Nuances

Showcasing the delicate art of subtle yet convincing screen acting.

001 Richard Kiel

Victim

In his long career as a state sanctioned killer, James Bond has taken an inordinate amount of lives (he’s also been indirectly responsible for loads more deaths, but let’s park that for now). To be fair, most of his targets were trying to kill him or, at least, were in the employ of the agents of evil, so he sometimes has a point but, even so, that’s a hell of a lot to carry around. This new series will look at some of Bond’s victims, more specifically the ones that, if he had a conscience, might occasionally shake their gory locks at him in unpleasant dreams: the ones who suffered, the ones who screamed, the ones who died in cruel and unusual circumstances.

Take this bloke, for instance. He’s a pilot and a common or garden villain only distinguished by a great moustache. Halfway through the flight, he leaves the cabin, pulls a gun, shoots out the control panel and then bails out leaving James without a parachute in a plane that’s about to crash. Little things like that don’t bother 007, of course, who simply jumps out, catches the pilot up, then knocks him about and nicks his parachute from him before kicking him away into the ether.

What’s disturbing about this incident is that the doomed pilot gives out two screams as he floats off: the first full of indignation at being kicked in the face and forcibly parted from his life saving device, and a second anguished, horribly strangled cry as he realises that he is now as dead as a doornail, but will have to hang around hopelessly and helplessly waiting to hit terminal velocity and begin his long drop to the ground. 

What do you do with that time? What does that realisation of impending annihilation do to the human mind? Baddie or not, it’s an awful way to go. I hope you’re proud of yourself, Bond.

Outer Space Now Belongs To 007...

‘Moonraker’ is a Bond film of contrasts – it’s fast moving, packed full of stuff, and the outer space battle is really pretty cool. On the other hand, it takes the smug, smirky elements of the franchise to their logical extreme, and, at times, becomes totally ridiculous.

The story is pretty standard: a mad Frenchman operating from a space station wants to poison the Earth and everyone on it and then re-populate it with a hand-picked master race. Only James Bond and his glamorous CIA partner / shag can stop him. So, after a lot of messing about and about a dozen near death experiences, they stop him.

The 52 year old Roger Moore plays Bond, and seems so lethargic and weary it seems astonishing that he would appear in another three films, finally retiring when he was pushing sixty. Moore’s Bond was never really very physical, of course, certainly not the brawler that Connery was, or the blunt instrument of Fleming, but watching him go through the motions of having a really, really slow fight with Jaws on top of a fake cable car is almost excruciating, and has all the menace and dynamism of a mime festival at an old people’s home.

It’s a feature of the series that footage is occasionally sped up (not particularly well) to enhance the action, but here they do it about a dozen times and it soon becomes pretty tiresome, a shortcut to actually putting some energy into the scenes. When you later see Bond grappling with an obviously rubber snake, or see the poor bluescreen work, or notice that his stand in in the opening parachute scenes is suddenly wearing goggles, it becomes clear that the film makers don’t really care about making a decent product anymore, and that they are just indulging themselves, safe in the knowledge that the film will make a shit load of cash regardless (‘Moonraker’ was the highest grossing film in the series to date, and remained so until the Brosnan re-launch in 1995).

The nadir of this jokey, lazy attitude comes in a scene set in Venice where Bond pushes a button and his souped up gondola converts into a hovercraft, climbing out of the canal and traversing a busy St. Mark’s Square. It’s bad enough that one witness does ye olde ‘looking at a bottle of wine and shaking his head in amazement’ routine, or that a waiter pours a beer over a patrons head but, when a pigeon does a double take – a fucking pigeon – that’s too much, especially as the visual effect is so poorly done.

That said, the outer space sequences are good if you don’t try and be a spoilsport and calculate the impossible amount of money Drax would have needed to set it all up – and they look great, so there’s an inconsistency there that rankles. The franchise would get worse, of course, and, for the most part ‘Moonraker’ is really very entertaining. But it could have been brilliant – a bit like the theme tune, which has a beautiful melody but never really sparks into life, not even in the disco version that plays over the end credits.

For the record, this was a film that I couldn’t wait to see back in 1979 but, at the time it was first released, I was at Sea Scout camp, so my Mum brought me the novelisation to be going on with. I read it three or four times and got more and more excited. When I finally got to see the film on the screen instead of in my head, I was, of course, really disappointed. And, no, even at the age of eleven, I didn't laugh at the pigeon.

FINALLY -- this film cost £35m to make. In 1979. This is the stand-in they used for seven foot tall metal toothed Jaws. Difficult to find a lookalike, yes, but come on...the real thing first, then the double --

Moonraker

Something Deadly

At the time it was released, I can remember 'Outland' being described as 'High Noon' in space and, indeed, it shares several plot points / motifs with the famous Western, although all the stetsons have been replaced by baseball caps.

It's the future, and Sean Connery (speaking in a particularly deep voice for some reason. Lower gravity?) is a Space Marshall sent to keep order at a huge mining complex on the Saturnian moon Io (according to a helpful caption, it's pronounced Eye-Oh). He soon uncovers a friendish Corporate conspiracy to feed the workers amphetamines to massively increase their productivity. Which sounds okay, except that, after sustained use, the drug turns the user loopy and suicidal / murderous, which is a decidedly bad thing in a confined space. The powers that be assume that Connery will take a bung and just let them get on with it, but, as his wife and son have just left him, he's in a funny mood so decides to take a stand - completely alone - against the hired killers subsequently sent to silence him.

There are four main problems with the film: it's a bit slow; Connery doesn't put much into it; Connery's son has a 'gee whizz' American accent although both his parents are British, and, at the end, a marginal character is suddenly revealed as the main villain, which is a bit of a cheat. Other than that, it's rather good.

Firmly in the post-'Alien' mode of making the future look really scuzzy and drab rather than shiny and spacey, the sets are excellent, and enormous (there's a continous shot of Connery chasing a suspect around that seems to go on for about ten minutes). My favourite bit is the nightclub, where the miners unwind with the numerous prostitutes that live on the base. With its vaguely rave-y electronic music and spotlighted performers doing unspeakable things to each other, it's like Aya Napa in space and is extremely camp. When Connery walks in, everyone stops talking and moving to look at him like something out of, well, 'High Noon', and that's funy, too. I particularly like the fact that the music sounds like it was made in 1990, i.e. it's futuristic, but only a bit.

Occasionally violent (at least two heads explode), tolerably tense, 'Outland' is a pretty satisfying film, especially as it has a nice happy ending. Even Connery's toupee behaves itself. Shplendid.

Outland

Watching, Waiting & Wanting

I've tried on many occasions to write something about 'Saturn 3' but, ultimately, have realised that there isn't much to say. I can usually work with bad films, but vapid, pointless films, made up of plundered parts poorly put together, are more difficult. The scenario is dull and drearily executed, the actors are boring and wooden and, in Harvey Keitel's case, dubbed. We also get to see Kirk Douglas' 52 year old dimpled derriere. It's not a favourite of mine, if I'm honest. The film or the arse.

There is one funny thing about the production. The name of the idiot who wrote it.

Saturn 3

The Spirit Of The Age

From the velour goldmine that is ‘Marc’, here’s Hawkwind with the quarky, strange and charming ‘Quark, Strangeness & Charm’.

This incarnation of the group was fairly new, so when Marc refers to them as his ‘best mates’, he may just mean that they shared a manager. Dave Brock of the band doesn't appear as he couldn’t stand Bolan and didn’t want to be anywhere near him, which tells its own story about just how friendly they all were.

The man with the strap on bird of prey is Robert Calvert, a poet and songwriter who was an important but intermittent presence in the band’s history. Calvert was frequently hired, frequently fired, but he lends a very contemporary edge and style to this appearance.

Valerie Leon, Queen Of Space

Just for Dolly Dolly, here's Valerie Leon in her short but memorable appearance as the 'Space Queen' in 'The Persuaders' episode 'The Long Goodbye'. Fill your moon boots, Dave.