I agree, but I know a lot of people who prefer the less over the top style of FYEO.

I just watched Goldfinger for the first time in a very long time this weekend and boy, does it not hold up well. I still enjoyed it but its not nearly as good as id remembered.

I voted for From Russia With Love.

Okay, so it's Kentucky...still a dull locale for a Bond movie.

(I don't know where I got Maryland from either.)

I went with From Russia with Love. On Her Majesty's Secret Service is a pretty close second.

Rather than choosing just one movie, I will go with my favorites from each major actor.

Connery: Thunderball & I liked the remake Never Say Never Again.

Moore: For Your Eyes Only

Dalton: Licence to Kill

Craig: Skyfall

I agree completely with this.

I can't do just a single favorite movie. I have to be fair and break them down by actor, at least. That in mind, it would be...

Connery: From Russia With Love - Just the right mix. Better than the movie it followed, and not as over the top as the once which came after for Connery.

Lazenby: On Her Majesty's Secret Service - Which, granted was the only one he did, but he really should have done at least one more. But for only doing one, it's an ace movie.

Moore: The Spy Who Loved Me - Mainly because it was the first Bond movie I saw in the theater, and it started my love of Bond. But, it's a tough call between that and For Your Eyes Only, which was probably the closest Moore came to the James Bond of the novel - and that is also why I think others rate it highly, too.

Dalton: License to Kill - I like the darker tone of the story.

Brosnan: The World Is Not Enough

Craig: Skyfall - Which I think is the best of the Bond movies Craig has done so far, but I also don't have any issue with the others.

Casino Royale with cheese (2006-Daniel Craig)

I re-watched From Russia With Love last night. That remains the perfect Bond film. Terence Young really stepped up his game and delivered a top notch movie that would be great even if Bond weren't a long-running series.

That's funny, as I rewatched From Russia With Love last night as well. I don't know, it's certainly a fine film, but it doesn't rank that highly as a BOND film for me. I just find it a little flat, and I guess I do like a bit more over-the-top elements in Bond movies rather than just a faithful filming of the novels---not Moonraker/Jaws/girlfriend-level silliness, but a little more than was in FRWL.

Also, the music in a Bond film is hugely important for me, and I felt they were still kind of finding their way with that in FRWL, in that they used the big, dramatic Bond theme when he was.....getting a taxi, checking into his hotel, quietly searching the room for bugs---that just didn't really work for me. Certainly a quality film, but lacking a bit for me.

I tend to like a lot of the "worst" Bonds. Usually, even in a "bad Bond", there's some redeeming characteristic.

For example, I truly enjoy Moonraker like a lot of you do. I love the sets in that movie, they're as 1980 as a DeLorean, intricately detailed and totally over the top. The movie's a complete mess of absurdity, self-mocking (without the wit of Diamonds are Forever) and excess, but it's definitely more entertaining than the majority of Bond films.

The Man with the Golden Gun has one of the best "field offices" in any Bond movie with the grounded SS Queen Mary, a terrific villain in Christopher Lee and bar none my favorite villain's hideout in any Bond film: Scaramanga's Ha Long Bay lair (minus the funhouse crap, which I hate). It's also got a murderous Herve in it.

Never say Never Again is widely reviled and not strictly canon, but Brandauer is (IMO) the second best Bond villain in history, Bond's Duran Duran video Monte Carlo villa rules, it's got a young Kim Basinger and the final gun battle is awesome.

IMO, the least entertaining Bonds are "Live and Let Die", "The World is Not Enough", "Octopussy" "Die Another Day" and "A View to a Kill". None of them are terrible, I just don't find them entertaining. OK, "Die Another Day" is pretty terrible.

There's something about Diamonds are Forever that I just find depressing. To me it kind of feels like a lame attempt to bring the 60s Bond and Connery into the 70s, and it doesn't really work. The whole movie just has a tired, ugly, garish and kind of cheap vibe to me.

I really enjoy both Live and Let Die and Man With the Golden Gun, maybe because of that. It helps that they were influenced by blaxploitation movies and HK kung fu movies, respectively, and to me they just successfully bring Bond into the 70s and it feels like a fresh start to the series. I'm a big Moore fan anyways, and I think good use was made of Moore's comic timing along with his more serious side in these two. And I may be in the minority here, but I find Sherriff Pepper and his interaction with Bond to be really funny. Also, Man With the Golden Gun is one of my favorite themes, and they really use the melody well throughout the movie.

If either Sean or Roger was in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, it would be the clear winner. Riggs was incredible, the finale is a wow and the final shot heart breaking. I could say the same for Skyfall if it had anyone else in the Bond role. I just can't warm up to the "new" guy, though I will admit he was good in this one.
So, I don't have a favorite. I love too many of them for different reasons.
And I don't get the love for FRWL. It has always bored me. I know it's considered the crown jewel of the series but it does nothing to me. When they re-released these earlier flicks as double bills in the theater, I was always bummed when FRWL was on the program. It's been a long time since I watched it so I'll have to check it out again and see if I feel the same.

I... it's like I don't know you anymore.

Just tell me you hate the slide whistle... for old time's sake...

I hear this opinion thrown around a lot (well at least Connery, I think you're the first I've heard suggest Roger Moore would be good in OHMSS) and I don't know that I buy it. I popped in the blu-ray of OHMSS for the first time last night (disappointing btw, it's kind of ugly with the jacked up contrast) and watched the first 45 minutes or so. This was right after I had finished Diamonds are Forever. Lazenby might be a bit awkward and green, but I have to believe his performance is better than what we would have gotten from an out of shape Connery phoning it in for a paycheck. Connery circa 1964? Maybe. But I'm still not convinced Connery's Bond was right for that story.

The thought that came to my mind while watching was that this might have been the perfect movie for Timothy Dalton's Bond. I don't think much of his two movies, but I'm fascinated by his take on the character. Dalton's Bond, while ruthless when he needed to be, always struck me as a nice guy who able to block out his emotions in order to get the job done. There was always this undercurrent of loneliness to his character. He strikes me as the perfect Bond to finally find love and get married. Even better is imagining the possible follow up film where he goes looking for revenge for Tracy's murder. I know they were trying to hit those beats in Licence to Kill, but...how do I put this...oh yeah, John Glen.

Anyone else think Dalton's Bond would have worked in OHMSS?

Oh, don't get all high and mighty on me---you probably liked Remington Steele better than the Dukes of Hazzard, too.

But yes I could have done without the slide whistle during that stunt.....

Timothy Dalton said on the Making of Licence to Kill documentary that he was originally considered for OHMSS, but he was only 25 at the time and was deemed way too young to play Bond.

I often think about how much better those Pierce movies would have been with Dalton in them instead. Brosnan only LOOKED the part, everything else about him was wrong for Bond. The exact opposite it true of Craig...he doesn't look like Bond, but everything else is perfect.

THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN had new life for me back in 2005 when KUNG FU HUSTLE came out. The landlady in the latter film had been one of the kung fu schoolgirls in Thailand in GOLDEN GUN and I delighted in showing her scenes in it to people who'd just seen the Stephen Chow movie.

I love FRWL, but this always cracks me up. The same thing happens in Dr. No. As far as the rest of the music is concerned, I LOVE the James Bond is Back intro to the title music. I'm surprised they never recycled that cue. FRWL also introduced the 007 theme, so musically I thought it was pretty great.

However, I do often wonder what FRWL would have been like had it been the 3rd or 4th in the series. A production crew that much more confident in what they were doing might have made a great movie even greater. Of course on the other hand, it might have fallen prey to the some of the excess that was pretty much solidified by the time of Thunderball and that may have taken away from the general seriousness and groundedness that makes it so good.

Going outside of the box - and keeping in mind that I've only gone through the series once per film (with some exceptions) - I'm going with The Man with the Golden Gun. I love seeing Lee as the main villain in a Bond flick.

If you see the movie as an "Adam West as Batman"-style camp exercise, I think it's great. Clearly it's the ugliest Bond film: Circus Circus is a garish nightmare, the Mustang Bond drives is the ugliest Mustang ever, Bond's ruffled tux is the worst 70s tux I've ever seen and the entire finale takes place on an oil rig: probably the least asthetically pleasing setting ever in a Bond film. The whole movie has a brown velour/quaaludes/purple sunglasses vibe. It's hideous but I think it was meant to be hideous. Nothing is taken seriously. It's got an ambiguously gay duo as hitmen, a line about "bombe surprise", a moon rover with a cheap plastic dome and frantically waving arms (I love how the "spaceman actors" in the scene where Bond steals it continue to move in slow motion when trying to catch Bond), the worst hit squad ever in Bambi and Thumper, Bond sitting on a giant toilet etc... it's ridculous. It's suposed to be ridiculous. I love it.

Oh yeah, I love that piece--really fantastic:



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Best gunbarrel award goes to Licence to Kill

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It's a classic Bond cue that any true long-time fan knows. It might be a little harder to incorporate into these harder-edged Craig Bonds but trust me, even if any of these recent ones had, out of the blue, used this music then fans everywhere would be ecstatic. At my showing of SKYFALL the entire theatre erupted and applauded at the reveal of the Aston Martin. This piece of music would elicit just as great a response.