And the Bondie for best actor as a Henchman...page 126

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Comments

  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 14,861
    Revelator wrote: »
    mtm wrote: »
    What’s obtuse is not noticing that it moves from her hating the sight of him, him giving her an awful cheesy platitude, MONTAGE, she’s in love with him. That’s dreadful. They couldn’t be bothered to write her falling in love with him.

    Hopefully this will be the last time I have to point out your perpetual (and yes, obtuse) misreadings of OHMSS.

    Kill the attitude, mate. Consider that your opinion might not be truth.
    I'm not hugely interested in having a conversation with someone who speaks like that, but fine.
    Revelator wrote: »
    Tracy does not hate the sight of Bond. She storms out of Draco's birthday party because she thinks Bond is just using her to get information from her father. She would not have done this if she didn't already have some feeling for Bond--and when Bond catches up to her she has tears on her face, which shows she's been hurt by what she perceives as Bond's indifference.

    I don't think she's exactly in love with him either. She's met him once before at this point and run out on him, and correctly perceived that Bond has only turned up to get what he wants from Draco.
    But because they're writing her as a woman who needs to be dominated, and 'to make love to her enough to love him' (ha!) she's not exactly a terribly complex portrait of a real woman. She's just been written as a silly hysterical female in this scene. Diana Rigg does an awful lot of work to make Tracy function as a character.
    Revelator wrote: »
    Bond has to therefore prove his genuine feelings for her, which he does by wiping her tears away, verbally reassuring her of his commitment ("Mistakes should be remedied" is one the very rare times in the series where Bond outright apologizes to a woman), and
    ...riding a horse with her! :D
    Revelator wrote: »
    The montage is therefore dramatically justified and also a good way to express in shorthand what would have made an already long movie longer. Furthermore, the whole idea of Bond needing to prove his feelings to Tracy is not in the book,

    That you think the montage is about Bond proving his feelings to her shows that you haven't even understood it: he doesn't have feeling for her at this point. That's literally spelt out straight after the montage. The idea is he only starts to fall in love with her when she comes to rescue him.
    Revelator wrote: »
    ...which treats the love affair in a far more cursory manner (there are no Bond/Tracy scenes in between Bond meeting Draco and going to Switzerland). That is why I have very little patience for your carping at what is a clear improvement on Fleming.

    Just because something is an improvement on a flaw it doesn't make it good. It just makes it better than 'bad'.
    The montage fills in an empty gap in the writing, it's just cinematic pollyfilla when they should be writing character development. I think it's bad. Rocky has a montage when he's training because there's no dramatic value in watching someone get fitter, a relationship growing is exactly what films are about. Hell, most Bond films manage a vaguely convincing development of the relationship between Bond and his love interest. To dump such a key part of that in the film which is supposed to be about him actually finding real love borders on criminal.
    Why don't you consider that a possibility instead of 'losing your patience'? If you just come here to get angry when you see opinions you haven't considered before instead of actually thinking about them, what's the point?
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited May 2020 Posts: 14,861
    Revelator wrote: »
    Worst adapted screenplay...

    My vote goes to TMWTGG. All the other nominees at lest replaced Fleming with something splashy and entertaining, even if it was bloated (YOLT), braindead (MR), or funny but shallow (DAF).
    Furthermore, TMWTGG was based on Fleming's weakest novel and therefore should have had less of a challenge surpassing its source. And yet even the best parts of Fleming's novel--the opening chapters and the final one--were completely skipped by the film.

    Yeah the frustrating part is they do actually start to improve on the novel: turning Scaramanga from a rather low rent hoodlum into the classiest and greatest assassin in the world who charges a million a shot of his golden bullets? That's great stuff. And Bond getting a bullet with his name on it in the mail? Gorgeous little hook. But then they throw it all away and just staple another, totally unrelated plot onto it.

    The Bond-brainwashed stuff is all a bit Man From UNCLE for my tastes so I'm glad that hasn't popped up in a film. I don't think audiences would have been hugely interested in a film where Bond doesn't know he's Bond: half the appeal is of the character himself and the way he acts.

    It's quite funny how a page ago it was all about how everything Maibaum did was great, and now we're nominating two of his as the worst! :D
  • mtm wrote: »

    It's quite funny how a page ago it was all about how everything Maibaum did was great, and now we're nominating two of his as the worst! :D

    Two points to consider here: (1) Since Maibaum wrote about half of the Bond films it's only appropriate that half of the ones we're currently considering are his. (2) Tom Mankiewicz co-wrote THREE Bond films with Maibaum. Two of those three are represented here. Sorry Tom, but I'm just going to blame you for the bad stuff. Maibaum still reigns as the sultan of scripts IMHO.
  • edited May 2020 Posts: 2,887
    mtm wrote: »
    Kill the attitude, mate.

    Physician, heal thyself.
    I don't think she's exactly in love with him either. She's met him once before at this point and run out on him, and correctly perceived that Bond has only turned up to get what he wants from Draco.

    The character's prior meeting shows they were attracted to each other, and the next scene between them sets the stage for a deeper relationship to develop. Tracy's perception couldn't have been correct, since Bond does not let her go after he gets the information about Blofeld.
    She's just been written as a silly hysterical female in this scene.

    There's nothing hysterical in the scene. Tracy utters a strongly worded comment and leaves the table to nurse her hurt feelings elsewhere. There are no hysterics and no tears until she's by herself. Your interpretation of the scene is sillier than anything Tracy does.
    That you think the montage is about Bond proving his feelings to her shows that you haven't even understood it: he doesn't have feeling for her at this point. That's literally spelt out straight after the montage.

    You don't seem to understand the difference between having feelings for someone and being in love with someone. The movie quite obviously shows that Bond has strong feelings for Tracy, not only in the montage but in the limo ride afterward, when the two are staring into each other's eyes (and oblivious to Draco sitting between them). Without the film building up Bond's feelings for Tracy in its first third, his falling in love in the final third would make no sense and would seem sudden.
    The montage fills in an empty gap in the writing, it's just cinematic pollyfilla when they should be writing character development.

    They already had. The montage is there to show that Bond is taking up Tracy's emotional challenge and is willing to prove he has genuine feelings for her and is willing to commit to a relationship. It's a montage because there's no dramatic value in watching every minute of their dates--we've already seen them meet and get to know each other. You're attacking a structurally valid scene and asking for dramatically superfluous scenes that no else requires.
    Hunt, Maibaum, and Raven put considerable care into adapting the love story and making its growth more organic and convincing than in the book. And I think most contemporary audiences and critics would consider the results successful and convincing.
    Hell, most Bond films manage a vaguely convincing development of the relationship between Bond and his love interest.

    Most Bond films have done the exact opposite. There was hardly anything resembling love in the romantic relationships in the films preceding or succeeding OHMSS. What made that film unique was that sleeping with the Bond girl was quickly got out of the way to focus on the emotional stages that came afterward.
    Why don't you consider that a possibility instead of 'losing your patience'?

    I have not only considered that, I have refuted it several times.
    mtm wrote: »
    The Bond-brainwashed stuff is all a bit Man From UNCLE for my tastes so I'm glad that hasn't popped up in a film. I don't think audiences would have been hugely interested in a film where Bond doesn't know he's Bond: half the appeal is of the character himself and the way he acts.

    It's quite funny how a page ago it was all about how everything Maibaum did was great, and now we're nominating two of his as the worst! :D

    The brainwashed Bond plot is only in the first couple of chapters and is there to set up the assassination attempt on M. Afterward Fleming skips directly to Bond being fully recovered.

    Maibaum can't take full credit for the badness of either of those films. It was Mankiewicz who write the final script of DAF, and with TMWTGG Maibaum had to do a rush-job rewriting Mankiewicz's drafts.
  • MooseWithFleasMooseWithFleas Philadelphia
    Posts: 3,332
    This one's tough. As much as I enjoy Fleming's works, EON has always done an amazing job of elevating Fleming's work to make it more contemporary and translatable to the big screen.

    I like all four of these screenplays. I wish I could take an easy route and say CR 67, but of these four, I will pick DAF.
  • HASEROTHASEROT has returned like the tedious inevitability of an unloved season---
    edited May 2020 Posts: 4,399
    i am split between Moonraker and You Only Live Twice - because both adaptations wipe their cracks with the source material...

    but if i am being honest, i would have to say that YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE is the worst adaptation out of the two..

    MR, while a poor adaptation still had some trace cross over elements that you could connect back to the original Fleming novel... where as YOLT, the only connections back to the novel are the very basic superficial ones - character names, setting, and title.. oh, except for Bond becoming Japanese - i guess that was the one thing they wanted to bring in from the novel :O)

    ..i mean one could argue that it's not even an adaptation in the purest sense of the word, because the entire story itself was changed from this very deeply personal and melancholy revenge plot, to one that involved capturing space capsules and preventing WW3 between Russia and US.. it's really it's own brand new thing..
  • NickTwentyTwoNickTwentyTwo Vancouver, BC, Canada
    Posts: 7,518
    Agree @HASEROT, I think the main issues with YOLT stem from the filmmakers taking it out of the Blofeld Trilogy, as has been mentioned before.
  • Posts: 1,009
    Moonraker can be lots of fun as a movie, but take the novel as it is and you'll get ideas for a very different flick.
    So, it's MR, hands down.
  • I really need to re-read it. I like Bond's musings on killing in cold blood at the end, but much of the novel I forget.

    I guess you still have memories of the opening chapters with Bond's return to London! Personally, I find it hard to be particularly critical of a novel that has never had the necessary proofreading by its author, which probably pushes me to be too forgiving, but I really like this adventure. Between the opening chapters that could be a great pre-title sequence and the character of Scaramanga, there are many things to be fond of in this novel. Its linearity always mingling with Fleming's sense of detail, the Caribbean setting, are all things that make it excellent, in my opinion.
  • GoldenGunGoldenGun Per ora e per il momento che verrà
    Posts: 6,757
    DAF could be an easy answer but since that wasn't the greatest novel to begin with I suppose you can't be too critical.

    On the other hand, there is MR, and I like MR as a film, but as an adaptation of my favourite Fleming novel it obviously falls flat.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited May 2020 Posts: 14,861
    Revelator wrote: »
    mtm wrote: »
    Kill the attitude, mate.

    Physician, heal thyself.

    I'm not the one who kicked off with all of the 'obtuse' guff. Speak civilly or not at all please. I'll ignore your attempts to insult and rile me from now on.
    Revelator wrote: »
    I don't think she's exactly in love with him either. She's met him once before at this point and run out on him, and correctly perceived that Bond has only turned up to get what he wants from Draco.

    The character's prior meeting shows they were attracted to each other, and the next scene between them sets the stage for a deeper relationship to develop. Tracy's perception couldn't have been correct, since Bond does not let her go after he gets the information about Blofeld.

    Yeah it's a fair point (although bear in mind there's still a million up for grabs!), Bond is certainly intrigued by her and it's not exactly out of character for him to have his head turned by an attractive woman.
    Revelator wrote: »
    She's just been written as a silly hysterical female in this scene.

    There's nothing hysterical in the scene. Tracy utters a strongly worded comment and leaves the table to nurse her hurt feelings elsewhere. There are no hysterics and no tears until she's by herself. Your interpretation of the scene is sillier than anything Tracy does.

    8-| Yes if there are hysterics, she's being written as hysterical.
    Revelator wrote: »
    That you think the montage is about Bond proving his feelings to her shows that you haven't even understood it: he doesn't have feeling for her at this point. That's literally spelt out straight after the montage.

    You don't seem to understand the difference between having feelings for someone and being in love with someone. The movie quite obviously shows that Bond has strong feelings for Tracy, not only in the montage but in the limo ride afterward, when the two are staring into each other's eyes (and oblivious to Draco sitting between them). Without the film building up Bond's feelings for Tracy in its first third, his falling in love in the final third would make no sense and would seem sudden.

    Don't blame me for it feeling sudden, blame the writing. This isn't a deep film, the characters feelings change with a montage.
    Revelator wrote: »
    The montage fills in an empty gap in the writing, it's just cinematic pollyfilla when they should be writing character development.

    They already had. The montage is there to show that Bond is taking up Tracy's emotional challenge and is willing to prove he has genuine feelings for her and is willing to commit to a relationship. It's a montage because there's no dramatic value in watching every minute of their dates--we've already seen them meet and get to know each other. You're attacking a structurally valid scene and asking for dramatically superfluous scenes that no else requires.
    Hunt, Maibaum, and Raven put considerable care into adapting the love story and making its growth more organic and convincing than in the book. And I think most contemporary audiences and critics would consider the results successful and convincing.

    I think they very much wouldn't. Can you think of any modern films which have had to resort to something like this instead of convincingly developing the characters? At the beginning of it they barely know each other and Tracy is angry and wary to even see Bond again, by the end of it they've picked out a ring!
    :D That's not nuanced stuff.
    Revelator wrote: »
    Hell, most Bond films manage a vaguely convincing development of the relationship between Bond and his love interest.

    Most Bond films have done the exact opposite.

    Nope, they're not fully fledged romantic relationships but they do at least plot a path between 'meeting' - 'getting to know' - and 'falling for'. Apart from the ones where Roger just kisses a girl seconds after meeting her!
    :D
    Revelator wrote: »
    Why don't you consider that a possibility instead of 'losing your patience'?

    I have not only considered that, I have refuted it several times.

    I don't think you have, it's just anger and insults and attempts to be patronising. Why not drop the aggression and have a conversation?
    Revelator wrote: »
    mtm wrote: »
    The Bond-brainwashed stuff is all a bit Man From UNCLE for my tastes so I'm glad that hasn't popped up in a film. I don't think audiences would have been hugely interested in a film where Bond doesn't know he's Bond: half the appeal is of the character himself and the way he acts.

    It's quite funny how a page ago it was all about how everything Maibaum did was great, and now we're nominating two of his as the worst! :D

    The brainwashed Bond plot is only in the first couple of chapters and is there to set up the assassination attempt on M. Afterward Fleming skips directly to Bond being fully recovered.

    I know, that's why my comment refers to the first couple of chapters.
    Revelator wrote: »
    Maibaum can't take full credit for the badness of either of those films. It was Mankiewicz who write the final script of DAF, and with TMWTGG Maibaum had to do a rush-job rewriting Mankiewicz's drafts.

    Ah I see. Shame he couldn't save them! Still, they have amongst the best little bits of sparkling dialogue in all of the films.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 14,861
    Agree @HASEROT, I think the main issues with YOLT stem from the filmmakers taking it out of the Blofeld Trilogy, as has been mentioned before.

    And of course dropping Fleming's original idea of having Bond and Blofeld as brothers ;)
  • ProfJoeButcherProfJoeButcher Bless your heart
    Posts: 1,664
    echo wrote: »
    My vote goes to YOLT; one of my favourite novels, stripped of everything that makes it fun and unique. Tough one though, there’s certainly logic behind voting for any of the nominees here.

    This is a tough one. I hate what they did with YOLT, TMTWGG, and DAF, but only MR had the balls to jettison almost all of the (quite good) source material. And then they kept crypto-adapting it, for some reason.

    But maybe that saves a true MR for another day...

    My vote is for MR.

    I so agree, this is how I look at it:

    MR:
    Very Great Novel into Good Film

    YOLT:
    Great Novel into Bad Film

    I suppose that's how I decided on YOLT. It's true though that it's criminal how they eliminated all the source material from MR.

    I like the summary of MR and YOLT there.

    It's YOLT for me. It's the dumbest script in the Bond series, by quite some margin.

    The pre-titles makes no sense (who is the audience for Bond's fake death?), Bond's picture is put in the newspaper just as he's sent running around again, Tiger, Aki, and Blofeld all seem to be watching the movie they're in on little monitors, Helga sacrifices a perfectly good plane to try to kill Bond in the dumbest way possible, Blofeld simply chooses to not kill Bond, Bond becomes Japanese for no reason whatsoever, Aki has to pick up Bond escaping from Osato twice and in identical fashion, it would obviously be smarter to steal space capsules from only one side if you want to start a war, Bond only found the volcano because they fired at him....

    God, you can just go on and on with this incredibly idiotic movie.
  • thedovethedove hiding in the Greek underworld
    Posts: 4,904
    The academy has spoken! The Bondie for worst adapted screenplay goes to...Christopher Wood for Moonraker!

    Moonraker with 7 votes!
    Diamonds are Forever with 2 votes
    You Only Live Twice with 5 votes
    The Man with the Golden Gun with 4 votes

    Our next category will be for best original story, screenplay. These are films where the producers either weren't able to use Fleming's material or had to invent an entirely new story! The Nominees are...

    Christopher Wood for The Spy Who Loved Me
    John Logan, Robert Wade and Neal Purvis for Skyfall
    Michael France, Bruce Feirstein and Jeffery Caine for Goldeneye
    Paul Haggis, Robert Wade and Neal Purvis for Quantum of Solace
    Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson for Licence to Kill
  • NickTwentyTwoNickTwentyTwo Vancouver, BC, Canada
    Posts: 7,518
    GoldenEye proved Bond could exist outside of the Cold War and its one of the main reasons we still have Bond today. It’s also the best use of the “rogue-agent-as-villain conceit”. It has flaws but they’re outside of story/screenplay IMO. GoldenEye gets my vote.
  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    I am going to give this to QOS. I cannot find much flaw or fluff in that screenplay. For something that wasn t even finished, it worked damn well.
  • ProfJoeButcherProfJoeButcher Bless your heart
    Posts: 1,664
    I'll second QoS. Interesting story, actual character development. It's top notch.

    I'll have to mention that Goldeneye may be the worst of this bunch. Aside from depending heavily on coincidence, the dialogue is atrocious. M, 006, and Natalya all talk in overwritten speeches that are a meta comment on the series. It hardly counts as dialogue.
  • NickTwentyTwoNickTwentyTwo Vancouver, BC, Canada
    Posts: 7,518
    It'd be fun to give a different name to the awards for "worst" something, like a Klebbie or something. ;)
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited May 2020 Posts: 14,861
    It's between Skyfall and LTK for me, and although I don't think it's a great film, I might have to go for LTK.

    I really like the story of this one, even though I don't like the film that much, oddly enough! :) It's really rare that the one big action sequence in the middle of it (Bond interrupting the deal and waterskiing behind the plane etc.) has such big plot implications for the whole movie: from here on Bond has the cash to set himself up as a big player, insinuates himself into Sachez's operation and even manages to spread dissent, later accusing Krest of the robbery himself. It's unusual for an action scene not to just be a throwaway to keep the audience amused or just to link scenes together: this one is actually pivotal. Plus the whole plot of Bond actually getting close to the villain and becoming a trusted ally is weirdly never really seen before or since, even though you'd think a spy would go undercover quite often!
    :)

    Whether it's an original screenplay is debatable of course: it obviously takes elements from LALD and Hildebrand, and the main story is a loose adaptation of Fleming's TMWGG. I think if TLD was considered an adapted screenplay then this would have to be too!
    :D

    The other four are totally original, I don't think LTK is.
  • ProfJoeButcherProfJoeButcher Bless your heart
    Posts: 1,664
    mtm wrote: »

    Whether it's an original screenplay is debatable of course: it obviously takes elements from LALD and Hildebrand, and the main story is a loose adaptation of Fleming's TMWGG. I think if TLD was considered an adapted screenplay then this would have to be too!
    :D

    Quite right. It's probably the most Fleming-dependent film between OHMSS and CR.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited May 2020 Posts: 14,861
    GoldenEye proved Bond could exist outside of the Cold War and its one of the main reasons we still have Bond today.

    I like GE and I'm not saying you're wrong to pick it, but did that need proving? I'd say LALD or TMWTGG or GR or TB or MR or LTK or many if not most of them proved that!
    :)
  • Posts: 1,009
    OK, this is a very personal choice: there must be a reason why LTK is my fav film of all time, and it may be the screenplay.
    Simple yet effective, it may be Bond at his most human since OHMSS: he has loved ones; he relies on his own resources because Q's gadgets and his own haste fail him and has to use his smarts to outdo a band of ultraviolent criminals that have a whole country at their service; he has to face the wrath of an unsympatethic M out to get him (who knows, maybe he plans to have Bond court-martialed. M's behaviour here is the reason why I think Lee and Brown's Ms are not the same person)... I just love how these factors combine.
  • ProfJoeButcherProfJoeButcher Bless your heart
    Posts: 1,664
    mtm wrote: »
    GoldenEye proved Bond could exist outside of the Cold War and its one of the main reasons we still have Bond today.

    I like GE and I'm not saying you're wrong to pick it, but did that need proving? I'd say LALD or TMWTGG or GR or TB or MR or LTK or many if not most of them proved that!
    :)

    Yeah, the series is generally pretty light on Cold War stuff.

    I think it's another issue with Goldeneye, actually. It feels like it was written by people who are not particularly familiar with Bond per se, but have a firm grasp of the popular image of what James Bond is supposed to be.
  • NickTwentyTwoNickTwentyTwo Vancouver, BC, Canada
    edited May 2020 Posts: 7,518
    mtm wrote: »
    GoldenEye proved Bond could exist outside of the Cold War and its one of the main reasons we still have Bond today.

    I like GE and I'm not saying you're wrong to pick it, but did that need proving? I'd say LALD or TMWTGG or GR or TB or MR or LTK or many if not most of them proved that!
    :)

    Not the character, but the film franchise. It's widely known that GoldenEye was the first Bond film to be made after the fall of the Berlin wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union and end of the Cold War, and that Bond's relevance with audiences in the new climate was uncertain (things addressed in the film itself as @ProfJoeButcher points out, although I can't see where it relies on coincidence unless he's referring to the PTS, which I think is a misinterpretation).

    I would say the source material and many of the early films, fundamental to the establishment of the character, lean pretty heavily on an antagonistic Russia.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 14,861
    mtm wrote: »
    GoldenEye proved Bond could exist outside of the Cold War and its one of the main reasons we still have Bond today.

    I like GE and I'm not saying you're wrong to pick it, but did that need proving? I'd say LALD or TMWTGG or GR or TB or MR or LTK or many if not most of them proved that!
    :)

    Yeah, the series is generally pretty light on Cold War stuff.

    Yes, is Octopussy the first time he even goes to the other side of the Iron Curtain? And it takes until AVTAK for him to actually visit Russia I think..?

  • ThunderfingerThunderfinger Das Boot Hill
    Posts: 45,489
    I'll second QoS. Interesting story, actual character development. It's top notch.

    I'll have to mention that Goldeneye may be the worst of this bunch. Aside from depending heavily on coincidence, the dialogue is atrocious. M, 006, and Natalya all talk in overwritten speeches that are a meta comment on the series. It hardly counts as dialogue.

    And I will second that.
  • thedovethedove hiding in the Greek underworld
    Posts: 4,904
    It'd be fun to give a different name to the awards for "worst" something, like a Klebbie or something. ;)

    I believe a Pepper was also suggested! LOL! I like Klebbie for the worst! I shall use it for the next "worst" category!
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    Posts: 14,861
    Ha! Pepper is rather good though :)

    I'd suggest 'double-taking pigeon', but that might be a bit too long...
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited May 2020 Posts: 14,861
    mtm wrote: »
    GoldenEye proved Bond could exist outside of the Cold War and its one of the main reasons we still have Bond today.

    I like GE and I'm not saying you're wrong to pick it, but did that need proving? I'd say LALD or TMWTGG or GR or TB or MR or LTK or many if not most of them proved that!
    :)

    Not the character, but the film franchise. It's widely known that GoldenEye was the first Bond film to be made after the fall of the Berlin wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union and end of the Cold War,

    Indeed, it's widely known because it's a fact :D
    and that Bond's relevance with audiences in the new climate was uncertain (things addressed in the film itself as @ProfJoeButcher points out, although I can't see where it relies on coincidence unless he's referring to the PTS, which I think is a misinterpretation).

    I would say the source material and many of the early films, fundamental to the establishment of the character, lean pretty heavily on an antagonistic Russia.

    The ones I mentioned really don't at all though, and the films kept going despite that. I don't think anyone thought LTK finished off the Bond series because there was no mention of Russia in it! :)
    It was a fun soundbite at the time and added a bit of manufactured PR jeopardy to the film's opening to make audiences curious, but in reality there was no huge surprise that Bond could keep going without the Cold War because he never actually directly battled the other side in any of his movies, and quite a few of them didn't have any mention of the cold war at all.

    Goldfinger and Thunderball were massive hits which defined the whole series, I think you'd be hard pressed to say they leaned heavily on an antagonistic Russia. There's a vague mention of Goldfinger himself being sponsored by the Chinese, but it's pretty blink and miss it and he's mostly just out for himself.

    Spy Who Loved Me is another massive, series-defining hit, and that does indeed have Russia, in the form of Anya, playing a pretty big part. So remove the Russian element and you get... Moonraker. Which also did pretty well
    :)
  • Posts: 928
    Hard choice between LTK and Skyfall, but I'll give the slight edge to John Logan, Robert Wade and Neal Purvis.
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