Plot: Agent 007 (George Lazenby) and the adventurous Tracy Di Vicenzo (Diana Rigg) join forces to battle the evil SPECTRE organization in the treacherous Swiss Alps. But the group's powerful leader, Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Telly Savalas) is launching his most calamitous schme yet: a germ warfare plot that could kill millions!
Firsts: New actor playing Bond, Bond falls in love, Bond's office is shown, M's private home is shown
Gadgets: Safe-cracking device/photocopier, radioactive lint (unused)
Girls Bond slept with: Tracy Di Vicenzo, Ruby Bartlett, and Nancy
Elaborate murder attempt that Bond escapes: Death by avalanche
Personal review: Perhaps the best word to describe this Bond film is unfortunate. There is a lot to like about this film, which I'll get to in a minute, but it just seems like it was designed to fail. There were too many moments in the film that encouraged the audience to reminisce about Sean Connery rather than appreciate the new Bond. You have Lazenby's line early on about 'the other guy', the opening credit sequence features clips from the previous films, and there's a scene with Bond in his office looking fondly at gadgets from past films. The film needed to give us reasons to like the new Bond, not yearn for the old one. On top of the nods to past films, they also do Lazenby no favors with his wardrobe. Outside of the standard tuxedo, most of the outfits he wears are pretty ridiculous looking. He does not come off as dapper or suave looking that way.
Now if you can get over those problems, buried inside is a pretty sweet film. The Swiss Alps locale was beautiful and provide yet another fresh change of scenery. The germ warfare plot, while a bit far-fetched is still very interesting and also new to this franchise. And I really love Diana Rigg as Tracy. For me, she may be one of the hottest Bond girls and she didn't even have to flaunt it like so many others before and after her. You can see why Bond would fall for her. She's not your typical 'Oh James' girl. I really want to like this film, but the producers give me so many reasons not to. Still, if you've never watched this one because of Lazenby, I would suggest you check it out. It's certainly not as terrible as some make it out to be. 7/10
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