You Onry Rive Twice
[spoilers follow]
Apparently, by the time You Only Live Twice was made, Bond films were printing money. So YOLT has the first real special effects and luscious locations. But for us, of course, the films are getting *less* lavish. Sort of.
In fact, YOLT *is* quite lush, and more money has been spent than on OHMSS. Mostly on the villain's volcano lair. Now, I'm a sucker for a lair, don't know about you, so I love that. And I like the ninja attwack. Because who doesn't love ninjas?
If you don't love ninjas, well, how do I know you exactly?
So Bond goes to Japan, gets "married", makes some off colour remarks about his bride before he meets her, and you know, I've seen this film three or four times, and I still don't know why exactly Bond "marries" a Japanese woman. And I certainly don't know who he's supposed to fool with yellowface. I mean, James Bond is as white as white can be and doesn't speak much Japanese.
Still, Bond films don't have to make sense, although there are definitely some with stronger scripts than this one. Nothing seems particularly connected and the characters are weak. I'm sorry to say that the Japanese in particular are awful caricatures. And I nearly spewed when Tiger said, in Japan men come first. And Bond of course loved that.
The girl villain inexplicably varies between wanting to kill Bond and wanting to fuck him. And Blofeld, once he has Bond, refuses to just, you know, shoot him, and lets him escape. Again.
I once wrote a short story in which Fu Manchu has to allow the men sent to kill him to escape -- read it if you want to know why -- but Blofeld actually does want Bond dead. He could probably just have fed him to the piranhas -- the forerunners of Stromberg's shark.
The action's decent and for its time, LIttle Nelly is a lot of fun. Okay, probably it hasn't dated well but nothing has. It's not a patch on OHMSS, which had beautifully realised tone, whereas this just sneers all the way through. Basically, it's saying, we know this is bollocks but you still paid six shillings so here goes.
I really liked this back in the day, particularly because my dad had a single of the theme music and it is awesome. Nancy Sinatra is very much underrated -- who doesn't love her work with Lee Hazlewood? But that's the best of it. The racism, the laziness, the shitty characters -- it all drags it down. I think C is generous but Connery's Connery, I guess. I fell out of love with it though.
posted by Dr Zen @ 7:43 pm
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