Bond, James Bond

I have always loved James Bond movies. I am pretty certain the first one I ever saw was On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and it’s been my favorite Bond movie ever since. I know George Lazenby was not well received but really, who could have followed in Sean Connery’s steps and not been criticized?

I remember my mother taking me to Live and Let Die and I loved, loved, loved the title song, especially the piccolo part. I had not yet switched to oboe so still played flute and dreamed of being that piccolo player.

But mostly I loved the glamour  the romance, the merely hinted at violence. In a phone conversation this morning, my mother said that the Bond movies had gotten too violent for her and I agreed they are no longer hinting but rather showing far more than they did in earlier movies.

Still I love them. Right now Kent and I are re-watching some of them in honor of the 50 years of Bond. I’ll probably skip Man with the Golden Gun since I watched that one to death in the early 80s when we had an early version of a laser disc player (a hand me down from my folks, who were always early adopters) and only three movies to watch: that one, Winnie the Pooh (still know every word by heart) and I don’t remember the other one.

Do you like the Bond movies? If so, who is your favorite Bond? I’m still awfully fond of George Lazenby and like both Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig. I wanted to like Timothy Dalton as Bond but the movies were pretty weak through no fault of his. Roger Moore . . . well, no. Let's just not talk about him. Sean Connery—at least in the first few movies—is still the gold standard, though. He typified how Bond should be. 

Can't remember all the movies? Go here.