Into the Blu

For Your Eyes Only

Posted on 23. Oct, 2008 by Gino Sassani in 1080p, 2.35:1, AVC MPEG-4, Action, DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 (English), Dolby Digital 2.0 (Spanish), Dolby Digital 5.1 (French), Drama, MGM, Reviews

The title of Roger Moore’s 5^th Bond film actually comes from a short story written by Fleming and not a novel as most of the earlier films did. To make up for the limited source material another Fleming short, Risico, was added to the mix and the screenplay would draw from both works. I’ve already said that Moore is my least favorite Bond, but I have to admit that I like For Your Eyes Only quite a bit. Coming on the heels of one of the absolute worst Bond films ever, Moonraker, it was a welcome return to a simpler adventure that relied more on the characters than gadgets and out of this world locations. Perhaps it was because the reaction to Moonraker was so bad that this crew went out of their way to rein the story and the character in somewhat. There’s even less of Moore’s adlibbed cornball remarks and almost no gadgetry at all. The film also returns to the exotic globetrotting that was missing from many of the 1970’s efforts. The film would feature one of the silliest pre-title sequences. A figure that I assume we are to believe is Number 1 commandeers Bond’s helicopter via remote control. He toys with Bond and the aircraft just long enough for 007 to regain control of the copter. He then picks up the assailant by his wheelchair on the craft’s runners and drops him into an industrial smokestack. If you had not already seen the film, your first reaction might have been something akin to “here we go again”. Fortunately, the rest of the film is unrelated to the incident, a common Bond tradition, and we get a truly down to Earth spy thriller.

A British spy trawler containing the Navy’s secret A.T. A. C. device is attacked and sunk in 500 feet of water. The device is a computer that can control Britain’s entire nuclear submarine arsenal. In Greece an archeologist couple are greeting their daughter aboard their research vessel when the ship is attacked by a strafing aircraft, killing the couple. The daughter, Melina (Bouquet) watches helplessly as her parents are murdered. The two incidents appear related to MI6, and Bond is sent to make the connection and retrieve the A.T.A.C. machine, or at least keep it out of enemy hands. In Greece Bond finds the hit man who had the couple killed getting his payoff. Of course, he’s captured, but quickly escapes with the help of Melina and her crossbow. She wants revenge for her parents’ murder. The two team up. All of the clues lead to a Greek smuggler named Columbo (Topol). This Columbo doesn’t wear a raincoat. When Bond finds himself in Columbo’s clutches, he fears it’s the end until Columbo pleads with him that he’s got the wrong guy and that he’s being set up by rival and former partner, Kristatos (Glover). In his investigation Bond contends with the usual chase scenes. There’s a spiked-wheeled motorcycle gang that chases him down a ski slope, and then he’s roughed up by a hockey team back at the ice rink. Bond’s the only one scoring goals in this game. Finally Bond discovers the downed trawler near the underwater city Melina’s parents were excavating. The two mysteries converge and Bond retrieves the machine, until Kristatos and his boys take it away. Bond and his team trace the gang to a monastery perched atop a huge boulder. That means some treacherous mountain climbing, but Bond’s there just in time for the machine’s pick-up by the Soviets.

This one moves quickly as Bond hops from location to location. One minute he’s on a sunny Greek island and the next he’s at an Olympic mountain covered in snow and ice. While the underwater scenes don’t have the same thrilling moments from Thunderball, they are quite eye-catching as Bond and Melina explore the ancient city beneath the sea. Finally the cliff perched compound is one of the better villain lairs in many films. After his wacky adventure in orbit these are the kind of settings Bond films were eager for, and the film was a huge box office success.

Moore is at least comfortable as Bond by now, and the script scribes managed to keep his witticisms to a minum here. Carole Bouquet is a nice enough looking Bond Girl, but her deadpan acting makes the character one of the stiffest of all of the Bond Girls. She looks pretty good handling the crossbow and strikes a formidable pose, but she doesn’t have the acting chops to bring off the character’s intended strength. About the best thing she has going is a gorgeous head of hair. The other woman is played by real life skating champion Lynn-Holly Johnson, who throws herself at Bond only to be rejected. This might have been the first time Bond throws a girl out of his bed. It didn’t help that she looked 12 and was about the dizziest character in film history. Finally Bond has a short fling with a Countess who meets the usual end. She’s the best of the three, but has just minutes of screen time. A bit of trivia for you is that she was played by Catherine Harris who was married to Pierce Brosnan who was the most recent Bond before the current Daniel Craig. So, if you’re looking at the Bond Girl element, this was a disappointing effort. The real strength in the cast came from Topol playing Columbo and Julian Glover playing Kristatos. Both are formidable villains, even if one begins as a red herring of sorts. Topol has tremendous screen presence and quite frankly causes Roger Moore to be diminished in each scene they are in. Of course Q (Llewelyn) makes a strong appearance, but Moneypenny’s (Maxwell) appearance is extremely brief, and M is supposedly off on vacation or something, so Lee doesn’t show in this one.

Video

For Your Eyes Only is presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1. You get a splendid 1080p image out of the AVC/MPEG-4 codec. Most of the film delivers a solid 30+ mbps bit rate. The time has finally come to see these films in a way that hasn’t been possible maybe even in the theaters during their original releases. This benefits from not only a wonderful HD transfer, but the recent 4k restoration from the camera negatives. This image might be one of the most dated of the Bond films. This film brought Bond into the 80’s, and the picture quality did improve, at least in sharpness. I was particularly impressed with how clear the underwater scenes were. The set designers did a marvelous job on the ruins, and it’s a homage to those guys that this HD transfer allows you to really take in that detail for the first time. Some of the scenes were filmed dry for wet as Bouquet couldn’t swim and was afraid of doing underwater scenes. Black levels are also quite strong as well.

Audio

The DTSHD lossless 5.1 track is somewhat better than the image. I’m actually pretty happy that there wasn’t a footloose effort to overengage the surround mix. Most everything is up front, and that’s actually pretty fine by me. The quality of the sound is all there, however. From the opening moments of the familiar Bond theme to the dialog, you’re going to get everything you came here for. The dynamic range is considerably stronger than previous releases have provided. Not as much sub as I would have liked, but it pleases just enough.

There is an audio commentary featuring many cast and crew participants, but it is a hosted affair. None of the participants were at a screening. It was put together from various archive interviews and such. It’s informative, but sounds too much like a documentary lecture.

There is an additional commentary by Roger Moore. This one is far more entertaining. He does tend to talk about himself a bit much, but there are some rather amusing anecdotes to be found along the way.

Special Features

Most of these features are imported from the last edition of the films.

The extras are grouped under menu headings that I will provide underlined:

Declassified – MI6 Vault:

Bond In Greece: Producer Michael Williams brings us what appear to be home movies of the production in Greece. There’s a lot of relaxed footage as well as filming segments in this 5 minute piece.

Bond In Cortina: From sun to snow, Williams again offers some casual footage of the snow covered mountain locations.

Neptune’s Journey: Again it’s Williams who this time covers the set design of the underwater city, and we get to see the production crew working in the watery environment.

Mission Control: These are direct scene access bookmarks for particular subjects like Women, Villains… and so on. One of the neatest things about these sections is the ability to watch the title sequence sans titles.

Mission Dossier: These are the only HD extras

Inside For Your Eyes Only: This is another half hour feature with Patrick McNee again narrating the piece. This runs pretty much the same way as the previous entries in this series. They didn’t shy away from the crew wanting to move quickly away from Moonraker.

Animated Storyboard Sequences: Both the snowmobile chase and an underwater scene are given the standard animated storyboard run here.

Sheena Easton’s Music Video: The music video for Easton’s performance of the title song is pretty much the title sequence from the film.

Ministry Of Propaganda: This is a collection of trailers, TV spots, and radio ads for the film.

Image Database: A collection of still galleries.

Final Thoughts

Once in a while Bond returns to his roots, and we’re treated to a story that might not really be all that simple but follows the age old Bond formula. We sit down to watch, and we’re made comfortable, and we can enjoy the ride in style. That’s exactly what this film provides. It also marks the near end of the long Moore reign as 007. He would appear in just one more film, and then he was gone from the picture. “Farewell, Mr. Bond. But not goodbye.”