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The Living Daylights

The Living Daylights

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Great Movie, Poor Video Quality
Review: Over the past year, MGM home video has done a spectacular job in remastering the nineteen James Bond movies. The DVDs are awesome, and the videotapes have been touched up as well. That is, until they got to "The Living Daylights". I guess by the time they got to the '80s movies, their budget ran dry. "The Living Daylights" is a great movie. Timothy Dalton plays a tough (but humorless) Bond. After "A View to a Kill", the writers at Eon productions opted for a believable plot about General Koskov (Jeroen Krabbe), who defects and warns the British secret service about a plot conceived by the new head of Russian intelligence, General Pushkin (John Rhys-Davies) to wipe out English and American spies. After Koskov is captured in a coup, Bond confronts Pushkin, who tells him a different story. It's up to Bond to decide what to do next. Maryam D'Abo is a cellist who becomes Bond's love interest. Joe Don Baker plays the chief villain, and the chief henchman/assassin finds many uses for a Walkman other than music. Now on to tape quality. IT'S BAD!! I don't get it. The other movies had high-quality resolution, widescreen credits and title sequence, and a "pan around" format when necessary. This time it looks like they just threw it all together at the last second. Resolution is poor, the title sequence has been butchered, and there are scenes where you see half of one head, and half of another. I know you get what you pay for, but this is ridiculous. If you are a novice fan, you probably won't notice the difference. But if you are a hardcore James Bond fan, go for quality and just get the DVD.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: BORED THE DAYLIGHTS OUT OF ME.
Review: This movie has two good things going for it, the begining and the end. Its the slow pace of this movie that just puts me to sleep. The opening scene, climax, and final fight between bond and the villan are very good, but every thing else in between is slow paced and boring. The title song was also a poor choice. This film was John Glen's a only poorly directed film, all his others are much better.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Classic Bond at its best
Review: Something about Bond always strikes me as a little corny, but I always find myself strapped to the seat. This bond is no exception. Exotic location, beautiful women, crafty gadgets, and of course the hair raising finale. If you like all that is good and sacred about the man, the myth, and the legend, this is definitely your bond movie.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: The Rebirth of James Bond in The Living Daylights
Review: The Living Daylights is one of the best bond movies of the last twenty years. The Living Daylights is an excellent film with an interesting plot, and excellent stunts. Timothy Dalton does an excellent job playing a more serious Bond, and the movie is a more traditional, Connery type Bond movie. I recommend this movie for any Bond fan, but would caution casual fans to see the movie before purchasing it, as it seems to be an acquired taste for some folks.

The movie does have two flaws. First, the movie is aobut 15 minutes too long. Every time I watch the movie I enjoy it, but get a little restless over the last few minutes.

The second potential flaw is that the plot can be a bit tough to follow. The plot (without giving too much away) finds James Bond trying to stop an apparent plot by a Russian General to assassinate British secret agents in the hopes of starting a war. Other plot elements include the defection of a high ranking Russian army officer, weapons and drug smuggling, and the Afghanistan-Russian war. All these elements are brought together to form a trickier plot than in most Bond films, which is a good thing in my opinion, but still can be somewhat confusing.
The stunt scenes are also excellent and include parachuting onto the Rock of Gibraltar, a great car chase scene with a "loaded" Aston Martin, and a fantastic fight scene outside of a cargo plane (plus about 5 other stunts I don't have time to mention).

Another nice change in this film is a legitimate love affair between James Bond and Kara Milovy (Maryam D'Abo, who is adequate) which is sweet and even romantic. As for the new Bond actor in this film, Timothy Dalton portrays Bond more seriously than Roger Moore and is much more believable as a secret agent than the 50-something Moore. He brings an edge to the character that had not been scene since Sean Connery. The fact that Bond is more believable (not so cartoonish) makes the film more tense and suspensful than most of Roger Moore's later efforts. All in all The Living Daylights is a very solid movie and one of the best Bond films in recent memory (due in part to the weak competition of horrible films such as Octopussy and Moonraker). I would definately recommend The Living Daylights on DVD to any Bond fan as it has been wonderfully remastered with lots of special features (the Documentary on the search for the "new" Bond actor is great) and looks as good as new on-screen.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Dalton makes history with his BOND!
Review: Timothy Dalton makes a good James Bond because he plays the part with seriousness which creates the drama and tension that makes the audience enjoy the movie. The movie begins with a dramatic high-altitude parachute insertion of Gibraltar, followed by a sudden surprise with Bond chasing a traitor, we don't know why, in fact as the movie progresses we are kept guessing as to who is who until about mid-way. To get to the point where Bond realizes the KGB is not behind a spy war, we travel rapidly across the world with a lovely lady with a cello. We take for granted now, but Dalton's Bond is the inspiration behind the Brosnan Bond films being action and plot hyperactive.

I think we shouldn't rank Bonds, actor or film wise unless the movie is really bad. The disdain many have for the Roger Moore Bond films is actually to the 70s mentality of self-parody and not taking things too seriously when realism is what makes the fantasy work. Moore made 3 fantastic Bond movies; Live and Let Die, The Spy who loved me and Octopussy. In the first, he created the Bond as non-stop action hero. In the second, he created the Sci-Fi/fantasy Bond type movie, and in the last one I highly recommend, an adventure spanning the globe with some unexpected plot twists. Dalton combines the non-stop action, global adventures with early Conneryesque seriousness.

I think many of us who admire the early Connery Bond films must remember they represent a by-gone era of the 60s where spies, the Cold War, JFK, and all the mystique was first created, it would be almost impossible to create a "retro" Bond picture unless you actually made it look like the 60s since people today are not like that anymore. This is what makes the whole Austin Powers things so entertaining. I'm just glad Bond has changed with the time as we have!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The best bond movie
Review: Living Daylights is the best bond movie made so far, the reason is great plot and Timothy as bond. Unlike nonsense fight in space or madmen, its more grounded. The story is great and so is bond romance. Movies shows Bond also makes mistakes, sensitive yet cold, and there is no where a suggestion that just being a 007 makes him superman. In all best bond movie so far.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Really 4 1/2 Stars
Review: I like The Living Daylights. I am, unlike many Bond fans, a great fan of Timothy Dalton as 007. He ain't no Connery- and that's a good thing. He's a harder-edge Bond that brings out the hard-eged side of the Connery embodiment- minus the Roger Mooreish slapstick. This colder James Bond character was, in my opinion, perfect for the late 80's; athough, I think it got just a little too dark in 1989's Licence To Kill.

I really like how TLD left the light, brainless fun of the absolutly dreadful A View To A Kill and got back into the more serious vein of some of my favourite Bond films such as From Russia With Love (in my opinion, the best), the overrated On Her Majesty's Secret Service, and the surprisingly good For Your Eyes Only. This is must see for any fan of a serious Bond film.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Dalton's best film as Bond......
Review: This 1987 Bond film introduced the world to Timothy Dalton, a more serious Bond. Suave was taken by Connery, and Moore portrayed a more humorous Bond, so Dalton was left with deciding a new personality. I wouldn't say that this is one of my favorite Bond films, but it certainly ranks higher than its predecessor, the mediocre, A View To a Kill. If anything, I would buy this DVD mainly for the extra features. Dalton would return for one more film, License To Kill, which didn't do much for me.........

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Living Daylights
Review: The Living Daylights is my favorite Bond film. In this adventure, James Bond becomes the pawn in a Russian defector's plot and finds himself in the middle of an international arms and drug smuggling ring.

In the opening sequence, we see Bond parachuting, dive tackling a fleeing jeep (then fighting with a KGB assassin in the jeep), and finishing him off in a mid-air explosion over the water.

Bond is on assignment to aid and protect a Russian defector (a KGB agent, who ultimately double crosses Bond). Bond meets up with the KGB agent's girlfriend traveling from Czechoslovakia, through Austria, to Morocco, and Afghanistan. And in the end, of course, the good guy wins. Add to this some romance (with just one girl, for a change), probably the best music score, great action, beautiful cinematography, and you've got a great James Bond story.

TLD has all the right ingredients and chemistry between actors. But what makes this story line believable is a credit to a superb performance on the part of Timothy Dalton. This guy is believable and looks like a professional killer.

TLD was filmed in Morocco, Gibraltar, Austria, England, USA, EuroDisney, and Pinewood Studios.

The Living Daylights is a sleeper, probably because T. Dalton is not as well known as S. Connery, R. Moore, or P. Brosnan. TLD is definitely a crowd pleaser - I highly recommend it!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Great movie but...
Review: The movie is really one of the best 007 adventures... I don't like this James Bond actor, because I think that he has not "this thing" that makes Bond invincible. Although he is a good actor and perfoms good throught this movie. Bond Fans don't miss this one as soon it becomes available... Great stuff comes in this Special Edition DVD!


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