The Living Daylights thread

Yes, I love this movie. It has it's faults though; the plot seems like it will be fantastic at the start, with Russians hunting down Bond and his fellow 00 agents, but in the end it comes down to simple drug smuggling. And Kara isn't a great Bond girl. But it is a great Bond movie, one of the best.

 

What I really disliked in the pre-credit sequence is that the 00 agents get kileld way too easily. It would have made sense had they have a terrible adversary, like the early SPECTRE, but the badguys ended up a bit...average. I liked the plot though.

 

Along with For Your Eyes Only, The Living Daylights is my favourite James Bond film. I really think Timothy Dalton captures Ian Fleming's Bond while blending the movie magic that Connery and Moore created into his portrayal. IMHO he blends the two together a little better than in his performance in Licence To Kill.

The Living Daylights had some great exotic locations, awesome action scenes (the pre title sequence was a great intro for Dalton,) the ice chase sequence, the airplane stunt, an awesome score by John Barry (updating the Bond theme using synth) and a pretty cool villain in Necros. As far as the whole Kara issue, at the time of production AIDS was a very controversial issue, maybe they didn't want Bond to go around nailing chicks left and right in the ususal, promiscuous manner.

I thought the ending was unfulfilling, it didn't exactly measure up in my opinion and deliver and was sort of anti-climatic. Other than the ending, I thought it was a great film. My personal fave moment is when Necros assasinates Saunders by crushing him between the glass doors and Bond finds the balloon with the message "Smiert Spionon" (Death To All Spies) and totally flips out. Great scene...

 

This is exactly what I felt about the movie, it was good but halfway through it seems that there was an all new plot.

 

The living Daylights: 7/10

10/20:
09. From Russia With Love
10. The living daylights
11. The man with the golden gun

 

Dalton as Bond I never liked him he seemed too cold he lost his touch with the ladies, you got have the charms as well as playing a hero (well if you're 007)

 

Good call, I don't think Dalts actually woos any ladies in his films.....they just fall on him straight away.

 

Dalton's Bond wasn't really supposed to be a ladies' man though. He was supposed to be more of a hardened, serious guy. I think that's why I really dig him in the role.

 

I'm worried that I may not like Craig's Bond cos he will be more cold blooded killer since Dalton's 007 tried to do but I didn't like though I like TLD and LTK movies.

 

No, he was supposed to be a ladies' man. In TLD, he goes into the Vienna hotel and tell the staff he won't take his usual room, he'll need something with two beds this time. There are a number of touches like that in his films.

 

Dalton's Bond wasn't cold-blooded at all. His emotions were always very evident. He's the most emotional 007 by far.

 

Well his eyes seemed that wanted to bacome cold blooded killer.

 

Watch the films. He shows genuine affection for Kara, devastated when Dela dies, absolutely infuriated when Sharky is killed, extremely upset that M refuses to go after Sanchez's crew after they mutilated Felix, and so on. Even when the monkey scares him in the opening of TLD, he shows believable shock and then relief. In his assasination scenes, especially with Pushkin, he's trying to be cold-blooded but he struggles. Great acting by Dalton.

 

Thanks for opening up a thread for The Living Daylights.

Its my second fav Bond film after You Only Live Twice

TLD had a fantastic story although confusing it was fab to get away from the past cartoonish supervillains like Drax and go back to the days of FRWL and FYEO.

Not all but many critics don't like the character Brad Whitaker the films main villain. He is not given enough screentime to make a proper impact which he deserved. Writers instead chose to give Koskov more scenes which did not add greatly to the film but it was needed to allow the audience to know what kind of person he was.

Whitaker should have been given at least a few more scenes and perhaps away from his villa. Where could he have been used I here you saying? - 1 Whitaker could have made a surprise visit during the opium/arms deal making sure Koskov is doing his job right. 2 maybe a scene earlier with Whitaker ordering Necros to get Koskov back from the safehouse, 3 a longer battle with Bond and maybe more action with 007 taking out Whitakers guards (5 in total not just 2)

Everything else in the film is good but this is the only pic I have against the Writers of the movie not the actors.

Joe Don Baker was chosen to play Whitaker and he did his best with the 4 scenes he was in.

Necros & Whitaker were good villains who needed more developement and at least Whitaker had an interesting background report which allowed the audience to know why hes all bitter and twisited.

 

Uh oh......<runs away>

 

But it wasn't as much of a present element in TLD and even less so in LTK. I mean, there weren't a lot of on screen love scenes. Focusing on Dalton's toughness rather than his way with the ladies was the right way to go.

 

I'd say it was more relevent in LTK than TLD - in Daylights he only interacts with Kara, in LTK he has two women who he indulges in jiggery pokery with who actually needs to help him in his goal.

 

I Agree with you regarding Whitaker. He needed to be more involved with the plot rather than just having Koskov and Necros do the main work.

The Living Daylights is one of my fav Bond films and to have seen more of Whitaker would have been a bonus.

Necros is a cool henchman but again as you said could have had more involvement with the main plot.

 

I liked both TLD and LTK..Dalton was my favourite Bond, although I watched all the Roger Moore ones with my dad while growing up..