A View to a Kill (1985)

"Alive and well I see and still bungling in the dark."

The absolute pits. This was as low as the Bond series was going to stoop, a mindless and seriously dull fiasco that highlighted all of the negative aspects of the films and promoted none of the highlights. Not even the subsequent Licence to Kill (1989) which sold out Bond's character big time was as bad as this; at least the later film had excellent set pieces and better performances to offer.

Bearing no resemblance whatsoever to the Ian Fleming story from which it drew its title (the original was the slightly longer From a View to a Kill) this fourteenth 'official' Bond had begun production knowing that Roger Moore was finally getting his way and was calling it a day after this one. And certainly his reluctance to carry on the role is evident in his painfully wooden performance, though given the atrocious material he was expected to work with it's hardly surprising that his heart simply wasn't in it. He was also clearly too old for the part by now and there seemed to be little serious effort to make his younger, fitter stunt doubles even remotely resemble him.

This tired attitude, simply recycling familiar elements out of either fear of change or sheer laziness, is evident throughout the entire film. There's absolutely nothing new in A View to a Kill and even the action set pieces looked weary and shop-worn. It gets off to a disastrous start with the cheapest gag in the film's history, the ill judged and misfiring California Girls skit. One had hoped that the depths of schoolboy humour had been plumbed with Moonraker (1979), but this took the series to new lows. Just as bad was the ridiculous scene of Bond hurtling around Paris in a car that gradually disintegrates as it hits more and more cars. It manages to ruin the film's only decent moment, May Day's jaw dropping escape from the Eiffel Tower.

May Day herself is another indicator of just how much writers Michael G. Wilson and Richard Maibaum had lost the plot by this stage. Grace Jones may not be much of an actress but her statuesque (and frankly rather terrifying) appearance could have been to a lot better use than it was here. Her last minute change of heart, throwing in her lot with a man who she'd been happy to try to kill on at least two previous occasions reeks of lazy plotting and is so unbelievable as to make a mockery of the finale.

Equally wasted. but for other reasons, is the wonderful Patrick Macnee who here follows in the footsteps of two of his former Avengers colleagues, Honor Blackman and Diana Rigg. Though he gives his usual excellent performance, Macnee is actually given very little to do and it beggars belief that a knighted civil servant would be sent on a field mission as sidekick to James Bond. Easily the best thing about the film, Macnee's too brief appearances bring a gentle humour to the film that the clodhopping sixth form gag cracking elsewhere fails to match.

The rest of the cast, with one exception, fails to make any impact whatsoever. Tanya Roberts was the most insipid Bond girls in many years, a frankly dull and irritating burden who does little but look attractive and scream a lot. Whatever her talents may be (and acting doesn't appear to be one of them), Roberts is patently out of her depth playing a scientist as a result, her attempts to sound like a geologist are really rather sad. Other characters, both good and bad, simply slip from the memory even before the end titles have finished rolling: David Yip's doomed CIA agent, City hall employee Howe and French agent Aubergine are there solely to impart information to Bond before being killed off. Bad guys Scarpine and Dr Mortner are so underused that we never get any real sense of menace from them the latter is a particular waste given his background as a deranged Nazi doctor performing experiments of concentration camp victims.

Other than Macnee, the only ray of hope in this dismal effort is the ever watchable Christopher Walken who gives an extraordinary performance as mad Aryan superman Max Zorin. Coming on like a psychotic schoolboy, giggling maniacally as he does 'naughty' things, Zorin had the potential to be the best Bond villain since Auric Goldfinger, with whom he shares a remarkable similarity see The Anorak Zone. But despite Walken's fantastic efforts, Zorin simply isn't in the same league as Goldfinger. His potentially fascinating background, the product of the Nazis' genetic engineering program, is barely touched upon and certainly plays no part in his crackpot schemes. The information is imparted in throwaway lines and barely mentioned again. A wasted opportunity.

The real problem with A View to a Kill then lies with its script which is, frankly, a mess. The failure to engage with Zorin's past, the wasting of Macnee in a potentially fruitful role and the laughable about face by May Day all suggest that not only was the series in need a major overhaul but that the men responsible for guiding it through the 80s had simply lost touch with their audience. In lieu of a new, cutting edge action adventure, they simply recycle the plot from Goldfinger, weaving in extraneous sub plots that seem to have nothing whatsoever to do with the main narrative. The KGB sub plot, for example, comes out of nowhere and goes back the same way, adding nothing to the narrative other than a convenient way for Bond to bed another conquest.

Adding insult to injury, John Barry turns in his blandest score for the series yet (though Duran Duran's theme song isn't half bad and an instrumental version of it is used to great effect throughout) and John Glen does his usual efficient but hardly inspiring job of holding it all together, the best scenes again belonging to the second unit.

It was clear to all and sundry now that a revamp of the series was long overdue. Box office takings were significantly down on Octopussy as fans began to express their dismay at the way the series had gone and general audiences expressed their unwillingness to buy the same old story again. With Moore finally bowing out, it seemed as good a time as any to try something new, though the results would be patchy and the real revival of Bond's fortunes were still a full decade away.
KEVIN LYONS