RIP Roger Moore

Some notes on Roger Moore: He knew he was filling big shoes by taking over as James Bond, but he kept his sense of humor . When Sean Connery returned as Bond in "Never Say Never Again," Moore said, "It's the first time I got bad reviews for a film I wasn't even in."

Moore fans might want to check out the Julie Andrews-Ben Kinglsey recording of "The King and I." Moore has a (non-singing) cameo as a British official visiting Anna.

Ghost Story Story

In 1981, they made "Ghost Story," a cool movie about four old men with a terrible secret. It was a horror movie but instead of teenagers getting killed it was old men. Think about it, there's never been a movie like it since. All horror movies are teenage driven.

But let's look at the casting. Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Fred Astaire, Melvyn Douglas and John Houseman.  All but Houseman were major movie stars from the 30s, some 50 years earlier.

Hollywood ultimately remakes everything. If it were to remake "Ghost Story" today, who would they get? Let's see. Fifty years ago was 1963. Which young movie stars from 1963 would they get?

It's easy to say Jack Nicholson and Clint Eastwood, but they're still  major movie stars. Astaire at the time was voicing TV holiday specials and Fairbanks was on the "Love Boat." Only Douglas was making major Hollywood motion pictures (see "Being There").

OK, so we want major movie stars from the 60s, who are not movie stars now (i.e. affordable). This rule would exclude Sean Connery.

Michael Caine
Roger Moore
George Hamilton
Christopher Plummer
Frank Langella
Albert Finney
Peter Fonda
Burt Reynolds

Who am I missing?

Indiana Jones and the Use of Supernatural Foreshadowing

An argument could be made that "Raiders of the Lost Ark" is really a perfect movie. It's exciting, it's beautiful to look at. Harrison Ford is perfectly cast, heck everyone is perfectly cast. And as the years go by, it's becoming universally recognized as a classic. No one remembers the one or two lukewarm reviews it received at the time.

And all the pieces come together at the end.

Or do they?

In all the reviews I've read, I haven't seen what I perceive to be two story holes, one minor, one gaping.

The minor: Where's Abner Ravenwood? The first third of the movie, everyone discusses Abner Ravenwood. He would be Marion's father with whom Indiana had a falling out with several years earlier. This guy has a backstory, everyone talks about him, and as a viewer, you sit there and think, "This is a lot of foreshadowing, that Ravenwood guy should be showing up any minute."

And though Marion said "Abner's dead," I was still waiting for him to show up at the end and save the day.

And he never does.

Then, in the third movie, Sean Connery shows up as Indy's dad. Indy's dad! I didn't even know he had a dad. In the two previous movies a dad is never mentioned. Wouldn't it have been better (from a continuity point of view) that Sean Connery play a character already established in the Raiders universe? Someone who it had already been established had a falling out with Indy? Like Abner Ravenwood?

(There is a similar problem in "The Crystal Skull." Ray Winstone keeps saying, "Indy, I've known you for 30 years." And the viewer keeps saying, "No, I've known Indy for 30 years and I've never met you before." Exactly who was that character written for, Sean Connery, John Rhys-Davies?)

Now, the gaping hole.

Ninety-nine percent of Raiders takes place in the real world, or as real as any early-40s Republic serial. Beating up Nazis, exploring scary caves, etc. But then, something happens at the end. Supernatural doings!

Supernatural doings? Where the hell did those homicidal phantoms come from? Picture watching Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and in the last five minutes, ghosts of dead gold prospectors come out of nowhere and kill the bad guys.

Compare this to possibly the best Raiders clone, "The Mummy." The whole movie has supernatural doings. It's established from the beginning that in this universe, the supernatural exists. It's freaky, but it's there. So when there's a supernatural climax, it's not so jarring.

Not so much for Raiders. Sure they say things like the ark is "A radio to talk to God." But even Indiana pooh-poohs this. Then there's the beginning exposition where Indy shows the feds the Bible illustrations of heathens opening the ark getting smited. I suspect at some point Spielberg thought that that wouldn't be enough foreshadowing. This would explain that one tiny scene in the middle where the ark is in a ship's cargo hold, and the mice start freaking out and the swastika stamped on the side of the crate gets scorched.

This was Spielberg's way of preparing you. He is saying, "Crap, as I'm editing this film, I'm just realizing that giving you a supernatural ending without enough foreshadowing is really unfair, but I've sent the cast home for the shoot, so in post-production I'll make a scene with the ark's crate spontaneously doing something supernatural."

The crazy thing is, all the Indiana Jones movies are guilty of this. The first hour and 55 minutes take place in a realistic world. The last five minutes: A supernatural climax! I think the "Mummy" has the better idea. If you're going to make a movie that takes place in a universe where the supernatural is real, then the whole movie should have supernatural doings.

Bond Lore

In William Goldman's "Adventures in the Screen Trade" (run out, buy it), he talks about a script he wrote in the 1970s loosely based on a true story. In the 1800s in Virginia, a rich dandy fancied himself a pirate, and even had a pirate ship commissioned (the only one ever) so he could take to the seas and play pirate.

That's the true part, in the Goldman script, the dandy runs across a real pirate, a Blackbeard type, and the two come to loggerheads until (as in true buddy cop movie formula) they must overcome their differences to fight a bigger threat.

Here's the genius part: For the pirates he suggested to the studios that Roger Moore play the dandy, and Sean Connery play Blackbeard.

Genius!

How come no one else thought of putting the two James Bonds in a movie? I would have paid money to see that.

The script of course never got produced due to the regular list of Hollywood reasons, but still, can you imagine how cool that film would have been?

But...what if...what if they wanted to make the film today? Quick, someone get Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig on the phone!

James Bond farm teams

As a James Bond fan, I've been interested in the use of copycat casting in the films. Let's think about this for a second. As James Bond became a big phenomena, naturally, imitation being the most sincere form of television, the copycats began. In "The Avengers" we have dapper international crime fighters.
Now, when the James Bond filmmakers needed a love interest for Goldfinger, they turn to the Avengers and recruit Honor Blackman.

OK, as they say in the novel Goldfinger, once is happenstance.

Then Honor Blackman was replaced in the Avengers by Diana Rigg. And when the Bond producers needed a love interest for "On Her Majesty's Secret Service," they get...Diana Rigg.

Twice is coincidence.

When it was time to replace Sean Connery (for the second time), they turned to "The Saint," a TV show about a dapper, tuxedo-wearing globetrotting crime fighter and snagged Roger Moore.

Three times is enemy actions.

(In fairness, the literary Saint predated the literary James Bond.)

But it doesn't stop there. When it was time to replace Moore, the first choice was Pierce Brosnan, who at the time was playing a dapper, tuxedo-wearing globetrotting crime fighter in "Remington Steele." (a Bond footnote. "Remington Steele was as good as cancelled when it was announced Brosnan would be the new Bond. NBC happy with all this publicity, un-cancelled Remington Steele, forcing Brosnan to sit out the next two Bond films. (This worked out for the best I think. I think Brosnan needed time to age into the role.)

All in all, not a lot of imagination in these casting choices. This is why they should get credit for taking chances on the actors with no Bond farm team experience: George Lazenby (a model), Timothy Dalton (who had never played a contemporary role in a film before), and Daniel Craig (who had experience playing gun-toting tough guys, but not as a good guy.).

They should also get credit for casting Sean Connery after his role in "Darby O'Gill and the Little People," in a role obviously written for Cary Grant or David Niven.