. . . . Back in February -- i.e. Before -- I went on a James Bond film kick, starting with the 1990's Pierce Brosnan entries and through the latest one, the Daniel Craig Bonds. For whatever reason my 30 - 40 minute nightly watching (about as much watching as I can do, it seems before bored now) is a second round of James Bond flix, constituting the initial ones, the Connery Bonds. I began last week, I think, with Dr. No from 1962.
Last night’s watching was the first half of the 5th Bond-Connery, You Only Live Twice (1967), which is even more preposterous than the usual Connery Bonds. Among the many ridiculousnesses is Bond going 'yellow face' for reasons that don't make any sense, and also a real? fake? marriage to a Japanese woman. Surely not to fool Japanese people into believing he is Japanese? Because it surely could not have worked.
You Only Live Twice is a slicker preposterousness than Dr. No, but nevertheless, they are all are, of course. One can never get away in these Connery Bonds that he's got Something ... a something that makes even the villain's henchwomen take one look at him and demand sex, and then -- sometimes, not always -- defect from the villain to help Bond succeed in his mission to stop whichever great high tech goofy crime-disaster from happening. Even if they don't defect they demand sex before completing the assignment to kill him. And he's always ready even though he's gonna die. (Is this what was meant by the title?)
You Only Live Twice takes place mostly in Japan.* Early on a Japanese assassin takes out a Bond ally, Bond chases him down, kills him. The assassin is wearing a medical mask. No foolin' that was the most significant element of the film for me. Nancy Sinatra does the theme song; Roald Dahl wrote the script, which seems to have shocked unpleasantly a lot of fans of this author of children's stories.
* This is the great attraction of these films, for me, that they literally are shot in their locations, shot before mass tourism, the opposite of travel, destroyed travel. From Russia With Love (1963), the second one, is mostly in Turkey, particularly in Istanbul. It was silly and fun. Goldfinger (1964) the third one, in Jamaica, was, as I probably mentioned here already, the template for the chiefbloodonhishandsforpower&money -- Auren Goldfinger even looks like him. That was anything but fun, set in Miami and Kentucky. Maybe tomorrow I'll start the 4th one, Thunderball (1965). Or, else Diamonds Are Forever. Not watching in order, for no reason, just whatever. Ha!
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