Best 'Bond-style' movies?

[James Bondage]

Hey guys, long-time lurker on this forum, first-time poster, blah blah blah etc.

So anyway, wanted to make my first post on here a new topic. Namely, are there any good 'Bond-style' films that you know of?? ie spy films/thrillers with a 'similar feel' to the classic Bond films of the pre-Craig era. And if so, what are they?? I'll explain why in a little more depth.

Having not quite 'given up' on the Bond franchise yet, but certainly finding myself far, far more apathetic towards the announcement of any new 'Bond' films than I've ever been before (since the Craig era started, well.. since TWINE to be exact), I recently found myself wondering if there were any 'non-James Bond' films which had a similar feel to them.

The thing is, I've seen all of the 'classic' Bond films now, several times over in many cases, and know them almost inside out. Re-watching the older Bonds isn't really an option any more.

So lately I've found myself itching to watch a 'new' James-Bond style film, at least new to me (admittedly, I haven't seen Skyfall but.... from what I'm reading it really doesn't sound like the kind of film I'm looking for). Unsurprisingly, the Craig era has really done nothing for me. (I guess I wouldn't be here otherwise )

For me personally (you may disagree), TND was really the last 'real' Bond film. And that was back in 1997.

I'll give you the general gist of the kind of film I mean. Secret agent (or something like that) as main protagonist, Main villain with evil plan, various action sequences, car chases etc, maybe even an exciting musical score.. and preferably anything post-1960's. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one currently underwhelmed by the latest 'Bond films' and having to resort to looking elsewhere for my high-thrill espionage action.

[Goldeneye]

Welcome to the forum James Bondage

[James Bondage]

Thankyou Goldeneye

[bjmdds]

Welcome Bondage We all are searching for REAL Bond films out there. I loved Ghost Protocol immensely. It was the best of the 4 MI films for me. It was fun and escapist in plot. The Bourne films do not do it for me for it was not much fun to watch an amnesiac being hunted by his own government. The Dark Knight Rises has Bond overtones, but it is not a spy film.

[FormerBondFan]

Aside from MI4 and TDK trilogy, The Incredibles is a perfect example of a great Bond-style film.

[The Saint 007]

Welcome to the forum James Bondage!

GoldenEye was the last Bond film I really enjoyed, the ones afterwards I've only found to be just okay or terrible. So the series hasn't been very fun for me in a long time either.

Personally, I'm into spy TV series from the 1960's and 1970's such as The Saint, Danger Man, The Avengers, as well as others I've collected on DVD over the years. I find they have a sort of Bond-like style to them (especially The Saint), and therefore I think they act as decent little alternatives to Bond. These older spy series might not be your thing, but I'm not too sure what else to recommend.

[FormerBondFan]

GoldenEye was the last Bond film I really enjoyed, the ones afterwards I've only found to be just okay or terrible.

A reason why Bond shall now be played by ethnic actors freaks/weirdos, robots, and pets. I can say this a billion times.

Personally, I'm into spy TV series from the 1960's and 1970's such as The Saint, Danger Man, The Avengers, as well as others I've collected on DVD over the years. I find they have a sort of Bond-like style to them (especially The Saint), and therefore I think they act as decent little alternatives to Bond. These older spy series might not be your thing, but I'm not too sure what else to recommend.

Did you watch Mission Impossible series by any chance?

[The Saint 007]

GoldenEye was the last Bond film I really enjoyed, the ones afterwards I've only found to be just okay or terrible.

A reason why Bond shall now be played by ethnic actors freaks/weirdos, robots, and pets. I can say this a billion times.

Personally, I'm into spy TV series from the 1960's and 1970's such as The Saint, Danger Man, The Avengers, as well as others I've collected on DVD over the years. I find they have a sort of Bond-like style to them (especially The Saint), and therefore I think they act as decent little alternatives to Bond. These older spy series might not be your thing, but I'm not too sure what else to recommend.

Did you watch Mission Impossible series by any chance?

Yeah, with Skyfall printing money like crazy, it looks like the traditional Bond could be lost. But I still try to have some faith that classic Bond may return someday.

I think I've only seen one of the Mission Impossible films a long time ago. Perhaps I should check out the series, since Bond has been abysmal for a while now.

[FormerBondFan]

Yeah, with Skyfall printing money like crazy, it looks like the traditional Bond could be lost. But I still try to have some faith that classic Bond may return someday.

There's no point of having faith on the classic Bond anymore. Bond is dead as a zombie on steroids.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HcwTxRuq-uk[/video]

I think I've only seen one of the Mission Impossible films a long time ago. Perhaps I should check out the series, since Bond has been abysmal for a while now.

I haven't seen the TV series yet.

[James Bondage]

Thanks for the responses (and welcomes!) guys. I will definitely check some of those out for sure.

The one that stands out the most for me there is The Saint, I think. Moore is one of my favourite Bonds, if not my favourite (as I grew up with him as 007) so always in the back of my mind I considered The Saint as a kind of 'possibly Bond-ish' type series, but never really took the time to sit down and watch it. Does it have much 'action' in it though? It always came across as more of a 'thinking-mans' kind of thriller (not that there's anything wrong with that, but that's not what Bond is )

(I always found it amazing how considering the huge success of the (Bond) franchise, no-one apparently thought to emulate its success with a similar series of their own. Why not? There seem to be cheap knock-offs of just about everything else )

I don't want to sound rude or anything but the Batman films are not really the kind of thing I'm looking for really (although I hear people everywhere endlessly gushing over The Dark Knight, so maybe I'll have to check that out sometime). But Mission Impossible IV sounds kinda promising, at the very least Tom Cruise feels more like 'Bond' then Daniel Craig ever will, to me anyway. I also considered the 'Jack Ryan' series of films as a possibility (Patriot Games etc), but I'm not entirely sure if those are even remotely Bond-like.

.. and.. the Incredibles? OK.. *checks out YouTube trailer video*..

Wait, what?? It's a Disney/Pixar animated film. Did I get the right film here?

[FormerBondFan]

I don't want to sound rude or anything but the Batman films are not really the kind of thing I'm looking for really (although I hear people everywhere endlessly gushing over The Dark Knight, so maybe I'll have to check that out sometime).

There's more Bondian elements in TDK trilogy (Rises especially) than DC Bonds. Bond-like character in Bale, nice cars, gadgets, Q-like character in Freeman, larger-than-life villains (even though they're grounded in reality), etc.

.. and.. the Incredibles? OK.. *checks out YouTube trailer video*..

Wait, what?? It's a Disney/Pixar animated film. Did I get the right film here?

Yes, it's a Pixar film. There's plenty of the Bondian elements in it.

[carl stromberg]

Welcome James Bondage!

How about the Jason King tv series?

I do like When Eight Bells Toll a 1970's film starring Antony Hopkins that was supposed to be part of a Bond type spy series.

The Saint with Roger is great too - on ITV4 every day.

[The Saint 007]

You may be able to watch some of the Saint episodes on YouTube to see if it's something you're into, James Bondage. I discovered The Saint series through James Bond. Whenever I read about Roger Moore in certain James Bond film books, it usually mentioned something about The Saint. So being a Roger Moore fan, I got curious and bought one of The Saint DVD box sets. Moments into the first episode, I fell in love with the series. Roger Moore plays Simon Templar pretty much the same way as he does James Bond. While the show does focus on mystery, it does have some action. Besides Moore engaging in some fisticuffs with the bad guys, there's episodes with car chases, scuba diving, and there's even an episode that involves a bit of voodoo elements similar to Live And Let Die. Simon Templar travels to various different parts of the world, drives a cool car (Volvo P1800), and some episodes even have Bond-like casino scenes.

Once again, you'll need to watch some episodes on YouTube to see if it's something that really interests you. I look at The Saint series as sort of a watered down version of James Bond. Overall, I find it's pretty enjoyable to watch. Since Roger Moore is one of your favourite Bonds, you should definitely check it out.

[James Bondage]

OK... never heard of Jason King series before, but it looks like something worth checking out. He does look a bit like a 70's porn star though

And The Saint... I just started briefly watching an episode 'The Fiction Makers' on YT.. it looks promising, a kind of 'watered-down Bond' as you say, and pretty much what I expected, but interesting-looking nonetheless. If you mentally replace him saying 'Simon Templar' with 'James Bond', and ignore the quiff, it kind of works.

(I started watching the first 20 mins or so and got quite into it, unfortunately I have some rather less-interesting things to have to do first but when I get time later I'll watch the full episode and hopefully have something to report back with )

[The Saint 007]

With The Saint series, there was two sort of TV movie episodes. One was The Fiction Makers, as you mentioned, and the other is Vendetta For The Saint. There's a total of 118 episodes, so check some of them out and see what you think. One of my favourite episodes is The Queen's Ransom, I thought that one was rather fun.

By the way, James Bondage, I noticed you have The Spy Who Loved Me, For Your Eyes Only, and A View To A Kill on your favourite Bond movie list. Pretty cool, since they also happen to be my top three favourite Roger Moore Bond films. But I like all the other Roger Moore Bond films too.

[Kristatos]

Yes, it's a Pixar film. There's plenty of the Bondian elements in it.

Yeah, director Brad Bird cited Ken Adam as a major influence on the film's design, and the score sounds like it was written by John Barry circa 1968. In fact Barry was hired as the film's composer, but quit when Bird said he wanted something in the style of his '60s Bond scores, saying that he'd already written his '60s Bond scores in the '60s, and wasn't really interested in doing it again.

[James Bondage]

By the way, James Bondage, I noticed you have The Spy Who Loved Me, For Your Eyes Only, and A View To A Kill on your favourite Bond movie list. Pretty cool, since they also happen to be my top three favourite Roger Moore Bond films. But I like all the other Roger Moore Bond films too.

Why yes! To be honest I was a little hesitant to put AVTAK as one of my favourites, because I was kind of semi-expecting to get a bashing for it! It appears the general consensus of public opinion is that apparently AVTAK is "The worst Bond film of all-time" and apparently Casino Royale is "The best Bond film of all-time" (although I assumed that wouldn't be the general opinion on THIS forum!)

I will always have a soft spot for AVTAK as it was my first-ever Bond.. but despite that, I still consider it (and the other two), to be among my all-time favourites.

Still haven't had time yet to fully check out The Saint, will get back to you on that.

[The Saint 007]

By the way, James Bondage, I noticed you have The Spy Who Loved Me, For Your Eyes Only, and A View To A Kill on your favourite Bond movie list. Pretty cool, since they also happen to be my top three favourite Roger Moore Bond films. But I like all the other Roger Moore Bond films too.

Why yes! To be honest I was a little hesitant to put AVTAK as one of my favourites, because I was kind of semi-expecting to get a bashing for it! It appears the general consensus of public opinion is that apparently AVTAK is "The worst Bond film of all-time" and apparently Casino Royale is "The best Bond film of all-time" (although I assumed that wouldn't be the general opinion on THIS forum!)

I will always have a soft spot for AVTAK as it was my first-ever Bond.. but despite that, I still consider it (and the other two), to be among my all-time favourites.

Still haven't had time yet to fully check out The Saint, will get back to you on that.

Even as a kid, A View To A Kill has always been one of my favourite Bond films. The title song is my all-time favourite, and I like the soundtrack by John Barry. The title sequence is also one of my favourites. It's so '80s, but in a good way. I think Max Zorin and May Day are awesome villains, and some of the action scenes are pretty cool, particularly the climatic Golden Gate Bridge fight between Bond and Zorin. And it has Patrick Macnee, who stared in The Avengers TV series, which is pretty cool. The only bad part is that he gets killed off kind of quickly in the film. There's so many other little things I like about A View To A Kill as well. I know it's not perfect, but overall, I think it's still very enjoyable. And don't be worried about admitting that you like the film, because I do see people on other forums saying that they like it, and feel that it gets more than its fair share of criticism. A lot of hate comes from the Internet punks, who think making fun of Roger Moore is the cool thing to do. But I don't care what they say, because I'm one of the younger Roger Moore fans on the Internet who is not at all intimidated to support/defend him.

Looking forward to your thoughts regarding The Saint series.

[Eye Of The Tiger]

I highly recommend the film "North By Northwest" to Bond fans.

It stared Cary Grant, and was directed by Alfred Hitchcock.

I wouldn't ever want to mess with the Connery era of Bond films. But it would have been great to see what Hitchcock would have done with a Bond film with Cary Grant as James Bond.

[The Saint 007]

I forgot about North By Northwest. Yes, that would also be another good Bond alternative. It's one of my favourite Alfred Hitchcock films.