‘For Yours Eyes Only’ or — Finally Forgiving The Flaws?

Despite loving it as a kid I’d always had problems with ‘For Your Eyes Only’ (1981) which are as follows –

Bill Conti’s score — too brassy and harsh and full of toe-curling synths.

The ignominious death of ‘Blofeld’ during the pre-credit sequence.

Bloody Bebe.

Margaret Thatcher and that parrot.

But I was recovering from a bout of food poisoning yesterday and was told to only consume bland morsels so re-visiting felt like all I could manage. And like a piece of dried toast in an exhausted stomach it did the trick as this might not be one of the best Bond films but it’s pretty damn decent.

The story is pretty simple — Bond has to retrieve a ZX-80 from the bottom of the Ionian Sea. The only problem is other interested parties are after it too. Throw in a vengeful orphan, a charismatic smuggler, a sadistic assassin and a treacherous former resistance fighter with a knack for playing both sides and it’s a simple mission which allows for some nice permutations along the way. It’s also stripped down and grounded (for a Bond film) with a heavy reliance on stunt-work and Bond using ingenuity rather than gadgets to escape various scrapes.

Yet what I think I responded to the most was the pacing and cinematography. ‘FYEO’ clips along at a brisk pace with very little down time and even though there aren’t huge set-pieces this means the filmmakers don’t get bogged down on one or two particular showstoppers, keeping the overall momentum moving along. Not that there aren’t some excellent sequences including a fun bike/ski chase and a truly heart-stopping rock climbing scene that might rank as one of Bond’s best moments. The film also looks gorgeous with Alan Hume’s cinematography providing the sort of look I’d kill for the series to return to; the shots from the top of St Cyril’s are down-right beautiful whilst Cortina and Corfu have never looked prettier.

The film also provides Moore’s Bond with possibly his most bad ass moments — kicking Locque’s car off the cliff. It’s the look on his face as he does so reminding us that this quip-cracking, eyebrow raising, loveable guy is, in the end, a killer. The scene is enhanced by a lack of music which really sets the tone and atmosphere and despite Conti’s score being too brash by far he certainly knows when to hit all the beats and punctuation points for maximum effect.

Similar to Peter Hunt directing ’OHMSS’ there’s also the feeling that director John Glen was hungry to make this movie and is seizing the chance to helm is first Bond film with both hands and give it his all. It comes across on the screen with that feeling of someone wanting to make as entertaining a movie as possible, something helped by a good script and a fairly decent plot which straddles realism and escapism better than a lot of films, Bond or non-Bond, I’ve seen recently.

Still the flaws remain. Bebe is and always will be annoying and redundant even if she does give Bond the chance to actually turn down sex which is refreshing, and considering her age relieving, to see. Margaret Thatcher popping up at the end is still cringe-worthy although I DID laugh at it this time, not at Janet Brown’s performance but at Q, Gray and Tanner desperately trying to unplug the audio feed (it’s amazing how food poisoning can lower your expectations for good humour).

The biggest surprise, however, was the opening and the killing of Blofeld which this time didn’t bother me. I’ve always hated this moment and for good reason as it takes Bond’s best and biggest nemesis and treats him as a throw away joke to spite the rival Bond production — if we can’t have Blofeld then screw you, we’ll just kill him off. For years I protested that this wasn’t canon Blofeld as it just didn’t even seem to make sense. But now…? Now we’ve had ‘Spectre’ and an incarnation and usage of Blofeld that is WAY worse, way more franchise destroying than any amount of stainless-steel delicatessens could ever manage. Seriously, Blofeld offering James Bond quality cook-ware in exchange for his life is way less awful than Blofeld being Bond’s bloody brother. So thank you ‘Spectre’ from the bottom of my heart because you are a shit film but I can now die happy knowing Blofeld is lying in the bottom of a chimney in a mangled wheelchair… and I thought that was something impossible to achieve.

It might sound like I’m damning ‘For Yours Eyes Only’ with faint praise by saying it’s a decent Bond film but that’s what it is and, sometimes, that’s all you want. It doesn’t outstay its welcome, has very little fat and, in my opinion, is aging rather nicely indeed.