Bondathon: Octopussy

I’m just ready to be finished with the Moore era.

For Your Eyes Only brought some much-needed life and grit back to the series, almost making Moonraker feel like a mere nightmare. Roger Moore was now 55 years old and seemed to be aging rather well, but many thought it was time for him to give Bond a rest. Many names were tossed around, including Timothy Dalton and even American actor James Brolin, but it is unknown if they had ever settled on anyone. However, a massive threat loomed onto EON, and that would make 1983 one fo the most interest years for the Bond franchise.

Back in the 1950s, Ian Fleming approached a number of producers to create a James Bond film. One of those was producer and screenwriter Kevin McClory, who he eventually struck a deal with, and work began on the screenplay, an original Bond story. Various delays and problems occurred, causing the project to eventually be cancelled. Later on, Fleming eventually turned the unfinished screenplay into the novel Thunderball.

 Fast forward to the early 1960s, when EON was making the Thunderball movie adaptation. McClory was furious and demanded to be billed as a producer, which he was. Fast forward to the 1970s. McClory still wasn’t happy, so he took EON to court. The court ruled in favor of McClory, giving him the rights to use the SPECTRE name, as well as the character of Ernst Stavro Blofeld (explains why Blofeld was never seen in any movie after Diamonds Are Forever). Fast forward to 1983, when McClory announced that he would be remaking the movie Thunderball under the name, “Never Say Never Again,” with none other than Sean Connery at the wheel as James Bond. EON had to step their game up to show McClory who’s boss and decided that a new Bond wouldn’t fare very well with fan-favorite Connery. So, Moore returned once again.

I’ll cover Never Say Never Again later, but today, we’re devoting our time to Moore’s penultimate film in his Bond tenure: Octopussy.

The film begins with a pre-credits scene (nothing new here) wit bond Posing as a Cuban military officer with the missing of finding out about a new tracking system built by the Cuban government. He is abruptly found out by the officers at the base, and captured. As he is being driven to his prison, he’s aided by an MI6 agent undercover as a local girl, who provides Bond with the opportunity to escape and hide in the trailer being pulled by the girl’s Range Rover. As the soldiers seemingly have Bond surrounded, he emerges from the trailer in a compact jet, which he uses to fly off and escape, ultimately kicking the film off.

After the titles, the story finally begins as 009 is found murdered at a British embassy, holding a Faberge egg in his hands. The egg is taken to MI6 where it is inspected and found to be fake. Soviet operations are immediately suspected. Bond is sent to an auction where the real egg has gone up for auction, where he spies a man named Kamal Khan taking extreme interest in said egg. Bond engages in a bidding war with him, eventually bidding up to 500,000 pounds, which Khan graciously pays.

Bond tracks Khan back to his palace in India, where he engages in a game of backgammon with Khan. Bond eventually wins the game, winning a night with a girl named Magda whom he saw with Khan back in London. Whilst in bed, Bond spots a tattoo of an octopus on her lower back, which indicates her employment in Octopussy’s Circus.  Magda’s intentions with Bond are to steal the fake Faberge egg, which she believes to be the real one. Bond places a tracker in the egg and lets her leave. Bond tracks the egg down to the basement of the palace, where he’s able to listen in on the conversation. He finds out that Kamal Khan is working with a corrupt Soviet general named Orlov, whose ultimate goal is to expand Soviet control into central Europe. With this useful information, Bond escapes the palace to find out more about this Octopussy character.

Bond is turned to a remote island where Octopussy lives. He infiltrates (through use of a crocodile sub) and finds his way to Octopussy’s chambers. They meet, talk for a while, and eventually realize that they’re very much alike. After a night together, Octopussy reveals that Orlov and Khan have been replicating priceless pieces of art and jewelry to replace them in auctions and to sell the real ones in the black market of the West. Octopussy uses her circus to smuggle them to the west, while Orlov takes care of making sure it goes unnoticed in the east. Bond narrowly escapes Octopussy’s island after Khan’s goons make a threat on his life, and he soon makes his way to East Germany to confront Orlov.

Upon arrival, Bond spies a nuclear warhead being loaded upon Octopussy’s circus train. The circus is set to perform at a US Military base in West Germany, and Orlov plans to detonate the bomb there, blaming it on a faulty US weapon, and pushing the cause for Western disarmament, which would leave the west open for Soviet rule. Bond steals Orlov’s Mercedes, filled with the jewels, and makes after the train on the tracks, which the Mercedes can now drive on after having the tires shot off by Soviet soldiers. Bond catches up and gets himself on the train and witnesses as the bomb is set to detonate once it’s taken into the military base. Bond is unfortunately found and ends up engaging with a knife duel with twins Mishka and Grishka. He kills the twins but ends up falling off the moving train. He commandeers a nearby car and makes his way towards the American base.

After warding off military police, Bond arrives and dresses up as a clown to make his way into the circus. He pushes people out of the way and defuses the bomb just before the trigger goes off. As soon as the generals see this, they soon apprehend the people responsible, but they escape. Kamal Khan is nowhere to be seen, but Orlov is tracked down to the East/West German border, where General Gogol takes matters in his own hands and kills the corrupt officer in cold blood. Bond, however, manages to reach Khan as he sets off in a plane, and latches on to the wing to go along for the ride. He manages to kill Khan’s henchman Gobinda before sending Khan to a great and fiery death.

You know, there’s not much I can say about this movie. It’s about as middle-of-the-road standard Bond adventure as you can get. There are no real standout performances and set pieces. Moore is good as Bond, I guess, but he seems rather tired of being there. If I can give this movie one thing, it was better than Never Say Never Again, which really isn’t much of a thing to gloat about.

The staidness of these bland films were unfortunately catching up with the Bond era, and that’s why this movie is just so…beige. That’s the only word I can come up for it. It’s beige. It’s neither good enough to rave about, or bad enough to curse to hell; it’s just good enough to watch every once in a while. That’s why I’m giving it a 2.5 out of 5. Dead set in the middle.

I wish I could say I didn’t have any more Moores to do. But…just one more…