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STUDIO: FOX/MGM
MSRP: $34.98
RATED: PG
RUNNING TIME: 128 minutes
SPECIAL FEATURES:
- Audio Commentaries
- Featurettes
- Deleted Scenes
- Still Gallery
- Music Video
- Theatrical Trailers
The Pitch
British secret agent looks for encryption device.
The Humans
Roger Moore, Julian Glover, Topol, Lynn-Holly Johnson, Cassandra Harris, Lois Maxwell and Carole Bouquet
The Nutshell
James
Bond is the greatest agent in Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Killing the
bad guy and slamming some hot tail is the daily routine. This venture finds Bond searching for Britain’s missing ATAC device. The ATAC allows you to take command of a nation’s nuclear submarines and give them direct orders. The possibility was there to start World War III and Bond wasn’t going to stand for it. Along the way, he mets a hot piece of Greek ass.
This might as well be stock footage at this point.
The Lowdown
For Your Eyes Only is a product of its time. Everyone thought they were too good to do a Bond flick. Sure, you could still nail down a Top 40 musician for the theme song, but nobody wanted to direct it. So, they give the film to a long-time stunt co-ordinator. The score doesn’t work for modern audiences, so a little bit of Monty Norman is thrown out the window for some Bill Conti. Oh yeah, there’s also that problem of dwindling literary source material. So, let’s just recycle ideas from previous books and hope for the best.
Roger Moore is watching you poop.
The 1980s proved to be a trying time for Ian Fleming’s super spy. Roger Moore had to be lured back to the role, as the 54 year old wanted to step down from the popular franchise. There was Cubby Broccoli’s forceful attempt to thumb his nose at Kevin McClory one last time with Blofeld’s final appearance. Hell, there’s even another forced joke that plays upon popular Bond theme song Nobody Does It Better. But, where does it all go wrong?
Yeah, I’d tap it. This is the one that was always a woman right? I know that this is the Bond film with the tranny. Please, let this not be the tranny. That would crush my world view.
John Glen is the film’s sole weakness. Spending very little time outside of the editing bay and stunt team, John Glen was given the keys to the kingdom way too early. The man can’t keep the focus on the central plot, as his mind wanders into the B-plot of a young ice-skating phenom that’s obsessed with Bond. There’s even more forced comedy with a smuggler (Topol) that has been pinned with the murder of the current Bond girl’s parents. Around the hour marker, Glen remembers that there needs to be a main Bond villain and we get our first full introduction to Kristatos. Don’t remember him? Well, neither does the rest of the world.
For Your Eyes Only is an off-film that makes you long for the days of goofy outer space battles ala Moonraker. All Bond fans have their preferred moments in the franchise’s history and I have to say that the John Glen era was the darkest. Glen committed the one thing that you should never do with Bond and that is to be boring. You don’t care about the Havelocks, you don’t care about Bond’s rock climbing and you don’t care about the skating teenybopper. All you want to know is when Jaws or somebody interesting is going to return.
This is how you used to regulate a mother-fucker in the 17th century.
The Package
For Your Eyes Only comes
to
Blu-Ray with an amazing release. You would expect as much from a killer
franchise, but leave nothing to chance when it comes to screwing the
High-Def consumer. Luckily, FOX/MGM didn’t skimp on this fan favorite.
Sure, it would’ve been nice to have the films released by individual
Bond actor or even by decade. But, you should be used to the random six disc releases by now.
The A/V Quality is amazing for a film that bares a resemblance to any MacGyver episode. There’s no audio dropout and digital noise is very minimal through the first reel of the film. What gets to me is the fact that none of the special features are new, save for a solo Roger Moore commentary. But, that feature was available on the 2006 Ultimate Edition release for the United Kingdom. Region 1 / Region A likes Bond too! Give us some new material!
The
only beef I have is that most of the special features are direct ports
from the various Ultimate Editions that MGM and FOX have released over
the last six years. I’ve heard this cross-cut audio commentary from John Glen and others for what seems like the fourth time. The
trailers, radio and tv spots are the same. Hell, the featurettes even
post information that feels out of wack when brought into the Daniel
Craig era. Still, that’s being kind of petty. You’d be denying yourself
quite a treat if you didn’t go out of your way to pick up this stellar
release.
One more turn and I cap my shadow. All at the expense of the British taxpayer.