Richard Maibaum Movies

For his second outing as James Bond, Timothy Dalton is working on his own rather than on behalf of the British Secret Service in this follow-up to The Living Daylights). When his American friend Felix Leiter (David Hedison), an agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration, is seriously injured by drug dealer Franz Sanchez (Robert Davi), 007 is out for blood. There is precious little time for the usual Bondian quippery and campiness, resulting in a marked increase in bloodletting (including the "implosion" of secondary villain Anthony Zerbe). A climactic highway chase involving an oil tanker and a helicopter is the highlight, as well as Benecio Del Toro in an early role as the psychotic henchman Dario. Licence to Kill's intensified taste for violence lessened Bond's box-office value, and helped keep 007 off the screen for another six years before Pierce Brosnan took up the mantle. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Secret Agent 007 must stop a megalomaniacal technology mogul from destroying Silicon Valley in this fourteenth episode of the long-running James Bond series. Computer baron Max Zorin (Christopher Walken) is planning to trigger a major California earthquake in order to wipe out his competitors. Bond is dispatched to stop him in Europe, where he is partnered with Sir Godfrey Tibbet (Patrick MacNee). Sent in to slow down Bond and Company is Max Zorin's sadistic and murderous sidekick May Day (Grace Jones), the first of two Bond girls in the film (the other being Tanya Roberts). The expected high-wire confrontations ensue, including a parachute jump off the Eiffel Tower, a drive through the streets of Paris with a car cut in half, and a life-or-death struggle with a blimp on top of the Golden Gate Bridge. This production is most notable for the fact that it marked the final appearance of Roger Moore as the dashing Bond. ~ Judd Blaise, Rovi

Roger Moore is back as Secret Agent 007, this time on the trail of shipwreck that holds an Automatic Targeting Attack Communicator (ATAC) for all of the British Naval submarine fleet. Along the way he teams up with the beautiful Melina, played by Carole Bouquet, a maiden out for revenge against a Cuban hitman who killed her father, the head of a British effort to salvage the ATAC. Turns out the hitman was in league with Greek businessman Aris Kristatos (Julian Glover). who's working for the Soviets to attain the Communicator. Together with a drug smuggling rival of Kristatos (played by Topol), Bond and Melina race against time before the keys to all of Britain's missles get in the wrong hands. Richard Maibaum's screenplay has very little to do with the collection of short stories that made up Ian Fleming's For Your Eyes Only, save for the plotline involving Melina's seeking vengeance for the death of her father. The direction is by John Glen, who'd previously done second unit work on other Bond films and went on to direct four more films in the franchise. For Your Eyes Only eschews the gimmickry and campiness of earlier Roger Moore efforts by concentrating instead on intrigue, save for the campy opening that sees Bond dispatch the dastardly Blofeld in a broad comedic pre-credits scene. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Though not Ian Fleming's most famous James Bond novel, 1962's The Spy Who Loved Me was distinguished by the unique device of telling the story from the heroine's point of view; in fact, Bond doesn't make an appearance until the book is two-thirds over. This would hardly work in the film world's Bond franchise, so the original austere plotline of the novel was eschewed altogether in favor of a labyrinthine story involving outer-space extortion. The leading lady, a "hard-luck kid" in the original, is now sexy Russian secret agent Barbara Bach, who joins forces with Bond (Roger Moore, making his third appearance as 007) to foil yet another megalomaniac villain (Curt Jurgens), who plans to threaten New York City with nuclear weaponry. Beyond the eye-popping opening ski-jump sequence, the film's best scenes involve seven-foot-two Richard Kiel as steel-toothed henchman Jaws. Fifteen scriptwriters worked on The Spy Who Loved Me; only two were credited, including Bond-film veteran Richard Maibaum. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Glenn Ford is Jarrett, a former boxer with an artistic streak. He becomes a private detective, specializing in cases that will allow him to breath the rarefied air of art galleries and museums. Anthony Quayle is Jarrett's "Moriarity," a wealthy art collector who will stop at nothing to build up his collection. Jarrett was written to accommodate a younger actor, but the producers owed a commitment to Glenn Ford. As a result, the storyline, involving the search for some rare scrolls, became an endurance test for both the venerable Mr. Ford and the audience. To be fair, the star does manage to handle the glib dialogue well (when he's not out of breath). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

It wasn't as well received at the box office as the pictures that preceded it or followed it, but Peter Hunt's On Her Majesty's Secret Service is one of the finest of the James Bond movies. James Bond, portrayed here by George Lazenby (in his only performance in the role) has spent nearly two years trying to track down Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Telly Savalas), the head of SPECTRE. He has been taken off the case by his chief (Bernard Lee), an action the pushes him to the point of considering resigning from Her Majesty's Secret Service, just as he opens a possible new avenue of attack on his quarry. Whilst in the field, Bond has chanced to cross paths with the Contessa Teresa Di Vicenzo (Diana Rigg), a beautiful but desperately unhappy woman, whom he rescues from one apparent suicide attempt and an embarrassing moment at a casino gaming table -- the Contessa, who prefers to be called Tracy ("Teresa was a saint"), is the daughter of Marc Ange Draco (Gabriele Ferzetti), an industrial and construction magnate and also a crime boss, who is impressed with Bond personally as well as professionally, and would like to see him marry his daughter. Bond is, at first, unwilling to involve himself with a woman -- any woman -- on that level, but Draco's underworld contacts give Bond a vital clue to Blofeld's whereabouts that get him back on the case and hot on the man's trail. Journeying incognito to Blofeld's mountaintop retreat in the Swiss Alps, Bond finds the criminal mastermind posing as a would-be nobleman and also as a philanthropist, running a clinic devoted to the treatment and eradication of allergies. It's all a front for a surprisingly sinister (and scientifically valid) plot for international blackmail that would make any previous Bond villain quake in fear. And in the process of staying alive long enough to have a chance of stopping Blofeld, Bond discovers the Tracy is truly like no woman he's ever known before -- one special enough that he finds himself willing to give up his life as a free-living, free-loving bachelor. ~ Bruce Eder, Rovi

Thunderball finds James Bond matching wits with the sinister espionage organization S.P.E.C.T.R.E, (which stands for Special Executive for Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion). This time, S.P.E.C.T.R.E. hijacks a NATO nuclear bomber, hiding the bombs under the ocean depths and threatening to detonate the weapons unless a ransom of 100,000,000 pounds is paid. The mastermind behind this scheme is international business executive Emilio Largo (Adolfo Celi), who maintains a pool full of sharks for the purpose of eliminating enemies and those henchmen who fail to come up to standard. Dispatched to the Bahamas, lucky Mr. Bond enjoys the attentions of three nubile ladies: Largo's mistress Domino Derval (Claudine Auger), British spy Paula Caplan (Martine Beswick, previously seen as a gypsy girl in the 1962 Bond epic From Russia With Love) and enemy agent Fiona Volpe (Luciana Paluzzi). ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

From Russia With Love, the second in the series of James Bond films, is the film that solidifies all the Bond film elements into a formula -- the action sequences are intensified and lend greater tension to the proceedings; John Barry's inimitable score makes its first appearance; and Sean Connery as Bond has nailed down his role as 007 -- accentuating Bond's stylishness and sophistication, while toning down his cold-bloodedness. In From Russia With Love, the bad guys don't want to take over the world. They want something more mundane -- a Russian decoding device. Assigned to the mission of stealing the decoding device are No. 3, former KGB agent Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya), and No. 5, Kronsteen (Vladek Sheybal), an expert chess player who has plotted every move of the mission. Kronsteen's plan requires using Bond's weakness for women as an element in acquiring the decoding device. Once Bond obtains the decoding device from Russian cipher clerk Tatiana Romanova (Daniela Bianchi), SPECTRE muscleman Red Grant (Robert Shaw) is to forcibly take it from Bond and kill him. But Bond suspects a trap. Being Bond, however, he can't resist the lure of a beautiful woman. So, flaunting danger, Bond travels to Istanbul to meet Tatiana. The centerpiece of this 007 feature is the thrilling fight to the death between Bond and enemy agent Red Grant aboard the Orient Express. ~ Paul Brenner, Rovi

The most successful of network television's many WWII dramatic series of the '60s, Combat!, ran for five seasons on ABC -- or roughly one year longer than the war lasted! Set in the months following D-Day, the weekly, hour-long series focused on King Company, a platoon of American GIs battling their way through Southern Europe, encountering action, adventure, humor, heartbreak and dozens of guest stars along the way. Throughout the series' run, King Company was headed by gritty, taciturn Sgt. Chip Saunders (Vic Morrow) and his superior officer, cool and courageous Lt. Gil Hanley (Rick Jason). Though several soldiers were attached to the platoon from one season to the next, the most enduring of the supporting players were Pierre Jalbert as Paul "Caje" Lemay, Jack Hogan as "Wild Man" Kirby, and Dick Peabody as PFC Littlejohn. Some of the better episodes were directed by such Hollywood heavyweights as Robert Altman and Burt Kennedy. Filmed in glorious black-and-white during its first four seasons -- the better to accommodate newsreel footage of actual wartime battles -- Combat! switched to color for its fifth and final season on the air. ~ Rovi

Real-life WW II hero Audie Murphy stars in this war drama that follows the exploits of a civilian who works closely with Filipino resistance fighters against the Japanese invaders. The man has come to the islands to find his new wife after they are separated during their honeymoon in Manila. She is alive but thinks that her hubby died under enemy fire. She then begins to fall in love with one of the underground leaders. Meanwhile, her husband and his buddy must fight the Japanese and the jungle until at last they find her. As soon as they are reunited, the guerrilla gracefully bows out, leaving the couple to head home and resume their lives. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

This crime caper based on a legendary robbery stars Aldo Ray as Norgate, the ringleader of the thieves out to steal a bundle from the Bank of England. But it is a young Peter O'Toole as the guard Fitch who steals the show -- two years before Lawrence of Arabia would make him an internationally acclaimed star. The year is 1901 and Norgate is an avid supporter of Irish Home Rule, avid enough to plan this robbery to get the bullion needed to make his independence wishes come true. He gathers together the necessary crew of brains, brawn, and bravado, and the would-be thieves make their way through a sewer system that runs under the bank. What they do not count on is that Fitch may not be quite as dumb as he seems. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

A stellar cast redeems the tawdry European-filmed melodrama 3DThe Man Inside3D. Nigel Patrick plays Sam Carter, a mild-mannered British clerk who spends half his life fantasizing about stealing a valuable diamond. When he is finally able to pull off this heist, it is at the cost of another man's life. Escaping to the Continent, Sam lives like a king, throwing his money around and romancing an unending stream of willing females. Private detective Milo March (Jack Palance) suspects that Sam is in some way tied in with the jewel theft, as are several less reputable types. Among the latter category are femme fatale Trudie Hall (Anita Ekberg) and two-bit crooks Lomer (Bonar Colleano, whose last film this was) and Rizzio (Sean Kelly). Anthony Newley also shows up briefly as a comedy-relief cabbie. If 3DThe Man Inside3D seems like a dry run for the "James Bond" films of the 1960s, it may be because the film was produced by Albert "Cubby" Broccoli and scripted by Richard Maibaum, both mainstays of the Bond series. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi