The BJMDDS General Discussion Thread......

[bjmdds]

Yes and that was ridiculous Count.

[Omega]

George Lazenby announces retirement:

https://metro.co.uk/2024/07/25/james-bo ... -21293246/

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He needed to retire years ago. Not to be to impolite he kind of milked the bond audience for years, I think bond fans have been very kind to him and his legacy in bond. In a way supporting his show circuit or whatever the fan conventions would be called.

or this announcement is to bring up the value of his autographs


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[Count_Lippe]

Regarding other actors who came back to the series as a different character,

George Baker was the real Hilary Bray in OHMSS and came back as Captain Benson, one of the naval officers Bond meets at the submarine base, in Spy.

Robert Brown was also in Spy in the same scene at the submarine base, as Admiral Hargreaves, and he became the new M after Bernard Lee as you of course know.

Those weren't as bad as Charles Gray though.

[Kristatos]

I suppose you have to take into account that there was no home video back then, and big blockbuster movies didn't get shown on TV for about 10 years after their release. I guess they figured enough time had passed for the audience not to think about his previous role (though IIRC, they wanted Telly Savalas back, but he was working on something else).

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[Count_Lippe]

Raymond Benson in his book The James Bond Bedside Companion thinks that Savalas as Blofeld was "too snide, more like a New York gangster".

Edit: In the poll I set up 11 years (!) ago Donald P was the most popular Blofeld.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3643

[Kristatos]

Raymond Benson in his book The James Bond Bedside Companion thinks that Savalas as Blofeld was "too snide, more like a New York gangster".

Edit: In the poll I set up 11 years (!) ago Donald P was the most popular Blofeld.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3643

He's not a fan of Pleasance or Grey, either. Basically, his complaint is that Blofeld has never been portrayed in the films the way Fleming wrote him, which is hard to argue with, though I regard the books and the movies as separate things.

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[Count_Lippe]

I suppose you have to take into account that there was no home video back then, and big blockbuster movies didn't get shown on TV for about 10 years after their release. I guess they figured enough time had passed for the audience not to think about his previous role (though IIRC, they wanted Telly Savalas back, but he was working on something else).

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You're completely wrong here I'm afraid.

The Bond movies were shown in re-runs in theaters on multiple occassions.

[Count_Lippe]

Regarding the villains in Fleming's books vs how they wrere portrayed in the films,

I think Dr No was very good and sort of how Fleming described him, although not as tall and with metal hands rather than hooks, but certainly not a completely different character.

Rosa Klebb was more revolting in the book, but the movie version was, like Dr No, sort of similar.

Goldfinger was a very short man in the book, Fröbe was about the same height as Connery I think, but other than that he was also sort of like in the book.

What do you think Kristatos?

[Kristatos]

To be honest, it's been a while since I read the books, but Blofeld is the only villain I remember being significantly different. I think Wint and Kidd were more threatening in the book of DAF as well.

[dirtybenny]

Charles Gray was also Henderson in YOLT as you know.

Weird that he returned to the series as Blofeld.

Joe Don Baker was also double booked as Whitaker in TLD and again as Wade in GE & TND. This was a relatively common practice in television back then. You can't watch a T.V. program from the late 60's-70's without seeing a score of recycled actors.

[bjmdds]

ATJ posted his new look on instagram. Is he hinting at a new role? Did Broccoli OK this release? A picture of himself with his long hair and beard with the caption “from one look…” This was followed by another snap captioned “to another”, with him sporting short locks and stubble in the gym. Considering all the Bond speculation around him, plus the fact that he’s just teased a new look that’s exactly what he would need to play 007, suggests that an official announcement could be imminent, if his motherly wife gives her permission.

[Kristatos]

Looks more like Rambo than Bond to me. And based on everything that's been said here,it doesn't sound like an official announcement is imminent, about ATJ or anyone else. He probably is about to announce a new role, but I doubt that it's Bond.

[bjmdds]

Interesting YOLT tidbit: One of the conditions laid down by the Japanese government was for the female leads to be played by local performers, something the production was happy to oblige. Mie Hama was hired to play Kissy Suzuki – who married Bond as part of an undercover operation – while Akiko Wakabayashi was brought in as ally Aki. Both stars were sent on a crash course to master conversational English ahead of shooting, but Wakabayashi fared much better than Hama. In fact, the latter was struggling so greatly that the production team was ready to replace her with somebody else who could master the required dialogue. When Hama was informed of the decision, she threatened to throw herself out of a hotel window. As director Lewis Gilbert recalled, at first, he didn’t believe it was a serious situation until co-star and Tiger Tanaka actor Tetsurō Tamba informed him that she was fully prepared to go through with it.
“The next morning I asked Tamba, ‘How did it go with Mie?’. Tamba told me, ‘Mie had lost face, and feels that she is a disgrace to her family and will jump out of her hotel window tonight,'” Gilbert was told, per The Telegraph. “‘You can’t be serious’, I said to Tamba. ‘Oh yes, she is 100% serious. She will jump’, he said. Well, that really scared the hell out of me. I didn’t want a young woman’s death on my conscience, nor did the producers want that kind of publicity. So I told Tamba to tell her to stay, and that she would be in the movie.” The compromise was that he swapped Hama and Wakabayashi’s roles, with Suzuki having a lot less dialogue than Aki, which meant her English didn’t need to be perfect. That still wasn’t good enough in post-production, where Hama was overdubbed by German actor Nikki van der Zyl, but it could have been a lot worse.

[kater23]

ATJ posted his new look on instagram. Is he hinting at a new role? Did Broccoli OK this release? A picture of himself with his long hair and beard with the caption “from one look…” This was followed by another snap captioned “to another”, with him sporting short locks and stubble in the gym. Considering all the Bond speculation around him, plus the fact that he’s just teased a new look that’s exactly what he would need to play 007, suggests that an official announcement could be imminent, if his motherly wife gives her permission.

*insert Homer disappearing into the bushes gif here*

[Pluto007]

ATJ posted his new look on instagram. Is he hinting at a new role? Did Broccoli OK this release? A picture of himself with his long hair and beard with the caption “from one look…” This was followed by another snap captioned “to another”, with him sporting short locks and stubble in the gym. Considering all the Bond speculation around him, plus the fact that he’s just teased a new look that’s exactly what he would need to play 007, suggests that an official announcement could be imminent, if his motherly wife gives her permission.

*insert Homer disappearing into the bushes gif here*

Handsome Bas***d. Unfortunately he’s just intensely boring, in my opinion. A try-hard Daniel Day Lewis wannabe, but instead of being a standout in his films, I always forget he’s in them. And that voice……….ugh

[kater23]

Look at how much beefier he is in the “now” picture.That’s a bit sus if you ask me.

[Pluto007]

Look at how much beefier he is in the “now” picture.That’s a bit sus if you ask me.

What'd you mean, Kater ? As in he maybe taking the “Hollywood vitamins” to achieve his look?

[kater23]

Got it in one!

[Count_Lippe]

We knew about the language problems in YOLT of course and that they switched the roles for Mie and Akiko. They both look cute but Akiko looks perhaps a bit more "Japanese" so to speak. Maybe that's why she was first cast as the Ama girl. But it works either way. Many girls in the Bond series were dubbed by Nikki Van Der Zyl though, so honestly they didn't really have to switch the girls roles, maybe there was something additional that made the producers make this decision?

Edit: Jay Leno had a chance to drive the Toyota 2000 from YOLT.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N77m1gRC7F4

[Count_Lippe]

I agree that in one of the photos in that clothes commercial DC looks sort of like Iggy Pop.

I like Iggy Pop though and he did a great cover of WHATTITW on the David Arnold cd of Barry covers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGbQ-o2jsfo