James Bond Movie Review: ****Goldfinger (1964)

 With a bad guy in Goldfinger (Gert Fröbe) and a henchman in Oddjob (Harold Sakata) this movie is filled with action.  James Bond (Sean Connery) is provided with a special car by Q (Desmond Llewelyn) (which becomes a Bond trademark).  Of course M (Bernard Lee) and Moneypenny (Lois Maxwell) play their normal roles. Early on Goldfinger has Oddjob kill two Bond girls so we know he is really bad.  Goldfinger has hatched a plan to attack Fort Knox and contaminate the gold with a nuclear bomb, making his gold even more valuable.  It is only Bond's prowess with women that turns Pussy Galore (Honor Blckman) into a help rather than an enemy as she informs people what is happening as Bond is always watched and cannot communicate with his men.  This Bond movie does not disappoint and has plenty of action.

James Bond Movies

Based on the novels by Ian Fleming.  Up to now there are 24 James Bond movies.  

**** Dr. No (1962) Sean Connery

**** From Russia with Love (1963) Sean Connery

**** Goldfinger (1964) Sean Connery

****^ Thunderfall (1965) Sean Connery

***^You Only Live Twice (1967) Sean Connery

***^On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969)  George Lazenby

****Diamonds Are Forever (1971) Sean Connery

****Live and Let Die (1973) Roger Moore

****The Man with the Golden Gun (1974) Roger Moore

****^ The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) Roger Moore

****^ Moonraker (1979). Roger Moore in space

****^ For Your Eyes Only (1981) Roger Moore in Greece

****^Octopussy (1983) Roger Moore, Bond goes to the circus

***^ Never Say Never Again (1983). Sean Connery, recovery of two nuclear bombs

**** View to a Kill (1985) Roger Moore, dirigible chase over the Golden Gate Bridge

**** The Living Daylights (1987). Timothy Dalton as James Bond, 

**** License to Kill (1989). Timothy Dalton. Bond gets revenge for his friend

**** Goldeneye (1995) Pierce Brosnan  006 vs 007

****^ Tomorrow Never Dies (1997). Pierce Brosnan vs a media company

****^ The World Is Not Enough (1999). Pierce Brosnan vs a wealthy oil heiress who he thought was an ally

**** Die Another Day (2002). Bond against the North Koreans in Iceland.

**** Casino Royale (2006) Daniel Craig. First book, gambling and torture

**** Quantum of Solace (2008) Daniel Craig in Bolivia

****^ Skyfall  (2012) Daniel Craig. agains Silva who is gunning for M

****James Bond Spectre (2015) Daniel Craig. Bond unravels Sceptre and Blofeld is captured

***** No Time To Die (2021) Daniel Craig.  Bond and the new 007 attack an island

Not part of the franchise

*** Casino Royale (1954). Made for TV movie.  Barry Nelson as Jimmy Bond

^ Casino Royale David Niven. A poor attempt at comedy

James Bond Movie Review: ****From Russia with Love (1963)

 This is the second of the Bond movies.  Again Sean Connery stars as James Bond 007.  Spectre is again the villian, and we meet number 1 but never see his face, just him holding his at.  However we do see the demise of numbers 3 (Lotte Lenya) and 5 Vladek Sheybal) on the scepter side.  This is a spy vs spy film with Spectre pitting the Russian KGB against the British MI6.  It is fun wathing spies go at each other.  Bond knows he is stepping into a trap when he agrees to meet the Russian beauty (Daniela Bianchi).  In the end of course she loves him.  She was not with Spectre but a Russian spy and manipulated by Spectre to work for them without knowing it.  Of course Miss Moneypenny (Lois Maxwell) and M (Bernard Lee) are in the mix.  This time we add Q Branch to MI6 who give Bond an explosive brief case.  It saves his life he he is captured by Grant (Robert Shaw) a trained assassin.  This movie has all the formulary fun of James Bond and the intrigue of a good spy movie.

James Bond Movie Review: **** Dr. No (1962)

 This is the first James Bond.  It is amazing how well they had the apy movie down from the very start.  Of course much of that has to do with Sean Connery as James Bond.  He is always the most debonair man in the room.  And there is always a worthy villain, in this case Dr. No (Joseph Wiseman) who is making a radio beam weapong to interfere with operations at Cape Canaveral.  

Many things common to Bond movies are introduced in this first.  Bond's womanizing and getting the girl in the end (Ursula Andress), M (Bernard Lee) andr his secretary Moneypenney (Lois Maxwell), help although usually minor from the CIA (Jack Lord) and his drink, shaken not stirred.  

Movie Review: 65 (2023)

 This movie starts as a spaceship crashing after being hit by an asteroid show and ends up as a run from the dinosaur show.  Pilot Mills (Afam Driver) is on a two-year space mission.  He accepted the job so as to get money to pay for his daughter's (Chloe Coleman) medical bills.  In the crash it appears all of the passengers have perished, but Mills does find one young woman (Ariana Greenblatt) alive.  It becomes his mission to save her.  There is an escape pod which landed on a hill so that is their destination. However they discover a world invested with dinosaurs.  Of course there are many close calls.  Both Mills and the girl become adept at escaping the dinosaurs, however sometimes it is luck.   When the finally get to the escape pod, the asteriod has further to do with them.  They are in the middle of the cataclismic event that killed all the dinosaurs on Earth.

Shiamaylan Movie Review: ***Old (2021)

Old is a really creepy movie.  This is a very cruel experiment.  A pharmaceutical company has discovered a beach that causes rapid aging.  This way they can test their drugs over a lifetime which only lasts a couple of days because of the rapid aging.  Most people die within a day.

So they spike their drinks with the drugs they want to study, and recruit them to go to a secluded beach.  In this case there is a small group that goes to the beach--The family of Guy (Gael Garcia Bernal) and Prisca Cappa (Vicky Krieps) and their two children, Maddox and Trent ( Thomasin Mackensie age 15 and Alex Wolff age 15 with several others as they age). Prisca has a tumor.  There is a rapper Brenden/Mid-sized Sedan (Aaron Pierre) and his girl, another family, Charles (Rufus Sewell) is a surgeon with grandmother and a daughter, and then a couple.   

First Brenden's girl is dead (maybe a murder), and then the grandmother.  Complicating the plot is Charles has paranoia.  Then the three children in just a couple hours are teenagers.  The realize the beach is causing aging.  However there is no way off.  Climbing the cliffs results in black outs.  Kara becomes pregnant and has a baby in just an hour or so.  The baby does not live.  She climbs the cliff knowing she will pass out an fall.  Due mostly to aging they all die, except for the two who were children.  They attempt swimming into the lagoon, and survive to turn the people doing the experiments into authorities.

This movie is a bit hard to follow, just because the plot is so incredible.

Animated Movie Review: ***Monster House (2006)

 This sho is strange.  We watched it as a preview for family movie night and flunked it as it is too scary for the little kids.  The house is truly the monster.  There is a cranky old man who lived in the house till he had a coronary and died.  I don't know if the house absorbed his energy or if the old man was trying to keep people safe from the house by being cranky.  I guess somehow his wife became the house; but it keeps grabbing things, and pets and people.  Definitely not good for the kids.  

Steve Buscemi as Nebbercracker the grumpy old man.  Mitchel Musso as DJ the neighbor, Sam Lerner as Chowder his friend and Spencer Locke as Jenny the new girl who joins the team to fight the house.

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