All posts by Rod Lott

Reading Material

The Music of James Bond

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What makes Skyfall, the new James Bond film, all the more terrific is that its theme song is, too. That hasn’t happened in, what, decades?

I’ve long thought that the 007 franchise producers have grown to be behind the times in selecting artists to do the theme, grabbing them well after their flame has burned brightest. As a result, the songs simply don’t chart anymore. This time, with Adele fresh off two arms full of Grammys, the tide will have reversed.

That’s a story I’m sure we’ll see covered in the next edition of Jon Burlingame’s The Music of James Bond. Until then, this does just fine as is.

Coming from Oxford University Press, the handsome hardback tells not only how each and every 007 main theme came to be, but how its overall soundtracks — and accompanying albums — were assembled and shaped. Broken into chapters movie by movie, logically enough, the renowned music critic Burlingame covers the entire canon, both official and not; therefore, the stories behind Michel Legand’s Never Say Never Again score nor Burt Bacharach’s wonderful Casino Royale ’67 melodies don’t go untold.

Who knew there was anything to reveal? While the “true authorship” debate between Monte Norman and John Barry over the series iconic, indelible, immortal main theme has been covered elsewhere, I don’t recall it being done so at this depth, this lively, and with something that at least approaches a modicum of suspense. Same goes for the tale of Barry’s battles in studio with Duran Duran for the A View to a Kill theme, which turned out to be the biggest Billboard hit of all.

While it’s interesting to read how the likes of Paul McCartney and Carly Simon came aboard, Burlingame also reveals stories of the Bond themes that never were. Among others, you’ll learn about Kate Bush almost breathed her way through Moonraker‘s credits, and how Eric Clapton jammed in a Licence to Kill track that was scrapped.

The author also briefly discusses David Arnold’s excellent Shaken and Stirred electronica tribute album of 1997, which helped him become Barry’s heir apparent to the franchise, and notes other 007 collections of interest. Sidebars in each chapter review the score highlights, time-coded to their appearance in the films.

Illustrated with a wealth of archival photos and original album covers, The Music of James Bond is as much fun to look at as it is to read. If that Skyfall isn’t covered is the only negative I can find — OK, second, because I wished Moby’s remix of the 007 main theme for Tomorrow Never Dies merited more than a mention — I can recommend it strongly to the series’ legion of fanatics. Dare I say it? Nobody does it better. —Rod Lott

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Horror

The Rats (2002)

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Made for TV, the New York-set The Rats originally was slated to air the week of Sept. 11, 2001, until suddenly, broadcasting a Big-Apple-in-peril flick didn’t seem like such a good idea anymore. But aside from a prologue in which the titular creatures short out the electricity in Lady Liberty, there’s nothing all that NYC-centric about it. If it can be set there, it can be set anywhere.

Thousands of aggressive lab rats have decided to fight back against humans, beginning in a posh downtown department store overseen by Twin Peaks’ Mädchen Amick, who is aging well. She calls in exterminator Vincent Spano (Rumble Fish), who is not.

Although it does throw in some rat gore and an attack on kids in a public swimming pool, The Rats runs through the numbers: Disbelieving city officials? Check. Opposite leads who eventually find love through a time of crisis? Check. Minor black supporting character dies? Check. Come up with a cliché, and sooner or later, The Rats gets to it, right down to the ever-predictable it-ain’t-really-over final shot. Child’s Play 2 and Man’s Best Friend director John Lafia does a decent job, having experience with all sorts of beasts, like killer dolls, robot dogs and Ally Sheedy. —Rod Lott

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Documentary

Ecstasy of Order: The Tetris Masters (2011)

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I spend very little time with video games, but when I do, it’s Tetris. The play gets so ferocious that I later have stressful dreams about maneuvering its falling pieces. Turns out, this is perfectly natural — a problem shared by many of the Tetris-obsessed gamers profiled in the documentary Ecstasy of Order: The Tetris Masters.

As a narrator informs us, two out of three Americans have played the game. This causes Portland resident Robin Mihara to wonder why the world’s arguably most-played game doesn’t have a world champion? Director Adam Cornelius’ camera follows Mihara as he locates and assembles the best blockers for a proper Tetris championship event.

The contestants include a woman who wears a Mercedes hood ornament around her neck, a guy whose strategy entails making his eyes veer in separate directions and, most notably, the enigmatic Thor Aackerlund, who won a national Nintendo championship at the age of 14 and since claims to have cracked the game’s fabled level 30, yet has offered no photographic proof. Watching them square off against one another raised my pulse.

The obvious comparison to Ecstasy of Order is 2007’s The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, the documentary about dueling Donkey Kong champs — so obvious, in fact, that it’s name-dropped by one of the players. But Ecstasy lacks that work’s Billy Mitchell, an arrogant bully to keep conflict and drama at a breathless high. In this doc, there are no villains; everyone’s a Steve Wiebe. That keeps Ecstasy from being as delirious entertaining as King of Kong, but makes it a natural for a second half of a double feature … because if you run it first, you’re just going to want to play Tetris, guaranteed. —Rod Lott

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Action

A View to a Kill (1985)

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Roger Moore’s seventh go-round as James Bond doubled as his last, and proof that it was time for him to go occurs almost immediately in A View to a Kill. During the otherwise fine ski-and-snowmobile-chase prologue, Agent 007 knocks out a couple of Russian goons by snowboarding into their faces, at which point the soundtrack blasts a soundalike version of The Beach Boys’ “California Girls.” Never mind this scene takes place half a world away from the Golden State — it’s that anyone thought that joke was a good idea is what we should be worried about.

One Duran Duran title sequence later, the real story begins, with blimp-loving French industrialist Max Zorin (Christopher Walken, awesome as ever) plotting a microchip monopoly by striking Silicon Valley. 007 poses as a reporter to get close to Zorin and his mannish henchwoman, May Day (pop singer Grace Jones, frightening as ever) — one of Bond’s four sexual conquests within a tedious two hours and 11 minutes, including a hot-tubbing Alison Doody (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade) and Virginia Slims-voiced blank slate Tanya Roberts (The Beastmaster).

Every time Bond is called upon to do more than throw a punch, workmanlike director John Glen (Octopussy) uses an obvious stunt double for Moore, then nearly 60, and the hair color doesn’t even match. Still, this does not keep the action set pieces from impressing — from a foot pursuit up the Eiffel Tower that becomes a car chase on the ground, to 007 swinging from an errant fire engine ladder through heavy traffic. The climactic Golden Gate Bridge finale is less notable, due to dated effects.

And speaking of dated, that Communism and the KGB loom over the film as big baddies is almost charming in a post-Cold War era. Moore’s inability to even try, however, is not. Look for Maud Adams and Dolph Lundgren in blink-and-miss-’em cameos; I missed ’em. —Rod Lott

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