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It’s merely waiting to be reupholstered
This is an almost throwaway line from the throwaway Casino Royale (1967) but it’s content is hard to ignore when contrasted with the 2006 Casino Royale. In the new movie, Mads Mikkelsen’s Le Chiffre dispenses with wit entirely and introduces Bond to one of the franchise’s most infamous acts of… Read More →
Filed Under: Casino Royale (1967) -
Send them to the funeral, will you?
Here’s another in a long list of Roger Moore’s most perfectly timed Bond quips and it lands precisely because of the absurdly civil context in which it’s delivered. In For Your Eyes Only, Bond slips into a flower shop under the pretense of buying a dozen lilies, carefully avoiding Melina… Read More →
Filed Under: For Your Eyes Only -
The Navy XT-7B: Top Secret Trash
In the final act of Never Say Never Again, Bond casually asks the submarine captain about the Navy’s top secret XT-7B platforms, claiming to have read about them in a “Russian translation” of one of his service manuals. Even by Bond standards, this premise strains credibility and the idea that… Read More →
Filed Under: Never Say Never Again -
…the tedious inevitability of an unloved season
Drax’s description of James Bond’s persistent appearance stands as one of the most memorably irritated villain lines ever and is a great example of one of Drax’s many aristocratic expressions. Funnily enough, the line is delivered with such precise disdain that one can almost hear Michael Lonsdale suppressing a private… Read More →
Filed Under: Moonraker -
How can I sleep? Nothing but problems
General Gogol’s wry complaint to his American counterpart after Drax’s spacecraft suddenly appears on radar is a small but revealing moment. The line initially plays as dry bureaucratic irony, yet the scene immediately undercuts it by showing Gogol awake not from geopolitical anxiety, but from drinking champagne in the company… Read More →
Filed Under: Moonraker -
Me, given an ounce of encouragement
Moneypenny’s flirtation with Bond is arguably at its most daring in the very first James Bond movie, Dr. No. This response to Bond’s casual “What gives?” reads unmistakably as an overt sexual innuendo that is remarkably bold for a 1962 production and all the more striking coming from M’s trusted… Read More →
Filed Under: Dr. No