For
Thunderball we were blessed with a remixed
Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, when it was originally recorded in mono. Sadly, no-one's
bothered here. My amplifier states the sound is in Dolby Surround, but it may as well be
in mono for all the difference it makes as there's little reason to suggest there's any
stereo steerage - just like
You Only Live Twice.
The main Bond music appears to have been jazzed up this time round and the theme tune used
was Louis Armstrong's We Have All The Time In The World.
Extras :
Chapters :
The usual 32 chapters for an MGM, which is an excellent amount. If only some other DVD
companies could take a lesson from this one.
Languages & Subtitles :
English is the only language on the disc - in Dolby Surround - and there are subtitles
for English (and hard of hearing).
And there's more... :
MGM seem to be pulling out all the stops for their Bond collection and starting with the
first Bond film made we have a great amount for you to sink your teeth into.
Featurette: On Her Majesty's Secret Service (42 mins): Another
documentary narrated by Patrick MacNee, this time also taking a look at the change
in Bond, with interview clips from director Peter Hunt, director of photography
Michael Reed, Angela Scoular (who played Ruby Bartlett) and of course
George Lazenby.
Featurette: Inside Q's Lab (11 mins): Narrated by Marie Clairu,
you can guess what this takes a look at. Albeit a short featurette, there's plenty
of chat from the man himself, the late Douglas Llewelyn, Roger Moore and Kristina
Wayborn (Miss Magda in Octopussy).
Featurette: Above It All (6 mins): a location report looking at filming
up in the Alps.
Release Trailer (2 mins): The theatrical one.
5 TV Spots (3 mins): Two 60-second trailers, one in 4:3 and the other cropped
to 16:9 (not anamorphic), with three more 20-second trailers.
Radio spots & Open-Ended Interviews (30 mins): 3 brief radio adverts lasting
between 30 seconds and a minute apiece, followed by approx. 7-minute interviews with each
of George Lazenby, Diana Rigg, Telly Savalas and Peter Hunt.
The O.H.M.S.S. Gallery: Scores of production stills and photos from several
points in the film.
Audio Commentary: from director Peter Hunt and members
of the cast and crew.
Some of the content, particularly the TV spots, aren't exactly first-rate
in terms of picture quality and sound, but it adds to the nostalgic quality
and all the interviews are clear enough.
Menu :
A blue-tinged main menu with the new Bond music and clips of Bond racing down the mountains
on skis. Another first-rate effort.
The initial screen offers you the choice to start the film, select a scene,
choose a language or watch the extras.
Overall, this one-time-Lazenby movie has its moments, but its lengthy running time does
drag things out and although we have different actors playing each of the main two parts,
it does seem ridiculous that they meet up pretending to be different people when they were
trying to shoot each other in the last film... and no-one's bothered to apply any
dodgy-eye make-up to Savalas for his Blofeld role.
I don't think Lazenby can really act either, which doesn't help matters. He just doesn't
have the right voice for the one-liners and comes across as sounding like the guy who used
to co-present a BBC1 gameshow after Neighbours in the early 90s and would utter
trite such as "You were right to disagree"... Well, either him or an excited Tony
Blackburn.
There are a few more extras this time round though, plus plenty of dodgy blue-screen
moments on the ski run and quite a striking ending...
Just a shame someone so head-strong didn't have quite a "strong head" (!)
FILM CONTENT PICTURE QUALITY SOUND QUALITY EXTRAS
OVERALL
The following is a list of all the Bond films now available in production order
with their dates of release, followed by the unofficial movies:
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
