The James Bond Bedside Companion (83 page)

Nevertheless, Roger Moore still brings warmth, humor, wit, and a great deal of charm to the role, believable as 007 or not. He is a complete professional and can hold his own in the same frame with someone as flamboyant and extroverted as Grace Jones. The method in which he has chosen to play the British agent has undoubtedly been a successful one, for there are many fans who insist that Moore will never be replaced.

The Bond-girl in the film is geologist Stacey Sutton, played by American actress Tanya Roberts. Miss Roberts, a veteran of television
(Charlie's Angels)
and other genre films
(The Beastmaster, Sheena, Tourist Trap)
,
manages to sail through a role of little substance with a competent and attractive screen presence. But despite the screenwriters' attempts to flesh out Stacey (so to speak) into an intelligent career woman, there really isn't enough there to grasp. When Stacey speaks scientific jargon while she and Bond are sneaking through Zorin's mine shaft, it is a bit laughable. The couple finds a large store of dangerous explosives and a small room with a three-dimensional tabletop diorama of the San Francisco Bay Area. With one quick look, it all becomes clear to Stacey, and she shrewdly explains that Zorin hopes to flood Silicon Valley. "All to coincide with the spring tide for maximum effect!" she announces knowledgeably.

Christopher Walken is an excellent actor, and he brings a wide range of dynamics to the character of Max Zorin. (Reportedly, the producers originally approached David Bowie to play the role, but he refused.) With his hair dyed platinum, Walken plays the madman as a spoiled kid who is having a particularly splendid time being evil. He smiles and laughs constantly, but then abruptly loses his temper and raises his voice. It is quite a manic performance for an actor who is usually subdued and intense
(The Deer Hunter, Annie Hall, Heaven's Gate, The Dead Zone),
and it is one of the most successful elements of the film.

Grace Jones almost steals the movie as the noto
rious May Day, but unfortunately, her character is sur
prisingly underused by the script. She could have been a much more challenging and deadly foe for 007, but instead the filmmakers opted to have the woman change allegiance at the end. When Zonn betrays her, she decides to help Bond save the world—and it just doesn't ring true. For heaven's sake, this is the same woman who murdered French agent Aubergine, Sir Godfrey Tibbett, and CIA agent Chuck Lee in cold blood! This is the same woman who defied death and leaped off of the Eiffel Tower! This is the same woman with the strength of two men! Her change in alliance is just too difficult to swallow. Nevertheless, Miss Jones is always fascinating to watch. She has enough screen presence to fill two motion pictures at once.

Patrick Macnee, a respected British veteran of television (
The Avengers
) and theatrical films, brings us the best Bond ally in a long time. As Sir Godfrey Tibbett, Macnee is funny, intelligent, and most importantly, believable as a member of the British Secret Service assigned to help 007 (although it seems a bit degrading to force a knighted civil service officer to be a chauffeur and valet to James Bond!). Tibbett is the film's first Obligatory Sacrificial Lamb, and he dies at the hands of May Day inside a car wash.

David Yip portrays CIA agent Chuck Lee, the second Obligatory Sacrificial Lamb. Bond meets Lee in San Francisco, where the CIA agent assists 007 in investigating Zorin's activities in the States. Once again, May Day draws the curtains on Chuck Lee.

As usual, Stacey Sutton isn't the only female companion for Bond during the course of the film. Agent 007 dailies with fellow agent Kimberly Jones (Mary Stavin) at the end of the pre-credits sequence; flirts with Jenny Flex (Alison Doody), Zorin's secretary and public relations officer; and bathes in a hot tub with Pola Ivanova (Fiona Fullerton), a Russian agent who is also keeping tabs on Zonn. It seems that Zorin was working for the KGB when he defected and has since thumbed his nose at the Soviets.

Bond film regulars make their expected appearances: Robert Brown returns as an ineffectual M; Desmond Llewelyn is looking a bit shaky as Q; Geoffrey Keen is the predictably surly Minister of Defense; and Walter Goteil performs his usual role of detente as General Gogol. Lois Maxwell, as the ever-faithful Miss Moneypenny, calls it a series along with Roger Moore, as
A View to a Kill
contains her final appearance as M's secretary. Since a younger Bond would be cast in the next film, the producers felt that a youthful Miss Moneypenny should then make her debut as well. Miss Maxwell will be missed, for she always brought much wit and warmth to her small but necessary role.

OTHER ASPECTS

I
n the interest of gadgets, Bond uses a few Q Branch items while he is spying at Zorin's chateau. These include a bug detector inside an electric razor, a pair of sunglasses which enable him to see through darkened windows, a check imprint duplicator concealed in a calculator, and a tiny camera built into a signet ring. Q is also seen working on a "Snooper," an overly cute doglike robot for surveillance purposes. Luckily, the Snooper isn't used much in the film.

A View to a Kill
required production designer Peter Lamont to make use of many outdoor locations, and this is one of the most successful aspects of the picture. Both the Golden Gate Bridge and the Eiffel Tower are used extremely well, not only as scenery, but as obstacle courses on which to plot action. Zorin's chateau in France is Chantilly, a historic structure built by Louis de Bourbon. San Francisco's actual City Hall and Fisherman's Wharf were used in the film to great advantage. A City Hall fire was beautifully created with the help of the San Francisco Fire Department.

John Barry's score is merely adequate—certainly not one of his best. He probably put most of his energy that year into the beautiful score for
Out of Africa
, for which he won an Academy Award.
A View to a Kill
's main title song was cowritten with and performed by Duran Duran, a popular British rock group. The song was a hit single, but it didn't do nearly as well as the band's other songs. The tune is lively and melodic, but the lyrics don't make much sense. Barry's instrumental versions of the song are lovely, and they nicely underscore the romantic scenes between Bond and Stacey.

After all is said and done,
A View to a Kill
, successful as it was at the box office, chalks up to being a mediocre entry in the series; but for a couple of hours' worth of escapist entertainment, it works just fine.

PRODUCTION

S
ince 1987 was Eon Productions' twenty-fifth anniversary, Albert R. Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson de
cided that it was time to send James Bond in a new direction. Along with new actor Timothy Dalton, the producers chose to present James Bond in a more serious vein, something akin to the early films and certainly more faithful to the spirit of Ian Fleming. It was a decision that was applauded by almost every Bond fan worldwide.

The Living Daylights
,
which premiered in London in June and in America in July, is the best James Bond film since the sixties. This is due to a number of factors: an excellent script by Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson which emphasizes character and plot more than action scenes; colorful locations; a good supporting cast; sophisticated rather than juvenile humor; and a smashing performance by Timothy Dalton.

Principal photography on the $32-million production began on September 29, 1986, and wrapped February 4, 1987. Locations included Gibraltar, Vienna, the Austrian Alps, Tangier, Ouarzazate in Morocco, and other locations in England and Italy.

Featured in the Vienna sequences are the exquisite Hotel Im Palais Schwarzenberg, a late Eighteenth-Century palace destroyed in World War II which is now a lavish hotel, and the world-famous Wiener Prater, the internationally renowned amusement park (which was also seen in Carol Reed's classic,
The Third Man).

In Morocco, the casbahs, rooftops, and villas of Tangier were used, as well as the magnificent Forbes Museum, owned by wealthy American publisher Malcolm Forbes. The museum contains the world's largest private collection of miniature soldiers and military memorabilia covering centuries of land warfare; hence, the building was used as the headquarters for the principal villain, General Brad Whitaker.

The rugged area of Ouarzazate, located between the Atlas Mountains and the Sahara Desert, doubled for Afghanistan. The film crew spent ten days at an Ouarzazate airfield staging a realistic battle between heavily armed Russian troops and the
mujaheddin (
Afghan freedom fighters). Moroccan soldiers played the Russians, while local horsemen were drafted to portray the Afghan rebels.

SCREENPLAY

T
he Living Daylights,
Eon's fifteenth production, was one of the few remaining Ian Fleming titles that had not yet been filmed. You will recall that the short story was originally written for and published by the
London Sunday Times
in 1962, and was later included in the OCTOPUSSY anthology when it was published in 1966.

The basic situation of the short story is retained in the film. In the cinematic version, James Bond is on the east side of the Czechoslovakian/Austrian border, where his assignment is to shoot and kill any potential snipers that might attempt to assassinate a certain Russian defector. Bond meets his contact, an agent named Saunders (Thomas Wheatley) at a concert hall, where he first spots the pretty blonde cellist (Maryam d'Abo). The defecting Russian is General Georgy Koskov (Jeroen Krabbe), a high-ranking KGB official. When the sniper turns out to be the cellist, Bond senses that the girl doesn't know what she's doing; and with a split second's decision, he shoots the rifle out of her hands. Despite Saunders' dismay and anger with 007 for disobeying orders, General Koskov is transported to England safely. During a meeting with M and the Minister of Defense, Koskov reveals that the new KGB head,
General Pushkin
(John-Rhys Davies)
has master
minded a plot called "Smyert Spionam" (the original Russian contraction meaning "SMERSH" in the novels) to eliminate several Western agents. M has no choice but to send Bond to find Pushkin and eliminate him. But 007 smells a rat—a Russian one. Curious about the cellist/sniper, Bond makes inquiries and learns that the girl, Kara Milovy, is an innocent musician who was General Koskov's girlfriend. But before Bond makes much progress, Koskov is seemingly
recaptured
from the British safe house by the KGB in a daring ruse which involves an assassin who disguises himself as a milkman. Koskov is actually taken to Tangier, where his partner in crime, General Brad Whitaker (Joe Don Baker) lives in a "fortress." Whitaker, a fanatical right-wing American mercenary turned arms and drug dealer, staged the kidnapping operation so that Koskov would be free to live a life of crime. Together, they have formed an elaborate scheme to make a lot of money by a) selling high-tech arms to Russia; b) using the down payment to purchase diamonds on the Western black market; c) trading arms and the diamonds for raw opium from the
mujaheddin
(freedom
fighters) in Afghanistan; and d) selling the heroin to various conduits around the world.

Before Bond stops Koskov in the Afghanistan desert and encounters Whitaker face-to-face in Tangier, the plot undergoes many twists and turns which keep the film moving with surprising, unexpected results. The story is more in keeping with the early films—more intrigue and less gimmicks.

The romantic subplot is by far the most successful dalliance between Bond and a heroine since
From Russia With Love
. To gain Kara Milovy's trust, 007 pretends to be Koskov's "friend" who has come to help her defect and join her lover. He stalls the truth as long as possible until he is certain that Koskov is in Tangier with Whitaker. But before he can tell her the truth in his own way, Koskov himself informs Kara that Bond is a spy who tried to have him killed. In a powerfully dramatic moment, a drugged and quickly fading Bond explains to Kara that it was he who knocked the rifle out of her hands the night Koskov defected. "I was supposed to kill you," he stammers. "Well, why didn't . . . ?" she asks, but Bond falls unconscious as Koskov and his henchman enter the room. Then it hits her. She realizes that the man had been sent to murder her and he spared her life.

Of course, from that moment on, Kara is in love with Bond, and the feeling appears to be mutual. Not since
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
have we seen a James Bond so obviously and sincerely involved with a leading lady. A lot of the credit goes to the acting talents of Timothy Dalton and Maryam d'Abo, but the script itself provides credible material. Because the audience is given a chance to become involved in the lives of the two characters, the love story is much more believable. For a Bond film, this is a revelation.

And with this new, romantically passionate Bond, comes a modem sensibility. James Bond has only one leading lady in
The Living Daylights
. Excluding the woman on a boat in the pre-credits sequence, Kara Milovy is the only female character for whom Bond has eyes. Gone is the "three-girl formula" which has been so overused in the past.