007 in Moonraker Or Metal Genitals vs Beige Clad Eyebrows

This time last weekend I had just finished watching what Alan Partridge once righteously dubbed “The Greatest Film Ever Made”.  This time last week I was joyously hearing Carly Simon sing out “Nobody Does It Better” to the end credits of said film. This time last week I had of course just watched and loved The Spy Who Loved Me, courtesy of ITV rerunning the Bond series for the  absolute umpteenth time.

Life was good.

But like a bungee jump that ends in paralysis, a Christmas dinner that ends in salmonella, a moment of sheer exhilaration and brilliance can turn to utter shit. Just like the Bond series did this week on ITV1.

This weekend, this writer watched Moonraker. Not only is it the worst Bond film ever made, it may also be amongst the worst films ever made.  Having just revealed the intimate details of my last two weekends (you lucky buggers), please permit me the opportunity to explain why this bizarre mess is an absolute pustule on a seemingly invincibly enjoyable franchise.

In 1979, Bond started to get a sweat on under his wonderfully pressed tuxedo, that the kids on the block would become apathetic to his international antics in a world of psychopathic villains, easy photogenic women, flash cars and unique gadgets. Why the stress Double O? Simple: Star Wars had made our international man of mystery start to seem a little old hat. Imagine Bernard Manning at an iPad convention and you can imagine how he felt.

Conservative and outdated dumped in the midst of an environment wise to the fresh and the groundbreaking. So like Manning would probably tell a gag about why he felt the black ipad wouldn’t sell as well as if they made one in white: Bond repulsively responded with Moonraker.

Starting with the plot, the villain, Hugo Drax plans to eradicate the human race with a worldwide toxin release, while like a fascist Noah, plans to take some sexy people into space to make a super race of his own. Yet although this is obviously a pretty wicked scheme, the way the film shows the couples lovingly kissing and bounding through space like couples waiting for casting calls on the Joy Of Sex book, the tone of this all seems like the filmmakers are expecting us to see this plan as slightly beautiful. What with the sassy romantic music, shell suits, and coiffed hairstyles who are we to judge this plan? The guy hardly discriminates: he’s got all the races covered; even a ginger or two.

So while this genocidal plot is obviously awfully vicious, the Moonraker team seem set on making this evil scheme appear almost normal. Whether this is intentional or not is only known by the makers, but my criticism lies with the way I ended feeling no hostility to Hugo Drax, well not for anything other than his distracting resemblance to David Brent of The Office. With a plan of that scale, he should appear awful, but no attempt is made to make us feel that. Just compare my disgust or contempt towards Hugo Drax to Christopher Ecclestone in 28 Days Later after his “ I promised them women” speech and you’re just nowhere close. Alright so Drax is only a Bond villain, but look at the likes of Blofeld, Goldfinger and the bitch who kills Bonds wife in On Her Majesties Secret Service, and you have one welter weight Bond villain, with an appallingly underwritten scheme.

 Not only does Moonraker fail to create any decent new villains, it successfully pisses all over the general view of secondary villain Jaws.

Originally coming across as one of the most ruthless henchmen of the series in line with Odd Job, Tee Hee and Robert Shaw in From Russia With Love: Richard Keil’s Jaws here returns as a mugging, soppy, dentists nightmare. A few qualms with the big man here: first of all (and there greater reason for this) he is never given a suitable demise: something every memorable henchmen is entitled to.

Its  obviously a running joke seeing Jaws as somewhat indestructible , but to this writer, its frustrating and damn well annoying. Let’s face it, even in this shit there were occasions were you agreed, “yes, that’s the way he should leave us”. But Jaws did not die, he instead fell in love. With a woman who resembled a pigtailed child inappropriately posing in a “your face here” frame of one of those saucy Naughty Nelly postcards you see in Blackpool, all twitching eyebrows and pert appendages. This creation arrives making an unacceptably strange arrangement with our Jaws.

So not only does Jaws escape from the demise we all wanted him to have, he instead blasts off into the moonlight to have some frighteningly awkward sex, especially if that metal genitals implication towards the end is to be believed.

Before finally settling in space, Moonraker is also abysmal for its scatty approach to locations, flying from alpine peaks, to Magnificent Seven aping frontiers, to a monastery, to science fiction temple to finally settle in this awful attempt at recreating the laser blasting excellence of the then recent A New Hope. Although it manages to take place in so many locations it manages to be utter bollocks in every one of these.

In fact only one scene, the river boat chase, manages to lift it slightly above the awful, yet the makers still manage to keep the standards of this promising piece in line with the rest of the film with the appalling editing.

I will openly admit, in this scene I found the explosions as a result of the bobbling mines to be excellent , but with a choice of music like this the filmmakers have hit a dud again. As if they had a composer walk out when it came to scoring this scene, and therefore anything would do, the scene is played out to music usually saved for Bonds pre-shag moments, not to be played out to some amazing stunt dummy throwing explosions. As a result of this criminal underscoring, what could have been an excellent scene, feels very mediocre and lacks any kind of tension or threat AT ALL.

Remember those outstanding ski chases in On Her Majesties Secret Service? Imagine if they were re-mastered to play to Moby’s Porcelain and you’ll get a fair idea of how incredibly jarring and frustrating this scene ends up being.

 I am even going to criticise Roger Moore. After being so strong in Live And Let Die and The Spy Who Loved Me it really pains me to do this, but in Moonraker, he is absolutely terrible. Breezing round like a beige clad eyebrow, he seems to put the whole thing on auto drive, possibly even wearing his own clothes onto set. Most crushingly bad is he in the scene in the fake ambulance, were he appears even more suggestive than his female companion trying to seduce/distract a bystanding guard, pulling faces so strange, he makes Bonds slightest eyebrow raise, seem like a nonstop, ultra coy, traditionally British come face. Dire.

So here I sit, thinking of better times, thinking how last week Carly Simon was singing out The Greatest Movie Ever Made. This week, I’m hearing a shockingly bad disco arrangement of Shirley Bassey’s Moonraker theme, that somehow doesn’t seem so painful after watching the film.

Along the way, Bond has made several duds, but to this writer, none as grave as this.