Bond On Bond (7 page)

Jaws’ popularity stemmed from the humour Richard injected into the character, and we all agreed he made a superb villain. In the script, he died at the end of
The Spy Who Loved Me
; however, Cubby felt it could be worth saving him, and the scene was re-written. Jaws didn’t drown, but popped up in the ocean and started swimming. That raised a round of applause at the premiere – especially from the youngsters.

He did of course return, in
Moonraker
, as did Hervé Villechaize … for a set visit. Our unit publicist thought he’d spotted a photo opportunity and asked if they’d pose together, as ‘little and large’ villains. Richard quite rightly said, ‘I don’t do freak photos.’

Moonraker
was filmed in Paris as an Anglo-French co-production under the 1965–79 film treaty. France had much more favourable taxation laws for the creative industries, and that was a great lure to Cubby in setting up the film there, but part of their qualifying criteria was that the lead villain had to be French. Hugo Drax was going to be played by James Mason, who coincidentally I worked with later that year in
North Sea Hijack
; I admired him greatly and thought it terrific casting. However, because of the qualifying criteria, bilingual Frenchman Michael Lonsdale was accordingly offered the part, and made a wonderfully underplayed yet menacing Drax. He became the first Bond villain to take a giant step for mankind, and perished in space.

Of course, once you’ve been to space, there isn’t a lot further you can go with a Bond villain, and so it was decided to bring the next film,
For Your Eyes Only
, and its protagonists back to earth. The only problem, for Jim, is that he couldn’t really be sure who the bad guy was: Kristatos (Julian Glover) or Columbo (Topol)?

It really is a much more grounded story, with the villains being the good old, dependable Russians – keen to get their hands on the British ATAC device. The Soviets were at it again in
Octopussy,
too. Crazed General Orlov (Steven Berkoff) thought he could make the West disarm by setting off a nuclear device inside an American airbase in West Germany. He and Kamal Khan (Louis Jourdan) used the Octopussy Circus as a front for their dastardly plans.

By the time of my swansong,
A View To A Kill
, technology was becoming the world’s major boom industry, and accordingly became the subject for our original screenplay. Our villain, Max Zorin, played by Christopher Walken, was the product of nasty Nazi medical experimentation during World War II, in which pregnant women were injected with massive quantities of steroids in an attempt to create ‘super-children’. Most of the pregnancies failed, but the few that did survive went on to become extraordinarily intelligent individuals – but with a taste for world domination and more than a streak of ruthlessness.

My only sadness with this film was the sheer amount of violence, gunfire and explosions, killing scores of innocent Zorin employees in the finale. It seemed a little over the top in my mind, and not quite in the Bond tradition.

With détente and a warming Cold War, the Russians obviously couldn’t be Bond’s enemy for much longer, but in
The Living Daylights
General Koskov, played by Dutch actor Jeroen Krabbé, played on the thawing relations to draw Britain into a double-crossing plot, which would help him eliminate the head of the KGB and leave the way clear to take over.

A complete change of tone was ushered in with Franz Sanchez in
Licence To Kill
: he ran a drug cartel from South America to Asia. Played by Robert Davi, Sanchez had an interesting choice of pet in a large green iguana that wore a rather fetching diamond collar. I found the iguana quite diverting, but the story was one of personal revenge for the murder of Felix Leiter’s new wife, Della, and, for me, it became far too dark in style and content.

It was interesting, therefore, to see that the next Bond villain – in
GoldenEye
in 1995 – was intent on taking over control of the aforenamed satellite and using it for personal profit – back to the good old baddies! Formerly known as ‘Agent 006’, Alex Trevelyan, played by Sean Bean, was a contemporary of Jim’s from MI6. Apparently, Sean Bean had been considered for the role of Jimbo at one point, but became a baddie instead. That’s what happens, you see.