The great and cool Roger Moore has left us and to pay homage, french TV changed programs to offer his 1st appearance as 007 ... and that one was indeed among his 2 007 movies i haven't seen so far (the last one is now Mooraker !). But honestly this one offers a really poor story for a 007 movie ! If the spy is expected to go in exotic locations, here, 007 goes to US ! Not really incredible ! Next, if he is the last hope against world threat, here, he deals with coke traffic ! The action sequences are pretty boring : the bus, then the boat, the crocodiles then the sharks…The only value of this movie is the franchise trademark that is to say its ability to vacuum and recycle trends: in other words, all 007 movies are deeply shaped by the time of production and as this one has more than 40 years, it has a great historical value: first, the narcotic traffic had just started in the movies: from my history, the oldest one about it is Pacino's Needle Park in 1971.. And for sure, the movie is just mesmerized by the blaxploitation era : all characters are blacks and we have all their classic items : music, car, Harlem, jewelry, fashion and also a very charming tiny sidekick… At the end, it's not Moore's best but it's no its worst (for your eyes only…)

This is the first Roger Moore Bond film of the seven, and guess what: it's pretty terrible.The plot is that Bond, after the killing of a few British Secret Service agents, is investigating the organization of a Dr. Kananga , who is planning to take over the market of heroin and become rich after giving away a whole boatload of it for free. No really, it's that simple. It's not even that big a threat. Goldfinger's scheme was way more threatening because it would have affected so many people. Here, only people who actually buy drugs will get affected, and not everyone buys drugs. On a side note, Bond causes the fortune-teller girl, Solitaire (the genuinely sweet Jane Seymour), to lose her virginity thanks to a ploy of his where he has a card deck where every one of those cards says that they'll be lovers. Later, when Bond asks for information about Kananga, Solitaire can't use her powers because she'll lose them if she has sex (Not a wise decision, Bond!) Now Bond also has to defend her from Kananga.Being the second actor to play Bond after Connery, there are some noticeable differences, not just in appearance, but HOW he plays the character. First off, he looks more British than George Lazenby, which is already an improvement, and plus, he doesn't try to mimic Connery. His Bond is more light-hearted and slightly warmer (only slightly). However, this approach also means that Moore's Bond gives off SO many puns and one-liners, they get tiresome very quickly. Moore's performance also seems too calculated, like he's trying to figure out what to say and when and how to say it. He doesn't look like the most confident guy in the room. All in all, in this film Moore is a competent, if not outstanding James Bond.But there's more to come in terms of the film's flaws. Let me start by saying: blaxploitation elements and racial stereotyping. All of the villains are African-American, and they seem to enjoy getting back at "the white man." Many times throughout the film, Bond is called a "honky" by the villains and a lot of the African-American culture portrayal in this film is terribly offensive. Bond becoming a Japanese man in You Only Live Twice is mild compared to this. There are "voodoo" rituals that look stereotypical and plus, there is a scene where Solitaire is set to be sacrificed by the people who perform these rituals, and this scene is probably the most offensive of all. It's right up there with the scene in The Birth of a Nation (1915) where a sex-crazed African-American man (portrayed with "blackface" by a Caucasian man), is chasing a teenage Caucasian girl in the woods and trying to force her into marriage. This stereotyping and offensive imagery makes the villains really annoying as well, especially the villain with the hook for a hand called Tee Hee (even more offensive name), who's always smiling and laughing like an a**hole. Plus, not only is this stereotyping offensive, but it makes most of the African-American characters (except maybe the ones who are working with Bond) seem fake, and it doesn't allow the film to have its own identity, and makes it seemed much more dated than other Bond films.In addition to the blaxploitation and offensive stereotypes, there is also a lot of unwanted comedy, thanks to Clifton James' Sheriff J.W. Pepper, who would also appear in the next Bond film. James would also play a similar character in Superman II, although not nearly as annoying. He comes off as a racist and seems to fit a poor Southerner stereotype; he's also too much of a goofy character and causes a very good action scene to go on too long. As previously mentioned, Moore's constant puns and one-liners don't help either.I will admit that this does have a good trap where Bond is stranded in the middle of a small island with crocodiles and alligators and even his watch gadget isn't able to help him. However, like with other traps and prisons, there happens to be a convenient way for Bond to escape, by stepping on top of crocodiles as stepping stones and somehow not falling in.All in all, this is easily one of the worst Bond films I've seen (and I'm only halfway through with the franchise; I sort of started watching these out of order). Goofy comedy, annoying villains, a plan that isn't dangerous enough to care about, and some of the most offensive portrayals of African-Americans and possibly people in the Southern states I have ever seen. Not recommended in any category. Besides the boat chase (before the introduction of Sheriff Pepper), the only other good thing to say is that Jane Seymour is so sweet as Solitaire, and she brings such a warm personality to the character, especially after she and Bond sleep together. It makes me wish she was in another, better Bond film, or even a better film, period.

This is a truly amazing movie to watch in the year of Trump, and compare to the year it was made, 1973 so 43 years ago. I can't imagine that everyone involved had an explicit political message; rather they were just channeling the times. But damn, what times they were channeling. Every stereotype of "the other" you can imagine is here, and proudly displayed. Black men do, in fact, form a single organized cabal. They are intent on poisoning "us" all. They want to steal and deflower "our" women. They believe in strange savage cults and engage in ghastly rituals. Hell, in the last mass ritual scene I half expected the boiling pot to come out and a cannibalism trope to join everything else we'd seen so far. It's a weird weird mix --- think James Bond meets the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, with the word Jew find-and-replaced with Black. You have to see it to believe it.Oh, and of course the usual Bond formula is well established by now. We have the gadgets, the multiple different types of chases and fights, the underground lair, the stupid evil genius who cannot shut up about his evil plans and never just shoots his enemy the moment he see him. We even have the first prototype of that canonical Roger Moore James Bond villain, Jaws!If you're going to see just one early Bond movie, make it this one; if for no other reason than to see how much has changed (and how much hasn't) over forty+ years.

Directed by Guy Hamilton and with a script by Tom Mankiewicz, this is the eighth film in the franchise and keeps Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli as producers. In this film, the first in which Roger Moore embodies the British spy, franchise tries to survive at two powerful factors of danger: the departure of Sean Connery after several years giving life to 007, and the unstoppable evolution of the world, with the seventies bringing a radical change in the audience. Thus, producers and screenwriter tried to attract new audiences, in particular the black public, attracted not only by black actors but also for some locations. Another subject that the film will address, and that was on the agenda during these times, are drugs and trafficking.In this film, the British agent will fight an American drug baron but gets lost in the black neighborhood of Harlem, where he cannot pass unnoticed and almost finds himself in danger. The track eventually leads Bond to Louisiana, where the persecution of bandits brings us the hilarious Sheriff J. W. Pepper, who worked not only as a film comic element but also as a severe criticism against the conservatism of white society in the southern states. We must remind ourselves that this movie was released at a time when American society was in deep transformation, largely thanks to the struggle of black society for respect, equality and civil rights, which were denied until then, particularly, in the South. The film then heads to the Caribbean, to an island that was probably inspired by Haiti and where the audience is faced with superstitions and beliefs as voodoo or magic.In these film, Roger Moore proved that could hold his role, and the agent could survive Sean Connery. In fact, he even manages to be much more English, while maintaining the habit of never losing his composure whatever the situation. The villains were in charge of Yaphet Kotto and Julius Harris, the latter in the role of Tee Hee, the man with the metal arm. Geoffrey Holder embodies the Baron Samedi, Haitian voodoo character who enters this film. The bond-girl was Jane Seymour, the role of the tarot reader Solitaire.For many people, "Live and Let Die" is one of the oddest films in the franchise because of the amount of unusual elements featuring: "blaxploitation", magic, voodoo, superstition, drugs. And these people aren't without reason. Today, this film is strange and doesn't leave many memories, like many films of the seventies. There are even those who think that is the worst movie of the franchise. Perhaps. But it helped to keep Bond alive and adapted him to a new era. For posterity stays the good performance of the elegant and humorous Roger Moore and the introduction song, written by Paul McCartney and who would receive, years later, a new life through the cover of Guns N'Roses.