151 Proof Hangover: Moonraker
[After creating and then testing the drinking rules, guest hosts Trent and Ryan recap their adventures with two of their least favorite movies, offering their thoughts on the quality of each film itself as well as how the drinking rules held up and whether they’re worth using.]
Moonraker is often considered one of, if not the, worst James Bond film of all-time. That is quite a reputation to have when there are so many films in the franchise. It is one of the Bond films I’ve seen the least, and going into this I remember very little about the actual movie. I knew the Bond girl was called Dr. Goodhead, because how do you forget that, and I knew Bond eventually ends up in space. Everything else is just kind of a blank to me. Did being fuzzy on details help us to enjoy Moonraker on our Bond-a-thon?
Movie-2
Swan-2
Moonraker is one of those movies that goes on way too long with not much actually happening throughout the film. It was very slow paced and hard to keep track of why our hero was going somewhere. He starts the film in England, gets sent to America, goes to Italy for some reason followed by a trip to Brazil and to top it off I believe he goes from Brazil to the moon. Maybe.
I admit I did Swan myself and miss the tail end of the movie and probably the greatest line ever, the “Reentry” one, but aside from that one line I don’t feel like I missed too much. Diamods are Forever and Moonraker both suffer from being extremely forgettable which is easily their biggest flaw. So check this out if you are desperate to see every Bond film, just grab a coffee to keep you awake.
Penguin- 2
This film suffers from a bloated run-time, which leads to a nonsensical climax with Bond in space. Aside from the name, the Bond girl is utterly forgettable in this film. The Bond villain has such a soft and non-threatening presence that it simply bored me. It also helped that at this point, Bond had his run of generic evil businessmen.
Then there is Jaws, who becomes something like the Coyote to Bond’s Roadrunner in this film. Where he was a lot more threatening in his original appearance, here he is being outwitted by Bond at every turn, and then surviving with the oddest of luck. He then instantly falls in love with some chick he meets. Their courtship is hardly seen, but they are willing to rescue Bond and sacrifice their lives.
Finally, there’s the plot which seems to go nowhere, but continues to move forward. Bond visits something like 4 major cities, and I swear I wasn’t entirely sure how or why he ended up in the final handful of them. Like there was stuff going on, but not enough to keep the audience entertained.
Drinking-4.5
Swan-5
I have to give this movie a 5 on account of not even being able to finish it but even if I had finished it I still would have the same score. Our rules kicked out ass this time out, with our hero getting his doodle wet 5 or more times. We actually had to change our rule from finish your drink to take a shot.
As for the other rules, they worked out quite well with Bond being called by his actual name and his number. There were plenty of people dying and one liners out the wazoo. Again if you watch this movie, be careful. It is rather dangerous.
Penguin-4
This movie worked a lot better than Diamonds are Forever, but we also made some additions to our rules before we started. Instead of drinking only when Bond is referred to as Bond, we also included 007. For some reason, Drax always refers to James as “Mr. Bond” and he does it with almost every sentence uttered towards him! 007 is used mostly by MI 6 and M so that got a lot of work out as well.
As Swan made reference to, Bond does seem to get a lot of action in this movie.. and it’s not with his gun. To help make the drinking less painful and filling, we decided it’s wiser to just take a shot whenever he beds a chick instead of finishing an entire beer. It’s about the same amount of alcohol, but takes up a lot less stomach room!
The rest of the rules were solid, but weren’t too over the top. I was really surprised that there was no joke or reference to the fact the doctor was named Goodhead.. I’m sure they named her that for a reason!
Moonraker’s biggest crimes is it has a terribly slow build-up to one of the goofier climaxes in Bond’s history. There’s really nothing to keep your interest while Bond is on the ground, and there’s nothing new or exciting when he is in space. If either side of the formula were better would make for a more exciting movie.
