On Her Majesty's Secret Service (DVD)

...This is my 50th review on Ciao and I thought for this monumental landmark that I would write about a film that I really enjoy watching and also one that has been recently released again on DVD in a fully restored package, which I have as part of my collection.

The film is the sixth Bond film, titled On Her Majesty's Secret Service. The year is 1969, Sean Connery had spectacularly resigned from the role on the grounds the audience would ...
...Hunt had a right job on his hands for this film, for starters the star of the previous five Bond films had gone, he had a new guy playing the secret agent who had never spoke a line in front of a camera before and worst of all he was directing one of the biggest Bond films in its 7 year history.

So without Connery what do we actually have? Well the answer is a very tight, fast paced film that you can really escape from day to day ... more

Hello and welcome. This is my 50th review on Ciao and I thought for this monumental landmark that I would write about a film that I really enjoy watching and also one that has been recently released again on DVD in a fully restored package, which I have as part of my collection.

The film is the sixth Bond film, titled On Her Majesty's Secret Service. The year is 1969, Sean Connery had spectacularly resigned from the role on the grounds the audience would not relate to him anymore due to the fact he was too old for role, in reality he was just approaching 40. His feelings were that he could not play Bond much longer without the character becoming a caricature of an aging playboy.
Director Peter Hunt had a right job on his hands for this film, for starters the star of the previous five Bond films had gone, he had a new guy playing the secret agent who had never spoke a line in front of a camera before and worst of all he was directing one of the biggest Bond films in its 7 year history.

So without Connery what do we actually have? Well the answer is a very tight, fast paced film that you can really escape from day to day life and watch. Like the other films before this one, the film is based upon the novel of the same title by Ian Fleming. Originally released on April 1st 1963, no April Fool at all, this was the 11th novel by Fleming and showed a slightly different Bond to what readers had become accustomed to in previous books. This time Bond was at a crossroads in life. He was thinking about resigning from MI5 and is searching for something more in life than what he has at the moment. He seems to have reached a plateau in life and is looking for something to take him to the next level. Not necessarily a mid life crisis but a kind of restart.

Thankfully the novel is truthfully reflected on screen and the story is an almost a direct transferral from novel to screen. I say almost a direct transfer because there are some scenes that were not lifted and filmed. This is something that I found to be very refreshing, mainly due to the fact that even after reading the novel you still are not sure what will happen next while watching the film. The film itself takes a different approach to the previously as adds a harder edge to the story without the increasing level of snobbery that the Bond films had started to show.

So that's the background, but what about the film? As is now the standard with a Bond film we have at the beginning the famous gun barrel sequence, only with a new actor, a new twist had to be taken. Bond walks across the screen, turns and drops to one knee then fires. A slick on-screen move that gives just a hint to expect the unexpected.

The pre-title sequence plays out with partial glimpses of Bond's face while he is at the wheel driving the Aston Martin, not the DB5 but the latest DBS. Throughout you are held back from seeing Bond's face and can't see enough to fully ascertain what he looks like. What happens next is really cool and is also a pivotal point in the film; Bond is overtaken at high speed on a costal road, and allows the car to pass. Further down the road Bond comes across the car, which is now abandoned on the beach, curious Bond stops and using a gun sight sees the stunningly beautiful woman walking into the sea. She is committing suicide. Bond drives on to the beach and against her will rescues her from the water; with the Bond introducing himself in the normal manner we get to see Bond's face in full for the first time, suddenly Bond is attacked by four henchmen. He takes them all out in a quite very energetic fight scene that really doesn't hold any punches. Only problem is that in the chaos of combat that Bond has just been put through the lady he has just rescued has stolen his car to get back to her vehicle back on the road!! Lazenby then delivers probably the best line from the whole series "This never happened to the other fellow!" Strangely enough this is a direct reference to Connery.

The film plays very well with Bond and M having a somewhat heated confrontation where Bond resigns from the service in disgust at the way he is being treated by M. M recognises this although not apologizing directly gives Bond a "two week leave of absence" to tie up loose ends with regards of hunting down a certain Ernst Stavro Blofeld, who unknown to Bond is covertly training up a number of very attractive women.. The mountain top retreat is called Piz Gloria and Blofeld is using the cover of a Health Clinic to cure peoples allergies, where behind the scenes he is brainwashing the women as part of their therapy to cure their allergies and for them to release germ warfare where certain things such as flowers and cattle become sterile effectively breaking up the food chain. So in this film there is really no official mission at all, but Bond does receive a small level of assistance from M with the back up he receives.

To get to Blofeld's Clinic, Bond has to go undercover and assumes the identity of Sir Hilary Bray. Bray is a Professor who has been contacted by Blofeld to confirm his heritage as Count De Bleauchamp; a French ancestor of Blofeld. As you can imagine Bond in a retreat with 12 attractive ladies is temptation that 007 really cannot resist.

There is also a story within a story as the women that Bond rescued on the beach comes back into the story in quite a dramatic manner after Bond is approached by her Father, Bond woos Tracy who totally changes Bond's life in a way that I think Bond didn't really expect. In the last third of the film the two storylines merge together in quite a satisfying manner and you see Bond working with mob boss Marc-Ange Draco who is Tracy's Father. The marriage proposal scene is very moving, but feels out of place in Bond film as this slows down the pace of the film quite dramatically as the part of the story where it is placed. But again this is integral to the story as this is really a different type of film on the whole.

To show how much of a new approach has been taken the opening titles have an instrumental played over them instead of a well known singer. This for me works as the title piece of music is quite chilling; the titles themselves show the Bond villains and Bond girls from the previous films. This is an attempt by the producers to patch up the fact there is a new actor playing the lead role and does kind of give a message that we should just accept him as Bond, which by the end of the film you do anyway. Throughout there are small hints linking the Lazenby Bond to that of Connery, for example you see Bond carry golf clubs in one scene which is a link to Goldfinger. In the theme from Goldfinger is being whistled by an office cleaner in one scene as part of an in joke, which goes to show how the script writers seized the chance to lighten up the script.

It is hard to believe that this was actually George Lazenby's first film. He has the looks for Bond in the fact that he is tall, dark hair with chiselled features. He was also 29 when he took the role and that is something that comes across on screen very well as he is brash and also slightly arrogant as James Bond should be, however it is in the fight scenes that Lazenby shows his own and excels especially when Bond has to keep a henchman quiet in the latter part of the ski sequence. You see a man who is prepared to kill to survive with Lazenby at this most deadly. Lazenby is Australian by birth and from earlier experience had shown that he can handle himself, in fact when he trained with stuntman Yuri Borionko pre-filming he managed to break one of their noses. Admittedly this was due to his timing being a bit off and the fact he was told not to pull his punches, but by the sheer force of a punch to do this does make you think. Throughout the film he steps out of his predecessors shadow and makes the film his own and although the story and the dialogue protect Lazenby in some areas of the film, conversations are kept to minimum it is Lazenby's athletic prowess coupled with the short, sharp cuts that really makes him memorable as the character. It's a real shame that Lazenby didn't do another film. He was offered a seven picture deal to continue to play Bond; this shows just how much the Studio believed in him as an actor. To the shock of the Producers Lazenby turned it down and walked away as he does look good in the Bond tuxedo, even if the shirt does have ruffles down the front.

The character of Tracy or to give the character her full name of Teresa Di Vicenzo is played by Diana Rigg and is not only a very strong and independent person but someone like Bond who likes to live life on the edge and increase the stakes. This is something that Bond finds out at there second encounter where he covers her gambling debts at the Casino table. She rescues him when he has escaped from Piz Gloria when his cover as Sir Hilary Bray is blow out in open and returns the favour when she is kidnapped by Blofeld after a quite exhilarating ski chase scene. Again another cast member of The Avengers comes to the Bond franchise.

Kojak star Telly Savalas plays Blofeld, a bald headed megalomaniac who this time has plans to break down the food chain and cause world wide chaos. Savalas is this role is a great piece of casting. The only American to have played the role of Blofeld in the entire history of Bond films. In appearance he is different to Donald Pleasance from You Only Live Twice as he has no facial scars, but he actually looks menacing and gives the body language of someone you shouldn't disagree with and in my mind gives the most chilling portrayal that is closet to the novels. Savalas has a knack of changing his voice in such a manner that it goes from normal to decidedly creepy within a syllable. This is scene in a number of scenes where Bond as Hilary Bray gets a dressing down from Blofeld and also when the therapy sessions begin which Bond stumbles across by accident when he is cavorting with one of the clinics patients.

Marc-Ange Draco is played by Italian actor Gabriele Ferzetti; Ferzetti's voice was dubbed over in the film, but doesn't take anything away from how he plays the character, who is memorable for being Bond's Father in Law. Draco is a mafia boss whose daughter Bond falls in love with. After Bond rescues Tracy from the sea, Draco's men ask Bond to join them at them and Bond is taken to Draco who offers Bond £1million to marry his daughter. Tracy has been through a lot and wants her to settle down, Draco think the only way is for him to purchase a husband. Bond declines the money. Draco joins Bond on the assault on Piz Gloria and is the first time that you see the Mafia helping Bond. It is also amusing seeing M asking Draco how pulled off a number of robberies at the wedding reception.

M, Q and Moneypenny are all present in the story. Out the three only M has the biggest role as there is little for Q to actually do bearing in mind that he doesn't issue any gadgets to Bond and only shares a scene with him at the wedding ceremony and makes a very rare appearance in the pre-title sequence just before we see Bond being overtaken on the costal road.. He is on screen for about two minutes in total. Also we have the obligatory scene with Miss Moneypenny who shares a scene with Bond in the usual office location, and also gets her bum pinched by Bond, as she says in the film "Same old James… only more so." Seeing her cry at the wedding as Bond and Tracey is married is not heart wrenching and moving. For Bernard Lee who played M for the sixth time in the film this is probably his biggest outing to date as we get to see his home for the first time and get to see more about the character than we have done before on screen. His home is called Quarterdeck and is located somewhere in Sussex; we also get to see M with a hobby as well. This again is a reflection of the novel as Bond and M as they have built a relationship of trust as well as friendship.

Other actors who appear in this film are Joanna Lumley who was the only actress to go onto The Avengers series after appearing in Bond and the rather irresistible Jenny Hanley who I remember as a kid presenting the TV series Magpie on ITV. Both played women who were at Piz Gloria to be cured. Also Lesley Phillip's wife Angela Scoular appears as Ruby Bartlett. She is Bond's first conquest in Piz Gloria. George Baker also makes his first appearance in Bond as Sir Hilary Bray who Bond meets early in the film. He also appeared in the Spy Who Loved Me and is well known for played Inspector Wexford.

With the titles being an instrumental rather than a song the music by John Barry is used throughout the film at times of high tension. For example the Piz Gloria escape and the beach fight at the beginning. It is utilized well; some scenes don't have any music at all which just adds to the atmosphere completely, evident when Bond is checking out his room at Piz Gloria and also when he is dangling from cable car wires over 2000 ft up. That is to say the action sequences are really top notch, with the pressure building between Blofeld and Bond throughout the film and the fact that Blofeld has effectively kidnapped Bond fiancée the film goes to another level where with assistance from Tracey's father to rescue Tracey this really does become something of a revenge mission for Bond where it is more personal than ever.

A number of scenes stick out in the film, naturally the beach scene at the beginning but also the scenes in Bond's Hotel room, the ski and car chase when Tracey assists in Bond escape and the showdown between Blofeld and Bond on a ski run whilst aboard a toboggan is not only an original idea but also something that Bond fans had been waiting a while for. I say these three as the Direction keeps up the pace and really does keep you on the edge of your seat while watching the film. What Peter Hunt did was to edit out all the unnecessary gaps in the fight scene and speed it up slightly. The end result is powerful and quite dramatic and it is never static with the frame of picture never taken from the same angle. Watching this for the first time you think you've missed something but by the end of the scene you know you haven't.

The film is also one of the longest to date; it is a colossal 140 minutes in length. After watching the film there are a lot of noticeable comparisons between this film and what is happening in the real world. What Blofeld has set up is effectively a training camp for terrorist killers that he will send out into the world to cause chaos and terror. I can see why this film doesn't get aired on TV as much as the "safer" other Bond films, but on the whole this has to be taken with a pinch of salt as it was made nearly forty years ago, and it seems that the world has caught up with fiction. As it was the height of the swinging 60's you do see Bond doing a lot of bed hopping as well and for someone who was gets married at the end of the film this was probably not a good role model for today's society and it is this that dates the film in some respects as views and opinions have moved away from this era and are now totally different.

So what you actually end up with her is a unique film that is effectively a one off that shows a vulnerable character that relies more on wits and brawn than gadgets. If you remove the previous films that came before and eliminate any comparison to Connery, then what you are left with is a high octane movie with a great entertainment value that really does grab you. I have not mentioned the ending at all and don't worry it is not the wedding, I repeat the ending of the film is not the wedding… well for those who haven't seen this I'm not going to spoil it as this is something quite unexpected. SHHHH!!! The film ends saying that Bond will return in Diamonds Are Forever. As Lazenby had walked out of the role it meant the door was open for a return for Sean Connery.

This is the one of the few Bond films that didn't make a good return when released; it's a shame really as the film itself is very, very good. It's just that the audience didn't want to accept anyone other than Sean Connery in the role of Bond at the time. I think that if Lazenby had pushed forward and continued to play the character for more films then we would have had a great series of films as the possibilities were endless as this was fresh start. It also raises the possibility that Roger Moore wouldn't have become Bond in the early seventies as well.

Price wise the single edition of the film will retail at around £10. The double edition disc retails at £14. Always look on-line as the prices will vary and these titles are now starting to become rare to collect as well. HMV have these in the sale at the moment for £7.99, or 3 for £20.

Thanks for reading and until next time take care. Tim 

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