Spectre

2015, UK/US, directed by Sam Mendes

The first time in a long while that I didn't see a Bond on the big screen, due to middling reviews, which turned out to be on point. It's a mediocre entry in the franchise, with perfunctory humanizing touches and a failure to use the chief villain to any great purpose. Indeed, Christoph Waltz's character seems to be conceived purely to speak lines in a Christoph Waltz manner, which has a relatively limited charm. The highlights: an excellent opening shot (or several, stitched together digitally), with a great deal of movement and self-conscious humour; and two or three atmospheric night-time sequences, wonderfully lit with chiaroscuro shadings. 

Skyfall

2012, UK/US, directed by Sam Mendes

Given the number of variations over the years both in personnel and style, I find myself increasingly confused by the complaints accompanying each Bond release that the movie in question doesn't adhere adequately to some cherished formula. While certainly an entry like Quantum of Solace seems to veer far away from what the series does most effectively, for the most part surely part of the pleasure comes from the ways in which novelty is grafted to a familiar template. In that regard, Sam Mendes's entry is one of the best Bonds in quite some time, referencing and celebrating some of the most cherished moments from the past -- a wonderful thrill passed through the audience when the Aston Martin makes an appearance, and the rejuvenated Q got some of the bigger laughs -- while deepening and humanizing Bond as a character without making him an especially gentle or even necessarily likeable individual (he is, after all, a tool of his masters, and generally a very willing one at that). The film does find some nobility in the character, though: there's a lovely, almost painterly shot near the conclusion where Bond, seen from behind, looks briefly like a medieval knight kneeling before an altar, and the reference is entirely apt -- a fighter in service to his paymasters, loyal to the end.

For Your Eyes Only

1981, UK/US, directed by John Glen

Memory told me that this was going to be one of the more enjoyable Roger Moore-Bond capers, something of a return to basics with fewer giant sets and plenty of enjoyable stunt work. Memory is a cruel thing, however, since the film feels terribly flat at this remove. Given his background as a second unit director, it's no surprise that director John Glen generally does right by the chase scenes, but the pacing is abysmal. Shots end abruptly, there are ugly zooms aplenty, and the actors are mostly at sea (sometimes literally, of course). The most enjoyable sequence, an extended hillside chase involving a Citroën 2CV, comes early in the game, and after that it's a bit of an ordeal to the dénouement.

Quantum of Solace

2008, UK/US, directed by Marc Forster

Although at least some of the familiar Bond tropes are present here -- most notably Bond's ability to show up in virtually any context wearing Savile Row's finest suits -- the second Daniel Craig entry continues in the back-to-the-origins mould of 2006's Casino Royale. At times, there's a sense that the filmmakers are struggling with the arc of the entire series, as if they want to go back to a metaphorical fork in the road in order to choose instead a path more like that of a John Le Carré rather than the path that led, eventually, to the naked self-parody of the Roger Moore era (even so, there's a hat-tip to the Connery Bonds in the form of a death scene that evokes Goldfinger).

It's hard, though, to mesh the dour realism of The Spy Who Came In From the Cold with the glitz of international jetsetting and the kind of high-octane thrills that bookend, and punctuate, the film; while the film feels populated by characters who might actually be people, they're still people with an unlikely ability to survive the worst possible physical abuse with barely a scratch, and given the requirements of the Bond genre, the brooding can't be allowed to run the show (even if the throwaway one-liners are almost completely absent). Still, one of the film's most enjoyable sequences is on a melancholy transatlantic flight, as Bond and his old pal Mathis drink themselves through the night, wondering what might have been, while the film's coda tries to ground things once again in the kind of chilly Eastern European setting so well employed by Le Carré.

As this installment's main villain, Mathieu Amalric is surprisingly adept at menace given his vaguely nebbish persona in other appearances; the script is careful to portray his amorality in terms of both political and personal power, with those around him easily sacrificed to his larger ambitions. This new Bond's take on geopolitics also tries, in its own way, to turn back the clock, counteracting murky American dealings in Latin America and intervening on the side of the weak: the Americans can't be trusted for a moment, a point made rather obviously, even if Bond's paymasters need the information accumulated by their US counterparts.

Moonraker

1979, UK/US, directed by Lewis Gilbert

Moonraker is the only Bond movie I didn't see growing up, and since it's often cited as the nadir of the series -- though how you determine that when it can be awfully hard to tell tongue-in-cheek Bondery from inadvertent foolishness -- I wasn't exactly eager to make up the gap in my viewing. It was a reasonably pleasant surprise to discover that it really isn't that bad. Sure, the reappearance of Richard Kiel's character Jaws is mindless, while the film loses the plot entirely once it goes into orbit -- Bond and Dr. Holly Goodhead (Lois Chiles) make no attempt whatsoever to conceal themselves and yet it takes an age for anyone to cotton on -- but the first hour is solid Bond entertainment.

Especially, that is, for Bond himself: there's an even longer parade of women than is usually the case, so much so that it becomes hard to sort them out, and the unreconstructed nature of the character comes to seem all the more jarring as the world around him changes. On the plus side, Michel Lonsdale is very enjoyable as the slithery, urbane Hugo Drax, delivering even his silliest lines with low-key relish, and playing straight man to the indestructible Bond. Lewis Gilbert, back for his third Bond, films a remarkable number of scenes almost wordlessly, and many of the action scenes have virtually no dialogue at all. At times, this is really quite effective: there's an especially good sequence when James goes exploring Drax's mansion at night, with Gilbert panning the camera away from Bond towards the door to track an unexpected arrival. It's just a shame that as we leave the earth such simple craftsmanship seems to fall away too.

The Spy Who Loved Me

1977, UK, directed by Lewis Gilbert

After the all-out silliness of The Man with the Golden Gun, the next entry in the Bond franchise is a considerable improvement, with a plot that pools the resources of the US, Soviet and British secret services, who find their interests suddenly aligned when the megalomaniac du jour decides to steal three nuclear submarines of varying nationalities (the opening sequence is economical and quite gripping, perhaps because it is free of the tongue-in-cheekery of the scenes featuring Bond).

It's not quite plain sailing, of course: while B-movie queen Barbara Bach is an enjoyable foil for Bond, Richard Kiel's Jaws, the iron-toothed villain, is absurb even by the standards of the series (which wouldn't stop him from returning in a later film). The film also feels twenty minutes too long, with the usual array of tropical locations (most notably Egypt on this occasion) padding out the running time. Lewis Gilbert returns for directing duties; he has more skill with the camera than Guy Hamilton, though he tends to repeat the same movements -- smooth dolly shots in particular -- with distracting frequency.

The Man with the Golden Gun

1974, UK, directed by Guy Hamilton
The Man with the Golden Gun, the second of the Bond films to star Roger Moore, is likely the nadir of the series in terms of sheer improbable silliness. That surely constitutes an achievement of some kind in a franchise that has rarely prized realism. While it's not necessarily a guide to film quality, this entry's box office performance was also notably dismal, and the series subsequently took a three-year break.

Christopher Lee plays the villain, Scaramanga, whose titular weapon provides him a lavish living, while he remains largely unknown to the intelligence services of the world. That proves no obstacle to Bond, who picks up the evil one's trail in no time at all, criss-crossing Asia while he's at it (the Thai locations are especially beautiful; there's no hint of the turmoil in Southeast Asia at the time, of course). The scriptwriters throw in various ideas from previous films, notably an especially wicked dwarf manservant (Hervé Villechaize), while Clifton James, from Live and Let Die, shows up again as a redneck sheriff (on an especially improbable Vietnam-era holiday), in the somewhat desperate hope of camouflaging the absurd central plot. After a capable debut, Roger Moore looks distinctly uncomfortable on this occasion, perhaps sensing that the inspiration was running dry; that he survived the three-year hiatus indicates that the producers felt, correctly, that the film's problems did not begin with its star.

Live and Let Die

1973, UK, directed by Guy Hamilton
Roger Moore's first outing as Bond is one of the strangest entries in the franchise, a mélange of spy thriller, action and voodoo; if You Only Live Twice was "Bond in Japan", with a nod to the increasingly popularity of Asian action, this is "Bond Goes to Harlem", complete with a recycling of many of the themes of blaxploitation. It completely turns that genre on its head, since the hero of the hour is Bond, rescuing the lily-white damsel from her black captors, with black characters notable mainly for their villainy and cruelty (with the exception of Bond's occasional assistant, Quarrel) -- though the one truly laughable character in the film is a redneck Southern sheriff.

On the plus side, however, the film's main narrative, concerning drug-running rather than world domination, is more credible than usual, while the action sequences are generally entertaining; there are memorable boat stunts, as well as a sequence where Bond escapes from a crocodile-infested pool with a sprint over the animals' backs. Roger Moore makes a low-key debut as Bond, with some of the usual trappings missing, but he's an immediate improvement over George Lazenby, with a lazy charm that contrasts with Connery's sometimes thuggish version of the character (there's also a reworking of one of the franchise's most memorable fight sequences, that between Connery and Robert Shaw in From Russia With Love).

Diamonds are Forever

1971, UK, directed by Guy Hamilton

Though the Roger Moore era is generally regarded as the bottom of the James Bond arc, the later Connery films are just as hit or miss: the star himself is clearly only there for the ample paydays, while the script recycle ideas -- not all of them that good in the first place -- with abandon. Though Diamonds are Forever starts out with a plotline based on a more recognisable reality than some of the preceding films, alluding to Howard Hughes's reclusive years in Las Vegas, the film ultimately chooses to go in a more conventional direction for the finale.

There are, of course, intermittent pleasures to be had, notably some entertaining stunt work, particularly in two extended chase sequences, and a close-up of Vegas in all its circa-1970 glory (in comparison to the in-your-face modern city, it does seem like something of a quaint golden age); the one-liners are also spread around more liberally than usual, with Putter Smith and Bruce Glover, as the stereotypically effete Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, getting some of the better examples.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service

1969, UK, directed by Peter Hunt

My fond memories of this as one of the better Bonds seem misplaced on re-viewing the film after a long gap; perhaps it wasn't as obvious, then, how substantial a downgrade George Lazenby is when compared to even a going-through-the-motions Sean Connery. Along with the 2006 Casino Royale, this is one of the most domestically-minded Bond films, with hints that James might be ready to settle down (though he happily beds an entire harem while preparing himself for nuptial bliss).

Like its immediate predecessor, You Only Live Twice, this film brings arch-nemesis Blofeld out from the shadows, robbing him of much of his menace (especially since he's played here by a rather genial Telly Savalas), while Blofeld, for all his alleged smarts, has to learn the hard way that failing to dispatch 007 using one of the traditionally foolproof methods is bound to come back to haunt the average over-reaching criminal mastermind. Though Lazenby can't hold a candle to Connery, Diana Rigg is one of the most appealing Bond girls, lighting up the screen when she's around, and displaying some independence of spirit (which clearly wouldn't do, though the conclusion of the film is lifted directly from Ian Fleming's novel); the skiing scenes are also a pleasing distraction, even if some of the back projection work is unconvincing.

You Only Live Twice

1967, UK, directed by Lewis Gilbert

Watching the Bond films in order of release, it's not really surprising that Sean Connery took a break from Bond after You Only Live Twice: he seems less than inspired in this outing, something which I'm sure contributed to the film's relatively limited commercial success notwithstanding the exotic Japanese location. The film is also considerably less jokey in tone than its immediate predecessor, Thunderball, a film absolutely riddled with throwaway one-liners and a massive box-office hit to boot (the attitude towards women, though, is if anything more unreconstructed here).

You Only Live Twice was one of Roald Dahl's only screenwriting forays, and the results aren't especially happy (though Dahl claimed that much of his work was discarded): the closing stages, though they provided great materials for the Austin Powers spoofs, have a few too many holes even by Bond standards. It's a shame, really, because there are some interesting possibilities: when the film slows down occasionally and pays attention to the details of Japan it's really quite absorbing, while I've always preferred Bond when he reins in the punchlines and tones up the fighting skills (the ninja sequences are especially fun, and notable in that martial arts films had not yet made it big in the West).

Thunderball

1965, UK, directed by Terence Young

Though it was a massive financial success -- out-grossing, in raw dollars, entries that came years later despite ticket inflation -- Thunderball is an undeniable disappointment given the standards set by the first three films. It's the first Bond movie to break the two-hour bar, and the padding shows particularly in the lengthy, unexciting underwater fight sequences (which are sometimes laughable; director Terence Young was apparently unenthusiastic about the underwater fights, and it's a pity he didn't stand his ground).

The series also shows the first signs of slipping into self-parody, especially in the guise of Adolfo Celi's SPECTRE No.2, while the quota of throwaway one-liners is significantly higher. Sean Connery is absolutely at ease as Bond here, with the character now clearly moving more towards the smooth than the brutal end of the spectrum; he spends a tremendous amount of time in beach-wear chasing women notwithstanding the imminent destruction of a major city, but also finds time to win at cards. The sequences which outline the SPECTRE plot to steal nuclear devices, remain gripping (the scenes on board a NATO plane are especially good), while the SPECTRE board meeting is also enjoyably dry, but overall the extended running time undercuts those early highlights.

Casino Royale

2006, US/Germany/UK/Czech Republic, directed by Martin Campbell

It's no mean task to breathe new life into a franchise that's in its forties, but the producers cannily brought back several of the key personnel (most obviously director Martin Campbell) who dragged Bond into the modern era with 1995's Goldeneye, and give them further freedom to develop a new tone (with another new Bond). Where Pierce Brosnan's Bond played the smooth angle to the hilt (with Brosnan later trashing that image in films like The Matador), Daniel Craig (whose features might have typecast him as a Boer cop) brings back some of the raw thuggery of the first Bond films. The fights here are as brutal as the famous sequence which pitted Connery against Robert Shaw in a cramped train compartment in From Russia With Love and serve as a salutary reminder that violence, even in a Bond movie, shouldn't be taken too lightly. The early going also features some spectacular parkour stunt-work, performed by Sebastien Foucan who, unusually for a stunt player, gets an opening credit for his work.

Just as the violence is a touch more realistic, the plotting focuses on a criminal banker whose interests lie in financial gain rather than the kind of world domination that became so laughably repetitive in previous entries; it's a refreshing return to earth, not least because it eliminates silly sequences in which Bond escapes from elaborately choreographed death and destruction. It takes some time to get used to Daniel Craig as Bond: he's not just new but genuinely different (as my wife commented, it's not hard to imagine that "James Bond" is itself a code name, just like 007, since there's no sense of a past history), but by the end of the film Craig has made the role convincingly his own. He's surrounded by an unusually good group of supporting actors, who are, crucially, given interesting things to do; Eva Green and Mads Mikkelsen are especially strong. The main flaw is length; like many recent Bond entries, Casino Royale overstays its welcome and there's a tacked-on sense to some of the closing sequences, where you constantly expect the closing credits to roll.

Goldfinger

1964, UK, directed by Guy Hamilton

The Bond franchise really swung into high gear with Goldfinger, which features some of the most memorable moments of the series as a whole: the Korean killer Oddjob, with his lethal hat; Gert Fröbe's tremendously villainous Goldfinger; and perhaps most of all, the sight of Shirley Eaton covered head to toe in gold paint, and draped, dead, on a bed. The plot features the usual control-the-world megalomania (although Goldfinger's desire for economic rather than military control is an interesting wrinkle), while Connery looks to be having as much fun as ever delivering smart one-liners (others, too, get their share of enjoyable zingers). He also gets to take advantage of a large complement of Bond girls, who are treated with spectacular disdain -- with the possible exception of Honor Blackman's Pussy Galore, whose name hardly helps her to be taken seriously, but who makes a case as more than just eye-candy. Despite some dodgy back-projection, the stunt work is entertaining, especially in the car-chase sequences, while Ken Adam's sets are, as ever, excellent: the Goldfinger house, with its secret panels and moving walls, is particularly fun.

From Russia With Love

1963, UK, directed by Terence Young

It didn't take long for the Bond producers to figure out the magic formula, for this second entry in the series is probably the best of all the Bonds. Like its predecessor, it's relatively small in scale: although über-villain Blofeld is introduced, the real threats are in the more down-to-earth forms of Robert Shaw and Lotte Lenya, two of the most memorable henchmen in the 40-year-plus history of the films. Shaw is perfectly cast as a blond ex-army man, credibly suave when required, and equally credibly thuggish when the time comes (especially in a great fight scene in the cramped confines of a train compartment). The exotic location this time around is Istanbul, conjured up with plenty of cinematic charm, and an enjoyable performance from Pedro Armendáriz (in his last film role) as Bond's man on the ground. Although Bond has had just one film to establish his reputation, it's clear that SPECTRE considers him the biggest threat to their activities, and they concoct an elaborate false plot to entrap him -- with Bond happy to take the female bait. The comically over-the-top sets, and even more comical killing methods, of later films are absent here, but Desmond Llewellyn makes his first, brief, appearance as Q, a fixture that is one of the most enjoyably playful aspects of the series.

Dr. No

1962, UK, directed by Terence Young

The first Bond movie, despite its exotic trappings, is one of the most restrained in scale: almost all of the action takes place in relatively tiny Jamaica (or on Pinewood sets), rather than the near constant jet-setting that often proved confusing in later movies. While the overall template is already firmly in place - Bond takes on a sinister megalomaniac intent on world domination - many of the flourishes that would later prove so critical to the franchise (Desmond Llewellyn's turns as Q, for instance) have not yet been grafted on.

While the supporting structure is thus not quite as comfortingly familiar, Sean Connery, as Bond, appears to have been born fully formed into the part: from the first moment he appears onscreen, he exudes a charm and assurance that transcends the often rickety plot and the archly incredible villain. Though Ian Fleming's first Bond book had appeared almost a decade previously, Bond seems a perfect 60's hero: he embodies the attractions of the golden age of jet travel, apparently possessed of infinite resources and resourcefulness, and engages in casual sex and even more casual violence in a manner that seems to typify that decade, throwing off the comfortable but dreadfully unexciting 50's with glee. The first 'Bond, James Bond' and the familiar Bond theme remain as stirring as ever, while Ursula Andress's emergence from the sea is one of the franchise's most iconic and enjoyable moments.