Why Moonraker Doesn’t Suck – Part One (Characters)

                Moonraker is considered by many to be the worst of the Bond movies. In my opinion, this it not true. In fact, it my just may be the best Bond movie of them all (here is my worst). Now I don’t think it is the best movie (which I think is this one), I think it is the best “Bond Movie”.  The thing about Bond movies is that they are not free-standing movies. They build on each other, and have their own established themes, style, and I am willing to go so far as mythology. Moonraker fits into the "Bond Movie" mold perfectly, and that is why I say it could be the best Bond movie. The main Bondness attributes I will be talking about are archetypal characters, over the top action sequences, and general Bondisms. This post got away from me a little bit so I have split each topic into its own post. First I want to talk about the characters. CONTAINS SPOILERS

                Roger Moore is my favorite Bond acter. This is because he opitimizes “Cavalier Bond,” who happens to be my favorite Bond (other Bonds include “Tough Guy Bond,” “Suave Bond,” “Sexy Bond,” “Edgy Bond,” and Timothy Dalton). None of the other actors remain so non-chalant in extremely rediculously dangerous situations (the extremely describes the rediculously, just to be clear), or produce deadpan pun delivery like Moore could. He is the Bond that I want to be. Personally, I don’t value skills like punching people, or seducing women nearly as much as I value the ability to be a sarcastic smart ass. Just a matter of taste I guess. Moore seems to gets a lot of flak about being old (he is three years older than Connery), but I must say he does relatively well for his age (51 while Moonraker was shot), and he just proves that Bond can still kick ass in his autumn years.

Bond, Master of Disguise

                Our villain is Hugo Drax. He is super rich (as in can privately launch multiple space shuttles rich), French, belittles the English, an excellent shotgun marksman, has a beard, plays the piano, has a butler named Cavendish, and hangs out with silent and sexy women who have elaborate titles (including Countess Lubinski, Lady Victoria Devon, Mademoiselle Daladier, and Signorina del Mateo, my DVD subtitles and IMDB don’t agree on all of the spelling). His secret layers (note the plural) include a space shuttle launching facility deep in the Amazon rain forest (and others in various exotic locales throughout the world), and a stealth space station (that has active radar jamming that behaves like passive radar stealth, somehow). His evil plan involves killing all the humans on Earth with special human targeted nerve gas, and then repopulating the Earth with his own hand-picked “super race,” and establishing an “ultimate dynasty". He does lack any distinguishing physical disfigurements, but other than that he has being a Bond villain on lock down (you can’t have Sean Bean quality in every film).

Drax introduces James to the Mademoiselle and Signorina

Our Bond Girl is the punnily named Dr. Holly Goodhead (an unspecified doctorate from Vassar). She is your classic smart and sexy mix, with some action skills thrown in. She is on loan to the Drax Corporation from NASA, and also happens to work for the CIA. She goes through the established arc of being frosty towards Bond and rejecting his advances (she is in no way impressed by his random trivial facts or common knowledge about space shuttles), but slowly warms to his charms. She and Bond do the deed early in the film after she becomes uncontrollably aroused as James goes through her hotel room triggering all her gadgets (actual spy gadgets, not a euphemism). Later she helps Bond steal a space shuttle and foil Drax’s evil scheme (using her impressive NASA knowledge such as being able to read the posted directions in the space station, and knowing the code to the laser cannon). Never have British-American relations looked so good, in space suits.

Definitely the smartest person in this film

“His name’s Jaws, he kills people.” What more do you really need to say about the iconic assassin, played by 7’ 2” Richard Kiel. Quite possibly the greatest supporting Bond movie character of all time (with the possible exception of Odd Job). The man is indestructible, survived accidents in this movie alone include sky diving without a parachute (he lands on a circus tent), crashing a cable car through a concrete building, crashing a boat over a water fall, and a space station breaking up with him inside. He can standing long jump at least 20 feet (the world record is 11.4 feet), looks good in suspenders, and apparently has a metallic crotch. This movie even features some Jaws character development, which scores it a lot of points. He falls in love with the petite blonde women Dolly, and when she is threatened for not meeting Drax's standards of physical perfection, Jaws joins up with Bond and helps to save the day. He also delivers the only line of his two film appearances with “Well, here’s to us” as he drinks some champagne with Dolly in the exploding space station. Jaws then has to save Bond and Goodhead's lives once again as he undocks their space shuttle with his incredible ability to break stuff. Then his portion of the space station get launched into space in a shot that is strikingly familiar to the shot of Darth Vader’s Tie Fighter hurtling into space (Moonraker came out two years after Star Wars, and may have tried to cash in on the hype. I would include a link there, but you can’t find Star Wars clips on YouTube). Don’t worry though, because Jaws and Dolly get saved by the Americans, who were just joy riding in their shuttle anyway, so it wasn't too much trouble.

The most bad ass person in this film

The sexiest person in this film

I also want to throw in a mention of Manuela. She works for the Rio branch of MI6 and shows up to give Bond some intel. She also gives him a vodka martini, shaken not stirred, and some sex (they had to kill five hours, and James doesn’t Samba). Later, while accompanying Bond on a scouting mission, Jaws tries to give her the old neck bite, and she is instantly stricken mute and doesn’t resist at all or cry for help (I guess she isn’t really a field agent?). Some rowdy partiers save the day so it all turns out okay, and we got to see some Jaws in a sinister clown suit. Manuela teaches us that spies who just gather intelligence but stay out of the action are still valuable to the team (but only as long as their sexy maybe?)

Those people were probably to drunk to help anyway

Tune in next time for ACTION!