Of all the major catalog titles finally making their way to Blu-ray this year, the one that I’m personally most excited for is the ‘Bond 50‘ collection that will be released next week. Even though I already bought most of the James Bond movies when they were previously released on the format, I’m such a sucker for this franchise that I can’t resist the temptation of that lovely box set. In anticipation of this release, I want to run some polls this week to celebrate the 007 movie series. We’ll start with the most obvious question: Which are your favorite James Bond films?
When we last asked this question, the 2006 ‘Casino Royale‘ reboot starring Daniel Craig won out as most people’s favorite entry in the franchise. I’d like to know if that result still holds true a year and a half later.
The other difference between that older poll and this one is that you can vote for as many options as you’d like this time. This isn’t just a competition to see which single title is deemed the “best” Bond film. Go ahead and vote for all the movies that you consider your favorites.
I love the whole Bond series, even the bad movies. I’d be inclined to just check off every box on this list, but the reality is that I of course have some favorites. There’s no arguing against ‘Goldfinger‘. That’s still perhaps the definitive 007 film. In addition to that one (which is just a given), to narrow my picks down to just one choice per actor, I’d have to go with ‘Thunderball‘ for Connery, ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ for Lazenby (perhaps a cheat since it’s his only Bond film, but it’s also a genuinely good one), ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’ for Moore, ‘Licence to Kill‘ for Dalton, ‘GoldenEye’ for Brosnan and ‘Casino Royale’ for Craig. But I also love ‘Dr. No‘, ‘From Russia with Love‘, ‘For Your Eyes Only‘ and the underrated ‘Tomorrow Never Dies’.
Which are your favorites?
If you love the James Bond franchise as much as I do, don’t forget to get your preorder in for the ‘Bond 50’ collection. When you order from Amazon, you’ll also get an exclusive hardcover book about James Bond movie posters.
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EM
I’ve seen only a few of the Bond films, and I’ve loved none of them. But of the ones I’ve seen, I think Goldfinger is the coolest. Certainly it’s got one of the greatest movie songs of all time…! I even once used it as part of an outgoing answering-machine message.
William Henley
Sigh, the 1954 Casino Royale is not listed. I got to have my Jimmy Bond!
While I really like Goldfinger, I think my favorites are the Pierce Bronson movies. Well, not all of them – pretty much Tomorrow Never Dies and Goldeneye.
I have to THINK when I write Goldfinger – I always want to write Goldmember instead.
Josh Zyber
AuthorSorry, William. This is feature films only.
Also, you don’t really like the 1954 Casino Royale. Nobody does. 🙂
William Henley
I guess Jimmy Bond isn’t going to be part of the collection.
I know its bad, but it’s always fun to say you like a movie no one else has ever seen, and it’s fun on Bad Movie Night (we actually watched the Rifftrax of Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny the other day. Jimmy Bond is probably in the same category).
William Henley
I also like saying this version simply because I know I will get a reaction out of Josh – probably the only other person I know who has seen it. It’s like whenever he talks about Dune, and I say that I prefer the SciFi miniseries to the movie (I really do, I just always know how Josh is going to react when I say it). Not that I don’t like the movie – I love it in fact, but I do prefer the mini-series.
Jessica
That’s what you said about Prometheus and yet we smart people love it.
Drew
I’m still reeling from the announcement, over the weekend, that the Alfred Hitchcock Masterpiece Collection has been delayed to the end of October.
I can’t really bring myself to make a worthy comment about Bond movies, after sustaining such a blow.
Dan
From Russia With Loves is my favorite! The train fight is an awesome scene. I’ve really enjoyed Craig’s outings as Bond as well.
Gareth Callenby
I voted for four of the current top five (From Russia With Love, Goldfinger, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and Casino Royale). I loved Goldeneye when I was a kid, but rewatching it now I found it for some reason really off-putting. Tomorrow Never Dies (that’s the one with Jonathan Pryce, right?) was far more enjoyable to me but not enough for me to click it.
I only remember Moonraker (goofy, fun) from Roger Moore and a hyperbaric chamber death from one of the Dalton entries.
Gareth Callenby
The GoldenEye Nintendo 64 game was a far better game than its source material was a movie.
Mike Attebery
I think Alan Cumming did his best to ruin GoldenEye, even if he was invincible.
Deaditelord
I’ve never understood Goldeneye’s popularity… well, the movie anyway. The video game on the other hand…
While I won’t go so far as to claim that it’s the worst of Brosnan’s Bond outings (cough… Die Another Day… cough) I certainly think Goldeneye ranks as one of the lesser James Bond films. My major pet peeve with the movie resides around what others have mentioned: the truly irritating performance of Alan Cumming as Boris Grishenko. If not for the oh-so-hilarious antics of one Sheriff J.W. Pepper, Boris would win the not so coveted award for the series’ most annoying side character. Seriously, who thought this was a good idea???
That alone knocks Goldeneye down quite a few notches in my opinion, but I suppose I could also point to the cheap – even by 1995 standards – special effects and CGI used throughout the movie and the awful musical score.
Oh well… at least they got it right with Tomorrow Never Dies.
Ted S.
Same here, I liked GoldenEye but never understood why it became such a fan favorite of Brosnan’s Bond film. In fact, I remember when it came out in theaters, not many fans or critics liked it. Somehow it became popular as the years gone by. In my opinion, Tomorrow Never Dies was a better film.
slade
there is no way any of the other Brosnan Bond films are even close to Goldeneye!
Tomorrow never dies has one of the worst Bond villians jonathan pryce is terrible – it has great design and a couple of good moments.
But Goldeneye has THE BEST bond villian in Sean Bean he is amazing – so many great line deliveries, and Famke Janssen as Onatopp is also fantastic – the moment when she shoots everyone at the start and almost has an orgasm is hilarious.
Alan Cumming does some great work in there too; hamming it up no end.
The opening bungee jump stunt is hard to beat, the tank chase is tremendous & the fist fight between Brosnan and Bean is a brilliant throwback to old bond fights – seriously go back and watch it now, no shakycam, you can really feel those hits
The film suffers from it’s lower budget relatively than other bond movies, and if david arnold had done the score for it rather than the mis-step of choosing Eric Serra (presumably off the back of Leon) it would be almost perfect.
“for england james”
Ted S.
Well of course that’s your opinion and my opinion is that Tomorrow Never Dies is a better film.
Jake Miles
From Russia With Love is my personal favorite. I think Bond is at his best when he’s actually being a spy. While I love the Daniel Craig reboot, I think it sometimes veers too far over into Bourne territory.
worth
I’m still surprised by all the love Casino Royale gets. It’s certainly an improvement over most of the Brosnan and Dalton films – the direction is solid and the dialogue is sharper, but it’s terribly structured and edited.
Rather than weaving the various story elements seamlessly together, we get a front half loaded with action set-pieces, a card game that goes on far too long and a love story that comes out of nowhere.
And while the notion of doing “Bond Begins” was an interesting idea, but really should have been dropped once they cast a guy pushing 40.
Jessica
I’d say something but it wouldn’t be “worth” it.
Barsoom Bob
From Russia With Love is my favorite also. As stated above it is a real espionage tale but also from the moment they escape from the embassy, a non stop escape/chase movie. The other thing great about it is that it is completely mano v mano, okay it has a mano v helicopter and mano v boats, but it is Bond against the bad guys all the way to the end. I really don’t like the big finishes that started with Goldfinger, where the big climatic battle is good guy army against bad guy army.
Casino Royale (2006) is my second favorite because it returned to this formulation and they eased up on the jokiness.
The last three of my top five are :
Thunderball – Connery on point as Bond, Techno Thriller (nuclear blackmail of U.S. targets), great score, and the best assortment of beautiful women.
GoldenEye – I have hope for Skyfall but Martin Campbell should be the only person allowed to direct Bond films. This was a pretty good return to form for Bond.
Quantum of Solace – I like it, but I do view it as the conclusion to Casino Royale, not a stand alone so much. Trivia, that is Beckett
from Castle as the Candian agent that is about ot get duped by the bad guy at the end that Bond interupts.
Tim H
Love all the Bond films, but Roger Moore’s run are my favorites. Just as Connery was Bond for the 60’s Roger Moore IS James Bond for me. Octopussy was the first Bond film I ever saw in 1983. Still one of my favorites too. Can’t wait for the Bond 50 set next week!
Jessica
Craig’s the best in my book I mean I picked Goldeneye, but it was really a mistake. Should’ve picked Casino Royale instead damn it.
Simon Coles
Casino Royale is one of the most overrated films ever made, and not just within the Bond series. It’s not bad, I just can’t see what all the fuss is about. It’d mediocre at best. Goldfinger is also massively overrated. From Russia With Love is far more definitive. As for my personal favorites I think it doesn’t get much better than The Spy Who Loved Me. It manages to rise above the handicap of being a Moore film and tha in itself is no mean feat.
Jak Donark
For as many votes as OHMSS got, I don’t think anyone commented on it. I wonder sometimes how many people have even seen it, or even given it a chance. Throughout the 80s I don’t recall ever seeing it on ABC (the first home of Bond), and after reading about it in various Bond books I really wanted to see it. It wasn’t until ’91 when TBS had the 007 days of 007 that I saw it. Since then I’ve watched it more than any other. Even though it was the longest Bond until Casino Royale (only beating it by two minutes) the pacing is good, there’s the right balance of action, romance, espionage, and chases. Casino Royale started off good, but after the card game the last half hour seems out of place. Seriously stop the movie after that, and it’s much better. Just like Pearl Harbor, after the attack don’t bother putting in the second disc. And Lazenby brought a real vulnerablity to Bond that I can’t recall ever seeing in any of the other movies. I guess there’s the shower scene and the end of Casino Royale, but by that point I almost felt like they were copying parts of OHMSS (see also: the middle part of For Your Eyes Only, and even the precredits reference).
I liked the more serious tone of Goldeneye, I thought Tomorrow Never Dies seemed too light in places, although it’s miles better than TWINE or DAD. And I will defend Eric Serra’s score. I was a fan of his score for Leon, and his ethereal score for Goldeneye gave it that little bit of uneasy atmosphere that some of the scenes needed, and had the right bit of punch for the action scenes. David Arnold is a good composer, but I thought he was just borrowing too much from John Barry for his TND score. And his scores from the last few just never seemed to be as memorable as anything Barry ever did. (Even Conti’s score for FYEO wasn’t half bad).
And of course I have to say Goldfinger is the definitive Bond. From Russia With Love is pretty awesome, but Goldfinger is the one that set the standard. The gold, the guns, and the girls.