Rent James Bond: Live and Let Die (1973)

Entertaining and Controversial 007 & Roger Moore's First - James Bond: Live and Let Die review by GI

Roger Moore's first outing as James Bond 007 and in fact the oldest actor at 45 to play him. This remains Moore's best film in the role and it is a worthy introductory film for the long series he went onto make. Many attribute The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) as the pinnacle of Moore's Bond movies but I disagree because I think it's here that the cross over from Connery (and not forgetting George Lazenby) was very cleverly done. Moore had an extra lightness to his predecessors but the dark edges of the Bond character remained and the overuse of wacky gadgets had yet to take hold where the franchise slipped woefully into spoof mode. This is a full on Boy's Own Adventure style narrative and the espionage theme is more or less dispensed with making it very comicbook and at times you just have to go with it. Here Bond is sent to the USA to liaise with the CIA into an investigation into the murder of three British agents. He discovers a link between a New Orleans based drug dealer and the leader of a small Caribbean island and sets out to bring down the entire organisation. Yaphet Kotto is a good villain with the usual lair that 007 must infiltrate to bring him down and Jane Seymour is a particularly beautiful woman who has to be seduced. This film has some exciting set pieces not least the chase sequences and especially the central speed boat chase through the Louisiana rivers. Like a lot of the Bond series there are some really daft plot lines and the climactic death scene of the main villain is silly. Viewed today Live and Let Die is controversial with it's racial stereotypes and language, and the idea that a whole black American community would be complicit in conspiracy to murder even under duress is pushing things way too far. But that aside this is a notable addition to this enduring franchise not least as Moore's debut as 007, but for it's sheer entertainment value, the removal of many of the Bond tropes (many would later return), a beautiful 'Bond girl' in the form of Jane Seymour and the only Bond film that has a narrative with the supernatural element.