a view to a kill movie review

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Tv/streaming, collections, great movies, chaz's journal, contributors, thirtieth anniversary of "a view to a kill".

Thirty years have passed since the release of the 14 th  James Bond film “A View to a Kill”, and it remains uncontested as the worst entry in the series. It’s not that the picture is devoid of any interest. On the contrary, it represents a curiosity of sorts among the Bonds. “View” has one of the series’ great title songs (by Duran Duran), it was filmed in some of the best locales imaginable (Paris, San Francisco), it was the first featuring an Academy Award winner (Chirstopher Walken), and yet, it is also the one where someone thought it would be a good idea to spice up a snowy chase scene with The Beach Boys ’ “California Girls”. Since that summer of 1985 when “A View to a Kill” came out, there certainly have been Bonds with lesser villains and plots (“ Quantum of Solace ”), others that were far more outrageous (“ Die Another Day ”) and even some that were not as visually attractive (“License to Kill”), but the key to “View” remaining alone at the bottom of the 007 canon is how terribly it scores in just about every category used to measure these films.

“A View to a Kill” deals with James Bond ( Roger Moore ) and his efforts to stop psychopath Max Zorin ( Christopher Walken ), from implementing “Operation Main Strike”, a plan that is similar in name to Auric Goldfinger’s “Operation Grand Slam” but not quite as intriguing in nature. Zorin, the product of a macabre WWII genetic experiment, is yet another bleached blond Bond foe in the tradition of Robert Shaw . His scheme involves the flooding of Silicon Valley in order to take over the microchip industry alongside the mighty and mysterious May Day ( Grace Jones ), a woman of few words and murky intentions.

“View” is one of those features that never get off the ground, something unprecedented in the James Bond series. If there is such a thing as a pulse in movies, there are sections of this one where a defibrillator would come in handy. This is not due to a lack of action scenes but those included are strung together with long, slow stretches. The pre-title one is perhaps the worst since those became a tradition in “From Russia with Love”. It starts intriguingly on a serious note when 007 finds the frozen body of a fellow agent in Iceland, but on the turn of a dime it derails into a senseless stunt-show of sorts, well beyond the physical capabilities of the film’s protagonist. More than a chase sequence, this one has the feel of a “ Home Alone ” clip, with the mischievous hero pulling all sorts of pranks on his clumsy pursuers and escaping in a cheesy iceberg-like boat that’s even less believable than the crocodile submarine from “Octopussy” (1983). 

Later action sequences fare much better but they all have more than the usual share of the silliness that prevailed during the Moore era. Take for instance May Day’s jump from the Eiffel Tower and Bond’s subsequent pursuit by plunging on top of an elevator. This is an exciting scene though somebody conveniently forgot that: A) It would actually take 007 two elevators to get to the bottom floor, by which time the villainess would surely be long gone, and B) Hopping from the top of a structure of such shape would have the paratrooper crashing against the structure sooner than later (it’d be like jumping from one of Egypt’s pyramids and hoping not to hit anything on the way to the ground). 

There’s also a fairly good duel on horseback between Bond, Zorin and the latter’s thugs but it’s hard to imagine that 007’s plan to elude them by climbing on his Rolls Royce could have ever worked, considering that the vehicle looks as heavy a tank (even if May Day is later able to push it all the way to the middle of a large lake). Then there’s a rather amazing chase in San Francisco with Bond hanging from a fire truck’s loose stair but the direst consequences of failing would have been getting arrested by the clumsiest of police forces. And considering the way these guys drive, they don’t seem to have the necessary eye-hand coordination to handcuff him in the first place. Very little suspense is generated here in what’s just stunt work for stunt work’s sake.

Despite Christopher Walken’s remarkable talents, his character here isn’t all that memorable. Like many of his predecessors, the actor tried to base his performance on grandiose poses and an evil cackle rather than in any kind of character development, but this just doesn’t fit his persona (even his Max Schrek from “ Batman Returns ” had more layers to him). Jones’ May Day makes for a very strong screen presence but her feline disposition is more bizarre than anything else and the scene where she’s betrayed by Zorin and turns to the good side might have fared better if she hadn’t spent a good deal of the movie cheerfully murdering innocents. The scene where she finally sees the light is about as convincing as Jaws' in “ Moonraker ”. One could assume May Day’s shortcomings derive from her character’s silent approach, but that didn’t stop Oddjob from becoming one of the prime Bond henchmen with the simple uttering of a few “aaaahhhs” in “ Goldfinger ”(1964), the greatest Bond ever.

If the movie has one fatal flaw, that has to be the casting of its two main leads. Most of Roger Moore’s Bonds have a great deal of entertainment value and there’s no doubt that his success in the role (taking over for the seemingly irreplaceable Connery) is one of the main reasons why the series has lasted until today, but at 57 he looked 2-3 movies too old to keep playing 007. By then, he didn’t much resemble his own likeness from the gun barrel sequence anymore (as taken a decade earlier). It may be normal to wonder whether the action we are watching on screen is being executed either by the actor or by a stuntman, but when we find ourselves doing it while the character is doing such trivial things as climbing up a flight the stairs, then there’s definitely cause for concern (at least by this point they could dye Moore’s hair and that of his stunt doubles’ in the same color tone, making it harder to tell them apart). When it came to his very young female costars, it had become somewhat odd to see them in bed together and when the same happened with the ferocious May Day, one had to fear for his well-being. It’s a shame that both Pierce Brosnan (“Die Another Die”) and Moore retired from the role with their very worst efforts, leading many audiences to forget that both had already made more than their share of good Bonds.

Nowadays we often see characters being cast with young actors as to make teenage audiences identify, but this clearly wasn’t the case with “View”. The early sequence when the MI6 team takes a trip to the horse track looks just like a day out at the retirement home and Bond’s partnership with Tibet (Patrick Macnee) can’t precisely be called dynamic. The scene where they fool their eavesdroppers by playing a recording of their bickering while they continue their conversation on a balcony (in front of dozens) is another example of the prevailing sloppy filmmaking. There’s also little chemistry between Moore and Stacey Sutton (the Tanya Roberts character). Through the years it has become a cliché for the latest Bond girl to claim that her character is an equal to Bond’s but that’s just not the case here with one of the weakest female leads in the series. Stacey is basically a damsel in distress who’s mostly limited to warning Bond of coming dangers and screaming for help, which makes it hard for her to sound convincing when trying to pass as a genius geologist, even if it is one who doesn’t spot a giant blimp sneaking up on her. I suspect that her co-star Alison Doody (who later became the female lead in the third Indiana Jones movie) would have been a much better choice for the role.

Overall, there’s not much in “A View to a Kill” that resembles Ian Fleming's creation. Q’s most recent invention is a cat-like robot used to infiltrate Stacey’s home. In reality, he could have simply walked inside and looked for himself. Besides, the cybernetic feline clearly wasn’t designed to climb stairs and looks about as practical as Paulie’s butler in “Rocky IV”. At any rate, as much as I complain here, as an entry in the James Bond series, I’ve watched “View” countless times; each one with the renewed hope that eventually it will improve with age (no such luck so far). Curiously enough, in a recent IMDb poll of people's favorite 007 movies ,“View” came next to last but still managed to score a few votes as the best entry in the series (it gathered only a couple less than the vastly superior “Octopussy”). I recall that in the very last Outguess Ebert contest, the sole winner named “A View to a Kill” not only as his favorite Bond entry but also among his favorite all-time films. This only serves to prove what Dean Martin once sang about everybody loving somebody sometime.

Gerardo Valero

Gerardo Valero is lives in Mexico City with his wife Monica. Since 2011 he's been writing a daily blog about film clichés and flubs (in Spanish) on Mexico's Cine-Premiere Magazine . His contributions to "Ebert's Little Movie Glossary" were included in the last twelve editions of "Roger Ebert's Movie Yearbook."

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A View to a Kill Reviews

It is a film that is perfectly watchable, but at the same time is completely forgettable and unremarkable.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Aug 28, 2022

It features a killer Duran Duran theme song but strikes out in nearly every other regard.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Sep 25, 2021

A View to a Kill is nowhere near as reviled as its reputation suggests. It might not be the proper send-off Roger Moore deserved, but the film has a great sense of fun, and its Villains are in a league of their own.

Full Review | Jul 23, 2021

The primary villain is memorably vicious and well acted, the henchmen and their demises are bombastic and amusing, and the set pieces are extravagantly grandiose.

Full Review | Original Score: 8/10 | Sep 8, 2020

It will always be my ultimate guilty pleasure Bond film

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Jul 16, 2020

Where other Bond films at least have a kitsch quality, A View to a Kill is not only silly but it also commits the ultimate cardinal sin for any Bond movie - it's boring.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/5 | Oct 29, 2019

A good Bond film, filled with plenty of action and set pieces, with a great opening theme to boot! A solid note to go out on for Moore, even if he isn't a highlight himself...

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 27, 2019

If [the Bond films] don't accept the convenience of retirement, which is not expected, they will stop being shows for adults with childlike spirits and become scandalous cases of corruption for minors. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Aug 29, 2017

Moore is worth every wrinkle on his face in "A View to a Kill," the seventh movie he has made in the Bond series and the most enjoyable since "Moonraker" back in the '70s.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | May 23, 2016

While it doesn't reach its full potential, Roger Moore's final 007 outing is still a largely entertaining if admittedly flawed adventure.

Full Review | Original Score: 6/10 | Oct 31, 2015

The film also fails on other traditional Bond levels. For example, the gadgets. Zorin and his gang have an inflatable dirigible, but so what? The key to the best Bond gadgets has been that they were something you might want to own yourself.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Aug 21, 2015

It's not double-oh-seven anymore, but double-oh-seventy, the best argument yet for the mandatory retirement age.

Full Review | Aug 21, 2015

An arthritic thriller that forgets where it put the excitement and infamously transforms Bond into a quiche cooking homebody.

The plot doesn't really convince, perhaps because we've seen it or something similar so many times before.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 21, 2015

A View to a Kill plods along dutifully, observing the rules of the series with dull consistency.

The strain is starting to show on 007.

Hard as it is to justify Bond films on intellectual grounds, there's something invigorating -- and strangely reassuring -- about this sort of picture.

Tired 007 effort has ridiculous plot, iffy behavior.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | May 5, 2014

This time around, 007 is a paunchy old man looking like he needs to retire. The film has little energy, thrills or fun, which is essential for a Bond film. The series has now reached an all time low.

Full Review | Original Score: 1/4 | Oct 30, 2012

Contrary to historical opinion and some truly awful movies, Moore conjured roguish magic over his 12-year tenure. His Bond cast the spell that initially charmed me as a kid - one perhaps so intoxicating to him that it was simply hard to let go.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 13, 2012

• MGM/UA Entertainment Company

Summary An investigation of a horse-racing scam leads 007 to a mad industrialist who plans to create a worldwide microchip monopoly by destroying California's Silicon Valley.

Directed By : John Glen

Written By : Richard Maibaum, Michael G. Wilson, Ian Fleming

A View to a Kill

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A View To A Kill Review

03 Aug 1985

131 minutes

A View To A Kill

The last hurrah for Roger Moore as 007, and that nagging sense that retirement was long overdue is transformed into blatant evidence. No matter how hard they try the difference between a podgy 58 year-old Moore and his stunt stand-ins was clear as day, and the love scenes with beaming but bland blonde Tanya Roberts is really quite yucky. The jib was up, he’d paid his dues, but this creaking Bond adventure is beyond redemption.

The plot is a failed attempt to rewire Goldfinger’s global market meltdown strategy for the microchip business — relevant, perhaps, at the time but, frankly, boring in concept. Christopher Walken sleepwalks his way through playing smarmy Nazi geneticist Zorin, where you would think he would have a ball hamming it up as a Bond villain. Indeed, it is a rare moment when Grace Jones makes the biggest impression as an Amazonian (naturally) henchman called May Day. She gets to parachute off the Eiffel Tower, that’s cool.

Director John Glen, with master stunt co-ordinator Vic Armstrong, strain every sinew to make the action exciting with fire-engine chase sequences in San Francisco and a grand finale on the Golden Gate Bridge, but no amount of smoke and mirrors can enable us to believe that Roger the Codger is really doing his bit for Queen and country. Although, you have to admit, Duran Duran wrote a cracking theme song.

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Hear me out: why A View to a Kill isn't a bad movie

The latest in our series defending loathed movies is a plea to reconsider Sir Roger Moore’s silly but superb Bond swansong

I have championed A View to a Kill before. I have repeatedly exalted its star. I have explained how my friend Tom introduced me to the deathless tao of Sir Roger Moore . Life is far too short and miserable to take it all too seriously. So don’t.

I’ve even interviewed Tom about his love for Gold , Moore’s 1974 non-Bond masterpiece which essentially supplies the plot for A View to a Kill: a villain plans a calamitous flood to boost the price of a commodity he wants to control (microchips this time), only to be stopped by an ageing knitwear model and the women he seduces.

So when I was charged with making the case that A View to a Kill is not the subject of ridicule it has in some places sadly become, I discussed it with Tom. He’s currently surviving lockdown in south London with only pillows with Sir Roger’s face on them for company, which even he would admit is a bit odd.

Such devotees of Kill, as we true initiates know it, have developed a flourishing subculture. Among key artefacts one day to be puzzled over by digital archaeologists is this video about how Max Zorin, in this very 1985 entry in the canon, “finds a computer indispensable”.

There is also Robbie Sims, author of Quantum of Silliness: The Peculiar World of Bond, James Bond who I talked to for this piece and who tweets under the handle The Bubbles Tickle My Tchaikovsky. That’s a nod to Pola Ivanova, the oft-overlooked third Bond girl of Kill, after Grace Jones and Tanya Roberts . Played by Fiona Fullerton, she’s the statuesque Russian seduced in a hot tub into which Moore’s pensionable Bond presumably poured Epsom salts.

But if all that somehow hasn’t convinced you of the greatness of Kill … here goes.

A View to a Kill is a glorious romp, silly and camp but in a magnificently British way most successfully so when it’s actually trying to keep a straight face.

Christopher Walken’s Zorin is one of the great Bond villains, totally ridiculous but oddly actually quite evil, cackling behind tinted specs while machine-gunning his own staff. Moore thought that too strong for Bond but I think it channels a key Bond theme: actual nastiness and pain. Ian Fleming wrote the books, remember, and as Christopher Hitchens pointed out , he was a rum piece of work.

Then there’s Grace Jones’s May Day, perhaps the greatest Bond girl because she brings rare diversity and agency to the role and because she’s just so gloriously, utterly unusual. Her sex scene with Moore is one of the strangest ever filmed.

John Barry provides a stirring score, Duran Duran a stupendous title song. This is Bond as operatic nonsense, the Aida of the oeuvre, grandiose and silly but right.

Prey to the vulnerabilities of an ageing star, the joins are sometimes visible. Some of the back projection, while for example Roger is supposedly skiing , is laughable. The famous “quiche” scene, a quite magnificently weird bit in which Bond whips up a nourishing meal for Stacey Sutton ( Roberts ) using only what he finds in her cabinets, comes after a fight in which it is plainly not Roger kicking a bad guy flush in the head.

But those stunt doubles’ work is superb. There’s the Eiffel Tower chase and leap; there’s the car smashed in two and driven through Paris; there’s the firetruck chaos; there’s what Sims perfectly calls “the astonishing blimp denouement” , in which a slow-moving dirigible gets tangled up on the Golden Gate Bridge … and an airship gets into difficulty too.

Yes, it’s not Moore having an axe fight hundreds of feet over San Francisco Bay. But it is a stuntman, and his mate playing Zorin. And Zorin’s death, plummeting from said bridge, is touching. Yes, his scientist “father” created him in a Nazi lab. But Dr Mortner’s shout from the blimp is just heartrending.

It gets me. Every. Single. Time.

Moore thought he could’ve done another Bond but he couldn’t, really. The Living Daylights (also criminally underrated, like its star Tim Dalton) would’ve had to have been renamed The Snoozing Goodnights. The 80s were not a time when actors staring their 60s in the face or even waving them a long goodbye could be held upright by CGI and our insatiable hunger for content.

But what a note to go out on. Made by professionals, A View to a Kill is a glorious outbreak of fun. It’s not serious Bond but as I have written before, serious Bond is not, ultimately, something that deserves to be taken seriously.

A View to a Kill is the pinnacle of Moore and therefore the pinnacle of Bond.

The defence rests. For now.

A View to a Kill is available to rent digitally in the US and UK

• Hear me out
• Roger Moore
• Christopher Walken
• Grace Jones
• Duran Duran

Comments (…)

Most viewed.

View to a Kill, A (United Kingdom, 1985)

A View to a Kill represents the farewell bow of two long-time Bond film actors: Lois Maxwell, who portrayed Miss Moneypenny in all fourteen official movies from Dr. No to this one, and Roger Moore. While Moore's stamp on Bond was never as memorable as Sean Connery's, seven pictures and thirteen years gave him the time and opportunity to re-shape the British agent in his own image -- something he did with the likes of The Spy Who Loved Me , Moonraker , and For Your Eyes Only -- the best entries of his tenure. But all eras end, and A View to a Kill lowered the curtain on this one, opening the door for Timothy Dalton to take the role.

A View to a Kill is often numbered among the worst of the series, but, upon closer inspection, this film is a vast improvement over Octopussy . Even though Moore sleepwalks his way through the part, making it apparent that he should have departed two films ago, and Tanya Roberts can't act to save her life (although she certainly can scream), we're back to a more conventional, straightforward Bond than the convoluted mess of the previous movie. The stunts are more spectacular than ever, Christopher Walken is a chilling psychopath (a role he has become intimately familiar with over the years), and Grace Jones is viciously effective as his sidekick.

Walken plays Max Zorin, a brilliant-but-unstable industrialist who intends to corner the market on computer chips by destroying Silicon Valley with an earthquake. Bond is sent out to stop him, hopping from Europe, where he's partnered with Tibbet (Patrick MacNee), to the United States, where he joins forces with geologist Stacey Sutton (Roberts, the only ex-"Charlie's Angel" to play a Bond girl). Locations include arctic Russia, Paris, and San Francisco.

The film opens with a lively, fast-paced chase across a snowscape, with Bond using skis, a snowmobile, and an improvised snowboard to escape his attackers. John Barry has a little fun with the music here, inserting some forty seconds of the Beach Boys' "California Girls" as 007 zips down a mountain and across a small pond. This is one of the series' better pre-credits sequences, and provides a solid intro to Duran Duran's chart-topping title song.

Trying to do a few things that haven't previously been attempted with Bond, A View to a Kill features a pursuit through the Eiffel Tower that ends in a death-defying leap, an out-of-control horse race, a road chase with 007 in a fire engine, and a struggle at the top of the Golden Gate bridge that has Bond fending off a blimp. There are conventional action sequences as well, including a car chase through Paris and several energetic fist fights. These thrills and stunts are the real reason to see this film.

A View to a Kill concludes Roger Moore's reign as 007 on a significantly higher level than it began (with Live and Let Die ), leaving all that the actor brought to the role -- both good (his sly charm) and bad (his fatuousness) -- to posterity. Unlike Connery, Moore never said "never again", but, despite his fans' wishes, it's highly improbable that he'll ever come back for another engagement. A View to a Kill is the last time this Bond will be in our sights.

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A View To A Kill -->

Posted March 7, 2021 by AI

A microchip James Bond recovers from the body of 003 in Siberia is a copy of one that is impervious to the magnetic pulse of a nuclear blast. It is made by a company recently acquired by Anglo-French combine Zorin Industries, so Bond is assigned to investigate Max Zorin. In Paris, Bond meets detective Aubergine to find out about Zorin, but Aubergine is killed by Zorin’s bodyguard May Day. Bond poses as a horse trainer to infiltrate Zorin’s equestrian estate, but his cover is blown and Zorin tries to drown him. 007 survives and tracks Zorin to San Francisco, where Zorin is planning Project Main Strike: the destruction of Silicon Valley by detonating explosions in mines beneath lakes and flooding the Hayward and San Andreas faults. With help from geologist Stacey Sutton, Bond sabotages Zorin’s scheme. Finding an unexpected ally in May Day, whom Zorin has betrayed, Bond prevents the main explosion from detonating. As Zorin escapes in his airship, he kidnaps Stacey. The final confrontation between Bond and Zorin is atop the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, where Zorin falls to his death.

Roger Moore, Christopher Walken, Tanya Roberts, Grace Jones, Patrick Macnee, Patrick Bauchau, David Yip, Fiona Fullerton, Manning Redwood, Alison Doody, Willoughby Gray, Desmond Llewelyn, Robert Brown, Lois Maxwell, Walter Gotell, Geoffrey Keen, Jean Rougerie, Daniel Benzali, Bogdan Kominowski, Papillon Soo, Mary Stavin, Dolph Lundgren, Bill Ackridge

Albert R. Broccoli Michael G. Wilson

Release Date

13 June 1985 (UK) 24 May 1985 (USA)

World Premiere

22 May 1985, Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco, USA

Iceland; Paris and Chateau Chantilly, France; London and Pinewood Studios, England

“A View To A Kill” – performed by Duran Duran, written by Duran Duran and John Barry

Tibbett’s silver 1962 Roll-Royce Silver Cloud II; Renault 11 taxi; Zorin’s airships; Iceberg submarine; Stacy’s Jeep Cherokee (XJ); Pola Ivanova’s silver Chevrolet Corvette C4

Gadgets/Weapons/Technology

• Walther PPK 7.65mm
• Camera ring
• Shaver bug detector
• Polarising sunglasses
• Cheque book copier
• Remote triggered implant
• ‘Snooper’ surveillance robot
• Avalanche-rescue receiver
• Computer mirror camera
• Limpet mines
• Micro-comparator
• Sharper Image credit card
• Thermos bomb

For A View To A Kill, 1985 Bond (Roger Moore) dons a ski suit for a 4th time on location in Lake Jökulsárlón, Iceland and Piz Palü on the Vedretta di Scerscen Inferiore glacier, Swiss Alps doubling for Siberia

Bond escapes his pursuers by jumping into an ice floe getaway vehicle with a Union Jack hatch. His co-pilot, agent Kimberley Jones, was played by Mary Stavin, Miss World 1977, who had also been in Octopussy

Although snowboarding had been seen in a short French film in 1983 – it made its debut in a major feature film in A View To A Kill

Tom Sims, snowboard pioneer and World Snowboard Champion (1982) along with Steve Link doubled for Roger Moore for the snowboarding sequences

Stunt skier John Eaves mainly doubled for Roger Moore in the skiing and snowmobiling sequences

The film was Moore’s seventh and final appearance as 007

The production was set back after the 007 stage was burnt down during filming of Ridley Scott’s Legend , meaning the stage had to be re-built

The film was Lois Maxwell’s final appearance as Miss Moneypenny

A lot of the dialogue between Roger Moore and Patrick Macnee was improvised

Patrick Macnee drove Cubby Broccoli’s real Rolls Royce in the film

During filming in San Francisco, Maud Adams visited the set to see Moore, and appeared as an extra

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A View to A Kill: The Final Roger Moore James Bond Movie

Roger Moore bows out as James Bond 007, in A View To A Kill. It's a film with a few problems...

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This one’s an unworthy last hurrah for Sir Rog. Yet such is life. Received wisdom pegs A View to A Kill as a lacklustre final outing in which an inspired song, villain and Grace Jones are smothered by slack plotting, a not-at-his-best Moore, weak characters and a general sense of weariness. Received wisdom is a terrible thing. But occasionally it has a point.

The Villain: To waste one great villain on a rubbish film may be classed as unfortunate. To waste a second is damned careless. Max Zorin is Exhibit B to counter the hoary old adage that a Bond film is measured by its antagonist. Zorin is fresh, vibrant, energetic – the inverse of the film he terrorises. He’s played by a Hollywood legend in his prime: good for the character, bad for the film. Christopher Walken just looks evil. Fine-boned and wild-eyed, he probably emerged from the womb in a whiff of sulphur. Sanity and platinum blond hair rarely coincide.

The Girl: James! James!! Jaaaaaaaaames!!! Oh James! James!!! Help me, James!!! James!! Don’t leave me, James!!! James!! Jaaaames!!! Jaaaaaaaaaaaaaames!!!! James! James! James! James! James! James! James! James! James, where are you???!!!

Remember that party from Live And Let Die ? It’s still going on, and Roger’s still there. Only he’s now twenty years older than everybody else and keeps trying to chat up girls by telling stories about their mother. His expensive suit and readily flourished wallet ensure he’s never short of company, but the sight is more than a little tragic. Time to go home, Roger. It was time to go home two hours ago.

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Sure, Sean Connery popped back for a snifter, but only for old time’s sake. And then he left hastily, as befits a man of his years. You’ve been here all night, Roger! We loved having you but the party’s over. The magic tricks don’t work anymore. You keep dropping the deck.

And still Roger ploughs on. Dancing on tables in once-shiny shoes. He tells long-winded jokes only to forget the punchline. He tries the limbo and nearly puts out his back. Dalton watches from the corner. Dalton looks sad.

The plot, then. Freshly returned from India, Bond is dispatched to Siberia for the pre-credits. A lot of people hate the combination of Beach Boys and snowboarding; personally I think the blast of “California Girls,” while hardly purist, does at least bring a touch of wit, a glimpse of originality. The 007 Theme makes a welcome return (“Dun, dun, dun, deeern”) and contrasts nicely with Brian Wilson and Co.

The obligatory blonde awaits in the obligatory fake-iceberg. (Why is Bond never paired with a monosyllabic Slav named Gert?) She promptly succumbs on a luxurious fur futon (MI6 sure don’t stint on comforts) as Bond purrs “Five days to Alaska.” Good luck, 007. No little blue pills in 1985; hope you’ve been eating your greens.

Nope, pass pre-credits sequence as far as I’m concerned. And the credits themselves are turbocharged by that thrilling Duran Duran number, a perpetual contender for series best. Certainly no song boasts a more exciting opening: “Bam! Bam ba bam! Bam ba bam…!” Note the subtle distinctions from the ‘Duns’ of the 007 Theme.

This may be the Moore’s last sigh as 007 but his isn’t the only notable departure. Lois Maxwell, veteran of 14 Bond films (exactly double Roger), has typed her last memo. Poor Lois. She barely featured in these retrospectives, save for a brief paragraph way back in Dr. No , where I warned she wouldn’t feature very much. Thus the fate of minor recurring characters. A steady job, decent wage, your own little niche in cinematic folklore – but very much brushed beneath the critical carpet. I imagine her ghost will cope.

In truth, Lois stayed behind the desk too long. Her exchanges with Moore dwindle to the stuff of the Bingo Hall. Maxwell brings great charm to a frequently thankless role but Moneypenny, like Bond, should be the youthful face of espionage, set against the grizzled visages of M and other top brass.

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Moneypenny is the least significant of the MI6 staff. M sets the mission, and thus the plot; Q provides gadgets and vehicles. Moneypenny flirts awkwardly. Perhaps the character should have retired with Maxwell. Her initial absence from the Craig reboots hardly registered. Although her appearance in Skyfall …well, all in good time.

We whisk over to Paris for a totally pointless interlude. Mayday skydiving off the Eiffel Tower is a fine stunt, one that gains double points for incorporating a national landmark. But then Bond gives pursuit. He hijacks a taxi and speeds through crowded Parisian streets with the devil-may-care attitude of a man who knows he’s doomed to spend most of the film mooching around San Francisco and if he wants to dent the budget now is the moment. Damage, mayhem, and considerable civilian danger duly occur; Bond spends most of this high-speed chase literally looking up at the sky. Mayday escapes, naturally, but not before Bond bisects his taxi (he keeps driving) and ruins a very expensive wedding.

At least the French jolly isn’t a complete waste of air miles. The sleazy detective divulges Zorin’s country horse sale before he is butterflied to death by Mayday. So, armed with priceless information he could probably have read in Tatler , Bond slinks back to Blighty.

Horsing around in the countryside is made bearable, even enjoyable, by the presence of Patrick Macnee as Sir Godfrey Tibbett. The stately Tibbett suffers the indignity of posing as Bond’s manservant; the interplay between old buddies Moore and Macnee is warm and witty, ensuring Bond’s Tibbett-baiting comes off as banter rather than bullying.

(I searched for an alternative to “banter,” as in 2015 the word brings the right-minded out in hives. Then I decided “banter” is historically a sound word and, if used in the right context – e.g. nowhere near the term ‘lad’ – banter can remain a sound word. So I reclaimed it. #Bringingbackthebanter)

The real joke is Macnee’s Avengers background as Bond-a-like Sir John Steed. The series had already purloined two former Steed girls in Honor Blackman and Diana Rigg. Making Steed himself wash Bond’s Rolls Royce was the ultimate assertion of superiority, albeit a playful one. The suave, debonair Steed, ever sporting a bowler hat, bore a certain filial resemblance to the Bond of Roger Moore. Pulling the trick with Timothy Dalton wouldn’t quite work.

Sneaking around at night, Bond and Tibbett beat up two security guards but decide to stick about and hope they aren’t identified. The ‘fingers crossed’ approach to espionage. Sadly this optimism is ill-founded; Zorin owns a computer that provides Bond’s name, number and killing licence. Not for the first time, and certainly not the last, one muses on Bond’s capability as a ‘secret’ agent. Maybe Zorin got his details from the maker of Scaramanga’s uncanny Bond waxwork.

A rather surreal scene ensues. Having discovered his foe’s true identity, Zorin opts against instant arrest and/or torture. Instead he decides to take Bond steeplechasing. Because Connery got to ride a horse, so Roger should too.

We could file this under ‘typical villainous attempt to assert superiority oh look you’ve beaten me’ were all the jumps not booby-trapped and Zorin’s goons didn’t hit Bond with riding crops, slightly compromising the competitive spirit. I wonder: were the jumps always booby-trapped for just this sort of occasion? Or did a construction team get to work very, very quickly?

Tibbett turns up dead. Boo! He’s strangled by Mayday from the backseat of the Rolls. Her concealment isn’t exactly covert: she sneaks inside whilst Tibbett goes to open the front gate. Only he saw her beside the car two seconds previously, and now empty green lawns stretch in all directions. Where could she have vanished? How mortifying if Godfrey peeked through the rear window and saw Mayday crouched on the floor.

Funny one, Mayday. She is set up as an Amazonian Jaws, silently taking out half the cast. Her bedding of Moore feels contrived: she woman, he Bond, it must occur. I wish her relationship with Zorin – a willing one, unusually – were properly explored. I wish he didn’t randomly betray her. Grace Jones is on formidable, glowering form, but her character is really just a memorable cipher, and side-lined after her murder of Tibbett. She deserved more than she was given.

Why shoot a man when you could watch him drown? Or at least, watch the surface of a lake and imagine him drowning underneath. Clearly Zorin has a lot of spare time. But sucking the air from a tyre is a neat survival trick so we’ll just about let the writers have that one.

Onto San Francisco, where Bond gate-crashes a Soviet surveillance job at Zorin’s oil rig. It is astounding how frequently rival spies bump into each other. Fortunately Pola, the hot female spy, survives while her unnamed male counterpart is captured and fed into a propeller. Even better – it turns out Bond romanced her in the past! That saves about thirty seconds of flirting. Into the Jacuzzi with you.

Some might view Pola as another sign that nobody could really be arsed. Her history with Bond certainly cuts a few corners. Yet perhaps Pola represents a brave stab at verisimilitude? It should be cause for comment if Bond meets a female spy he hasn’t previously bedded. Goodnight, Anya, Holly, multiple pre-credits blondes: no wonder the old boy starts repeating himself.

Anyway, Pola steals the wrong cassette tape and exits apartment and film. She’s done her bit: a notch on the Bond bedpost and ten minutes killed.

The action heats up as Bond visits San Francisco City Hall. Nothing like municipal bureaucracy to get the thrill juice flowing. Posing as a Financial Times reporter, Bond spars with city official W.G. Howe on the mechanics of oil pipelines. Then, disaster! Stacy Sutton materialises and Bond decides to follow her home. He previously encountered Stacy at Zorin’s country pad. There she was cool, enigmatic. Never trust first impressions.

Oh Stacy Sutton. The alliteration rings true. Plenty of ‘S’ words describe Stacy. ‘Shrill’, ‘shrieking’, ‘stupefyingly senseless.’ Sadly not stoic.

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Like Tiffany Case, Stacy is initially positioned as a tough cookie only to crumble, loudly, at the first hint of peril. Tanya Roberts does a fine job of imbuing numerous screams of ‘James!’ with subtly different inflections. Sometimes she adds an ‘Oh James!’ for the sake of variety. At one point excitement takes hold and ‘James! Help Me!’ is summoned. Occasionally she gets flustered and just goes ‘Aaaah!’

Bond is kept busy at the Sutton residence. He fights off some heavies, fixes the electricity and rustles up a quiche. Typical Roger: the only Bond man enough to venture into the kitchen (the rest invariably dine out, although Dalton carries a whiff of Ready Meal. Keep your eyes peeled in Tesco and I bet you’d spot Timothy slinking toward the lasagne aisle). Is the quiche a clever piece of wordplay on the Moore era: kitsch? Doubtful – but I’ll give the writers the benefit of it. Very witty, chaps.

Unable to resist the pull of local governance, the film has Bond and Stacy revisit City Hall. Stacy is promptly sacked. They go home. CIA agent Chuck Lee comes round for a chat and a cuppa. Lee exists solely to be killed off; that purpose is swiftly fulfilled.

So what now? Need you even ask? Bond ditches Stacy and tracks Zorin to Italy for a showdown within the bowls of an erupting Vesuvius. No, of course not. Because that would be vaguely involving. Back to City Hall once more.

Our heroes return at night and start rifling through filing cabinets. Only Zorin and Mayday lie in wait – at least I assume they’re lying in wait. Perhaps they too love City Hall. Perhaps this is date night.

Perhaps not. Zorin shoots Howe and sets City Hall on fire. Good move: Bond was one visit away from standing for office. The shooting of Howe is very well done: a Zorin monologue references the still-living official’s murder, prompting Howe to observe, ‘but that means I would have to be-‘‘Dead!’ says Zorin cheerily, and shoots him. Nicely done.

Zorin is usually responsible for the rare moments of inspiration. His shooting of Howe is a highlight. Ditto the last, helpless giggle just before he falls from the Golden Gate Bridge: surely a Walken improvisation. To his credit the famously loopy Walken doesn’t ‘do a Berkoff’ and start wolfing down the scenery. Underplay occurs. The casual “Does anybody else want to drop out?” after a reluctant business associate is sent plummeting from the airship. My personal favourite: at the climax, as Bond dangles from the airship, and the Golden Gate Bridge drifts into view. Zorin’s smile is wickedness incarnate.

Yet Moore and Walken fail to spark. Blame age, partially: Walken is the only baddie noticeably younger than his Bond. This isn’t exactly a case of “Roger Moore is 58, ha ha ha.” Blame Walken, if you wish, for being 42. Moore required a contemporary, while Walken’s lively performance demanded a youthful 007.

Moore has many virtues. His television background and soufflé-light persona chimes wonderfully with Patrick Macnee and helps make The Spy Who Loved Me , Moonraker and Octopussy fine teatime fare. You can almost sniff the toasted crumpets. He also works well with the exotic, the archetypal Englishman abroad, as visits to Harlem, Thailand and India all proved. His gameness can anchor the most absurd of concepts.

But Roger doesn’t do gloss. Even for big American stars, Christopher Walken and Grace Jones are particularly large, American and starry. Against their glitz Moore feels diminished, shrunken. Walken and Jones aren’t quite bigger than Bond but they are bigger than the Bond of Roger Moore. I doubt Dalton would have fared much better. Brosnan, with his Hollywood sheen, might have provided the requisite ballast.

After the tuk tuk, double-decker bus and moon buggy, how about a fire truck chase? The chase works well as a set-piece, provided you don’t question why it’s happening in the first place. Surely Bond could spare thirty minutes to accompany the police downtown and make a quick phone call? Then pour out a stiff brandy while the might of the Californian police force descend on Zorin’s mine. Simples.

Famously Moore hated the scene where Zorin machineguns the mine workers. Not Bond, quoth Sir Roger – the same criticism levelled against redneck sheriffs, Kung Fu schoolgirls, space travel and clowns. As we know, Bond’s genius is its elasticity: pretty much anything is Bond if you squint hard enough. Still, I admit mowing down hordes of people hardly typifies the Moore era. (Although tell that to poor Corinne Dufour and those Moonraker dogs.)

Mayday turns good awfully quick. I view her sacrifice as the act of a woman scorned as opposed to a sudden conversion to the angels. Her act would be far more powerful if the film explored more of her and Zorin’s relationship. They both like killing people and falling from architectural landmarks. The rest is a mystery.

The Golden Gate Bridge is a massive tactical error by Zorin. Obviously no villain wants Bond dangling by a rope from their airship but overall this is a position of strength. Just keep flying. His arms will get tired. Avoid tall structures. Tall structures plus trailing rope could cause problems. So Zorin flies Bond into the Golden Gate Bridge. Nice one, Max. One thing you shouldn’t do and you go ahead and do it.

But then we all do things we shouldn’t. Such as making that seventh Bond film when, in your own words, you’re about “400 years too old.” The true shame isn’t Bond’s age, or the script’s weakness, but that this farewell mission didn’t remain true to the Moore era. That crucial sense of fun is totally sapped. Exhaustion pervades. Even The Man With The Golden Gun (my personal bête noire) contained interesting ideas, strong characters, a brilliant concept in the Fun Home and a nicely hardboiled opening third. My problem with Golden Gun is its squandered potential as much as the finished product.

AVTAK squanders little potential. The film is rotten to its core. Even the strengths of Walken and Jones feel detached from the rest of the action. Sir Godfrey Tibbett is a joy, the action largely entertaining, and kudos to any climax that crashes an airship into the Golden Gate Bridge. My opinion of Golden Gun mellowed, or certainly deepened, after reading the comments of its defenders. I’ll be interested to see if AVTAK fans can repeat the trick.

And so farewell to the man who (officially) played James Bond more than anyone else. That record, I suspect, will never be broken. Moore joined a phenomenally successful series that seemed yoked to its original star. He left a franchise. Under Moore the number of Bond films doubled. The age of the franchise doubled, from 11 to 23. This was only inevitable in hindsight. A Connery clone would have dropped the ball. Another failed casting could have proved terminal.

So thank you, sir. For ensuring James Bond exists in 2015. And for some wonderful moments; the hair-breadth escapes, flashes of wit, acts of derring-do, unruffled charm and a bedroom appetite of heroic proportions. They will be other Bonds. But there will never be another you.

It’s been an absolute blast. Roger and out.

Best Bit: Zorin’s cleverly executed killing of Howe.

Worst Bit: Any time Stacy shrieks “JAMES!” A loaded field.

Final Thought: I like how MI6’s attempts to locate Bond consist of sending Q to lurk outside Stacy’s house in a van. And why doesn’t he just ring on the doorbell?

Max Williams

Common Sense Media

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A view to a kill.

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Duran duran rocks baby, 'bond. james bond.', a view to a kill, "wow what a view" "to a kill", super film 😀😃, weird and tired bond flick has moore's final entry being particularly weak., good bond film, a tired entrance to the franchise..

• Cast & crew
• User reviews

Follows a passenger on a train to New Delhi. The train soon becomes a combat battleground as a pair of commandos face an army of invading bandits. Follows a passenger on a train to New Delhi. The train soon becomes a combat battleground as a pair of commandos face an army of invading bandits. Follows a passenger on a train to New Delhi. The train soon becomes a combat battleground as a pair of commandos face an army of invading bandits.

• Nikhil Nagesh Bhat
• Ayesha Syed
• Raghav Juyal
• Tanya Maniktala
• 4 User reviews
• 11 Critic reviews
• 1 nomination

• Baldev Singh Thakur

• Man with Mobile
• (credit only)
• Brahmeshwar
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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User reviews 4

• The first act. While I didn't dislike it overall, I think the first act suffers from some pacing issues that took me out of the film. It sorta gets started from the get go and I tend to prefer films that slowly lead us into the narrative.
• Tiluka. I know, I know. The love interest isn't the main part of this movie, and while I found her and our hero's relationship sweet for what it was trying to be, I couldn't help but feel her and him were a bit underwritten.
• ryanpersaud-59415
• Sep 9, 2023
• How long will Kill be? Powered by Alexa
• July 4, 2024 (United States)
• United States
• Sikhya Entertainment
• Dharma Productions
• See more company credits at IMDbPro

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• Runtime 1 hour 55 minutes

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So what does it say that in a movie like “Boy Kills World,” that level of cheeky dark sadism has been turned into a pure lark — the new extreme threshold of mainstream entertainment? The fact that this is what we now seek out for kicks may be scarier than anything in “A Clockwork Orange.”

Yet the pop culture of the last 50 years has primed us for it: the slasher movies, the video games, the high-body-count delirium of the “John Wick” series, which may have been the first films to package this kind of relentlessness as cutthroat jollies for the megaplex. The kill-kill-kill spirit of “John Wick” made a film like “Boy Kills World” possible, yet “Boy Kills World” takes it all a step further. It’s the action film as slasher movie as gonzo damaged-superhero movie. It’s a depraved vision, yet I got caught up in its kick-ass revenge-horror pizzazz, its disreputable commitment to what it was doing.

Boy, who can read lips, understands most of what’s happening around him, and he reacts to events by talking directly to us on the soundtrack, in an exaggerated he-man voice (like Mel Gibson’s in “Mad Max”). You could say that the movie, in a way, cheats the fact that he can’t speak, but Boy’s quips-from-his-inner-voice lend “Boy Kills World” a graphic-novel funkiness.

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Reviewed at Regal Union Square, New York, April 24, 2024. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 115 MIN.

• Production: A Lionsgate, Roadside Attractions release of a Nthibah Pictures, Hammerstone Studios, Vertigo Entertainment production. Producers: Sam Raimi, Zainab Azizi, Roy Lee, Wayne Fitzjohn, Simon Swart, Stuart Manashil, Dan Kagan. Executive producers: Sipho Nkosi, Mxolisi Mgojo, Humphrey Mathe, Bill Skarsgård, Reza Brojerdi, Christian Mercuri, Moritz Mohr, Andrew Childs.
• Crew: Director: Moritz Mohr. Screenplay: Tyler Burton Smith, Arend Remmers. Camera: Peter Matjasko. Editor: Lucian Barnard. Music: Ludvig Forssell, El Michels Affair.
• With: Bill Skarsgård, Jessica Rothe, Michelle Dockery, Jamke Janssen, Sharlto Copley, Brett Gelman, Isaiah Mustafa, Andrew Koji.

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Mature Content Description

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Monster gore and violence

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• Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
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