Diamonds Are Forever is the 1971 James Bond spy film and the seventh in the James Bond series produced by Eon Productions. This is Eon's sixth and last movie starring Sean Connery, who returned to the role of James Bond fictional MI6 agent, for the first time since You Only Live Twice (1967), after refusing to repeat the role in > On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969).
The film is based on the 1956 Ian Fleming novel of the same title, and is the second of four James Bond movies directed by Guy Hamilton. The story has a Bond who mimics a diamond smuggler to infiltrate a smuggling ring, and immediately uncovers the plot by his arch-enemy Ernst Stavro Blofeld to use diamonds to build space-based laser weapons. Bond must fight his arch-rivals for the last time, to stop smuggling and stop Blofeld's plan to destroy Washington, D.C., and blackmail the world with nuclear supremacy.
After George Lazenby left the series, producers Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli tested other actors, but the United Artists studio wanted Sean Connery back, paying $ 1.25 million after that to return it. The producers are inspired by Goldfinger ; like the movie, Guy Hamilton was hired to direct, and Shirley Bassey did a vocal on the theme song title. Locations include Las Vegas, California, Amsterdam and Lufthansa hangars in Germany. Diamonds Are Forever is a commercial success, but receives criticism for its funny camp tone. The film marks the last appearance of the SPECTER (though not by name) organization in the Eon Bond film until the 2015 film of the same name.
Video Diamonds Are Forever (film)
Plot
James Bond - Agent 007 - chases Ernst Stavro Blofeld to take revenge for his wife's death, hunts SPECTER operations around the world. He eventually finds him in a facility where a Blofeld-like is made through plastic surgery. Bonds kill the test subjects, and then "real" Blofeld, by drowning them in a super hot mud pool.
While the killers. Wint and Mr. Kidd systematically kills several diamond smugglers, M suspects that South African diamonds are hoarded to push prices by dumping, and ordered Bond to uncover smuggling rings. Disguised as a professional smuggler and assassin Peter Franks, Bond traveled to Amsterdam to meet Tiffany Case's contact. Frank actually appears on the street, but the Bond cuts and kills him, then switches ID to make it appear as if Frank is Bond. Case and Bond then goes to Los Angeles, smuggles diamonds in Frank's body.
At Bond airport meet his CIA ally, Felix Leiter, then travel to Las Vegas. At the funeral home, Frank's body was cremated and the diamond passed to another smuggler, the Teduh Tree. Bonds were almost killed by Wint and Kidd when they put them into a coffin and sent them to the cremation oven, but Trees stopped the process when he discovered that diamonds in Frank's body were falsely planted by Bond and CIA.
Bonds say Leiter to send him the real diamond. Bond then goes to Whyte House, a casino-hotel owned by secret billionaire Willard Whyte, where Tree works as a stand-up comedian. Bonds observed the action of the Tree and then went into the locker room, where it found there that the Tree had been killed by Wint and Kidd, who did not know that the diamond was fake.
At the craps table, Bond meets Opllt O'Toole's opportunism; after gambling, he took her to his room. The gang members ambushed them, throwing O'Toole out of the window and into the pool. Bond spent the rest of the night with Tiffany Case, instructing her to take the original diamonds at Circus Circus casino.
Tiffany reneged on her deal to reunite with Bond and instead escaped, handing her a diamond to the next smuggler. However, seeing that O'Toole was killed (after being misinterpreted), Tiffany changed her mind. He drove Bond to the airport, where the diamond was given to Whyte's casino manager, Bert Saxby, who was followed to a remote facility. Bonds enter a clear goal of diamond: a research laboratory owned by Whyte, where satellites are being built by Professor Metz, a laser refraction specialist. Metz false bonds by saying he is Klaus Hergersheimer, a technician whom he met at the facility. The cover was blown when the original Hergersheimer appeared. Bonds try to stay hidden, but are seen by a technician. He manages to evade the security guard by stealing the lunar train and reuniting with Tiffany. The lab reports Bond's activity to the sheriff's office. Bond and Tiffany return to Las Vegas; they were seen there by the Las Vegas police, who were involved in a car chase, but Bond managed to avoid all the cars.
Bond then scale the wall to the top floor Whyte House to face Whyte. He was met by two identical Blofelds, who used electronic devices to sound like Whyte. Bonds killed one of the Blofelds, which turned out to be similar. Blofeld actually pulled the gun to Bond, and instructed him into the elevator, where he was knocked out by gas. He was picked up by Wint and Kidd, and taken to the Las Vegas Valley, where he was placed in a pipeline and left to die. The plumbing was buried the next morning.
Bond escapes and calls Blofeld, using a similar electronic device made by Q to pose as Saxby. He knew Whyte was kept in his summer home outside the city and went there with Felix and the CIA. After a brief battle with Whyte's female guard, Bambi and Thumper, they save Whyte. Saxby tried to kill Bond outside the summer house, but was shot dead during a firefight ensuring. Meanwhile, Blofeld kidnaps Case. With the help of Whyte, Bond raided the lab and unveiled Blofeld's plot to make laser satellites using diamonds, which have now been delivered into orbit. With the satellite, Blofeld destroyed nuclear weapons in China, the Soviet Union and the United States, then proposed an international auction for global nuclear supremacy.
Whyte identified the oil platform off the coast of Baja California as Blofeld's operating base. After Bond's attempt to change the tape containing the satellite control code failed due to a mistake by Tiffany, a helicopter attack on an oil rig was launched by Leiter and the CIA.
Blofeld tried to escape on a dwarf submarine, but Bond gained control of the submarine launch and crashed the sub into the control room, causing both the control of the satellite and its base being destroyed. Bond and Tiffany then head for England on a cruise ship, where Wint and Kidd posed as room service maids and tried to kill them with a hidden bomb. Bonds alter tables on them, causing Kidd to throw himself into the sea after being burned and Wint to detonate the bomb after being thrown overboard. Tiffany then asks James Bond sensitive questions: "How can we bring that diamond down again?"
The obvious cause of the question is the satellite diamond, which can be seen by Bond and Tiffany as a point in the night sky.
Maps Diamonds Are Forever (film)
Cast
- Sean Connery as James Bond: Agent MI6, codenamed 007.
- Jill St. John as Tiffany Case: A diamond smuggler.
- Charles Gray as Ernst Stavro Blofeld: Head of SPECTER and archaeological Bond arches. (Gray previously appeared in the series when he played Dikko Henderson in 1967 You Only Live Twice ).
- Jimmy Dean as Willard Whyte: An entrepreneur, loosely based on Howard Hughes.
- Bruce Glover and Putter Smith as Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd: Blofeld's accomplices.
- Norman Burton as Felix Leiter: CIA Agent, and Bond ally in tracking Blofeld.
- Joseph Furst as Professor Doctor Metz: The brilliant scientist and world-renowned expert on laser refraction, which is on the Blofeld payroll.
- Lana Wood as Plenty O'Toole: A gold digging Bond beauty met at the casino.
- Bruce Cabot as Bert Saxby: Whyte's casino manager conspires with Blofeld. This is the latest feature film feature Cabot.
- Bernard Lee as M: Head of MI6.
- Lois Maxwell as Miss Moneypenny: Secretary M.
- Desmond Llewelyn as Q: Head of the MI6 engineering department.
- Joe Robinson as Peter Franks: A diamond smuggler whose identity was taken by Bond.
- David Bauer as Morton Slumber: President of Slumber Incorporated, the funeral home.
- Marc Lawrence as an officer of Slumber Inc.
- Sid Haig as a Slumber Inc officer.
- Leonard Barr as a Shady Tree: Jokes and stand-up smugglers.
- Laurence Naismith as Sir Donald Munger: A diamond expert who brought the case to MI6.
- David de Keyser as Doctor
- Ed Bishop as Klaus Hergersheimer: Health physicist for WW Techtronics. (not verified)
- Lola Larson and Trina Parks as Bambi and Thumper: Guardian Willard Whyte. (not verified)
- Brinsley Forde as Joshua, Houseboy (unverified)
Production
The producers initially intend to have Diamonds Are Forever recreating the commercial success aspects of Goldfinger, including hiring director Guy Hamilton. Peter R. Hunt, who has directed At Her Majesty's Secret Service and worked in all previous Bond films as an editor, was invited before Hamilton, but because involvement with other projects can only work on the film if the production date is delayed , which is rejected by the manufacturer.
Write
While In Your Noble Secret Service is in post-production stage, Richard Maibaum writes initial treatment and script for Diamonds Are Forever as a revenge-themed sequel with Irma Bunt and Marc-Ange Draco back, and Bond mourns for his dead wife Tracy, while Louis Armstrong's "We Have All Time in the World" is playing in the background. When George Lazenby departed from the role before the release of the film, a complete rewrite was requested, in addition to the Maibaum script that failed to impress Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman. After this, the original plot has as evil brother Auric Goldfinger, seeking revenge for the death of his brother. The plot then changed after Broccoli dreamed, in which his close friend Howard Hughes was replaced by an impostor. So the character of Willard Whyte was made, and Tom Mankiewicz was chosen to rework the script. Mankiewicz says he was hired because Broccoli wanted an American writer to work on his script, because so much was made in Las Vegas "and the English write very bad American gangsters" - but it must be someone who also understands the English Idioms, because it has English characters. David Picker from United Artists has seen the music scene
The adaptation eliminates the major criminals from the source novels of Ian Fleming, a mafia named Jack and Seraffimo Spang, but using the shady Tree, Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd.
Maibaum's original idea to end is to chase the giant boat on Lake Mead, with Blofeld being chased by Bond and all the casino owners of Las Vegas, who will sail on their private yachts. Bonds are to awaken allies into action with Lord Nelson's famous joke, "Las Vegas expects everyone to do their job." Maibaum misinformed; there was no Roman ship or junk in Las Vegas, and the idea was too expensive to imitate, so it was dropped.
Maibaum might have thought that the oil rig ended in the end as a poor substitute, but was originally meant to be far more spectacular. Armed farmers will jump from helicopter to sea and stick a mine to the rig legs (this explains why frogs appear on movie posters). Blofeld will flee at BathoSub and Bond will chase him, depending on the weather balloon. The chase will continue in a salt mine, with two bitter enemies who fight over the white salt hills before Blofeld will fall to his death in the salt granulator. Permission not given by salt mine owners. It also makes the sequence too long. A further problem occurs when the explosives installed for the final leave too early; fortunately, some cameras are ready and capable of capturing recordings.
Casting
George Lazenby initially offered a contract for seven Bond films, but refused and left after just one, At Her Majesty's Secret Service , at the suggestion of his agent. The producers considered replacing it with John Gavin (though the stars Batman , Adam West and Burt Reynolds have also been considered); Reynolds and West have stated that Bond should not be played by American actors. Michael Gambon declined the offer, telling Broccoli that he was "in a terrible condition." United Artists' head David Picker is unhappy with this decision and insists that Connery will be interested in returning to that role and that money is not a problem. When approached about continuing the role of Bonds, Connery charged a fee of Ã, £ 1.25 million. In order to attract the attention of actors to play Bond once more, United Artists offers to support two films of his choice. After both sides agree to the agreement, Connery uses the fee to set up the Scottish International Education Trust, where Scottish artists can apply for funding without having to leave their country to pursue their careers. Since John Gavin is no longer in the running of his role, his contract is fully paid by United Artists. The first film made under Connery's deal was The Offense , directed by his friend Sidney Lumet. The second is to be an adaptation of Macbeth by William Shakespeare, using only the Scottish actor and where Connery himself will play the title role. The project was abandoned because the Roman Polanski version of Macbeth has been produced.
Charles Gray plays the villain Ernst Stavro Blofeld, after playing Bond's ally named Dikko Henderson at You Only Live Twice (1967). David Bauer, who plays Morton Slumber, has previously appeared in the film, not recognized, as an American diplomat.
Jazz musician Putter Smith was invited by Harry Saltzman to play Mr. Kidd, after the Thelonious Monk Band performance. Musician Paul Williams initially served as Mr. Wint. When he could not agree with the producers for compensation, Bruce Glover succeeded him. Glover said he was surprised to be elected, because at first the producers said he was too normal and that they wanted the defective actor Peter Lorre.
Movie star Bruce Cabot, who plays Bert Saxby, died the following year; Diamonds turned out to be the role of his last film. Jimmy Dean plays Willard Whyte after Saltzman sees a presentation about him. Dean is very worried about playing Howard Hughes pastiche, because he is a Hughes employee at the Desert Inn.
Raquel Welch, Jane Fonda and Faye Dunaway are considered for the role of the Tiffany Case. Jill St. John was initially offered the part of Plenty O'Toole, but landed a female actor after Sidney Korshak, who helped film producers in Las Vegas, recommended his client St. John, who became the first Bond American girl.. Lana Wood plays the role of Plenty O'Toole, following the advice of screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz. Denise Perrier, Miss World 1953, plays "Marie", a woman in a bikini forced by Bond to reveal the location of Blofeld.
A cameo appearance by Sammy Davis, Jr. who played on the roulette table was filmed, but the scene was finally removed.
Filming
The filming began on 5 April 1971, with the South African scene completely shot in the desert near Las Vegas, and was completed on August 13, 1971. The film was mainly taken in the United States, with locations including Los Angeles International Airport, Universal City Studios and eight hotels in Las Vegas. In addition to Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire, elsewhere in the UK are Dover and Southampton. The sequence of climactic oil rigs was shot off the coast of Oceanside, California. Other shooting locations include Cap D'Antibes in France for the opening scene, Amsterdam and hangar Lufthansa at Frankfurt Airport, Germany.
Filming in Las Vegas is mostly done at Howard Hughes hotels, because he is a friend of Cubby Broccoli. The empty streets to shoot were achieved through Hughes's collaboration, Las Vegas police and shopkeepers' associations. The Las Vegas Hilton doubled for Whyte House, and since the owner of Circus Circus was a Bond fan, he let Circus be used in movies and even made a cameo. The cinematographers say shooting in Las Vegas at night has the advantage: no additional lighting is needed due to the high number of fluorescent lights. Sean Connery spent most of his time at a location in Las Vegas. "I do not sleep at all, we shoot every night, I catch all the shows and play golf all day.On the weekend I faint - boy, did I collapse, like a skull with a foot." He also plays a slot machine, and once postponed the scene because he collected his victory. While filming in Las Vegas Connery dated Lana Wood's opponent.
The site used for Willard Whyte Space Labs (where Bond was killed on Buggy Moon) actually, at that time, a Johns-Manville gypsum factory located outside Las Vegas. The Kirk Douglas house was used for scenes at Tiffany's house, while Elrod's House in Palm Springs, designed by John Lautner, became Willte Whyte's home. Slumber's slate exterior shot is from Palm Mortuary in Henderson, Nevada. The interior is a set built at Pinewood Studios, where Ken Adam imitates stained glass windows in the shape of the original building in the center. During the filming of the location, Adam visited several funeral homes in the Las Vegas area, the inspiration behind the striking design of the Slumber morgue (the use of Bland Art Nouveau furniture and Tiffany lamps) comes from these experiences. Production wrapped in crematory order, on August 13, 1971.
Because the car chasing in Las Vegas will experience a lot of car accidents, the filmmakers have arrangements with Ford to use their vehicles. Ford's only request is that Sean Connery must drive the Mustang Mach 1 of 1971 that serves as Tiffany Case's car. The Moon Buggy was inspired by the actual NASA vehicle, but with the addition of like hitting the arm because the manufacturer did not find the design "outrageous" enough. Built by a custom car manufacturer Dean Jeffries on a rear-engined Corvair chassis, it's capable of road speed. Fiberglass tires should be replaced during the chase sequence because heat and desert soils do not irregularly damage them.
Hamilton had the idea of ​​making a fight scene inside the elevator, which was choreographed and performed by Sean Connery and stuntman Joe Robinson. The car chase where the red Mustang came off the narrow street on the opposite side where it was rolled up, filmed for three nights on Fremont Street in Las Vegas. The sequence of roll gangley car is actually filmed in two locations. The entrance is in the Universal Studios car park and the exit is on Fremont Street, Las Vegas. This ultimately inspires a continuity error, when the car enters the alley on the right side of the tire and out of the way driving on the left side. During a car chase where police chased Bond in a small parking lot, Mustang had to jump over several cars. Bill Hickman (Bullitt fame) performs this action; the stunt driver hired, they can not do this and ruin two or three cars. The casting team had only one car left so they called Hickman - who drove the car for hours to the location, jumped to the Mustang, and did acrobats in one shot. When filming the scene finds Plenty O'Toole drowned in Tiffany's pool, Lana Wood really has her legs loosely tied to the cement block at the bottom. The film crew member held the rope across the pond for her, by which she could lift her face out of the water to breathe between the time it took. The bottom of the pool makes the blocks slip into deeper water with each take. Finally, Wood is submerged but is noticed by the one who sees and is saved before it is completely submerged. Wood, becoming a certified diver, took water but remained calm during the ordeal, though he later admitted some "very uncomfortable moments and some struggled until they pulled me out."
Music
"Diamonds Are Forever", the title song, is the second James Bond theme to be performed by Shirley Bassey, after "Goldfinger" in 1964. In an interview for James Bond's Greatest Hits television program, composer John Barry reveals that he told Bassey to imagine him singing about the penis. Bassey will then return for the third show for 1979 Moonraker .
The original soundtrack was once again composed by John Barry, the sixth time composing for the Bond film.
With Connery back in the lead role, "James Bond Theme" is played by electric guitar in a rather unusual sequence, blued gunbarrel accompanied by ripples of prisms of light, in pre-credit sequences, and in full orchestral versions during the hovercraft sequence in Amsterdam.
Release and acceptance
Diamonds Forever airs on Odeon Leicester Square. It was released on December 14, 1971. It grossed $ 116 million worldwide, of which $ 43 million came from the United States.
Reviews are mixed, and camp tones have a mostly negative reaction. The film currently has a 67% "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Connery was applauded by Kevin A. Ranson from MovieCrypt and Michael A. Smith from Pop Nolan Culture . Critic Roger Ebert noted, in positive reviews, the irrelevance of the story line and the "moments of silliness," as Bond found himself riding a moon train with spinning antennas and flapping robotic arms. He praised the Las Vegas car chase scene, particularly the segment when Bond moved the Mustang with two wheels. Twenty-five years after its release, James Berardinelli criticized the concept of laser photo shoots, the Jill St. show. John, Norman Burton, and Jimmy Dean. Christopher Null calls St. John "one of the most ineffective Bond girls - pretty, but shrill and helpless". Steve Rhodes said, "looks and acts like a pair of pseudo-country fools, [Putter Smith and Bruce Glover] seem to have walked accidentally from the adjacent sound stage into the making of this movie." But he also praised car chases as "classic". According to Danny Peary, Diamonds Forever is "one of the most forgettable films of the entire Bond series" and that "until Blofeld's appearance we have to watch what is not better than the usual smuggling-diamond melodrama, without the spectacle we associate with the James Bond: the Las Vegas setting is not quite exotic, there's a bit of humor, the killers Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint are similar to the characters you'll find on The Avengers, but hardly funny - and problems Bond comes in, even Maxwell Smart can get away with it. "IGN chose it as the third worst James Bond film, behind only The Man with the Golden Gun and Die Another Day. Film Total lists Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, and Bambi and Thumper, as the first and second worst criminals in the Bond series (respectively). The film was received more positively by Xan Brooks of The Guardian, who said it was "strangely remarkable, the best of the group: a perfect and bleak Bond film for an imperfect Western world."
The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Sound for Gordon McCallum, John W. Mitchell, and Al Overton. It's lost to Fiddler on the Roof .
See also
- James Bond Outline
References
Source
External links
- Diamonds Are Forever on IMDb
- Diamonds Forever in the TCM Film Database
- Diamonds Are Forever at AllMovie
- Berlian Is Forever at Rotten Tomatoes
- Diamond Is Forever in Box Office Mojo
- Official MGM website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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