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The Ten Goofiest James Bond Moments
They go beyond camp, beyond kitsch. By
Rob Vaux
November 14, 2008
James Bond (Roger Moore) and JW Pepper (Clifton James).
© MGM/UA
As Daniel Craig continues to take the Bond franchise by storm, it's easy to forget that 007 hasn't always been at his best. Sexism, racism, embarrassing cultural trends… the series' durability has preserved them all for future generations to point at and laugh. And a few very special moments transcend even the lame excuse of fad and fashion. They go beyond camp, beyond kitsch, beyond all good sense into the realm of the truly ridiculous. If Craig and Casino Royale represent Bond at his smash-mouth best, then these moments… well, it would be cruel to say they aren't fun, but they're fun for all the wrong reasons. Here are ten of the goofiest moments lovingly mined from forty-five years of James Bond films.
10. Joe Don Baker's Tush (Goldeneye)
A little flesh is par for the course with 007, but some derrieres are more welcome than others. Baker's Jack Wade really didn't need to bare it all--especially as part of a lame bit of comedy whereby Pierce Brosnan's Bond has to identify him by way of a posterior tattoo. The sight of his filthy boxers has a way of shooting all that glitz and glamour in the head, as well as fueling nightmare material for months to come. They wrote off Felix Leiter for this?
9. Drag Queen of SPECTRE (Thunderball)
The name Jacques Bouvar (Bob Simmons) does not rank among the great 007 villains. Probably because, after faking his death, he dressed up as his own widow for the funeral. Connery's Bond spots him and follows him back to a nearby chateau, where a fracas ensues. But it's hard to work up much interest when the heavy has been sporting a black slip… and doesn't even sleep with Bond before attacking him.
8. The Superfluous Third Nipple (The Man With the Golden Gun)
Q gadgets had their share of low points (see #1, below), but none sported the skeezy freak show curiosity of this little number--a prosthetic nipple requisitioned by Roger Moore's Bond in order to impersonate the titular assassin. Its existence is less cringe-worthy than the prominence it receives in the film. It's simply impossible to avoid, and while Christopher Lee was born to play a Bond villain, that unnecessary bit of knowledge about his character's anatomy turns the rest of the movie into a risible game of Spot the Man Boob.
7. Sheriff JW Pepper (Live and Let Die/The Man With the Golden Gun)
Well, dem Duke Boys sure done it this time. They let their inbred cracker cousin JW Pepper (Clifton James) go wanderin' into one o' dem fancy Yeropeen spy capers. Oh he had a grand ole time hasslin' the local ethnic stereotypes an' generally stinkin' up the joint like a dead polecat. An' they let him back agin fer the next film to boot! Some people just ain't got sense enough to know what they stepped in, do they?
Christopher Walken as Max Zorin in A VIEW TO A KILL.
© MGM/UA
6. The Plummeting Crash Test Dummy (A View to a Kill)
This shtick was a staple throughout the Moore Bonds, but it reached its dubious climax in A View to a Kill when Max Zorin (Christopher Walken) drops an uncooperative flunkie off of his blimp. The camera follows the man's fall into San Francisco Bay… allowing audiences to clearly perceive that he's nothing but a crudely inarticulate dummy. The very real scream looped in over the soundtrack only heightens the absurdity, as well as ruining Walken's beautiful follow-up ("anyone else want to drop out?") for all time.
5. Mini-Me Played Straight (The Man With the Golden Gun)
He's mean. He's nasty. He fits into most overhead compartments. And this time, he's supposed to be taken seriously. He's Nick Nack (Herve Villechaize), the dwarf servant of Francisco Scaramanga. A three-foot-tall killer presents a cornucopia of mocking opportunities--the logistical problems alone merit a space on this list--but Mike Myers trumped all comers by making the notion a central part of the Austin Powers movies. Just plant your hand on the little guy's forehead JB: he's never going to get that knife near you. Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd from DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER.
© MGM/UA
4. Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd (Diamonds Are Forever)
It wasn't enough to make these two assassins creepy. The producers of Diamonds Are Forever had to bring bad taste into the equation by explaining their creepiness away as homosexuality. In the original novel, Ian Fleming used it as a garnish to their characters: hinted at, but never dwelt upon. The film version makes rampant mincing the order of the day. From their first scene when they clasp hands and giggle about how unattractive women are to an appalling late moment when Mr. Wint shrieks with glee as Bond roughs up his bathing-suit area, it all screams bad fratboy joke. And do they skip away from their kills?! At least they're diverting attention from Connery's advancing age…
3. I Think I'm Turning Japanese, I Really Think So (You Only Live Twice)
Ugly racial caricatures were par for the course in the early Bond films, but they reached farcical levels with Tiger Tanaka's (Tetsuro Tamba) "elite ninja force" here. The film itself is actually one of the series' better efforts, no thanks to its silly training scenes, secret ninja compound, passive geisha girls, and the piece de resistance: Connery's Bond made up to resemble a Japanese fisherman. It may have signaled the moment when camp finally trumped the more serious elements of the character, holding uncontested sway until Timothy Dalton came along twenty years later.
2. Moonraker
All of it. The whole thing. Jaws' girlfriend, the exploding bolas, the sad, desperate attempt to cram Bond into the Star Wars craze… yeah, best just burn this one down and build something beautiful in the ashes.
A version of James Bond's famous Aston Martin with light-emitting polymer skin that turned it completely invisible.
© MGM/UA
1. The Magic Invisible Car (Die Another Day)
The toys from Q branch always fought against advancing technology in the real world. The best of them--say, the attaché case in From Russia With Love--worked because they kept things simple and thus retained a certain timelessness. The worst of them tried to ape the most recent Sharper Image catalogue and thus stamped themselves with an embarrassingly quick expiration date. In an effort to head that off, the producers of Die Another Day took a leap into the truly ridiculous: a version of Bond's famous Aston Martin with "light-emitting polymer skin" that turned it completely invisible. They should have sprung for the deluxe model--the one with Harry Potter in the trunk.
(Special thanks to all the folks who contributed their advice and insight to this article.)
I admit seeing ANY part of Joe Don Baker's ass is pretty uncalled for in a movie, but I don't remember seeing much of anything really. I mean maybe I've blocked it out from memory, I have a copy of the movie I could go back and look, but I’m not watching Goldeneye to see how much of Joe’s ass I can see. I recall it was a small patch of skin you could just pretend it was his underarm.
I actually kind of thought that bit was kind of funny. Lame? Oh, yes.
I think “Die Another Day” should just be listed completely like you did for Moonraker.
I loved Goldeneye, (I must really be blocking that scene), the second two follow ups were okay, but not great, “Die Another Day,” ughh, I was starting to think “where’s Timothy Dalton when you need him? “
And I hear that is bad thing to start thinking.
Maybe Mitchell does deserve the number 10 spot afterall.