With You Only Live Twice concluded, Sean Connery had reached
the end of his five picture deal with EON. He planned on retiring from the
character, but that was not the case. He would come back in the future release
Diamonds Are Forever, but in the middle of all that, new talent had emerged for
the role. Australian actor George Lazenby hadn’t hit it big in the business,
but he screen tested for, and eventually won the role of Bond. Compared to the
likes of Connery, Roger Moore, and Pierce Brosnan, Lazenby is the most under
the radar. Some even forget who he was, due to the fact that this was first and
only Bond film he’d ever starred in. Every other actor, even Timothy Dalton,
played the character at least twice. This made me think he must be so bad that
he almost ruined the movie. In actuality, he’s responsible for one of the best
Bond movies yet.
Bond continues his search for SPECTRE number one, Blofeld.
He has a lead on the whereabouts of the fiend, but there’s one catch: the
leader of a European crime syndicate will only give him the information in
exchange that Bond marries the man’s daughter, who he had saved earlier in the
film. The trail eventually leads Bond to the Swiss mountains, where he
discovers a plot involving hypnotizing allergy patients, and sterilizing the
world’s food supplies if his demands to be granted the title of Count De
Bleuchamp are not met.
It was decided early on that the film would follow the
original novel more closely than many of the other films had done, and the
story they came up with is quite good. It’s got the action, the suspense, the
intelligence, it even gives us the impossible. James Bond has some actual depth
now?! *GASP*! For the first time, I feel
like the SPECTRE storyline is becoming interesting, admittedly late in the
game, but I’ll take it. The action and suspense are just as good as ever, with
perhaps the only exciting toboggan sequence you’ll ever see.
The talent is pretty good throughout. For what had me
thinking Lazenby would be the worst Bond, I think he’s the most
underappreciated of the bunch. This is the Bond I had been waiting to see. He
still has that charisma that made Connery work so well, but he also manages to
nail more subtle emotional mannerisms. Chief among this come from his
relationship with Contessa Teresea, played by Diana Rigg, who is one of the
best Bond girls to date, and certainly one of the most alluring. The thing that
I really love is that these two actually have some great chemistry, and that
makes their story work big time. Blofeld is also entertaining as the villain
once more, although the switch from Donald Pleasance to Telly Savalas is a
little odd.
This is the movie that I think should have followed up
Goldfinger. It’s not quite as good as that, but it’s close. However, OHMSS does
not escape its flaws. I think the film runs too long, occasionally hitting some
pacing issues. On top of that, I think the twist in the story at the end of the
film was a cruel decision, and not even cruel in a way that works. It’s simply
cruel in the traditional sense. Then again, a similar twist of cruelty occurred
in Casino Royale decades later, so maybe I’m getting too worked up about that.
All in all, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is a great film.
It’s just a shame Lazenby never came back for another go. He had apparently
been so at odds with producer Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli that he would
never play the character more than once, but there was apparently more to it
than simply that, and the consensus on the film may not have helped either.
Critical opinions of him had been mixed initially, and even though reviews of
the film have improved in hindsight, opinions of Lazenby have still been
polarizing. Love him or hate him, Lazenby was done, and it was time for Connery
to return, where we would finally see the end of the SPECTRE saga… THANK. GOD!
****1/2 / *****
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