At the time it was released, this was the best Bond film. The cinematography is so far ahead of the previous films that it is incomparable. The film does an excellent job balancing action, romance, drama, and intrigue. Despite having a slightly lower budget than the previous Bond film, "You Only Live Twice," nearly everything in the film is better done - and it is so drastically better than the films before "You Only Live Twice" that it is shocking they are from the same franchise.
George Lazenby received a lot of criticism for his portrayal of Bond, but I did not dislike it. He provides us with the most human, the most vulnerable Bond. It is instantly more relatable than Connery's Bond, and Lazenby does an excellent job making Bond interesting without gadgets. Connery is more charming, of course, but I feel like too much of the criticism was simply because Lazenby's portrayal was so different from Connery's - it is not bad acting.
Speaking of the acting, this is the first time that I felt all the characters in a Bond film were well acted. There were no unconvincing characters, no unbelievable villains, no barely rehearsed side characters. The female lead, Diana Rigg, was particularly excellent. Her confidence and strength of will made her even better than the previous Bond Girls (though I did love Daniela Bianchi and Akiko Wakabayashi).
The film takes Bond out of the absurd situations the Connery films were known for and into a more believable conflict. I prefer this immensely, as I was tired of rolling my eyes at the Connery films. We trade out poorly shot ridiculous situations and cheaply made sets for real locations, a convincing screenplay, and excellent camera work. It makes Bond feel "real" for the first time.
The film is far from perfect, however.
The movie has a tendency to drag things out. Scenes that should be brief are loaded with filler. Unimportant and uninteresting scenes are included for no reason. Scenes that should finish in five minutes instead take ten.
This is most apparent in the three terrible chase scenes. We have two awful skiing chase scenes (some fool liked the first so much that they insisted on including another), and a ridiculous bobsled chase scene. All of these use obvious camera tricks the rest of the movie avoids, all of them change the distance between pursuers and attackers with no relevance to what is actually happening, and all of them actively make the movie worse. Any other choice for the escapes would have been preferable to these awful, terrible scenes.
The plot itself magically "resolves" without any confirmation whatsoever from anyone. It is as if the scenes explaining the resolution were simply cut out. For a movie that spends so long building up the threat, to simply forget about it is ridiculous.
Fight scenes are unfortunately haphazardly shot. The characters involved change places with each camera cut, making the scenes feel chaotic and jarring. I suspect this was deliberate since the rest of the film was so well done, but I am not a fan of this style.
Finally, the ending of the movie is ridiculously poorly shot. The final minute of the movie seems as if it were done by a different director, and makes nearly every mistake it could. The camerawork is poor, the pacing is ridiculous, it is completely unfeasible given all the earlier plot developments, but it still happens. George Lazenby and Diana Rigg do a great job making sure that in spite of all this, the audience feels. To say anything else would be an unfortunate spoiler.
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Top reviews from the United States
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Reviewed in the United States on December 17, 2017
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Reviewed in the United States on June 10, 2019
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Reviewed in the United States on June 14, 2017
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Reviewed in the United States on October 5, 2020
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Top reviews from other countries
cora
Late 60s Bond Adventure with George Lazenby
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 16, 2021Verified Purchase
Michael Sommer
On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on April 6, 2019Verified Purchase
B.N.H.
Lazenby Could have been a Great Bond.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 25, 2015Verified Purchase
Thomas Parkinson
Vastly underrated to its book office disappointment
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 17, 2020Verified Purchase
Eric H.
O.H.M.S.S. A BRILLIANT BOND FILM!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 21, 2016Verified Purchase
