(The skirt Lazenby wore….what were they thinking?)
Drumroll please, my first post in over a year…just a few impressions swirling after trying to sit through hours of OHMSS just to learn George Lazenby wasn’t an actor, but he still limboed under whatever bar was set. At times he even looks terrified. As for location I think everyone should visit the Schiltorn – just not in a kilt! OK, so he could do his own stunts. So can I. No one is doubling for me while I type away…I mean, did he ever know the difference between quotation marks and commas? This is not helping anyone wanting to learn more about OHMSS but my final point is if they make a film about Lazenby’s life, Idris Elba should play George. No, maybe Idris Elba should play Diana Rigg. He couldn’t be any worse. Anyway, no one comes out of this smelling of roses except composer John Barry and whomever arranged the beach fight and ski chases.
My highlight is George screaming when a man in a polar bear suit leaps out of a crowd.
‘The Assassination Bureau Ltd.’ was an incomplete novel by Jack London. The 1969 film version was produced by Michael Relph and directed by Basil Dearden. Crusading journalist Sonya Winter (Diana Rigg) uncovers the existence of a secret society of hired assassins operating at the turn of the 19th century. Their founder is cocksure Russian nobleman Ivan Dragomiloff (Oliver Reed). He is hired by Sonya to murder…himself. Feeling the Bureau to have become complacent, he accepts the challenge. Sounds like quite an ominous plot!
Following a long period of cheap-looking productions designed to play as double-features on their home turf, Hammer returned to premium quality with Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed. This is Peter Cushing’s definitive portrayal of the Baron. For once a Hammer Frankenstein doesn’t need an actual monster, but lets the baron himself become “more monstrous than the monsters he created”, as the advertisements proclaimed. And for a horror film, you’d have to agree that the locations used for filming were really quite elegant and ornate. The Spengler boarding house and Brandt’s home were exquisitely appointed and furnished, and all the while I kept thinking that they would have been a pretty nice place to live. 
Assignment number six for the 007 franchise was the most controversial. Mr Connery had gone AWOL and United Artists waved their cheque books at every casting studio, trying to find the right replacement. What they got was an Aussie model who had starred in a chocolate bar commercial. But, despite the million naysayers, I think he was a rather good Bond. His voice, for instance, was deeper than Pierce Brosnan’s. He had more youth (far more!) and testosterone than that smirking dinner jacket, Roger Moore. You can believe Georgie is doing those stunts – because he is. His lack of experience makes him more real. He seems a little unsure of himself, which is the Bond of Fleming’s novels. And we even get a love story. Just to make us feel icky. Anyway, this one ends in tears, which was a first. 
High Tea Dreams 