PG, 126 min.
Director: Lewis Gilbert
Writer: Christopher Wood,
Ian Fleming (book/characters)
Starring: Roger Moore, Lois
Chiles, Michael Lonsdale, Richard Kiel, Corinne Cléry, Bernard Lee, Geoffrey
Keen, Desmond Llewelyn, Lois Maxwell, Toshiro Suga, Emily Bolton
“Moonraker” is often thought
of as the worst of all the Bond films. Perhaps it is. Its existence is
certainly the result of the flimsiest inspiration for a James Bond film ever.
In 1977, a little film called “Star Wars” was released. Calling “Star Wars” a
“little film” now might seem absurd, but it was at the time. The studio didn’t
put much money or faith into it. Lucas took what was then thought to be a
ridiculous pay deal from the studio, which ended up making him rich and costing
the studio fairly little. Sci-fi wasn’t popular at the time. Nobody wanted
another “2001: A Space Odessey”, but after it was released, everybody wanted
another “Star Wars”, and so every studio in Hollywood went green light crazy on
space adventures.
United Artists owned the
Bond franchise at that time and looked in the entire cannon of their properties
to find a sci-fi property. Lo and behold, Ian Fleming had written a James Bond
adventure called “Moonraker” as his third novel starring the international
superspy. The book had nothing to do with space, but since the word “moon” was
in the title, the studio figured they could shape it into a space adventure.
And so, they did.
The film franchise had long
since abandoned the plots of the books from which it took its titles and
characters. The 70s had been a good decade for the series, despite the fact
that they had abandoned the long running threat against Bond in the form of
SPECTRE and its leader Blofeld. By including a couple of characters that would
show up in multiple films, the filmmakers had built a mythology unique to the
films. Jaws had been the popular henchman played by Richard Kiel in the
previous film “The Spy Who Loved Me”, and the producers brought him back for a
second outing in this movie.
The series had also started
leaning more toward kitsch with its Bond, Roger Moore, who had a knack for
making it work for the character. “Moonraker” is like a convergence of all the
trends of the decade in one huge mess of a movie. Critically, and I believe box
office wise, it was a disaster of the proportions of a Bond villain’s dreams.
It deserves to be thought of as the one of the worst, if not the very worst of
the series. Not only does its kitsch factor run out of control, but also it’s
poorly made. Bond’s investigation of the villain Drax’s plans makes little
logical sense. Bond is bounced around the world to exotic locations in true
Bond tradition, but the locations make little sense, have no relation to each
other, and aren’t clearly introduced.
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