007 Contra o Homem com a Pistola de Ouro

The year after Roger Moore first appeared in the role of James Bond in 1973's "Live and Let Die", marking the beginning of his twelve-year stint in the role, he returned for the ninth film in the franchise, and his second of seven. Recently, knowing that this wasn't the most widely praised of all the official Bond films, I watched it with fairly low expectations, but I think my expectations were at least slightly surpassed. Like the first film starring Moore, this one didn't blow me away consistently, but I found a lot of it entertaining, mostly later in the film (if it wasn't for that, I doubt I could rate it any more than a 6/10).

Francisco Scaramanga is a renowned hit-man who uses a golden gun with golden bullets, which is why he is known as "the man with the golden gun"! MI6 receives a golden bullet with "007" on it, which suggests that James Bond is Scaramanga's next target! Because of this threat, M decides to dismiss Bond from his duties until the problem is solved. Nonetheless, Agent 007 sets out in search for Scaramanga, and during his search, he witnesses the assassination of a man who turns out to be a scientist creating a device that can harness the sun's power! Bond must track down this machine, and on his mission, he must go through Andrea Anders (Scaramanga's mistress), and Nick Nack (the hit man's servant), as he is assisted on the mission by Mary Goodnight, a mission which eventually leads to a showdown between the secret agent and his main foe!

Like "Live and Let Die", this one has some tedious moments, unsurprisingly, and for a while, it seemed to me that it was turning out to be slightly inferior to Moore's first Bond film, but like I said, I was more impressed later in the film, with a decent amount of suspense and humour. They brought back Sheriff J.W. Pepper, the stereotypical Southerner introduced in "Live and Let Die", for comic relief in this movie. The character made me laugh in the 1973 Bond film, once again gave me some laughs this time, and as I stated in my comment on the first film featuring him, I don't see why I should feel guilty for finding Sheriff J.W. Pepper amusing if I'm willing to laugh at Canadian stereotypes. One very memorable sequence is where Bond chases after a car with Pepper inside with him, which is both suspenseful AND humorous (humourous thanks to the presence of Pepper). After that, a lot of suspense takes place on the island.

Like "Live and Let Die", this second Bond film starring Roger Moore is rather polarizing with Bond fans, but both films, while not the best, I have found to be reasonably satisfying, and in my opinion, while Moore can't quite match Sean Connery (the first actor to play Ian Fleming's famous character, as I'm sure you know), he was a decent replacement, unlike George Lazenby, who was only in one film in the franchise (1969's "On Her Majesty's Secret Service"), in between Connery's last two (1967's "You Only Live Twice" and 1971's "Diamonds Are Forever"). Christopher Lee is also impressive as the main villain in this particular movie. So, while I wouldn't watch "The Man with the Golden Gun" expecting to be blown away, I would say it's worth watching, though some would obviously disagree.

Roger Moore's second outing as Agent 007 puts him against the evil trick shot artist/assassin, Scaramanga (Christopher Lee). Hailed by many Connery fans as the film that marked the downfall of the 007 franchise, 'The Man With The Golden Gun' turns out to be one of the most pleasant surprises of the entire series and one of the 'better' Roger Moore films. 'Gun' does take some getting used to, in fact, more times than not, you need to see it a few times to really begin to enjoy the film.

The cast is great, one of the better ones of the entire series. There are two leading ladies in this film, the wonderful Maud Adams, who would later star in Octopussy (1983), and the terrible Britt Ekland who just acts so dumb and hopeless that it almost angers viewers. The villain Scaramanga is top notch as well as his comical, yet silently evil assistant, Nick Nack, played by French painter Herve Villechaize. The plot of the film is very interesting, the locals are exotic (which is always an extremely important part of a bond film), and Roger Moore continues to develop his character from a Connery-clone to putting his own, charming spin on 007.

All-in-all, 'Gun' is another good 007 adventure and is quite possibly the 4th best Roger Moore Bond film. Any fan of the series should give it a second look before they hail it as 'bad'.

Altho there's a lot of hate for this second Moore 007, I never understood it. For a change, most of the witty dialogue works well. I think it's one of Moore's best Bond performances.

So let's break it down: The Good: - Roger Moore is witty and action ready. His fight scene in the belly dancer's room is pretty good. Tough and violent. Don't know about that cigar, but it adds a little extra somethin'.

• Herve Villechieze as Knick Knack. Not threatening, but a fun memorable sidekick with lots of playful malevolence. I love it when he shushes Bond.

• Christopher Lee. Nuff said, tho they didn't build up this character to the level they could have. Where are those deleted scenes between him and Moore (from the trailer and photos)that obviously exist?

• John Barry. Yes, Lulu's song is ridiculous. Still, I love the brassy music and this is one of Barry's most memorable catchy Bond scores. Especially during the karate scenes and the jazzy swing of Scaramenga's fun parlor.

• Kung fu. The Bond films always lucked out when it came to latching onto the culture of the day. 1974 was the height of kung fu exploitation and Bond was there. Still have BLACK BELT magazine featuring this on the cover...

The Bad: - Miss Goodnight. Giving Bond a ditzy helper...well, bad night.

• Lack of compelling plot. The energy cell and Scaramanga are too loosely tied together and the film shouldn't have tried to pull a Blofeld at the end.

• Production design. Ken Adams is sorely missing here. And what's with that ONE GUARD in the massive solar laser set? Missed opportunity there.

The Ugly: - JW Pepper.

• Slide whistle.

The Man with the Golden Gun wasn't a bad movie. I actually thought it was better than Ian Fleming's novel (quite a few of the movies adapted from his books are better than them, in my opinion). I thought it started out pretty well but it did kind of lose steam by the end in my opinion.

I liked Christopher Lee and Maud Adams. Roger Moore's my favorite Bond but I didn't like him here as much as in just about all his other movies. Britt Ekland was okay but not great. And I'm usually easily pleased by most Bond girls (I actually liked Tanya Roberts's character in A View to a Kill).

The climax was pretty disappointing. The fight between Bond and Scaramanga should have gone on longer. The flying car was kind of dumb. And I thought it was kind of pointless to have Sheriff J.W. Pepper in this movie. And I was kind of hoping he'd meet that kid somehow and give him the 20,000 bahts (it is a Roger Moore Bond movie, after all, so it's not like it would have been an unbelievable coincidence).

Overall, it wasn't wonderful but not that bad either.

This is the second film for Roger Moore in the role of "Agent 007" and even though this particular movie isn't the best it happens to be my favorite James Bond movie of them all. Essentially, the world's #1 assassin named "Scaramanga" (Christopher Lee) has sent a golden bullet to James Bond indicating that he is his next target. So rather than waiting around for Scaramanga to choose the time and place James Bond decides to find him first. This leads him to Beirut, Macao, Hong Kong and Bangkok in an attempt to find information that might be helpful in that regard. Now, rather than reveal the rest of the story I will just say that this movie does a good job of combining both action and comedy. As a matter of fact, I think this is probably the most humorous James Bond film ever made as it features nifty one-liners from James Bond along with "Sheriff J. W. Pepper" (Clifton James) and a midget named "Nick Nack" (Herve Villechaize). It also features two quite attractive women in Maud Adams (as Scaramanga's mistress, "Andrea") and Britt Ekland (as "Agent Goodnight"). Again, it might not be the best James Bond movie but I found it to be quite entertaining and recommend it to all fans of the series. Above average.