The 1980s Roger Moore Era

[Count_Lippe]

The early 80s was a bit of a separate era of the Bond series after the 1970s, even though Roger Moore continued to play 007 and many of the EON regulars were still part of the filmmaking team.

Was it artistically a successful era or should another actor have stepped in after The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979), two epic 007 adventures with Moore in his prime that probably would have been hard to top in terms of hugeness.

What do we think of these three early 80s Bonds, was Moore starting to be too old, were the films not epic enough, were they campy and too silly, were they mediocre and not breaking any new ground, were they too much influenced by Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) ?

Or was this era one of the best and funniest in the series?

[Blowfeld]

This is a tough one for me. For Your Eyes Only was a good come back after Moonraker, however I could easily imagine Timothy & Pierce taking over for the ageing Roger.

However I do not believe the faults with the moveis would be corrected with lets say Timothy as the lead. Nobody could make Lynn-Holly Johnson palatable to me. She was a very young looking 23, who I don't think could act very well.

I don't know if it was MGW's writing or producing which was worse in this era. There was a story written in 1989 I believe blaming Cubbys nepotism for the fall of the 007 series.

I certainly would replace Roger before A View to a Kill, however it was Roger's presence which makes this movie work as much as it does. I'm not sure how a recast could have benefited this movie, I do know Roger looks too old to be believable as an active secret agent.

Odd we've returned to the days of a old looking 007 being replaced on set by his stand in while he recovers. I half expect to see a new name introduced as Bond since Daniel it seems will not be on screen for a majority of the action.
If I had the skill I'd love to edit the actions scenes of Spectre to Roger stunning in his safari jacket, Roger after all jokes he was on standby as his darling Daniel was injured on set.

[FormerBondFan]

The way I see the 1980s Moore era is that it was like Disco genre in 80s as both were worn out in that decade. After all, Moore is considered as the Disco era Bond.

[Count_Lippe]

Maybe John Glen also did too many Bonds since he did all the 80s films?

Anyway I think A View To A Kill had some good ideas, a pretty good cast, and also by far the best score of these three films, Octopussy had a pretty lame score even though it was composed by John Barry , and the For Your Eyes Only score by Bill Conti I have always found very mismatched.

So Moore did a reasonably well made film as his last Bond film.

[The Saint 007]

Love the 80s Moore Bond films. Even though they're a little more grounded than The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker, they're still quite fun and entertaining. Moore was getting a bit old, but I still think he played the part well, and he was the only one that could compete with Connery's surprise return. In my opinion, Moore aged better than Craig, who by his third film, went from a rookie to an aging Bond. I've personally found the series to be kind of a mixed bag after the Moore era. I like Dalton and Brosnan, but not to the same extent as Moore and Connery, and the Craig era has been abysmal.

[Kristatos]

I liked FYEO, but Octopussy is one of my least favourite Bonds. AVTAK gets a bad rap, but I don't think it's as bad as its reputation makes it out to be. It's not great, but it has its moments. And it's good to see Steed and Bond together at last.

[Count_Lippe]

These films also had some staple ingredients, like 007 being caught in the act with his girl at the end of the film by M, Q, Margaret Thatcher, etc.

Of course this started already in Spy and Moonraker and perhaps it became a bit repetitive?

They skipped this when Dalton took over.

[Veronica]

The Moore movies in the 80's grossed less and less after Moonraker which was a huge office success.I like to call MR "Roger Moore at his Roger Mooriest" because you can obviously see how relaxed he is.In MR it seemed like he didn't even have to try.It all seemed natural.In FYEO his age started to show and it became really noticeable in OP and AVTAK.Moore's peak was TSWLM-the movie that just works so well."When one is in Egypt,he must dive deep into his treasures!" GO MOORE!

[Count_Lippe]

For Your Eyes Only would have been a suitable film to introduce a new 007 actor, although I think Moore was still quite ok in this one.

To me this film is a little too down to earth and a bit boring, and also has a terrible score.

It has a lot of well made action that is not just incredible stunts like some of the later Bonds, but the film should have been a little tougher even though it is occasionally fairly tough, Moore pushing Locque's car over the edge for example.

But it would have been interesting to see someone like Dalton doing this film, tone down the humour and have an exciting John Barry score instead.

[Veronica]

For Your Eyes Only would have been a suitable film to introduce a new 007 actor, although I think Moore was still quite ok in this one.

To me this film is a little too down to earth and a bit boring, and also has a terrible score.

It has a lot of well made action that is not just incredible stunts like some of the later Bonds, but the film should have been a little tougher even though it is occasionally fairly tough, Moore pushing Locque's car over the edge for example.

But it would have been interesting to see someone like Dalton doing this film, tone down the humour and have an exciting John Barry score instead.

The thing with FYEO is that after two times it becomes a little bit boring. That's what happened to me. For the first two times I watched it I thought it was fantastic and claimed its Moore's best. Now I don't anymore. The score by Bill Conti is out of place in a Bond movie. Let's put it this way-there's nothing bad in this movie,but there's nothing particulary terrific either. The Spy Who Loved me is as much as interesting the third time around as is it flr the first.

[Count_Lippe]

Unless you are a big fan of Roger Moore, that you find his Bond the best one, I think this era was so-so.

It's certainly not as good as the late 70s Moore era, and of course not as good as the classic 1960s era.

I also think Dalton's debut The Living Daylights (1987) was much better and overall a breath of fresh air at the time.

[surgcmdr]

Moore Era was last Era of the real Bond. Men were men women acted like woman. Before Political correctness gay rights all the liberal bulls**t. I saw the the writing on the wall when M said to Brosnan your a relic relic of the cold war a chauvinist misogynist dinosaur Now woman want to have a real man. But no real men to be found when we been emasculated by the PC media. Glorifying Kaitlyn Jenner. How many single women you know dying to get married because millennial men live with their parent playing video games with a huge credit card debt because the economy is so bad. Moore Era was it downhill from then.

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[Daltonite Toothpaste]

While far from a supporter of the Moore era, I like FYEO. After the goofy-ness of MR, it was an attempt to bring Bond down to earth. Unfortunately, while it tries to be a spy thriller, it is also hampered in being a Moore film, so that means cheap "gags" crowbar'd into the film. It would take TLD to properly bring the series back down to earth.

[ml94]

Best BOND decade with SIR ROG & TIM.

[Omega]

While far from a supporter of the Moore era, I like FYEO. After the goofy-ness of MR, it was an attempt to bring Bond down to earth. Unfortunately, while it tries to be a spy thriller, it is also hampered in being a Moore film, so that means cheap "gags" crowbar'd into the film. It would take TLD to properly bring the series back down to earth.

FYEO had the jailbait figure skater ? She took me out of the movie. I don't know if any actor could of played it off well next to her. Moore looked like her grandfather be propositioned. She probably wasn't as young as she looked. But it had a bad 70's sex abuse vibe. IMHO


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[Omega]

Ok now I feel bad the actress I was talking about had a stroke in 2010, seems like A courageous lady. But I still don't care for her in FYEO

http://m.ocregister.com/articles/holly- ... -life.html

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[Kristatos]

While far from a supporter of the Moore era, I like FYEO. After the goofy-ness of MR, it was an attempt to bring Bond down to earth. Unfortunately, while it tries to be a spy thriller, it is also hampered in being a Moore film, so that means cheap "gags" crowbar'd into the film. It would take TLD to properly bring the series back down to earth.

FYEO had the jailbait figure skater ? She took me out of the movie. I don't know if any actor could of played it off well next to her. Moore looked like her grandfather be propositioned. She probably wasn't as young as she looked. But it had a bad 70's sex abuse vibe. IMHO


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Well, to be fair, it was a rare example of Moore's Bond refusing a proposition from the female of the species. I was a hormonal teenager when I first saw it, and couldn't understand why.

[Daltonite Toothpaste]

While far from a supporter of the Moore era, I like FYEO. After the goofy-ness of MR, it was an attempt to bring Bond down to earth. Unfortunately, while it tries to be a spy thriller, it is also hampered in being a Moore film, so that means cheap "gags" crowbar'd into the film. It would take TLD to properly bring the series back down to earth.

FYEO had the jailbait figure skater ? She took me out of the movie. I don't know if any actor could of played it off well next to her. Moore looked like her grandfather be propositioned. She probably wasn't as young as she looked. But it had a bad 70's sex abuse vibe. IMHO


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I can only hop that if another actor had been cast, FYEO would have turned out more even, and without, of course, Bibi Dahl.

[Omega]

Well, to be fair, it was a rare example of Moore's Bond refusing a proposition from the female of the species. I was a hormonal teenager when I first saw it, and couldn't understand why.

good point . If I'd seen her as a teen maybe I'd see it differently

Looking back maybe Maryam d'Abo from TLD might be too young for dalton, but to me she was just all kinds of awesome. Guess back then I was young enough that she was a cougar


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[Count_Lippe]

Nobody cared about this in the 80s, the age difference between 007 and the ladies. Typical of today's PC climate to have objections about this.

Back then this was a non-issue, and besides the scene with Bibi was done in a humorus manner, there wasn't anything questionable about this. It could have been if Moore had jumped into bed with Bibi but that's exactly what he didn't do.

The only thing that was an issue was that Moore was perhaps starting to be too old to play Bond, that the Bond girls were younger didn't matter, and most of them were not that young either, around 30 or so.

Same goes for Dalton, Kara was a bit girlish but she was still an adult and the relationship they had in the film was more romantic than usual also.