James Bond - Octopussy

9 February 2015

Octopussy 1983

• Director:  John Glen
• Based on the novels  by Ian Fleming
• Cast: Roger Moore, Maud Adams, Louis Jordan, Kristina Wayborn, Kabir Bedi, Robert Brown, Lois Maxwell
• Personal “oh yeah him/her” reaction, i.e. have seen this actor in:
• Roger Moore  – The Saint
• Maud Adams – Radioskuggan, Playing for Time, The Man with the Golden Gun
• Louis Jordan – Gigi
• Robert Brown – The Life and Death of King John, Henry IV Part One, The Spy Who Loved Me, Billy Budd, old TV series
• Why? Curious. Hal and I saw several Bond films in a Bond festival in the early 70’s and enjoyed them. Sean Connery is the only Bond we have ever seen.  Friends have said later actors have been good too. And with Judi Dench they can’t be all bad.  So we bought the box...
• Seen:  February 6, 2015  

With a title like this my expectations hover somewhere around zero.

After fifty-one minutes I wonder if the film is ever going to start being about something. At 1h06m Maud Adams shows up and some vague story shows up with her. Adams has some character. The story doesn’t - I’ve already forgotten it. Something to do with jewellery smuggling and nuclear bombs and mad Russian generals. It’s not altogether believable.

It’s basically uninteresting but somehow entertaining. Maybe it’s the circus. Double-oh-seven as a clown. Ha ha. And I like the camel, the elephants, the tiger, the tiger kitten, and the horses. Has James Bond been shown riding a horse before? And Maud Adams and her army of women soldiers are tough.

The last half hour – dare I say it? – is quite good.  Still not very likely but rather exciting.

Lesson: one cannot judge a film by its title.

2* of 5