movie review - License to Kill
the journal of Michael Werneburg
twenty-seven years and one million words
Today my son and I watched our fourth James Bond movie, for the fourth actor to take on the role. We'd previously watched "Goldfinger", "In Her Majesty's Secret Service", and "The Spy Who Loved Me". The first was slow and stiff, featured a rape committed by the hero, and generally felt dated and cartoonishly naive. The second was a huge improvement with some problems, being effectively two movies with distinct tone and purpose, one inserted inside the other. The third was over-the-top camp. Of the three I recommend only the second.
Which brings us to today's outing, a movie from 1985 (eight years after the third of our set) and featuring then-to-favorite Bond; Timothy Dalton. His is an all-business Bond, or near enough. To me, he was the first who seemed like he might actually have some of the nerve and character needed for such a job. We agreed that the plot was substantially better than those of the previous actors' movies, and that the tone and seriousness were a substantial credit to the movie. There were a good number of over-the-top scenes in it that kept it from getting *too* serious, but these didn't derail the story.
I think most of it aged well, certainly it's far more modern than the plodding Connery stuff in the sixties or Moore's smirking womanizing. Recommended.
P.S. I hadn't realized that a (very) young Benicio Del Toro was in this. Naturally, his character doesn't survive.