The story behind your first Bond movie viewing

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  • edited July 2011 Posts: 3,494
    I've told this story before, and it's one I love telling. A seminal moment in my childhood.

    The year was 1968, and I was about 6 years old. My parents had gotten into Bond movies around the time Goldfinger was released and were big fans of Sean Connery. As a result, my father was completely hooked on the genre in general, watching spy type TV shows and movies. So of course it was natural for my younger brother and I to spend time with him watching these things, and of course we heard so much from him about this James Bond being the biggest and most awesome of them all, so it was logical for us to ask to see a movie. And off one night we went to see a double feature of Thunderball and You Only Live Twice on the big screen. I remember being totally into TB, seeing the most exotic locations, hearing the most amazing music, and watching the coolest dude I had ever seen taking down the bad guys in style. My brother fell asleep towards the end of the movie but I begged to stay and see even more. I think I made it through the YOLT PTS before nodding off due to the lateness of the hour, and home we went. By the next day, my brother and I were begging again to see the other films and as they came around to different local theaters Dad took us to see them. By the time OHMSS came out we had seen them all and I can honestly say I have never seen any Bond movie on anything less than the big screen since. I could even tell you what theater I saw each one in but that's probably TMI :)]

    I well remember the movies coming on TV (Channel 6 WPVI was and still is Philly's ABC outlet) in 1972, and was happy to see them although I could tell they were edited. Many of my friends at school were first exposed to them at that time because their parents hadn't taken them to see them, and I also remember how "cool" I was with them because I had been telling them about Bond for years and now they really liked Bond too. I've been spreading the Bond legacy pretty much my whole life. I'm never bored with them and still try to watch one every week if time allows it. It's even more awesome now because my 10 year old son has become a fan and watches them with me. Now THAT is ^:)^
  • DB5DB5
    Posts: 408
    i remember going to the Drive-In with my parents in early 1965 to see "Goldfinger" (I was nine years old). I thought it was the greatest movie I had ever seen in my life (still do to this day, 46 years later).
  • edited July 2011 Posts: 163
    for me LICENCE TO KILL was my first BOND film.

    i guess all the planets and stars were in alinement that day in the early 90's.

    i can remember like yesterday, i was at my DAD's house watching cable TV(well sneaking around channels) waiting for the film TOTAL RECALL to come on.

    while checking the TV guide for time listings, the movie scheduled before it was LTK.

    hmmm "KILL" i said to myself, now that sounds interesting.
    i had no clue about the novels, FLEMING, who BOND was, or what LTK was about.

    see back in the day "hot chicks with ice picks, killers with knives for fingers, bipolar nam war vets and killer cyborgs from the future" was my thing as a kid.

    hell who am i kidding still is, hey what can i say - i just have simple taste.

    but anyway after watching LTK it became a favorite flick of mine in general, sadly i thought that LTK was just that one film.

    i did not realize that there were more films until after i saw NSNA and OP ironically a year later on cable.

    GOLDENEYE was my first to see in theaters.
  • CatCat
    edited July 2011 Posts: 25
    I saw Daniel Craig in the movies Enduring Love and Layer Cake. I said to myself, 'This guy is a very good actor." Then, soon after that, I heard that he was chosen to be the next Bond. I saw Casino Royale & Quantum of Solace, then I was really hooked.

    For some reason, the other Bond Films didn't grab my attention. In my opinion, Daniel Craig is a very good actor and possibly overqualified for the Bond Franchise.
  • Creasy47Creasy47 In Cuba with Natalya.Moderator
    Posts: 40,474
    I was maybe eight or nine (if that) when my Mom came home one day with Tomorrow Never Dies and Goldeneye on VHS. Cue me watching them again, and again, and again, and again.
  • QsAssistantQsAssistant All those moments lost in time... like tears in rain
    Posts: 1,812
    HAHA... I actually love hearing about peoples first time with Bond. Anyway...

    Goldfinger was my first Bond movie.
    Goldeneye was my first Bond movie on VHS.
    Die Another Day was my first Bond movie in the theater and to own on DVD.

    I remember when I was a kid, in the 90's, I played the "Goldeneye" game alot with my family but never saw the movie and never cared to. I also remember my dad watching "The World is Not Enough", but once again, I didn't care; thought it looked too boring.

    Then one day I couldn't find anything on TV to watch until I came across a marathon called 'The Rocky Balboa vs James Bond Marathon'. The movie that was just starting was "Goldfinger", and I figured why not watch an old movie with the dad from "Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade"?

    Once it started I couldn't stop watching it! It was so awesome, from this guy having a nice car, to getting women, and wearing a cool grey suit. That was when I wanted to be Bond! Once it was over I was left wanting more but the next film that came on TV was one of the Rocky movies.
  • Posts: 7,653
    I discovered the Fleming novels among my dads collection of paperbacks, after having finished the Charteris novels, I liked the stick figure of the Saint, I started on Fleming and liked them so much that I bought the missing novels 2nd hand (as well as loads of Saint novels).

    I had just started to go to the cinema on my own when I ran into this poster that said James Bond and Moonraker. The poster didn't add up with my recollection of the novel I had called "Moonraker" and the drawing of the guy on the backside of the novel didn't look at all like the person on filmposter. Only later I found out that this was a drawing of the FRWL Sean Connery.

    So I decided to have look and was immidiately hooked upon the movie, I had not seen anything like it before. Was in love with Lois Chiles/Holly Goodhead. Liked Roger Moore didn't find out till later he had also played the Saint (for me the Saint was that Ian Ogilvy chap from the telly).
    The son of the cinema-owner was in my class and he told me about a doublebill of two 007 movies a week later. I got my parents so far in letting me go and saw a Sean Connery in Goldfinger / From Russia with love. That was it.

    I have seen all 007 movies on the big screen, and whenever they have a special viewing of an older 007 movie in my neighbourhood I go. Having all UE's on dvd doesn't measure up against a 007 in the cinema.
  • I got introduced to Bond movies through the November 1965 special The Incredible World of James Bond. It was in the same time slot as The Man From U.N.C.L.E., which I watched. I ended up seeing Thunderball sometime in the spring or summer of 1966 at a drive-in.
  • Agent007391Agent007391 Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, Start
    Posts: 7,854
    I got into the movies only a few months before playing GoldenEye on the Nintendo 64 for the first time. TBS was airing a marathon of Bond movies, and I was forced to watch TV with my dad at the time. Now, his favorite film is Live and Let Die, so I didn't catch any that aired before that or after, but I got to see Live and Let Die, and I was completely blown away. Then we flash forward maybe two or three months and I'm playing GoldenEye, and I was hooked, pure and simple.
  • edited May 2012 Posts: 12,837
    My foster dad took me on my first trip to the cinema when I was a kid and I saw the living daylights, I found it awesome, I remember the car chase on the ice and i thought it was the coolest thing ever.
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