes in to find out what happened. Christopher Lee delivers a perfect line. `Mr. Fat has just retired. I'm the new chairman of the board'. As Lee walks outside into the sunlight he shouts back, `He so loved that mausoleum. Put him in it!'.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
43 of 56 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
The Bond car is an AMC Hornet!, December 6, 2002
The choice of car is symbolic of this entry -- the weakest of the entire series. The film does have some positives: Christopher Lee is very good as super assassin Francisco Scaramanga; Maud Adams is sexy and very sympathetic as the doomed Andrea Anders and the location photography in Thailand is beautiful. However, there are three very glaring weaknesses to the film that doom it to the bottom rung of Bond films.
First, Hervé Villechaize is absolutely ridiculous as the "super henchman" Nick Nack. Especially after Robert Shaw as Red Grant and Harold Sakata as Oddjob, Villechaize is laughable. He is never menacing or threatening, just irritating. Villechaize grates on the audience's nerves at an increasing rate until the end when Bond neutralizes him by stuffing him in a suitcase as he whines that Bond is "a big bully." Doesn't quite match the punch of Oddjob being electrocuted by Sean Connery, does it?
Britt Ekland, who is VERY sexy in Golden Gun, unfortunately is also the most inept and stupid female in the entire series. While believability has never been a hallmark of the Bond series, Ekland's Mary Goodnight is so dumb and so incompetent it makes the audience wonder why Bond doesn't have her replaced with someone who can find their butt with two hands and a copy of Gray's Anatomy. The Bond films have always been strongest when the heroines' beauty is matched by their brains -- Honor Blackman as Pussy Galore, Diana Rigg as Tracy DiVicenzo, Barbara Bach as Anya Amasova, Carole Bouquet as Melina Havelock, Halle Berry as Jinx, etc. When a Bond heroine is as blindingly idiotic as Ekland's Goodnight, the series earns its reputation for treating females like decoration.
Most damaging to the film, however, is its cartoonish and juvenille sense of humor. This was an unfortunate addition to the Bond series in Diamonds Are Forver which got worse in Live and Let Die and reaches its height (or nadir) in Golden Gun. Every time the film builds some dramatic tension or sets up a great action scene, it squanders the moment with stupid 10 year old level humor. During the chase along the Bangkok canals, for example, we suddenly see Sheriff J.W. Pepper (Clifton James) from Live and Let Die who just happens to be vacationing in Thailand. James is a terrific character actor, but his J.W. Pepper is to the Bond films what Jar Jar Binks was to the Star Wars films. I wish the Bond producers had had Pepper come back for The Spy Who Loved Me so the audience would have the pleasure of seeing Jaws chew him to bits.
Even the film's greatest stunt is just about ruined by this infantile sense of humor. Bond, while pursuing Lee's Scaramanaga in the previously mentioned Hornet, executes a spectacular corkscrew jump over a canal. During the jump, however, the sound effects idiot in charge added a slide whistle sound effect, thereby lowering the level of the action to a Saturday morning cartoon. Time and time again, the audience is subjected to these stupid attempts at humor.
The Man With the Golden Gun could have been so much better. It's too bad that this was Harry Saltzman's swan song as a Bond producer. I love Warner Brothers cartoons, but not when they're masquerading as a James Bond film.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
![[Start the discussion]](http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/discussion_boards/start-new-discussion-sec._V192250339_.gif){kind=small}
