DVD James Bond Ultimate Edition - Vol. 4 (Dr. No / You Only Live Twice / Octopussy / Tomorrow Never Dies / Moonraker):
Rate:
Editor: MGM (Video & DVD)
Category: Action / Adventure - Feature Film-action/Adventure - Gift Set - Movie
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $89.98 Our Price: $56.49YOU SAVE $33.49!
Buy it
DVD James Bond Ultimate Edition - Vol. 4 (Dr. No / You Only Live Twice / Octopussy / Tomorrow Never Dies / Moonraker)
Dr. No: Released in 1962, this first James Bond movie remains one of the best, and serves as an entertaining reminder that the Bond series began (in keeping with Ian Fleming's novels) with a surprising lack of gadgetry and big-budget fireworks. Sean Connery was just 32 years old when he won the role of Agent 007. In his first adventure James Bond is called to Jamaica where a colleague and secretary have been mysteriously killed. With an American CIA agent (Jack Lord, pre-Hawaii Five-O), they discover that the nefarious Dr. No (Joseph Wiseman) is scheming to blackmail the U.S. government with a device capable of deflecting and destroying U.S. rockets launched from Cape Canaveral. Of course, Bond takes time off from his exploits to enjoy the company of a few gorgeous women, including the bikini-clad Ursula Andress. She gloriously kicks off the long-standing tradition of Bond women who know how to please their favorite secret agent. A sexist anachronism? Maybe, but this is Bond at his purest, kicking off a series of movies that shows no sign of slowing down. --Jeff Shannon
You Only Live Twice: The film boasts the best of the Bond title songs (this one sung on a dreamy track by Nancy Sinatra), but the movie itself is one of the weaker ones of the Sean Connery phase of the 007 franchise. The story concerns an effort by the evil organization SPECTRE to start a world war, but the not-so-super villain behind the plot is the awfully civilized Donald Pleasence. The thin script is by Roald Dahl (shouldn't we have expected a better Bond nemesis from the creator of mad genius Willy Wonka?), and direction is by British veteran Lewis Gilbert (Alfie). But the movie can't hold a candle to Dr. No, From Russia with Love, or Goldfinger. --Tom Keogh
Octopussy: Roger Moore was nearing the end of his reign as James Bond when he made Octopussy, and he looks a little worn out. But the movie itself infuses some new blood into the old franchise, with a frisky pace and a pair of sturdy villains. Maud Adams--who'd also been in the Bond outing The Man with the Golden Gun--plays the improbably named Octopussy, while old smoothie Louis Jourdan is her crafty partner in crime. There's an island populated only by women, plus a fantastic sequence with a hand-to-hand fight that happens on a plane--and on top of a plane. The film even has an extra emotional punch, since this time out 007 is not only following the orders of Her Majesty's Secret Service, but he is also exacting a personal revenge: a fellow double-0 agent has been killed. Two Bond films were actually released in 1983 within a few months of each other, as Octopussy was followed by Sean Connery's comeback in Never Say Never Again. The success of both pictures proved that there was still plenty of mileage left in the old license to kill, though Moore had one more workout--A View to a Kill--before hanging it up. And that title? The franchise had already used up the titles to Ian Fleming's novels, so Octopussy was taken from a lesser-known Fleming short story. -- Robert Horton
Tomorrow Never Dies: Pierce Brosnan returns for his second stint as James Bond (after GoldenEye), and he's doing it in high style with an invigorating cast of costars. It's only appropriate that a Bond film from 1997 would find Agent 007 pitted against a media mogul (Jonathan Pryce) who's going to start a global war (beginning with stolen nuclear missiles aimed at China) to create attention-grabbing headlines for his latest multimedia news channel. It's the information age run amok, and Bond must team up with a lovely and lethal agent from the Chinese External Security Force (played by Honk Kong action star Michelle Yeoh) to foil the madman's plot of global domination. Luckily for Bond, the villain's wife (Teri Hatcher) is one of his former lovers, and at the behest of his superior M (Judi Dench), 007 finds ample opportunity to exploit the connection. Armed with the usual array of gadgets (including a remote-controlled BMW), Brosnan settles into his role with acceptable flair, and the dynamic Yeoh provides a perfect balance to the sexism that once threatened to turn Bond into a politically incorrect anachronism. He's still Bond, to be sure, but he's saving the world with a bit more sophisticated finesse. --Jeff Shannon
Moonraker: This was the first James Bond adventure produced after the success of Star Wars, so it jumped on the sci-fi bandwagon by combining the suave appeal of Agent 007 (once again played by Roger Moore) with enough high-tech hardware and special effects to make Luke Skywalker want to join Her Majesty's Secret Service. After the razzle-dazzle of The Spy Who Loved Me, this attempt to latch onto a trend proved to be a case of overkill, even though it brought back the steel-toothed villain Jaws (Richard Kiel) and scored a major hit at the box office. This time Bond is up against a criminal industrialist named Drax (Michel Lonsdale) who wants to control the world from his orbiting space station. In keeping with his well-groomed style, Bond thwarts this maniacal Neo-Hitler's scheme with the help of a beautiful, sleek-figured scientist (played by Lois Chiles with all the vitality of a department-store mannequin). Despite Moore's passive performance (which Pauline Kael described as "like an office manager who is turning into dead wood but hanging on to collect his pension"), Moonraker had no problem attracting an appreciative audience, and there are even a few renegade Bond-philes who consider it one of their favorites. --Sean Axmaker
Beyond James Bond Ultimate Collection - Vol. 4
James Bond Ultimate Collection - Vol. 1
James Bond Ultimate Edition - Vol. 2
James Bond Ultimate Edition - Vol. 3
Stills from James Bond Ultimate Collection - Vol. 4 (click for larger image)
Review(s): DVD James Bond Ultimate Edition - Vol. 4 (Dr. No / You Only Live Twice / Octopussy / Tomorrow Never Dies / Moonraker)
Bond Fans Be Heard
Now that this current batch of special edition sets are nearing their completion let's start a discussion. Let's do a count from best Bond film to worst. Starting with the Best, ending with the worst.
1. From Russia With Love - Great story, Connery is the man, & what a fight at the end between Bond & Grant. Get's Better Every Time.
2. For Your Eyes Only - Roger Moore's best turn as Bond & a wonderful apology for the Worst Bond film (See #22 Moonraker).
3. License To Kill - Timothy Dalton wasn't as bad as people make him out. Read the books. Bond is every bit as cold in the books as Dalton played him & it's hard not to picture him when you tackle the Literary Bond. And it was a pleasure seeing Literary Bond creep up for a spell on the movies. Which leads me to number 4.
4. Casino Royale - I am glad Daniel Craig has proved himself to be worthy (although he will unfairly suffer as the man who follows Brosnan). He has the coldness of Dalton down, but also manages to have touches of Connery, Lazenby, Moore, & Brosnan as well. Plus it was great to see a plot line from the book stay in the films for a change.
5. On Her Majesty's Secret Service - Would have been considered the Best if Connery had stayed. But once again people have unfairly treated the replacement. Lazenzby wasn't that bad folks. Also has the best Bond girl.
6. Goldfinger - What can be said about this one that already hasn't been said?
7. Octopussy - Truly underrated. Moore should have quit here. It would have been the perfect one go out a winner with.
8. The World Is Not Enough - Gets Better With Every Viewing. Brosnan was perfection as Bond by the time he got to this one.
9. Dr. No - Simply for one scene. Bond to Prof. Dent.
"You've Had Your Six." A Perfect Early Example Of A Cold Secret Agent.
10. The Man With The Golden Gun - Although the return of JW Pepper should have been left on the cutting room floor & Holly Goodnight has to be the dumbest Bond girl, the rest of the film is great. Great Villian (Christoper Lee steals the show), another underrated turn by Moore. Classic Bond Scene: (Scarmanga to henchman after he kills Hy-Fat)"He always did like that mosoleum. Put him in it."
11. Tomorrow Never Dies - Another Great Villian in Jonathon Pryce. Scene after scene is great & Brosnan prooves to be the best, thus far, since Connery.
12. Goldeneye - A welcome return after 5-6 years of 00-abscence. All the key ingredients were here. Has the best fight scene since From Russia With Love (between Bond & 006).
13. The Living Daylights - Once again, read the books, Dalton wasn't that bad. John Glen was a great director for Bond. He kept this one tight & to the point. Altogether a fun ride.
14. Thunderball - Connery seems to be having a blast in this one & so do we. A little too long. Classic scene between Bond & Fiona as they dance to her death. Another Classic Cold Bond Moment.
15. Diamonds Are Forever - Bond in a moon buggy in the desert has a special place in my heart for some strange reason.
16. The Spy Who Loved Me - I used to like this one more. Still find it very enjoyable, but it moves slowly for some reason & the bad guy wears out his welcome.
17. Live & Let Die - Not a bad debut from Moore, but he needed a better chance to show he was worthy. Bond's inner animal desperately needed to appear & it sadly didn't.
18. You Only Live Twice - Not all that bad, but this one suffers from me for being a fan of the books. This was the best book. It offered the best glimpse of Bond at his darkest (it followed the death of his wife). It's a shame the heart of the story was abandoned. Great turn from Donald Pleasance as Blofeld. He was very creepy.
19. Never Say Never Again - Some people don't count this one, but I do. It was great to see Connery return for one more go. Klaus Maria Branduer was a great villian too. Suffers from being basically a rehash of Thunderball though.
20. Die Another Day - Started off great, but just kept slipping downward as it went along. The CG Bond was a stain on the series, the bad guy wasn't so good, & (let's face it) Halle Berry didn't cut it. It's a shame Brosnan didn't get to go out with a winner. At least he's in this one to keep it from being totally unbearable.
21. A View To Kill - The film makers did try with this one I'll give them that, but Roger Moore was just too old for this one (you can spot his stunt man every time). That seriously makes this one hard to watch. Tanya Roberts, eye candy though she may be, was the worst Bond girl. Her job (more than any Bond girl) was to just stand there & look helpless. ONE GOOD NOTE: Cristopher Walken. His presence alone saves this one from being the worst.
WHICH BRINGS US TO THE WORST....
22. Moonraker: Just getting through this one is an endurance test. Starts off great with a knockout opening sequence, but goes downhill from there. Jaw's in love, Bond in space, & a villian who looks more with each passing scene like he just needs to go to sleep (this is a shame because every other time I've seen the actor Michael Lonsdale, he has been 1st rate). This is a real shame to the series. Not even laughably bad.
Hope you have enjoyed the reading.
Lets hear what every one else has to say.
Bond fans be heard!
Missing one.....
I got all of them as a early gift for myself but the new "Ultimate Edition" is missing one of the Bond movies. Never Say Never Again. Where is it? Every other bond movie is here but not that one...
It's Bond--And Beyond!
I, for one, have no objection to this new packaging of the beautifully remastered films and their lavish extras. This series is like the old joke about pizza (and sex)--even when it's not-so-good, it's still pretty good. These films are such a big, big part of our culture--all of them. All the actors playing Bond. The whole shebang. I appreciate that there are those out there who only want certain titles--and they should be available that way--but I say, "Bring 'em all on!" I'm loving this collection!
DR. NO is the first and freshest, with Connery the first (and best) Bond and Andress the first (and best) girl. YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE has that marvelous volcano and that lovely song, possibly the best song in the series. MOONRAKER is just plain silly, but kind of fun. OCTOPUSSY is big and colorful. TOMORROW NEVER DIES is kind of blah, but it has Michelle Yeoh, who is not blah, and those stunts, which are anything but blah.
Related DVD's James Bond Ultimate Edition - Vol. 4 (Dr. No / You Only Live Twice / Octopussy / Tomorrow Never Dies / Moonraker)
Phase II of the 007 film recapitulation gives the viewer access to five James Bond movies (Thunderball, The Spy Who Loved Me, View to a Kill, Die Another Day, and License to Kill). The restored quality of these films is fantastic, and the added bonus features takes the compilation to a higher level. When you watch these films, keep in mind the times they were created in before you pass them off as sophomoric. The technology we have to today, and fictionally used in more recent 007 movies, was not imaginable during the early sixties and seventies.
The criticism that comes from other reviewers over not having the option of purchasing these films separately is justified. For someone like me, who had only two previous Bond movies in his collection, the redundancy is not so... More Info about this DVD Director(s): John Glen (II) - Terence Young - Lee Tamahori DVD Release Date: Released the 07 November 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $89.98 Your Price: $64.99YOU SAVE $24.99!
Buy it
GOLDFINGER never looked or sounded better. They did an outstanding job. The KungFu out-takes on THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN were outstanding. Those two girls were the real thing. The remastered sound on DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER raised this Connery Bond film to a new level. This is a great volume. More Info about this DVD Director(s): Guy Hamilton - Michael Apted DVD Release Date: Released the 07 November 2006 Usually ships in 6 to 12 days
List Price: $89.98 Your Price: $59.99YOU SAVE $29.99!
Buy it
Goldeneye: The 18th James Bond adventure was a runaway box-office success when released in 1995, thanks to the arrival of Pierce Brosnan as the fifth actor (following the departure of Timothy Dalton) to play the suave, danger-loving Agent 007. This James Bond is a bit more vulnerable and psychologically complex--and just a shade more politically correct--but he's still a formally attired playboy at heart, with a lovely Russian beauty (Izabella Scorupco) as his sexy ally against a cadre of renegade Russians bent on--what else?--global domination. There's also a seductive villainous with the suggestive name of Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen), and the great actress Judi... More Info about this DVD DVD Release Date: Released the 12 December 2006 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $89.98 Your Price: $56.49YOU SAVE $33.49!
Buy it
To my disbelief, what I got are two copies of the 2nd disc of Superman Returns. The disc "You Will Believe: The Cinematic Saga of Superman" is not included. How do Warner will go about it? More Info about this DVD DVD Release Date: Released the 28 November 2006 This item is currently not available.
List Price: $99.98 Your Price: YOU SAVE $99.98!
Buy it
After years of enduring Roger Moore in the role of James Bond, it was good to have Sean Connery back in this 1983 film for a one-time-only trip down 007's memory lane. Connery's Bond, a bit of a dinosaur in the British secret service at (then) 52, is still in demand during times of crisis. Sadly, the film is not very good. In this rehash of Thunderball, Bond is pitted against a worthy underwater villain (Klaus Maria Brandauer); and while the requisite Bond Girls include beauties Kim Basinger and Barbara Carrera, they can't save the movie. The script has several truly dumb passages, among them a (gasp) video-game duel between 007 and his nemesis that now looks utterly anachronistic. For Connery fans, however, this widescreen print of the Irvin Kershner (The Empire Strikes... More Info about this DVD Director(s): Irvin Kershner DVD Release Date: Released the 17 October 2000 Usually ships in 24 hours
List Price: $14.98 Your Price: $10.99YOU SAVE $3.99!
Buy it
Dr. No: Released in 1962, this first James Bond movie remains one of the best, and serves as an entertaining reminder that the Bond series began (in keeping with Ian Fleming's novels) with a surprising lack of gadgetry and big-budget fireworks. Sean Connery was just 32 years old when he won the role of Agent 007. In his first adventure James Bond is called to Jamaica where a colleague and secretary have been mysteriously killed. With an American CIA agent (Jack Lord, pre-Hawaii Five-O), they discover that the nefarious Dr. No (Joseph Wiseman) is scheming to blackmail the U.S. government with a device capable of deflecting and destroying U.S. rockets launched from Cape Canaveral. Of course, Bond takes time off from his exploits to enjoy the company of a few gorgeous women, including the bikini-clad Ursula Andress. She gloriously kicks off the long-standing tradition of Bond women who know how to please their favorite secret agent. A sexist anachronism? Maybe, but this is Bond at his purest, kicking off a series of movies that shows no sign of slowing down. --Jeff Shannon
Octopussy: Roger Moore was nearing the end of his reign as James Bond when he made Octopussy, and he looks a little worn out. But the movie itself infuses some new blood into the old franchise, with a frisky pace and a pair of sturdy villains. Maud Adams--who'd also been in the Bond outing The Man with the Golden Gun--plays the improbably named Octopussy, while old smoothie Louis Jourdan is her crafty partner in crime. There's an island populated only by women, plus a fantastic sequence with a hand-to-hand fight that happens on a plane--and on top of a plane. The film even has an extra emotional punch, since this time out 007 is not only following the orders of Her Majesty's Secret Service, but he is also exacting a personal revenge: a fellow double-0 agent has been killed. Two Bond films were actually released in 1983 within a few months of each other, as Octopussy was followed by Sean Connery's comeback in Never Say Never Again. The success of both pictures proved that there was still plenty of mileage left in the old license to kill, though Moore had one more workout--A View to a Kill--before hanging it up. And that title? The franchise had already used up the titles to Ian Fleming's novels, so Octopussy was taken from a lesser-known Fleming short story. -- Robert Horton 
Moonraker: This was the first James Bond adventure produced after the success of Star Wars, so it jumped on the sci-fi bandwagon by combining the suave appeal of Agent 007 (once again played by Roger Moore) with enough high-tech hardware and special effects to make Luke Skywalker want to join Her Majesty's Secret Service. After the razzle-dazzle of The Spy Who Loved Me, this attempt to latch onto a trend proved to be a case of overkill, even though it brought back the steel-toothed villain Jaws (Richard Kiel) and scored a major hit at the box office. This time Bond is up against a criminal industrialist named Drax (Michel Lonsdale) who wants to control the world from his orbiting space station. In keeping with his well-groomed style, Bond thwarts this maniacal Neo-Hitler's scheme with the help of a beautiful, sleek-figured scientist (played by Lois Chiles with all the vitality of a department-store mannequin). Despite Moore's passive performance (which Pauline Kael described as "like an office manager who is turning into dead wood but hanging on to collect his pension"), Moonraker had no problem attracting an appreciative audience, and there are even a few renegade Bond-philes who consider it one of their favorites. --Sean Axmaker 
Goldeneye: The 18th James Bond adventure was a runaway box-office success when released in 1995, thanks to the arrival of Pierce Brosnan as the fifth actor (following the departure of Timothy Dalton) to play the suave, danger-loving Agent 007. This James Bond is a bit more vulnerable and psychologically complex--and just a shade more politically correct--but he's still a formally attired playboy at heart, with a lovely Russian beauty (Izabella Scorupco) as his sexy ally against a cadre of renegade Russians bent on--what else?--global domination. There's also a seductive villainous with the suggestive name of Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen), and the great actress Judi...