Thread: Who Played the Best James Bond?

There are many to choose from. My top choice varies back and forth from Connery to Moore depending on my mood. Who's you're Bond?

Connery is my fav but I like how Daniel Craig brings some darkness to the role. Brosnan is the worst IMHO

Roger Moore, tight race with Connery.

Originally Posted by Sublime

Connery is my fav but I like how Daniel Craig brings some darkness to the role. Brosnan is the worst IMHO

This.

1234

Roger Moore? Seriously?

Connery. Craig is the best Bond since. I find it almost equal but with a different personality.

Originally Posted by huckbucket

Roger Moore? Seriously?

You're right, Timothy Dalton was WAY better.

PETER SELLERS is not on the list. How cruel.

Originally Posted by Core Shot

PETER SELLERS is not on the list. How cruel.

Don't you mean David Niven ?? He played James Bond in the spoof of Casino Royale I believe.


Connery

Craig

Moore (longevity counts for something, but too damn campy for my taste)

Brosnan

Dalton

Lazenby (Bond in a kilt ?? C'mon be serious)

Geeky Stats for Geeky Stats Sake:

Roger Moore was the first bona fide Englishman to portray Bond, who, in the novels, was always made out to be a London-bred Brit.

Sean Connery is Scottish
George Lazenby is Australian
Timothy Dalton is Welsh
Pierce Brosnan is Irish



As for me, I've always had a soft spot for Moore, despite his over-the-top camp take on the role. This is mostly because he was Bond when I first began seeing the films in the theaters (early '70s) with my parents. It was kind of a family ritual to go see the new Bond film when it opened, either as a family or just me and my dad. And honestly, I didn't have much of a problem with Dalton or Brosnan, I had more problems with the shoddy scripts and lame plots they were dealt in their films (ditto for later period Moore). An actor is really only as good as the material they are given and a lot of the later period Bond pix had really crappy storylines, goofy villains, and the like.

Still, in terms of film franchises, I believe the Bond one is the longest running and most successful, which is saying something.

In terms of favorite entries in the series:

For Your Eyes Only (one of the few plot-driven, light-on-stunts, light-on-camp Moore vehicles).

Goldeneye (the best Brosnan)

Casino Royale (gritty as hell)

Not sure which Connery is my fave, but I think it might be Goldfinger...

Connery
Craig
Brosnan
Lazenby
Moore
Dalton

Listed in order of the combination of ruthless-spy-killer-with-a-heart and ability to convey enough hotness to make all the tail he pulls in the films believable.

Originally Posted by bklyn

Connery
Craig
Brosnan
Lazenby
Moore
Dalton

Listed in order of the combination of ruthless-spy-killer-with-a-heart and ability to convey enough hotness to make all the tail he pulls in the films believable.

A good (interesting) take on the poll. Id put Lazenby at the bottom of that list though

roger moore is 82 and still skis. he lived gstaad for a long time. he now lives in [ame="http://www.tetongravity.com/forums/showthread.php?t=161805"]crans montana[/ame]. i keep looking for him when i go there.

do any of the others ski?

Originally Posted by huckbucket

Roger Moore? Seriously?

I like Roger Moore. Not Connery or Craig but still good...

Originally Posted by dookey67

Bond, who, in the novels, was always made out to be a London-bred Brit.
r...

Scottish father, Swiss mother, much time abroad prior to being orphaned, briefly lives near Canterbury, sent down from Eton before going to Fettes school in Scotland.

Not much London.

Connery
Craig
Lazenby
The others mostly sucked.

I just love the darkness that Craig brings to the roll. The fatalism of knowing that he will likely not live to the mandatory retirement age of 45.

Originally Posted by Labcabin

Connery. Craig is the best Bond since. I find it almost equal but with a different personality.

Exactly. Connery is more suave gentleman, Craig is more ruthless killer. I was stoked when Craig took over mainly because IMO every Bond since Connery has sucked. Roger Moore was a flabby pud.

Originally Posted by OSECS

Don't you mean David Niven ?? He played James Bond in the spoof of Casino Royale I believe.

)

There were actually 7 bonds in that movie.

Its psychedelic madness.

And Lazenby was great.
Marrying the girl and having here shot dead was a great movie ending.

connery for the sex appeal alone.

YUM!!

Originally Posted by Jer

Exactly. Connery is more suave gentleman, Craig is more ruthless killer. I was stoked when Craig took over mainly because IMO every Bond since Connery has sucked. Roger Moore was a flabby pud.

ORLY?



that's at age 52. and he's still got all his hair at 82!!!




fwiw, i like craig the best. casino royale blew my mind. moore is always bond to me coz i grew up with his movies.

PNWBrit: I stand corrected (been a spell since I cracked open one of the books so my memory is a bit faded).

Bklyn: Um, Craig didn't bag hardly any chicks in the 2 films he's been in (2 in Casino and I don't think he "hit" any skins in Quantum, which surprised me)...I mean how could he (Bond) not get with Camille (Olga K)?

Moore may have been cheesy, but dude was always bagging mad trim (or at least surrounded by it, which was just as good and fueled the male fantasy that the films go for). And I believed it, naive that I am in that respect. I mean he was friggin' James Bond, albeit more like James Schmarm, but still.

I dug up this review of QoS from a British rag and it's interesting because it's written by a Brit and a man, so it touches upon the British nature of Bond and the sexist, male fantasy angle:

Cosmo Landesman - The Sunday Times

The big question that has always dominated debate among James Bond aficionados has been this — who is the greatest 007 of them all?

Now, with the second film in the relaunch of the franchise, they must face a new question — is Quantum of Solace the most boring Bond film ever?

Following Casino Royale was never going to be easy, but the director Marc Forster has brought the brand’s successful relaunch crashing back to earth — with a yawn. Even we Bond agnostics could see that Royale had its memorable moments, but Quantum of Solace is $200m worth of bland crash-bang-wallop. It’s an action film on autopilot, one that produces instant amnesia. By the time you have left the cinema, you won’t remember a thing. The trick, of course, is to get a balance between the Bond formula and something fresh. Every time Forster tries to push the feelgood buttons of Bond’s glorious past, however, he totally misses the mark, depriving us of traditional treats. It’s like a panto without a wicked witch.
Consider the Bond theme song. Why is it so difficult to write a decent Bond tune? (Answer: because, in the days of John Barry, nobody worried about market demographics.) The latest concoction, Another Way to Die, performed by Alicia Keys and Jack White, is a soulless slice of rock’n’soul sludge. The opening credits, featuring female body shapes emerging from desert sands, look like a cheesy 1970s television ad for a brand of cheap scent. For the big opening scene — a key feature of the Bond film — what do we get? A car chase you can’t enjoy, because the cars and characters disappear in a blur of frantic editing.

From this point in, it’s all downhill. The screenplay, by Paul Haggis (Crash), Neal Purvis and Robert Wade, is at times incomprehensible. It’s assumed that you know Casino Royale by heart and understand the intricacies of Bond’s relationship with his true love, the late Vesper Lynd. Did she betray him or try to save him? Search me, guv.

And it’s unclear what her relationship was to the secret organisation Bond and MI6 are trying to penetrate, headed by the eco-champion Dominic Greene (Mathieu Amalric), who wants to take control of the water supply of the whole of South America. Greene is a thug who topples governments at the click of his fingers, abolishes the minimum wages of factory workers and sells great hunks of the rainforest for a fast buck. This is a Bond villain? It’s the perfect CV for a career at the World Bank.

Then there is 007 himself. James, what have they done to you? He has been stripped of any traces of charm, wit or intelligence, and is just another modern hero, concerned only with his own hang-ups and emotional issues. Feelings of grief and guilt over Vesper — not any notion of duty — propel him into action. He’s a thug with a broken heart, trying to find closure through killing. James, get over it and get back to work. Would any kid, or middle-aged fantasist, want to be like this back-to-basics Bond? The glamour is gone; the crack of broken bones has replaced the clink of martinis. In the most recent film, we saw his testicles whipped; here, they are removed. Not, I hasten to add, by a villain, but by the screenplay. The great thing about being 007 is that you get to sleep with beautiful women — all the time. In the new age of Bond realism, however, he gets a quickie with Agent Fields (Gemma Arterton) and nothing with his leading lady, Camille (Olga Kurylenko). Bond directors, take note: more sex, please, we’re British.

At the heart of the story is a question: who can you really trust? The Bond series has finally embraced what might be called John le Carré relativism: the notion that the “good” guys are as morally grubby as the “bad” guys. Indeed, one of the characters says, “There is no good and evil” — as if this were a daring proposition. Yet every film these days says it. It would be more daring to suggest that there are no shades of grey, only right and wrong. So, Bond ends up being hunted by both MI6 and the CIA as if he were the villain.

You would expect some memorable performances from an actor’s director such as Forster — the man who made Halle Berry look talented in Monster’s Ball — but the casting is a mess. Kurylenko is cute and capable, but Amalric, while he looks like a young Polanski, has the menace of a mouse. The weakest link, though, is Craig. Yes, he looks good in a tuxedo, and is terrific when it comes to action sequences. Paradoxically, however, even though we’re meant to have a very human Bond on display, he moves through the film with the cold, mechanistic manner of Schwarzenegger’s Terminator. No comic quips or human touches are capable of piercing the armour of those tight, puckered lips. In Craig, the 007 franchise has found a great face (and body), but it has not found a voice or a visual style it can call its own. Bond has been stripped of his iconic status. He no longer represents anything particularly British, or even modern. In place of glamour, we get a spurious grit; instead of style, we get product placement; in place of fantasy, we get a redundant and silly realism. Craig makes an attractive corpse, but Bond is dead.

sean connery, roger moore, craig are the best and the only ones worth mentioning.

dalton is a hack and an embarrassment to the james bond icon/image.

way too much dookey....

Originally Posted by dookey67

Bklyn: Um, Craig didn't bag hardly any chicks in the 2 films he's been in (2 in Casino and I don't think he "hit" any skins in Quantum, which surprised me)....

He boinked Gemma Arterton in QofS and I can't say I blame him.

But it did kind of feel that such a scene with the female lead had been cut and it was generally a disappointing follow up to Casino Royale.

Best opening scene for any movie (let alone a bond film) EVAR! HD, big screen, big sound. Really well done.