So after You Only Live Twice, Connery decided to retire the role of James Bond which resulted in him being replaced by George Lazenby just for this movie. So let's talk about how that turned out in On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
Plot: For the past two years, Bond has been searching for Bolfeld after the previous film with no success and has been removed from the case by M leading him to consider resigning from the Secret Service. But while all this is happening, Bond comes across Countess Tracy di Vicenzo and saves her from committing suicide. Her father who is a crime boss notices this, and asks Bond to try to start a romance and eventually marry her in exchange for knowledge of Bolfeld's whereabouts.
Now this is kind of a fascinating film to reflect on and see how people have viewed it. Whether it has to do with Lazenby's performance, the film itself or both, people's views seem to be highly divided among about what they liked or disliked about this movie. With both Lazenby and the film, I myself feel like I'm kind of in between with what's good or bad about this movie. For the movie itself, there's one side where magazines like The Observer who felt that "All the pleasing oddities and eccentricities and gadgets of the earlier films have somehow been lost, leaving a routine trail through which the new James Bond strides without noticeable signs of animation." But on the other hand, people have come so far as claim that this is the best bond film and is even the last truly great film in the series. For the first argument, I would agree that I did notice how all the gadgets and other things from the series have started to disappear which is something that I find strange and kind of makes the film act like a totally different movie from the kind we want/expect from James Bond. But despite that, I would have to side with the other party because admittingly, they did give us a story that's very unique from what they normally give us with James Bond. With Bond threatening to resign from the service and the film as a whole acting a little more about catching the central antagonist rather than find out who it is later in the film, we are given something very different from what we originally get. Also the main love interest is very interesting. In fact I wanted more of Tracy with her back story and her relationship with Bond. Because one of my other issues with this film is how she's left out during ...I think roughly whole hour or longer from the film just to be replaced with Bond finding Bolfeld and sleeping with other women. What the heck? I mean I liked that she came back and stayed for the rest of the film but I still ended up wanting more after all the time that she was gone and I was starting to forget all about her. Because as a Bond girl, she was also very unique with her past and how she and Bond met and started a relationship. Also for the record, sorry everyone if you're all "What the heck H.A.K.?" with not even mentioning the other Bond girls in my other reviews. Just know that when that's the case, it's because I have found the women in those films to be generally 'meh' and not really have anything interesting to say about them either good or bad. Okay now with that out of the way, let's get to the guy that temporarily replaced Sean Connery as Bond. To put it bluntly, with Lazenby's performance, people either thought the sucked and just wasn't a good actor, or thought he held out pretty well and was the kind of Bond the film needed. This is where I'm a little more torn with what I thought about the movie. Because part of me felt that this guy was not really someone to take Connery's place. That in no way means I also thought he sucked or anything, but he wasn't completely convincing. But at the same time I would also somewhat agree that he kind of was. While he wasn't quite as devilishly charming as Connery he sort of stands his ground as someone trying be a little bit like Connery's Bond. There are also moments during the second half of the film that as an actor, Lazenby did a genuinely good job with how Bond should react to certain moments in the movie that lead me to more or less agree with people who say that Connery's Bond would be out of place with what is happening compared to Lazenby's.
And that's my review for On Her Majesty's Secret Service. Whether you disliked Lazenby's performance and how certain aspects of the James Bond franchise are left out, it's still manages to have a very creative story, a great Bond girl, and an actor who stood his ground somewhat well as James Bond himself. This particular bond film is either disliked or viewed as one of the greatest is not THE greatest Bond film ever made. But which side you pick concerning Lazenby or this film or both is 100% up to you.
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