Once again we return for the inimitable “Does It Look Like It’s Our First Time?”. We’re changing up our methodology a bit this week, I’ll be doing our standard piece as a solo mission while CJ will be working up an editorial piece on the film. This week’s entry is a bit of an odd duck so let’s dive right in to On Her Majesty’s Secret Service!
Cold Open
On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’s cold open is a bit unique. After a sequence where M openly wanders where 007 might be, we cut to Bond driving down the road. Suddenly he drives his car onto the beach and runs to the water to save a woman from committing suicide by walking into the ocean. It’s as he’s walking out of the water that we see his face for the first time and GASP it’s not Sean Connery. Some new guy has taken over the role! At this point Bond gets into a rather poorly staged and edited fight and then, cue credits.
Music
Yet another diversion from what had become established series norms, while OHMSS does have a theme song, sung by Louis Armstrong, the version with the lyrics is not used over the credits. Instead the film opts for an instrumental version. Nonetheless it’s quite a good theme song, however the rest of the music for the film is rather unremarkable.
Plot
Ok this is a weird one so do your best to follow along. There are two plots in the film which converge and diverge throughout. One is the romance of Bond and Tracy di Vicenzo, the woman he saved from drowning herself. A wide assortment of reasons bring them together and Bond is smitten, but duty comes first. For you see Tracy’s mob boss father has discovered the location of Blofeld and Bond must spring into action before returning to marry Tracy. Still with me? Well, Bond goes undercover as a genealogist, which for some reason requires him to wear a kilt and a ridiculous assortment of shirts and ties, as he tries to figure out Blofeld’s plot, which seems to revolve around using a fake allergy-curing clinic to hypnotize women so that he can hold the world’s food supply for ransom by threatening to use said hypnotized girls to sterilize all manner of livestock and crops. Confused? Me too. From there we have a lot of skiing and snow fights and it’s all a rather absurd affair. It’s simultaneously a textbook Bond film and not at all typical.
Villain
As mentioned before, Blofeld is back and, per series tradition as this is a new appearance, he must be played by a new actor. This time it’s Telly Savalas, and I honestly prefer him to Donald Pleasance from the previous film. He’s less quirky and more menacing. There’s a gravitas to the performance and, while his plan is absurd, he sure sells the heck out of it. He also is responsible for the line “I have taught you to love chickens” and any villain who works that line in has to be respected. More importantly, by the end of the film he manages to hold the claim of being one of the only villains to personally hurt Bond.
Bond Girl
While there are many different female characters in this film, several of which Bond sleeps with, there’s only one true Bond girl and that’s Tracy. Tracy isn’t just your typical Bond girl though. She’s arguably one of the two most important Bond girls in the series, and that’s because she actually matters.
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She’s one of a very small number of Bond girls to melt Bond’s heart, and the only one he marries. That their married bliss is tragically cut short when she is gunned down by Blofeld only underlines this.
Bond (actor/performance)
This had to be a confusing moment for a lot of fans the first time around. After negotiations with Connery broke down, he was replaced with model turned actor George Lazenby.
Lazenby isn’t a bad Bond. He brings a new emotional vulnerability to the role and presents the character in a very different manner than his predecessor.
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That being said there are some flaws. Gone is the intensity of Connery’s Bond, and Lazenby brings nowhere near the same amount of physicality to the part.
Combined with the fact that he decided to leave after just one performance, thinking the franchise wouldn’t survive the 70s, it makes it hard to define his Bond. It’s a worthy effort but it honestly leaves more questions than answers.
Gadgets
There are none. OHMSS is a weird exception to the franchise’s escalation in that it really lacks many of the elements that defined the franchise for so many years.
Stunts/action
The action in this film is… not great. Without the physicality that Connery brought to the role the crew resorted to editing tricks to try and sell the action and it doesn’t really work. That combined with the film’s insistence on making non-snowboarding winter sports cool (there are multiple skiing and luge based action sequences) it just kind of lands with a thud. Tip to aspiring action directors: a man on skis will never look intimidating. Never. Just give up on that dream and make it easier on all of us.
Locales
So much snow! A large portion of this film is set in the Swiss Alps and it’s all well and good, but it just isn’t as exotic or exciting as any of the other environments that the previous films have been set in. With the villain’s lair being a glorified ski lodge, there’s just something missing.
Iconic Moments
Does Bond in a kilt and a frilly shirt count? There honestly aren’t that many iconic moments in this film. You would probably need to count the first recast in franchise history and Bond’s wedding in that category, but beyond that they just don’t produce many moments that we truly associate with the franchise. That hasn’t stopped every film in the franchise that features snowy environments from homaging the film, it’s just that the homages in question are rather dull.
Cringe Factor
I want to start by saying it’s nowhere near as bad as You Only Live Twice, but it’s still pretty bad. Gone is the racism of the previous film, instead replaced with some super cringey male-female interactions. From Tracy’s father basically offering to sell her to Bond and openly stating that she just needs some good loving to sort out all of her emotional problems, to Bond seducing multiple women by telling them that he is gay but they’re the special woman that turned him, this film has some problems. It’s always important to understand that these films are a product of the time in which they were made, but it’s honestly stunning to realize how much attitudes have changed since their release.
Final Thoughts
This is a really interesting addition to the canon. It eschews many of the standard franchise tropes and dares to marry off the main character. It has a bonkers plot, Lazenby puts on a fine performance, and it’s all in all one of the better put together entries in franchise history. It’s just not very remarkable at any one thing. Overall it’s a good film, just not one that I’ll be in a hurry to revisit in the near future.
