007 Double Feature: For Your Eyes Only
By David Pegram
The second film in the 007 Double Feature, to benefit UNICEF, was For Your Eyes Only, released in 1981.
Count me in as one who was never particularly fond of For Your Eyes Only, and so I attended the screening with curiosity. Would seeing the film on the big screen change my opinion of the film? The short answer is, yes, it did.
For Your Eyes Only is the one Bond film that should have been thrown a heavier punch. At the time of its release, it was likely the most violent (or brutal) Bond film to date—right up there with On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Melina Havelock (Carole Bouquet) witnesses the assassination of her parents. Bond and Melina dive into a sunken ship where dead bodies (the crew had drowned) are floating around, like ghosts. And then there is the death of Locque, one of Bond’s more ruthless killings.
The film also contains action sequences on five fronts: 1.air/helicopter; 2. automobile; 3. snow skiing; 4. underwater 5. rock climbing (a masterful scene where Bond ascends to St. Cyril’s monastery). Much of this i set against a rich Italian and Greek backdrop. No doubt, the film looks beautiful.
So where does For Your Eyes Only go wrong? In too many places, director John Glen (in his debut) undercuts the film’s serious tone with the look and feel of a TV drama. Bill Conti’s score is out of place and, in the case of the ski chase, a distraction. Lynn-Holly Johnson’s Bibi Dahl might be the most infuriating Bond character (or Bond girl) in the franchise’s history. Dahl serves no useful purpose and she is also a distraction, every time she is on screen. Melina’s laughable stare into the camera, after realizing her parents are dead, is yet another distraction, in a scene that needed greater control. And dare we mention Sheena Easton’s presence in the title sequence? We just have to ask: why?
But most of these problems occur in the film’s first half. The plotting of the second half, after Bond reunites with Melina in Corfu, is simplified, and so is Glen’s approach. When Bond climbs to St. Cyril’s, filmed at Meteora, Glen does well to present the scene with no background music. The suspense is heightened due to this effect. If only he’d taken this simpler, no-nonsense approach elsewhere.