Favorite Bond Actor?

[TrekSucksHard]

Who is your favorite Bond actor- and why? :jump2:

[Kara Milovy]

It is completely neurotic to include Daniel Craig, as he has not yet "played" James Bond. I know some fans have already stated he's the best, or the worst, but...They. Need. Lives.

[TrekSucksHard]

It is completely neurotic to include Daniel Craig, as he has not yet "played" James Bond. I know some fans have already stated he's the best, or the worst, but...They. Need. Lives.

Well I just wanted to include Craig in there for completeness sake... :rolleyes:

[Kara Milovy]

I wasn't picking on you, TSH, I'm just saying. Have you seen CBn? There are folders asking people to rank the Bond movies, including Casino Royale! That's just...wrong.

[LeiterCIA]

Wow...kinda shocked to see I wasnt the only one who picked Lazenby.

I dunno... he just hits a certain chord with me. Maybe something about his lack is real acting experience makes him seem more genuine to me.

PS: Oh wait... I AM the only one to pick Lazenby!! The small sample was a little misleading for a second there.

[Kara Milovy]

It's very hard for me to choose between my top three. Ask me another day, you might get a different answer.

[BeauButabi]

Dalton for me, easy.

[Cooper]

Like Kara says, the answer can change depending on what day it is. However, my choices will always between two... Connery or Dalton. I know it's an easy answer, almost a cliche, to say Connery but the guy originated the role and he had the benefit of starring in the films in the era Fleming wrote in. Therefore, his films and his Bond have the taste of the book more than anyone elses.

Dalton was the most lethal Bond. Dark and intense... I've even come to appreciate License to Kill. Just wish EoN didn't cheap out on that film.

[Daltons Chin Dimple]

Can't a Roger get no love ?

As per my ranty 007 essay, I think each Bond actor reflects their time and their own sensibilities towards the role, making them immpossible to rank.

[TrekSucksHard]

Yeech! People actually like Dalton and Lazenby?! I actually found them to be quite terrible- they played Bond as he was in the books- totally stiff and charmless (of course, that was the reason why he never maintained a long lasting relationship with the girls he encountered in the novels); the Ian Fleming books were nothing but travelogues and Bond was nothing more than an archetypical plot mover. :angry

Connery is my favorite because he made the character his own and set the stage for future Bonds- he could be suave and lethal all at once- he had that certain toughness and effortless masculinity that actually improved upon the tasteless icon that Fleming wrote about.

Lazenby was a complete stiff with no facial expressions whatsoever and was a total zombie- same as Dalton.

Moore also reinvented the character and played him for laughs- I wouldn't be surprised if he had actually did it intentionally just as a satirical jibe at Connery's impersonation (although Connery was already leaning towards that in his latter films) but I do have a certain fondness for his take because Moore knew that Bond was a joke with no basis in reality.

Brosnan tried hard and he comes closest to Connery in terms of character though there are times it feels like he is just acting and not being natural- but that could be becuase of the overblown scripts he got.

[Kara Milovy]

You are just SO wrong about Dalton. Dalton was the only one besides Lazenby to have a real romance. He was dark, intense, not humorless but not light or jokey, and very romantic. Not only with Kara, he was, I think, wonderful and tender with the two women in LTK as well.

Fleming's Bond was, in fact, less of a one-night guy than the movies have him. He always fell hard for the girl. He asked two women to marry him (Tracy and Vesper). He lived with Tiffany Case for a year. He paid for Honeychile's surgery to have her nose fixed. He was so infatuated with Domino that he jeopardized the mission. He agonized over Tanya's eventual fate.

The Bond novels are fairly nuanced. There's a lot of insight and introspection. TMWTGG has Shakespearean overtones. Fleming was a careful writer. The plots weren't meant to be realistic but he knew what he was doing.

[neglet]

I haven't voted because I can't decide. I can't pick just one ... like Kara, it depends on my mood. If I want a tougher Bond, I want Connery. If I want a more tortured, romantic Bond, I want Dalton. If I want a sexier, smoother Bond, I want Brosnan.

Hmmm. What fun it would be to have all three at once! :smirks:

[Kara Milovy]

Hmmm. What fun it would be to have all three at once! :smirks:
With a bottle. And Astroglide. :o

[Cooper]

Kara,

You are dead on about Bond in the Fleming Books. Bond comes off, dare I say, as almost pathetic in the books. He fails to "get" the girl in Moonraker, is positively giddy that he made a bunch of pretty girls laugh with his bar game in OHMSS and sits around in a Parisian cafe fantasizing about meeting a beautiful girl in A View To a Kill, only to give up on the fantasy because the women he'd actually meet would not be nearly attractive enough.

Pathetic is a strong word. ....He's just more "human" in the book when it comes to the women, than he is in the movies. The guy has genuine affection for these women and falls hard. (We'll put aside the misogony for now...how many times does he refer to a woman as a bitch??)

Anyway...Dalton reflected this real human Bond. Dark and intense and then suave and romantic. In TLD, the guy pulls a teenage move on the ferris wheel one minute and then has that look of pure fury, in the next minute, when he pops the balloon with the SMERSH message on it.

[Kara Milovy]

Kara,

Anyway...Dalton reflected this real human Bond. Dark and intense and then suave and romantic. In TLD, the guy pulls a teenage move on the ferris wheel one minute and then has that look of pure fury, in the next minute, when he pops the balloon with the SMERSH message on it.
Dalton studied the novels and not the films to prepare for the role. He understood that Bond thought he was in love practically every time he held a woman in his arms.

And that scene? Well, given my name, any surprise it's one of my very favorites?

[TrekSucksHard]

Pffft- Dalton's romantic scenes were no better or worse than the others, even Moore's scenes with his leading ladies I found better than Dalton's. In the end all Dalton could do was walk around the scene with a scowl and nothing else- its no surprise why his movies flopped. Connery knew the part- if he played it like the books it was a dead end and he had enough style and brains to experiment with it and finally hit on the trademark formula in his second move, From Russia With Love- he knew that he had to inject some toungue in cheek humor or else the franchise would not be as successful as it now is.

[LeiterCIA]

Kara,

You are dead on about Bond in the Fleming Books. Bond comes off, dare I say, as almost pathetic in the books. He fails to "get" the girl in Moonraker, is positively giddy that he made a bunch of pretty girls laugh with his bar game in OHMSS and sits around in a Parisian cafe fantasizing about meeting a beautiful girl in A View To a Kill, only to give up on the fantasy because the women he'd actually meet would not be nearly attractive enough.

Pathetic is a strong word. ....He's just more "human" in the book when it comes to the women, than he is in the movies. The guy has genuine affection for these women and falls hard.

You guys have definitely nailed it here. Having rediscovered the books recently, I'm amazed at how different Bond's interaction with women is in the movels.

In the novels, Bond loves women. In the films, Bond loves banging women (with a few exceptions already mentioned).

[Kara Milovy]

Pffft- Dalton's romantic scenes were no better or worse than the others, even Moore's scenes with his leading ladies I found better than Dalton's. In the end all Dalton could do was walk around the scene with a scowl and nothing else- its no surprise why his movies flopped. Connery knew the part- if he played it like the books it was a dead end and he had enough style and brains to experiment with it and finally hit on the trademark formula in his second move, From Russia With Love- he knew that he had to inject some toungue in cheek humor or else the franchise would not be as successful as it now is.
Dalton's movies didn't flop. The Living Daylights was a big hit. Licence to Kill was a financial disappointment, but not a flop. Whether or not to blame LTK's relative failure on Dalton is something that goes around fandom without resolution. The director, John Glen, had enormous problems with the location, the low budget, and the crew. The marketing was a mess as well.

And Connery didn't invent Bond's tongue-in-cheek humor, nor was it introduced in the second movie. It was there from the first movie, at the insistence of director Terence Young.

[Martini97]

Well it's like what someone said before, I now find it difficult to rank the Bonds now. However, I give my high school year intepretation.

Class Clown - Roger Moore

Most Likely to Succeed - Sean Connery

The Most Athletic - tie George Lazenby and Connery

The Most Unique - Timothy Dalton (LTK I came to appreciate to, but I thought he was the cutest thing when he was prince baron in the film Flash Gordon - in those little green tights. )

The Most Goodlooking - Pierce Brosnan.

[Kara Milovy]

(LTK I came to appreciate to, but I thought he was the cutest thing when he was prince baron in the film Flash Gordon - in those little green tights. )
I thought he was cutest as the Errol Flynn bad guy in Rocketeer. :jump2:

[Martini97]

I thought he was cutest as the Errol Flynn bad guy in Rocketeer. :jump2:

As Neville Sinclair -that was his sexiest. Too bad he blew up on the end, but it was funny though.

[TrekSucksHard]

As Neville Sinclair -that was his sexiest. Too bad he blew up on the end, but it was funny though.
Whaaa? Dalton Again?!

I just can't figure out what you ladies see in that man- he has got nothing whatsoever in my view. Every man wants to be Connery, not Dalton!

[neglet]

Whaaa? Dalton Again?!

I just can't figure out what you ladies see in that man- he has got nothing whatsoever in my view. Every man wants to be Connery, not Dalton!

What a man wants to be doesn't necessarily appeal to the ladies.... Dalton is tall, dark, handsome, with intense eyes that speak of passion. <swoon> Plus, he even looks cool holding a monkey in a kids' movie:
http://www.zelluloid.de/images/szenen/3fabceb00088a.jpg

Now, he may not fit your ideal of Bond, but it's hard to deny the man is yummmmmy. If you need a more youthful picture:
http://www.cnn.com/SHOWBIZ/9702/07/beautician/link.lion.jpg

No, I wouldn't kick him out for leaving cookie crumbs in the bed.:D

[Daltons Chin Dimple]

I would let him into bed, but only if he brought the cookies with him ! I am straight, therefore this is because of my love of cookies rather than any love of erotic man-on-man wrestling or movies about cowboys eating pudding.