My Review of For Your Eyes Only (1981)

 

Written by Richard Maibaum And Michael G. Wilson

Directed by John Glen

James Bond: "Oh, by the way, we haven't been properly introduced, Melina. My name is Bond, James Bond."

Took a tiny break but now I'm back into the Roger Moore era of James Bond and it seems like a return to basic was the order of the day. After the more science oriented Moonraker, that was probably for the best.

Once again, 007 has got himself into a pickle. The way this movie, he was on the brink of death. There's a bald guy in a wheelchair played by John Hollis who attempted to kill Bond. Of course this ended horribly for him in a scene that was unintentionally very cartoonish in it's execution.

There's also the death of two marine biologists and it's their daughter, Melina Havelock (Carole Bouquet) who got to be the Bond girl in this film. There's decent enough chemistry between her and Roger Moore and of course, as expected, this film ended with the two of them in throes of passion. 

The villain itself, Aristotle Kristatos (Julian Glover) had an interesting trajectory here. He started seemingly as an ally to Bond before his true colours were revealed. His scheme involved planning to expand his fortune by selling the ATAC to the KGB. It was pretty straightforward enough as a plot.

There's also characters such as Hector Gonzalez (Aris Kristatos), Milos Columbo (Chaim Topol), Bibi Dahl (Lynn-Holly Johnson) Emile Leopold Locque (Michael Gothard), and Lisl, The Countess Von Schlaf (Cassandra Harris). All of whom are given sizeable amount of screen time and helped move the story along at a brisk enough pace.

- Charles Dance appeared in this film as Claus, who was the right hand man for Locques. Janet Brown and John Wells played Margaret and Dennis Thatcher respectively.

- The bald guy at the start was clearly meant to be Blofeld, wasn't he?

- Standout music: Sheena Easton's For Your Eyes Only.

- Chronology: Set in Greece and Spain.

For Your Eyes Only did take things somewhat back to basics and it's a fairly basic as a Bond adventure. I didn't love this but I didn't hate it either. It's okay I guess.

Rating: 6 out of 10