For Your Eyes Only Review (Revisit 2) "He had no head for heights!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, since its September, I thought I would do another post and this one is on another Bond film and the film in question is one of Roger Moore's era, which is For Your Eyes Only, which will be a revisit of an older post from 2021. 

So, with that said let's take another look at this Bond classic some 45 years on from its release.

And the usual warning is coming up.

SPOILERS ARE AHEAD!!! 

STORY 

So, the film begins with a British spy boat being sunk after its strikes a mine, the boat itself contained a specialised communications system used by the ministry of defence to communicate with its fleet of Polaris submarines, named ATAC.  So, 007 or James Bond (Moore) as a result of the incident is ordered by his superiors to retrieve the ATAC before the Soviets can as they could use it for their own means.

Meanwhile a British marine archaeologist who was hired by the British to locate the sunk spy boat is murdered by a hitman named Hector Gonzalez (Stefan Kalipha).  Bond follows up the lead and travels to Spain where he sneaks around Gonzalez's villa but he is captured, however Gonzalez himself is killed by an arrow, which allows Bond to escape.  Bond soon finds out Gonzalez's assassin is the daughter of the murdered archaeologist, Melina Havelock (Carole Bouquet) and the two of them escape together.

Bond later on with the help of Q (Desmond Llewellyn) discovers the identity of one of the men that was present at Gonzalez's villa was Emile Leopold Locque (Michael Gothard) another hired killer.  Bond then travels to Cortina in Italy to track Locque and he meets with his Italian contact, Luigi Ferrara (John Moreno) and a Greek businessman and informant named, Aris Kristatos (Julian Glover) who tells Bond that Locque is employed by a smuggler named Milos Columbo (Topol) who was one time a former business partner of his.

Bond later meets up with Kristatos's protege figure skater, Bibi Dahl (Lynn Holly Johnson) and while they ski together, Bibi points out to Bond an East German biathlete, Eric Kriegler (John Wyman) who later tries to kill Bond, who manages to escape.  Later on Bond fends off another attempt on his life at an ice rink and soon finds his contact, Luigi dead, with the symbol of a "dove" in his hands, the nickname for Locque.

Bond then travels to Corfu to follow Columbo and he meets with Columbo's mistress, Countess Lisl van Schaff (Cassandra Harris) and they spend the night together.  The next morning while walking a beach, Bond and Lisl are attacked by Locque who kills Lisl but Locque flees just as Columbo's men show up and capture Bond and take him to Columbo.

Columbo later explains to Bond that Kristatos is the man Bond should be after as he was the one who hired Locque and Kristatos is working with the KGB to retrieve the ATAC and he persuades Bond to go along on a raid of Kristato's opium processing warehouse in Albania.  During the raid, Bond discovers naval mines similar to the one that sunk the British spy boat, later Bond chases after Locque, shooting him in the shoulder, causes Locque's car to crash on the edge of a cliff and Bond kicks the car over, which sees Locque plummet to his death.

So after this Bond then teams up with Columbo and reunites with Melina to take down Kristatos and end his schemes....

THOUGHTS 

After the somewhat over the top and completely fantastical Moonraker, For Your Eyes Only saw the Bond series come back down to Earth (literally!) and with the change of director, John Glen, the film has a more gritty feel to it than Moore's previous films did, which is certainly not a bad thing in itself.

The film also saw a change in the cast as sadly Bernard Lee, who played M, died shortly just after filming had begun in 1981, so instead of replacing the actor, they re-wrote his character to include a new one, Bill Tanner, to take over as the chief of staff at MI6 and Bond's superior.  Roger Moore also apparently was set to make this his last Bond film but later of course did come back to play the part in two more films, Octopussy and View to a Kill. 

The film also notably starts with reference to Bond's late wife, Tracy, who visits her grave before he is attacked by an unknown bald assaliant, who we see sit in a wheelchair with a cat. This clearly appears to be a reference to the Bond villain, Blofeld (as previously played by Donald Pleasance, Telly Savalas and Charles Gray). However, as the filmmakers didn't own the rights to the character Blofeld, they weren't able to use his name directly. So, instead they resorted to shooting the actor, John Hollis, who played the villain from behind.  

PERFORMANCES AND NOTABLE SCENES (Warning: this section may contain spoilers!)

Performance wise, the film is actually quite good and features a largely fine cast.

And to start off of course we have Roger Moore who provides another solid turn in the part and this time he plays Bond with a bit more sensitivity and with less chauvinism and it actually stands as one of his most likeable performances in the role.  Although it does have to be said that Roger is starting to look a bit old for the part by this time as he already 53 years old by this point at the time of filming.

Moore has some good scenes and naturally some good one-liners and even his opening scene is quite funny where Bond is attacked by a bald headed villain (unidentified but clearly based on Blofeld and played by John Hollis and voiced by Robert Rietty) who remote controls a helicopter that Bond is in.  And in the scene Bond eventually manages to take control of the helicopter and picks up the villains' wheelchair by one of the copter's landing skids and as the villain pleads with him and Bond pats his head and says "Alright keep your hair on!" and the villain continues "Please Mr Bond, put me down!" Bond teases him saying "Oh you want to get off???" and he drops the villain down a large chimney stack and the the villain shouts "MR BONNNNND!!!!" as the credits roll. 

Then there are the scenes where Bond is stuck with taking care of Bibi, the annoying horny teenage skater and one such example is where Bibi lies in bed naked and Bond for once looks uncomfortable given that she is just a teenager. And Bib asks Bond "What is it? Don't you like me? and Bond awkwardly tells her "I think your wonderful, Bibi. I just don't think your Uncle Aris would approve!" and Bibi says "Aris? He still thinks I'm a virgin!". So, Bond again awkward, says "Yes well...you put on your clothes, I'll buy you an ice cream!".  

Then we have the scene at the ski slopes where Bond bids her farewell and says "Well, sorry Bibi but I'm afraid I must be off?" and Bibi says "What?" and Bond tells her "I have an appointment". And Bibi a bit disappointed asks him "Well, will I see you before we leave?" and Bond tells her "Well, I'll try but if I don't see you again, Bibi, I'll just say don't grow up anymore" and Bibi looks at him puzzle and says "Huh?" and Bond says to her "The opposite sex would never survive it!" and he skis off.

Then there is one of the film's best scenes where Bond chases after Locque, who crashes his car up the top of a cliff and Bond goes up to Locque and shows him the killer's pin that he left with Luigi Ferrara's body (Bond's associate) and Bond says to Locque "You left this with Ferrera, I believe".  And as the cars starts to give way to the crumbling rock, Bond kicks Locque's car off the cliff and later he quips "He didn't have a head for heights!".  Moore was reportedly uneasy about the idea of filming the scene but eventually agreed to go ahead with filming it, which is just as well as it remains a standout moment in Moore's era. 

Another really good scene for Roger which is quite suspenseful is when Bond makes his long climb up the mountain to St Cyril's monastery where Kristatos is hiding and waiting to deliver the ATAC machine to the KGB. And in the scene in a mountain-top monastery and one of Kristato's men tries to kick him off the cliff and knock out the climbing bolts he has placed one by one, but Bond manages to pull himself up just in time before the last one is knocked out and he kills the henchman with a throwing knife.

Roger also has one or two good serious moments as well such as in the scene where he warns Melina about taking revenge for the death of her parents and he says "The Chinese have a saying "before setting off on revenge, you first dig twice two graves". And later on as she is about to kill Kristatos he reminds her again as she is ready to kill Kristatos and Bond tells her "No, Melina, we'll leave him for the police" but Melina insists "Out of my way, James!" and James relucantly says "Alright. Just be prepared to dig those two graves" before (PLOT SPOILER!!) Columbo saves her the trouble.  

And in the second last scene of the film Bond throws away the ATAC machine as he approaches General Gogol (Walter Gotell) and the machine itself smashes into pieces on the rocks below. So, Bond then smiles at Gogol and says to him "That's detente, general, you don't have it and I don't have it!" and Gogol himself laughs and bids him farewell and leaves. 

Julian Glover is pretty good in his part as the main villain, Kristatos and he seems to enjoy playing the part of the double dealing businessman and intelligence informant although his villain isn't the most memorable or menacing it has to be said.

But Glover has some good moments that include the one where Kristatos has Bond and Melina tied up on his boat and they have been tied to a speedboat which will drag them through the water to attract the sharks for dinner!  And in the scene just before Bond and Melina are to be dropped into the water, Kristatos says to his men of Bond's wound on his arm "Bind that wound. We don't wany any blood in the water.  Not yet!".  Melina then looks disgusted at Kristatos and she spits at him "Murderer!" and Kristatos says to her, as a way of a pun as she uses her crossbow as a weapon in the film: "You've shot your last bolt, Miss Havelock!".    

Another scene of note is when Kristatos at the monastery near the end tries to appease a tired and bored Bibi, who is working out and he comes in to see her. So, Bibi in the scene asks Kristatos "What are we doing in this creepy place?" and Kristatos says "Our plans have changed. We are going to live in Cuba for the next few months" and Bibi annoyed says "Cuba?!" and Kristatos says to Bibi "You can skate privately there, without distractions and I will be your audience". Bibi, however is not interested "What a drag that will be! I wanna win the gold medal!" and Kristatos reassuringly says "We all want that!" and Bibi says "I know what you want...you're too old for me! I'm splitting!". Kristatos then glares angrily at Brink and says "You have poisoned her against me!" and Bibi says "Leave her alone, Ari!" and Kristatos looks angrily at Brink and says "I will deal with you as I deal with everyone who betrays me!" and he storms out.

Then there is the scene where Kristatos near the end readies his departure with the Atac machine but he is met with by an angry Bibi, who angrily asks him of the whereabouts of her coach "Where's Brink?" and he tells her "Go to your room!" and she angrily says "You can go to hell!" and  Kristatos smacks her roughly and shuts the doors.   

Topol however provides the film's standout role as Milos Columbo who is a really colourful character, who loves eating pistachio nuts and Bond is wary of him at first but he later becomes allies with him.  

And when Columbo meets with Bond he tells him that he has got him all wrong and that Kristatos is the real villain.  So Columbo tells Bond "I'm here, Mr. Bond of the British Secret Service. But I'll tell you... it is Kristatos you want, NOT me. He told you about himself. He's the one with the powerful connections, not me. Locque works for him, not me. He told you that I was a heroin smuggler, yes? That is partly true. I'm a smuggler. I smuggle, yes. I smuggle gold, diamonds, cigarettes, pistachio nuts... but no heroin. Sit down. That I leave to him... when he is not too busy working for Russia against my country and yours". Bond then reminds Columbo that the British government gave Kristatos a king's medal but Columbo tells him that he was a double agent.

Bond then asks Columbo "What does Kristatos gain by setting you up?" and Columbo says "Well, I know too much about him. He wants me out of the way. By using a British agent to do his dirty work for him, your government might give him another medal". Bond, still wary of Columbo asks him "Why should I believe you?" and Columbo says "I'll prove it to you tonight. We'll go to his warehouse in Albania". Bond warns Columbo "If I don't report in by tomorrow morning, not only my people, but the entire Greek police will be down on you like a load of bricks" but Columbo reassures him "Don't worry. By tomorrow, we'll be good friends. Let us drink to that" and Bond carefully says "I'll wait until tomorrow". 

Columbo then goes and takes Bond's Walther PPK and aims it at him and then hands over to him and says "You will need this. I'm a good judge of men. You, Mr Bond, have what the Greeks calls "thrausos" Guts!".

Carole Bouquet is one of the weak links in the cast as she is pretty wooden in her part as Bond's love interest (or one of them!) Melina Havelock.

Regardless of that though, Bouquet does what she can with her role and to the credit of her character, she does have more of a motivation and backstory to deal with than most of the Bond girls we usually see.  Bouquet, a French actress, reportedly had her voice dubbed over by another unknown actress for the film, which given that she can speak English herself seems a bit daft. 

Bouquet still has some good moments here and there and the one that springs to mind is when Melina tells Bond she is out for revenge for the murder of her family.  However Bond warns her with the Chinese saying of being prepared to "dig two graves" if you plan for revenge and Melina says to him "I don't expect you to understand, you're English, but I'm half Greek and Greek women like Elektra always avenge their loved ones!".

Then there is the scene where Bond, Columbo and Melina arrive at the scene of a monastery where Kirstatos is located and Bond starts to make his way up a steep mountain to get to the top where it is.  And during the scene, Columbo looks up concerned saying "We are just five men!" and then Melina produces her crossbow and says "And a woman!".  

Bouquet also gets the dubious pleasure of delivering the film's title line, which is one of the naffest as well "For your eyes only, darling!" just as Bond and Melina strip off and go for a swim.  This is of course then following by the annoying parrot who speaks to Margaret Thatcher (played by June Brown) on the phone and keeps saying "Give us a kiss!" although the parrot is kind of funny. 

As for the other cast members, Lynn-Holly Johnson is quite annoying as the horny teenage ice skater, Bibi Dahl who has a thing for Bond even though he is three times her age!

However it is worth mentioning Johnson's most notable scene where she attempts to try and seduce Bond as get's into bed naked but Bond is reluctant to oblige her.  And in the scene Bibi asks Bond "Don't you like me?" and Bond wearily says to her "Why, I think you're wonderful, Bibi... But I don't think your uncle Aris would approve" and Bibi says to Bond "Him? He thinks I'm still a virgin!". Bond then awkwardly says "Yes, well, if you put your clothes and I'll buy you an ice cream!".     

And lastly I will mention her scene where Bibi who has been taken to St Cyril's with Kristatos and her coach, Brink but she hates the place and is bored of working out and Kristatos comes in to see her. So, Bibi in the scene asks Kristatos "What are we doing in this creepy place?" and Kristatos says "Our plans have changed. We are going to live in Cuba for the next few months" and Bibi annoyed says "Cuba?!" and Kristatos says to Bibi "You can skate privately there, without distractions and I will be your audience". Bibi, however is not interested "What a drag that will be! I wanna win the gold medal!" and Kristatos reassuringly says "We all want that!" and Bibi says "I know what you want...you're too old for me! I'm splitting!". Kristatos then glares angrily at Brink and says "You have poisoned her against me!" and Bibi says "Leave her alone, Ari!" and Kristatos looks angrily at Brink and says "I will deal with you as I deal with everyone who betrays me!" and he storms out.

Michael Gothard is quite effective in his role as the creepy silent assassin, Locque aka "The Dove" who Bond kicks Locque's car off a cliff with him in it.  Gothard himself has no dialogue at all in the film, which would suggest that his character was a mute.  Sadly Gothard later took his own life in 1992 after years of struggling with depression. 

Desmond Lewellyn also nicely reprises his role as Q and has a good scene where Q and Bond try to identify Locque by using specialised facial ID tracking equipment.

So, in the scene, Q sets up the machine to use it with Bond's help and tells Bond "This  -D Visual ldentigraph is still in the experimental stage. Now, once we get a composite of the man...we can find a match by patching into the photographic files...of the Surety, lnterpol, CIA, the Mossad..." and Bond finishes Q's list and says "Yes and the West German police. You've told me so already five times!". 

And later there is the amusing scene where Bond goes into a church in St Cyrils and goes into a confession booth and he says to the priest on the other side "Forgive me father, I have sinned" and the priest turns out to be non other than Q who says to him "That's putting it mildly, 007!" who peels off a fake beard. Q then says to Bond "Your signal sent Whitehall into shock. So far we have managed to locate...St. Cyril's in Greece. Heaven only knows to which one Kristatos took the ATAC!" and Bond says "Well, I know a well informed man who I contact about that, Q".

Cassandra Harris also adds a bit of sexy charm to the film aswell in her role as the Countess, Columbo's mistress, whom Bond spends the night with just before she meets her fate the next day.

And I will mention one of Harris's scenes which is the one where Bond spends the night with the Countess but her Greek accent starts to slip a little revealing her to be English. So, as the Countess lies next to Bond she says in an English accent "My nightie's slipping!" and Bond says "So's your accent, Countess. Manchester?" and she corrects him "Close. Liverpool!. Bond asks her of her fake storm out to Columbo earlier "That was quite a performance earlier with Columbo. What exactly did Columbo whisper to you?" and she says "That you're a spy and to find out more about you" and Bond asks "And have you?" and she says "Have I ever?" and they kiss and you know the rest!   

John Wyman does OK in his role as Eric Kriegler, Kristatos's henchman, who has an amusing scene after chasing Bond in the mountains and Bond escapes, Kriegler out of rage angrily lifts his bike above his head and throws toward Bond's general direction!  In fact it has to be said that this film seems to have a thing for not so very talkative henchmen! 

And last of all is of course June Brown, who provides an amusing cameo performance as Margaret Thatcher, who calls to congratulate Bond on his mission's succcess, however instead she talks to Melina's parrot, Max, while Bond and Melina both go off for a night swim. 

So, in the scene, Maggie Thatcher unwittingly talking to Max says "Ah, Mr. Bond. I wanted to call you personnally and to say how pleased we all are that your mission was a success. Thank you" and Max says "Thank you! Thank you!". So, Maggie continues "Don't thank me, Mr. Bond. Your courage and resourcefulness are a credit to the nation. Denis and I look forward to meeting you. Meanwhile, if there is anything I can do for you..." and Max tells her "Give us a kiss!" and Maggie bashfully says "Oh, Mr Bond!".

DIRECTOR AND MUSIC 

Moving onto the director, John Glen does a fine job here in his directorial debut and he confidently handles the action of the film very well as he would continue to in his next four Bond films that he directed.  Glen also contributed well towards changing the tone and style of Bond quite a bit and he radically changed it when Timothy Dalton came onboard as Bond and its funny to think he was the only active Bond director in the entire decade of the 1980's! However, Irvin Kershner did direct the Thunderball remake, Never Say Never Again with Sean Connery in 1983 but that's not part of the official Bond series as it was not by the Eon production studio.

Music wise the film also has a fairly good score by Bill Conti, however at the same time his musical style isn't quite well suited to the Bond films as you just keep hearing echoes of his Rocky scores here. Regardless his score is still a decent one and it has some good sections to it that include the one where Bond makes his mountain climb up to the top of St Cyril's monastery near the end. 

The film's theme song however sung by Sheena Easton was never really a favourite of mine, so its a pretty average theme for me but there are worse ones for sure out there. Interestingly enough though, Sheena Easton herself was the first singer to feature in the title theme credits as the title designer, Maurice Binder liked her appearance (or basically fancied her!) and wanted to include her in them. 

FLAWS (Warning: this section may contain spoilers!)

As for flaws...... well For Your Eyes Only isn't perfect and it has to be said that again the film lacks a strong central villain as Kristatos isn't very menacing even though Julian Glover's performance is pretty good his character is not an effective villain, certainly not in comparison to the likes of Goldfinger, Scaramanga or Kananga and next to them he is quite forgettable.

The same can also be said to an extent for its leading lady and Bond girl character, Melina Havelock, as her character doesn't really come across as well as she could have, given that Melina's character had the potential to be really good as she had a motivation for revenge in the story.  This however could also even have come down to the possibility of Boquet's voice being dubbed over and if it was then it would certainly attribute to her performance being not as strong as it might have been, which if it is the case then that's probably more to do with the director's decisions than the actress. 

Then there is that stupid albeit entertaining opening scene where a bald-headed man, who is presumably Blofeld, takes remote control of a helicopter that Bond is flying in, however Bond manages to severe the cable that was remotely controlling it.  So then Bond turns the table and he scoops up the bald-headed villain's wheelchair, which leaves the villain pleasing "Mr Bond, I'll give you anything!  A delicatessen in stainless steel!!".  A WHAT???!!  A delicastessen in stainless steel???!! Now that is a bizzare one even by any Bond villain's standards!  Its just an example of very cheesy, lazy writing if you ask me and it mars the opening scene.

Another silly scene is the facial ID equipment Q uses with Bond to identify Loque and while Bond's description is hardly pin accurate, the tech of the time is pretty crude, so its amazing they were able to come up with Loque almost straight away! So, yep about 10 seconds later, we get an old dot matrix printer print a copy of Loque's face and full bio on the man. Not too bad for the early 80's! ;-)

I also felt that the film's underwater scenes were a bit tedious where Bond and Melina locate the ATAC and get attacked by a man in a metallic suit with pincers (yep really daft!).  Then there is the scene where Bond and Melina are tied to the back of Kristatos's speedboat and he has them dragged through the water in an effort to attracts nearby sharks in the water.  Its a pretty laboured drawn out sequence which ultimately of course results in Bond and Melina escaping anyway.

And then we have Bibi...ohh God! Yeah, Bibi. Bibi must be one of the most annoying Bond characters to have appeared in the series, who is of course a horny teenage ice-skater with a promising career ahead of her, who has her eyes on Bond despite the fact that he must be about 40 years older than her! And there is one point where Bibi is even arrogant enough to think that Kristatos wants her and she says to him that he is too old for her yet Julian Glover is actually 8 years younger than Roger Moore!  But yeah, Bibi is pretty annoying and she has plenty of naff dialogue and one of her worst lines which I didn't mention is when she hugs Bond and says "I could just eat you alive!". Jesus wept! 

And lastly Bernard Lee's presence is somewhat missed from the film as his character M was written out to allow for the new character Bill Tanner to be written in who makes a rather bland replacement.  But then Lee's contribution to the series was very memorable so his successor would have had some tough shoes to fill and unfortunately Tanner just doesn't cut it. 

Anyway that's it for the flaws.   

SUM UP 

So to sum up, For Your Eyes Only remains one of Moore's stronger Bond films and definitely one of the more underrated Bond films of the era as it has plenty of good solid action, a likeable performance from Moore himself and a good supporting cast particularly from Topol and Glover.

And yes it does have a few problems and its not one of the most memorable Bond films but its still got a lot going for it and it saw the series come down to Earth after the outlandish (literally) Moonraker.  Although the following film, Octopussy, would see the series become perhaps the most ridiculous its ever been up to this point, so we go from one extreme to the other...again! ;-) 

Anyway, I will give For Your Eyes Only a rating of:

8 out of 10. 

So, that's it for this one and I'll be back with another post or other hopefully before the end of the month as I know the blog has been a bit empty post wise lately. 

Until then its bye for now! 

 

The Man With The Golden Gun Review (Revisited) "He must have found me quite tittilating!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, I've been looking at posts to do to start off August (despite being in the middle of it!) on the blog, so I thought I would revisit an old Bond film and have opted for the 1974 classic, The Man with the Golden Gun, starring Roger Moore in the titular role of 007. 

So, after 52 years, let's take a look at how this classic Bond flick fairs... 

PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD!!! 

STORY

So, the story begins with a golden bullet received by MI6 which has "007" etched on it and it was believed to be sent by a famous and mysterious assassin named Francisco Scaramanga (Christopher Lee) as a taunt to James Bond (Roger Moore).  

Bond then decides to go off and locate Scaramanga, without the permission of his superiors and he starts his travels and in a nightclub he spots a dancer, Saida (Carmen du Sautoy) with a golden bullet in her belly button.  Bond goes backstage afterward and allows himself to be seduced by the dancer but is suddenly attacked by thugs just as he kisses the dancer's stomach he swallows the bullet.  Bond then fights off the men and leaves and afterward tracks the manufacturer of the bullet with the help of Q (Desmond Llewellyn) and he goes to Macau.  

Bond then follows Sacaramanga's mistress, Andrea Anders (Maude Adams) who is seen collecting bullets from a casino.  Bond then follows Andrea to Hong Kong and to her hotel where he forces her to tell him about Scaramanga's plans and what he looks like (as he has never been seen) and Andrea tells Bond that his next hit will be at the Bottoms-up club.  

At the club Bond discovers that Scaramanga's next hit is Gibson, a scientist who holds valuable piece of technology called the "solar agitator".  Scaramanga kills Gibson with one shot from his golden gun and his dwarf henchman, Nick Nack (Herve Villechaize) steal the solar agitator.  Bond arrives on the scene but is suddenly arrested by Lt Hip (Soon-Tek Oh) who takes him to meet up with M (Bernard Lee) and Q onboard the wreck of the RMS Queen Elizabeth, where they have a secret office.  At their meeting M orders Bond to retrieve the solex device and assassinate Scaramanga and from here Bond starts his dangerous journey to stop megalomaniacal Scaramanga...

THOUGHTS 

Whilst its not the strongest Bond films in the franchise, The Man with the Golden Gun is still a very entertaining, albeit cheesy Bond film which features plenty of action, cheap laughs, adventure and fun to keep the viewer interested.  Based on the original novel by Ian Fleming it was originally set to be filmed after You Only Live Twice and to use Cambodia as the location for filming, however it was cancelled due to an uprising at that time over there.  

Interestingly enough, this was Ian Fleming's final novel before his death in 1964, which was later published in 1965. The film's script also mirrored the real life energy oil crisis of 1973 which greatly affected the UK and also the USA, which was covered with the theme of the Solex agitator and how Scaramanga wished to steal the device so he could capture  the power of solar energy for his own uses.  The film also poked fun at martial arts films, especially given the success of Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon, which we see during the scene where Bond has to fight within a karate dojo.

PERFORMANCES AND NOTABLE SCENES (Warning: this section may contain spoilers!)

Performance wise TMWTGG (quite an abbreviation!) is largely pretty good even if the cast aren't all quite perfect. 

Starting with Roger Moore who does a find job as James Bond and this was only his second film but even by then he had already eased into the part of playing the suave, smooth yet deadly secret agent.  Moore however felt at the time he wasn't entirely happy with the direction of where the character was going as in the film Moore is directed to play Bond a bit more like Sean Connery, as rough and tumble 007 who will slap women around if necessary to get information.  And we see Moore do this in the scene where 007 pressues Andrea to tell him information about Scaramanga, which Moore was not comfortable filming.

Moore however does have quite a few highlights in the film and he get's plenty of a glib one-liners and double entendres.  Some examples include the scene where Bond seduces (or allows himself to be seduced) by the belly dancer, Saida, and he ends up accidentally swallowing her golden bullet just as the thugs attack him.  And after the fight the dancer looks down at her belly button and screams "I've lost my charm!" and Bond says "Not from where I'm standing!" before he leaves and hails a taxi outside and says to the driver "Take me to the nearest pharmacy!".  

Then there is the scene where Bond threatens the bullet manufacturer, Lazar by aiming a rifle at his groin. And in the scene, Lazar tells Bond how he just makes bullets but doesn't kill anyone much to the protest of Bond who accuses him of supplying bullets to killers such as Scaramanga. So, Lazar says to him "Mr Bond, bullets do not kill. Its the trigger that pulls them" and Bond says "Exactly" and he trains the rifle he stands behind at Lazar and says coldly "I am now aiming precisely at your groin. So speak now or forever hold your piece!". Moore was reportedly uncomfortable shooting this scene as well.

Another is the scene where Bond pressures Andrea to tell him where Scaramanga is and what he looks like he asks her "How can I recognise him?" and she says "Tall, slim and dark" and Bond quips "So is my aunt! Anything disctinctive about him?". So, Andrea tells him "He's not like other men he has three..." pointing to the area of the chest to indicate three nipples and Bond says "Funny anatomical titbit, but perhaps the most useless piece of information I've ever heard unless the Bottoms-up is a strip club and Scaramanga is performing there!".  

Another scene is where Bond meets with Hai Fat (Richard Loo) a wealthy Thai entrepreneur who is in cahoots with Scaramanga and he takes off his shirt as he prepares to go in for a dip with some girls in a pool within Fat's estate and he sees that Bond has a fake third nipple.  And Bond after the meeting with Fat, leaves and say to Hip "He invited me to dinner.  He must have found me quite titillating!" and he removes the fake nipple and throws it away.  

Then there is the scene where Bond is taken to a dojo in Fat's estate and he is forced to fight some of the dojo's students the first he knocks unconscious with a single kick before fighting the dojo's top student, Chula. And after a tough fight, Bond manages to escape by diving out the dojo and before leaving he bows his head!

This is then followed by the moment where Bond tries to escape Fat's men in a small motored boat but it runs out of steam and stutters, so Bond tries to look for a way to fit and a young boy selling a statue jumps onboard to pitch to him. So, the boy says to him "You are very handsome, Mister. 30 baht. For your 20 baht!" and Bond looks at him and says "Tell you what, sonny, I'll give you 20,000 baht if you can make this thing go any faster!". And the boy suddenly turns a small switch, which powers the boat and it speeds up and the boy grins and says "20,000 baht!" but Bond sees the Fat men coming on the canal, so he pushes the boy into the water and says "I'm afraid I'll have to owe you!" and the young boy shouts "Bloody tourists!".    

And there is of course the car chase scene between Bond and Scaramanga where Bond just so happens to steal a car from a dealership, which Pepper is sitting in is testing out. So, as Bond get's in the car, Pepper without looking at him and asks "How about a demonstration, boy?" and Bond says to him "Certainly, sir!" and starts up the engine and drives it out through the dealership window. However, as Pepper looks at Bond he says "Now, I KNOW you!" and Bond recognises him and says "Oh, no!" and Pepper says "You're the secret agent! That English secret agent from England!". 

And later on as Bond loses sight of Scaramanga, he soon finds him again but across a river and he eyes an incomplete spiral shaped wooden bridge that would lead other side and Bond suddenly turns the car around levels it up to make the jump. So, in the scene Pepper nervously says "You're not gonna..." and Bond says to him "I sure am, boy!" and he revs up the car and drives toward the incomplete bridge and says "You ever heard of Evel Knievel?!" and the car makes the looped jump over to the other side. Pepper then shouts in celebration as they make and in amazement he says "I ain't never done THAT before!" and Bond says calmly "No, neither have I actually".  

Then there is the scene where Bond travels to Scaramanga's remote island and has dinner with him and he listens to Scaramanga's waffle. So, Scaramanga concludes by saying to Bond that they are no different from each other and that surely he must enjoy killing as much as he does but Bond says to him "There is an interesting four letter word, and you're full of it! When I kill its on orders of her majesty's government and those I kill are themselves killers!" but Scaramanga says to him "Oh, come come, Mr Bond. You get as much fulfilment out of killing as I do, so why don't you admit it?" and Bond says "I admit killing you would be a pleasure". Scaramanga then tries to taunt Bond by saying "Then you should have done that when you first saw me but the English don't consider it sporting to kill in cold blood, do they?" and Bond irritated says "Don't count on it!" and tries to pull his gun but Scaramanga pulls his first. 

WARNING: BIG SPOILER AHEAD! 

And last of all is the scene where just after Bond kills Scaramanga having disguised himself as S's waxwork of Bond, he finds Goodnight and they make their exit from the island. 

So, in the scene, Goodnight asks Bond "Where is Scaramanga?" and Bond tells her "Flat on his coup de grace! I'll have to take care of the maintenance man" and Goodnight tells him "I already did. I laid him out cold" and Bond looks surprised and says "There's more to you than meets the eye, Goodnight". However, as they enter the plantworks area, Bond notices the warning signs and the helium containers are starting to bubble up violently. So, Bond asks her "Goodnight, I hate to ask a stupid question but where exactly did you knock him out cold?" and Goodnight points and says "He fell into that one other there". So, Bond annoyed says to her "Don't you believe in signs?! We've got 5 minutes before his body temperature raises that helium and then this place will go sky high!". 

And then there is Christopher Lee who steals the film as Scaramanga, the ruthless assassin, who apparently is paid a million dollars a hit as he considered to be that good.  

Lee has some good fun with his character and he has several highlights in the film, such as the opening scene where a man comes to his island, where he challenges him and ends up killing the man and he says to Nick Nack "You'll be the death of me yet, Nick Nack!" and he then turns to a dummy of Bond and shoots its fingers off!  

Then there is the scene where Scaramanga kills Hai-Fat and just before he does, Hai-Fat tells him that he most take the Solex and return to the power plant and Scaramanga secretly assembles his gun for the kill.

So, in the scene, Scaramanga teases Hai-Fat about his karate dojo student failing to capture Bond "What do they teach at that school? Ballet dancing?!" and Hai-Fat says to him "I find nothing amusing in Mr. Bond's escape. May I remind you that you work for me. I took you on to be an occasional consultant, nothing more. I now regret having even considered employing your services, but that is beside the point. Bond doesn't know you; he's never seen you. But he knows me. That's the problem". Scaramanga by now having fully assembled his gun says to Hai-Fat "That's no problem" and he aims his gun and shoots Hai-Fat, who collapses. So, one of Hai-Fat's aides runs in and asks what happened and Scaramanga tells him "Mr Fat has just resigned. I'm the new chairman of the board" and he leaves and says on his way out "He always did like that mausoleum. Put him in it!". 

And one of Lee's best and most cheesy moments is the scene where Scaramanga finally meets with Bond during a Thai kick-boxing match, as Bond sits next to Andrea (who is now dead at this point).  And in the scene Scaramanga tells Bond a little backstory about himself "When I was a boy I was brought up in a circus.  My only real friend was a huge, magnificent African bull." and he continues to say "You see, Mr Bond, I always thought I loved animals.  Then I discovered that I enjoy killing people even more". Scaramanga then says to Bond before he goes "I will bid you farewell now, Mr Bond. Please don't try to follow us" and Bond says of Nick-Nack who sits behind Bond with a gun "Your peanut gun-toting friend back there wouldn't like it" and Scaramanga smiles and says "No, he wouldn't" and leaves. 

Then there is the scene Scaramanga and Bond taunt each other while Bond is at Scaramanga's island and Scaramanga pulls out his gun and says "I could have shot you down when you arrived, but that would have been ridiculously easy!  You see, Mr Bond, like every great artist I would like to create an indisputable masterpiece once in my lifetime.  The death of 007 mano en meno, will be mine!".

Maude Adams as Scaramanga's mistress, Andrea Anders is also very good and Adams herself would later return in another Bond film, Octopussy as a different girl.

And I will mention just one of Adams's scenes, which is the one where Bond interrogates Andrea at her hotel room. So, In the scene Bond asks her "Do you work for him?" and Andrea awkwardly says to Bond "I don't work for him. I'm his... eh...his..." and Bond susses it out "So, he's a lover too" and Andrea says "Only before he kills" and Bond says "Bullfighters do the same thing. They claim it improves the eye. His eyes are on me. Where can I find him?". Andrea then says "I don't know" and Bond grabs her roughly and slaps her and shouts "I said where?!" and Andrea says "I know he has a date at the Bottoms' up club tonight!". 

Bond then asks her "How will I recognise him?" and Andrea says "Tall, slim and dark" and Bond quips "So is my aunt. Anything distinctive about him?" and Andrea says "He's not like other men he has three..." and indicates the nipple area and Bond says "Fascinating anatomical titbid but probably the most useless piece of information I've ever heard unless Bottom's up is a strip and Scaramanga is performing there!". So, Bond threatens Andrea and says "You'll have to do better!" and Andrea says "He usually wears a white linen suit, black tie, and jewellery all gold" and Bond says "You're improving" and Andrea rolls her wrist and says "I don't want you to twist my arm again!" and Bond says "I don't want to either".

Then there is Britt Eckland as Bond's later love interest, Goodnight, whom is somewhat clumsy and hapless in the film but ends up helping Bond at the end (and yes she does look good in a bikini!).  

And Britt has one of the film's cheesiest but still fun lines, where Bond first meets up with her and he says to her that he has official business (i.e. Andrea, Scaramanga's mistress) and Goodnight having spotted Andrea earlier says "Yes I saw your official business" and Bond says "Goodnight after two years would I do that to you?" and she shouts "Yes you bloody well would!".  

Another good scene from Britt is when Bond and Goodnight share a late night drink together outside and she is wearing a fetching blue dress, which Bond compliments her on as he drinks some sub-par wine. So, Bond drinks the wine and says "I approve" and Goodnight asks "You do?" and Bond says "Oh, not the wine, of your frock. Tight in all the right places, not too many buttons" and Goodnight smiles and says "Its South East Asia standard, the buttons are down the back". So, Bond then flirts with Goodnight a bit more heavily and says "If Hip doesn't come up with a lead, there really isn't much for us to do tonight". However, for once, Bond is given the cold shoulder and Goodnight says well goodnight to him! So, Goodnight says "Oh, darling, I'm tempted. But, killing a few hours as one of your passing fancies, isn't quite my scene" and she walks off. 

And lastly there is the scene near the end where Goodnight knocks out Scaramanga's plant worker and he lands in a container of liquid helium (I think!) and his body temperature raises the plant's temps to an unstable rate much to Bond's horror. So, Bond says to Goodnight "We'll need to take care of the maintenance man" and Goodnight says to him "I already did. I laid him out cold " and Bond looks at her surprised and says "There's more to you than meets the eye, Goodnight!". So, as they enter the plant area, Bond asks her "Goodnight, I hate to ask a stupid question but where did you knock him out cold?" and Goodnight says "I knocked him out in that one over there" and we see the man's body lie in the container. Bond however says to her "Don't you believe in signs?! We've five minutes before his body temperature raises that helium and this whole place will go sky high!" and Goodnight says "I'm sorry, I didn't know!".   

And last of all is Britt's last scene where Bond and Goodnight make out onboard Scaramanga's private junk but unbeknownst to them, Nick-Nack has also smuggled himself onboard. So, just as Bond and Goodnight embrace, Goodnight smiles and says to Bond "I always wanted to take a slow boat from China!" and they kiss but its not long before Nick-Nack appears from above with a knive and Goodnight looks up and screams just before Nick-Nack drops down and he and Bond fight.

Clifton James also reprises his role from Live and Let Die as Sherrif J.W. Pepper who turns up in the film and just happens to be on holiday in Bangkok (with his wife) and testing out a car in a showroom when Bond suddenly races into the car and takes off with Pepper.  Pepper it has to be said is actually one of the more annoying characters in the Bond series and these days its probably harder to find him amusing given his rather blinkered and racist outlook but nevertheless he still provides some amusing moments.  

And in the scene Pepper suddenly realises who Bond is and says "Now I know you!" and Bond looks at him and realises how he is and wearily says "Oh, no!". And Pepper says excitedly to Bond "You're that secret agent, ain't you?!  That English secret agent from England!". Pepper then grins and sees that Bond is chasing after someone and says "You're chasin someone, aren't you?! Who are you after, boy?! Commies?! I'm with you all the way!". 

Then there is of course the scene where Bond is about to make the film's spectacular looped car jump over an incomplete bridge and just before Bond does it, Pepper looks at Bond and says "You're not gonna..." and Bond says in a feeble American accent "I sure am, boy!". So, after Bond makes the jump, Pepper excitedly yells "WAHHHOOOO!" and he gathers himself and sits up and says "I ain't never done that before!" and Bond confesses "No, neither have I actually".

And later on when Bond chases Scaramanga to a hanger and then Pepper is hand-cuffed by one of the local police officers and he protests loudly as you would expect! However, as Pepper protests, the local police officers are too busy looking up at the skies as Scaramanga's car with added wings, flies off. So, Pepper yells at the office who has cuffed him "You can't do this to me! And I want my wallet back. Take these god damn bracelets off! I'm gonna sue you for false arrest. Police brutality! I've got connections, you brown pony heads! I'm gonna get the FBI on you! And the CIA! God Damn it! I'm gonna get Henry Kissenger! Now, look at me when I'm talkin' to you, boy!". And Pepper finally looks up but thinks its just a plane and asks the officer "What's the matter?! Ain't any of you pointy-heads seen a plane before?!".

And last of all is Herve Villechaize as Nick Nack, Scaramanga's dwarf henchman, who has a fine line in some cheeky one liners and generally being more mischievous than anything else. Villechaize would later achieve greater fame in the TV series, Fantasy Island with Ricardo Montalban but tragically ended up taking his own life in 1993 aged only 50.  

Herve has some amusing moments in the film such as the scene at the start where Scaramanga faces a challenger at his island and he manages to kill him. So, Nick Nack, monitors the challenge until Scaramanga has succeeded and after, Nick Nack appears and says "This was the best one yet, n'est-ce pas?" and Scaramanga says "Not bad. But you're going to have to do better if you want to come into my money" and Nick Nack grins and says "I'll get you yet. And I'll enjoy everything you leave me!" and Scaramanga smiles and says "You'll be the death of me yet, Nick Nack!".

Then there is of course the scene where Bond and Scaramanga face off one another on the island and Nick-Nack counts to twenty as they walk 20 paces apart before they are to turn and fire at each other but Scaramanga disappears when Bond turns around and fires. So, as Bond searches the island for Scaramanga he stumbles on Nick Nack who says to him quietly "If you kill him, all this becomes mine!" and Bond threatens him and says "I've never killed a midget before but there's always a first time" and Nick Nack says "Oh, Monsieur!". 

And lastly there is the scene at the end of the film where Nick Nack confronts Bond onboard Scaramanga's junket and angrily shouts at him "I'll kill you!" and Bond looks at him and says "Why, you...". And as they play a game of cat and mouse (guess which is which?!) Bond captures Nick Nack by putting him in a suitcase and tying him to the boat's mast and Nick Nack is heard yelling "Oww! Let me out, you big bully! I maybe small but I never forget!" and Bond yells "Shut up!". 

DIRECTOR 

As for the director, Guy Hamilton, who was a real veteran of the Bond film's by then, does a very good job here with the film and he knows how to handle the action scenes very well and keeps the film's pace fairly taut and allows for some typical moments of cheesy Bond-esque humour. This in fact would be Hamilton's final film that he worked on in the Bond series and would later go on to direct films such as Force 10 From Navarone and Evil Under the Sun before his retirement. Hamilton later died in 2016.  

The film also features a fine music score by John Barry, which stands out as one of the film's better aspects and there are plenty of good tracks in the film, particularly during the sequence where Bond tries to track Scaramanga's whereabouts on the island during their duel. Unfortunately the film's theme song sung by Lulu is not as good and stands as one of the weakest Bond themes in the series.

FLAWS (Warning: this section may also contain spoilers!)

So, flaws??? Yes, The Man With The Golden Gun has some worth of note.  

For starters the film is naturally quite dated looking given its 70s setting and it also has some rather uncomfortable sexist attitudes in it.  Bond is naturally a typical male chauvinist and in the film but he also is portrayed a bit more roughly as seen in the scene where Bond forces Andrea to tell him about Scaramanga and in the scene he slaps her and twists her arm behind her back, which was the sort of thing we saw Sean Connery do in Diamonds are forever when he takes off a girl's bra and nearly strangles her with it. Already as mentioned, Moore himself was uncomfortable shooting the scene with Maude Adams.

The film also displays a rather sexist attitude by showing inept and clumsy female characters such as Goodnight, who get's herself too easily into trouble and in the scene near the end she activates the solar powered dish control button by leaning back on it with her bum and activating it!  And I guess this is something they wanted to try and remedy in The Spy who Loved Me, where Major Amasova is a far more capable, disciplined and well trained agent than Goodnight ever was.  

The film's dialogue whilst has some good lines it also is pretty cliched and features some ridiculous lines such as the scene where Bond meets with the bullet manufacturer, Lazar who as soon as he meets Bond says "Ah Mr Bond, your reputation proceeds you!" which again re-iterates that James Bond is supposed to be a secret spy but he is hardly secret if everyone knows who he is!  This is also noted in the scene at the start where Scaramanga shoots the fingers off the waxwork dummy of Bond and in that moment its more like Bond is a celebrity figure than a secret agent and unlike Scaramanga everyone knows what he looks like and its a pretty daft moment in the film anyway!  

The film is also guilty of having some rather boring chase scenes in it, which often are the dullest moments of any Bond film although the chase scene with Sheriff J.W. Pepper next to Bond blaring in his ear does add something a bit different! However, if there is one thing I hate about that car chase scene is the annoying slide whistle that is played when Bond makes the car jump. Its just cheesy as hell and not necessary. 

Also further to this point, just how did Pepper happened to be on holiday in the exact same spot as Bond was at in the film in the first place??! The notion of Pepper being on holiday is fair enough but to be in the same place as James Bond is just a bit too far fetched as they end up going for a "test drive" as Bond chases after Scaramanga.  

As for the plot niggle, just how was Andrea planted next to Bond at the kickboxing fight when she was dead? I mean did Scaramanga shoot her before Bond arrived and propped her up in the seat or maybe Nick-Nack shot her??? Who knows? I just could never figure out how she just happened to be sitting there as a corpse at that moment as I can hardly imagine them being able to discreetly drag her corpse into the arena, so I can only guess that Scaramanga might have shot her at point blank range in the seat but again that's just a guess. Bottom line is though, if Andrea was dead before then, it would have been impossible for them to carry her in without someone noticing surely?! Ahh well, its just a film after all.  

Last of all, I have to ask just how the hell did Bond manage to climb down the scaffolding just in time before Scaramanga would find him and get dressed in the Bond waxwork suit??? Not only that but with Nick-Nack keeping an eye on the camera monitors for Bond, surely there would have been one nearby the waxwork area that could have shown Bond changing clothes maybe??? Yeah, its another convenient plot moment that doesn't quite add up.

So, that's it for the flaws.

SUM UP

So, to sum up, The Man With The Golden Gun, while its not one of the best Bond films by any stretch, it is still quite an enjoyable one and has enough action set pieces, amusing one-liners and decent performances from its main cast to make it very watchable. In fact, its safe to say that Scaramanga definitely remains as one of the most memorable villains in the series and Christopher Lee definitely steals the show here with his performance. 

However, the film of course isn't perfect and has its share of problems that prevent it from being a classic with some daft plot issues, some blatant sexism and Moore to a certain extent here even being forced to imitate Connery's Bond when it comes to roughing up women, which doesn't feel right for Moore's interpretation of the role. That aside, The Man with the Golden is a fun film and worth a look even if its not one of the strongest Bond films of its era or the franchise.

So, I will rate it: 

7 out of 10 

So, that's it for now and I will be back with another post soon.

Till the next one, bye for now! 

 

Point Break Review (Revisited again) "I am an F...B...I AGENT!!!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

OK guys, so figured I would try and get one last post in this month before August comes round and this one is a revisit of a film I've looked at quite a few times and watched it last night, so figured I would update the post for it again. So, the film in question is Point Break, the 1991 action classic starring Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze. 

So, after 35 years, let's take a look at this one and see how it fairs...

And the usual warning is coming up...

PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD!!! 

STORY   

So, the film begins with rookie FBI agent Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) who is assigned along with his veteran partner, Angelo Pappas (Gary Busey) to investigate a series of bank robberies.  The robbers themselves are dressed up wearing masks of four former presidents, Ronald Regan, Richard Nixon, Lindon B. Johnson and Jimmy Carter and they nickname themselves the "ex-presidents".

Pappas has a theory that the ex-presidents are in fact surfers (due to video footage of one of them dropping their trousers to moon revealing a "tan line" across their ass, which would be associated with surfers!) and Utah decides to go with his theory and infiltrates a small surfing community.  Utah however has no idea how to surf and nearly drowns out at sea on his first day but he is rescued by a female surfer, Tyler (Lori Petty). Johnny then runs her plates and finds her arrest sheet and history and uses her parents deaths in a plane accident as angle to get to her. Johnny then tells Tyler that he wants to learn to surf although Tyler initially refuses, Johnny lies and tells her his parents died in a car crash, which makes her reluctantly accept.

Johnny eventually manages to get the hang of surfing through Tyler's help and he soon meets the leader of a local surfing gang, Bodhi (Patrick Swayze) and when he reveals he was a former quarterback in football, Bodhi's crew accept Johnny, who begins to get drawn into their world.  Utah also follows the lead of a clue which might lead them to the robbers as he and Pappas set up a raid on another gang of surfers, who turn out not to be the ex-presidents and it turns out instead they have accidentally ruined a DEA undercover operation in the process, which incurs the wrath of Utah and Pappa's superior, FBI Agent Harp (John C. McGinley).

The next day however Johnny, who by now has become romantically involved with Tyler receives an early wake-up visit from Bodhi and they go out for surf, however as Utah walks along the beach he sees Bodhi and his crew out surfing, one of whom moons (i.e. drops his shorts!) in the same style as the bank robber did in one of the video tapes taken from the bank robbery at the start of the film.  It then dawns on Utah that Bodhi's gang are the ex-presidents and he tells Pappas of his suspicions as he tailed Bodhi to find that he was scoping a bank.

The next day Utah and Pappas steak out outside the bank and right enough they see the ex-presidents leave the bank, with Utah and Pappas giving chase, Utah eventually chases the robber wearing the Reagan mask on foot through a neighbourhood.  As Utah chases after the robber he accidentally slips down an aquaduct and injures his knee in the process, as the robber gains distance, Utah takes out his gun and aims at the robber but can't bring himself to pull the trigger and fires his gun into the air instead, yelling in frustration.

Later that night Bodhi and his gang reveal that they are indeed the ex-presidents, but Bodhi's motivation was to rebel against the system and not to gain profit.  With Bodhi's gang scared and wanting out, Bodhi refuses to back down and he insists that he knows what to do with Johnny.  Meanwhile Tyler discovers that Johnny is in fact an FBI agent as she finds his badge and gun in his apartment, furious with Johnny for lying, Tyler runs out on him. 

The next morning Bodhi turns up at Johnny's front door and insists he goes skydiving with his gang, which Johnny reluctantly obliges, but in doing so, he get's a real kick out of it and bonds with the group during the dive.  After they land Bodhi takes Johnny into a van and plays a tape showing Tyler tied up to a chair with one of Bodhi's gang, Rosie (Lee Tergesen) holding a knife to her throat.  Bodhi reveals that he knows that Utah is an FBI agent, and tells him that Tyler will be fine as long as he gets a certain place in time first, and he forces Utah to go along on their last robbery with them, which brings the film toward its hectic climax....

THOUGHTS

Even at 35 years onward, Point Break is still a very enjoyable action thriller and while it is at times somewhat cheesy in its depiction of the surfer community and of the robbers it nonetheless has plenty of high octane action that keeps an audience gripped.  The relationship between Utah and Bodhi also helps drive the film's story pretty well as Utah is sucked into the world of surfing and he is drawn to Bodhi's charisma, and in the end even as Utah pursues Bodhi so relentlessly, he at the end of the film still has a lot of respect for him.  And the film certainly says a lot for adrenaline junkies and the rush and the need for it, and even shows how fanatical Bodhi's crew are as they even willing to die to find that ultimate rush (or killer rush being more like it!).  

And at the time of the production, neither Reeves, Swayze or Petty hadn't any real surfing experience and they ended being taught by a surfing instructor over a two month period with Swayze and Reeves both being drawn towards surfing, and Reeves who continued to keep it up as a hobby afterwards. Most of the surfing was done by professionals however and the cast mostly did basic surfs. It was also later revealed that Swayze did his own aerial stunts during the skydiving scenes, as well as during the fight scenes and of course surfing, and Swayze himself felt that he had a strong kinship with Bodhi's character as the wild guy.

PERFORMANCES AND NOTABLE SCENES (Warning: this section contains strong language and spoilers!!) 

Moving onto the film's performances things are mainly pretty good here.

And to start off with Keanu Reeves, who while he is not the best actor in the world, does give a good account of himself here as the ambitious young FBI rookie, Johnny Utah, who gets drawn into the world of surfing and makes a connection with the surfing gang leader, Bodhi.

Reeves also has his share of good scenes also get's some good dialogue as he delivers plenty of glib one liners.

And Keanu's notable scenes include the one where Johnny has it out with Pappas to find out what his theory on the ex-presidents are but Pappas is reluctant to tell him. So, Johnny says "Right, if you can't solve it with your years of experience, its impossible to conceive I might have something to offer, right? Well, maybe I can do better than some over the hill burnout!" which angers Pappas who says "Watch your mouth!". Johnny then teases Pappas more "Maybe you should retire and get some renta-kill job, tell Nam stories!" which infuriates Pappas who grabs Johnny by the jacket and he shouts "Listen you little shit, I was taking shrapnel in Khe Sahn, when you were crapping in your hands and rubbing it IN YOUR FACE!!". 

Johnny then asks him "You mad?!" and Pappas yells "YEAH!!" and Johnny shouts back "Good and mad??!" and Pappas yells "YEAH!!". Johnny then yells back "Its feels good like your still alive, doesn't it?!" and Pappas yells again "YEAH!!" and Johnny yells "Well since you're still alive and not in the box just yet, why don't you tell me your theory and we can go and GET THESE GUYS!!!". Pappas then sighs and says "OK hotshot! You wanna nail robbers and be a big hero?" and Johnny grins and says "Definitely!" and Pappas "OK, so here it is...the ex-presidents are surfers!". Johnny looks at him sceptically and asks "Surfers?" and Pappas confirms "Surfers!".  

Then there is the scene that even takes the piss out of his character Ted, from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, when he scopes out surfers on a beach and tries to get a hair sample from one of them and pulls off a piece of hair by saying to the guy "Watch out, you've got a big sucker going right for your ear!" and tears off a piece of the guy's hair and says "Saved your life, bro, close one!".

Also after he get's chewed out by his superior, FBI Agent Harp who says "Now has any one of you got anything even remotely interesting to tell me???!" and Reeves sarcastically replies "I got my first tube this morning... sir!" (a tube being surfers term that refers to a tunnel like shaped wave, which surfers can ride in the middle of).

Then there is the scene where Utah discovers that Bodhi has had Tyler kidnapped and he is forced to go along with Bodhi and his crew as they carry out their last robbery and he angrily says to Bodhi who wants Utah to go into the bank with them "Bodhi this is your fucking wake up call, man!  I'm am an  F....B....I agent!!!".

Another good scene is when Utah turns up at near the end at the airfield to negotiate with Bodhi to try and find out where Tyler is being held.  And as Bodhi is not prepared to really listen to him, Utah says regarding the botched robbery where Bodhi (SPOILER) is forced to kill an off-duty cop, "The guy you killed was an off-duty cop!  They'll nail your wherever you land!  There's a new thing called radar! Maybe you've heard of it!".  

And Utah continues saying to Bodhi "I know you, man, when shit goes down, you won't back down!  They'll have to burn your ass to the ground!" and Bodhi says "Yeah? And shit happens!" and Utah says "Look, you've got a deathwish a want to ride to glory?! Fine, but don't take Tyler with you!  I'm begging you! Tell me where she is and I'll walk away!".  And Bodhi looks almost convinced and says "You'll walk away?" and Utah says "I walk away!" and Bodhi says "That is beautiful, Johnny!" but they are interrupted by Roach opening fire on Pappas from afar and a quick gunfight ensues.

And lastly there is the scene where Johnny finally catches up with Bodhi in Australia at Bells beach, where he is waiting to ride out the 50 year storm. And Johnny walks up to Bodhi and throws his Ronald Regan mask down infront of him on the beach and asks him "Lose something, bruh?!" and without looking, Bodhi says "Special agent Utah. I knew I could count on you!".   

And Utah tells Bodhi "You've gotta go down!  People trusted you and they died" and Bodhi says "Yeah, it went bad, real bad!  Life sure has a sick sense of humour, doesn't it?".  And Utah says to him "Look, Bodhi, you're gonna have to come back with me" but Bodhi just laughs and says "Sorry, my friend!" and Utah starts fighting Bodhi and as the two of them struggle, Utah manages to latch a handcuff on Bodhi's wrist.  

And Utah smiles and says "I told them!  You'd go quietly!" and Bodhi enraged shouts "NO!!!  There's no way I can handle a cage, man!" and Utah says "I don't care!  You gotta go down!  Its gotta be that way!".

But in the end (SPOILER!!!) Utah decides to let Bodhi go and surf the lethal waves, knowing he most likely will not survive them and Bodhi pleads with Utah "Come on, compadre.  This is what my whole life has been about, Johnny.  Come on!" and Utah looks at the ferociously huge waves and Bodhi angrily shouts "COME ON!!" and Utah finally relents and uncuffs Bodhi and tells him "Vaya con dios" (Spanish for "Go with God") and let's him go.  

And just as the Aussie police arrive and one cop (with a ridiculously bad Australian accent no less!) shouts at Utah "What the fuck, Utah! You let him go!!" and Utah says "No, I didn't" and he looks out at Bodhi surfing the huge waves and he is soon consumed by them.  And the cop says "We'll get him when he comes back in!" and Utah walks away saying "He's not coming back". And in his final moment, Johnny looks at his FBI badge, now disillusioned with his job, he throws it into the ocean.   

Patrick Swazye is excellent as Bodhi, the charismatic gang leader who is more into the spiritual side of surfing and life in general!  Swayze plays Bodhi pretty much as an almost spaced out guru, who get's his thrills out of adrenaline rushes such as robbing a bank, skydiving or surfing, but also develops special connection with Utah as the film progresses.

Swayze as Bodhi has some good scenes such as when he is about to a bank at the start of the film, wearing his Ronald Reagen mask he says "The little hand says its time to rock and roll!".  Also in the first bank robbery scene he has some good lines such as "Hello helllo hello ladies and gentlemen we are the ex-presidents!  We need just a few minutes of your time, and we've been screwing you for years for a few more minutes shouldn't matter, should it???!".  And as they are about to leave the bank he turns to the customers and says "Thank you very much ladies and gentlemen and please don't forget to vote!!".

Another good scene is where the rival surfing gang beat up Johnny and Bodhi stops them and shouts "Back off he's with me!" and one of the gang says "Kiss my ass, Bodhi!" and Bodhi warns him "Back off, Warchild, seriously!" and they let him go. And after Bodhi and Johnny kick the gang's asses they make to leave and Bodhi tells them "This is stimulating but we're out of here!" and he tells Johnny quietly "Go on, keep walking" as they move. 

And this is followed with Bodhi and Johnny walking together and Johnny asks him "Who are those guys?" and Bodhi says "Nazi assholes! The big one you dropped is Bunker Weiss, and the other one is Warchild aka Lupton Pitman! And the other two I dunno". Johnny asks "What's their program?" and Bodhi says "Their heads are wired wrong and they are into some bad shit" and Johnny asks "Ilegal shit?" and Bodhi says "I dunno, that's not what I mean, they only live to get radical. They have any understanding of the sea, so they'll never get the spiritual side of it". Johnny then asks "You aren't gonna start chanting are you?" and Bodhi laughs and says "I might!". Bodhi then asks Johnny "You never figured out the waves have you? Its that place where you find yourself and lose yourself. I say you with those guys, you're a pitbull! You didn't hesitate and they didn't back you down an inch and that is very rare in this world!".

And then there is the scene where Bohdi reveals his willingness to sacrifice his life to do what he loves the most in doing his surfing and he wishes to surf at Bells Beach in Australia, where an alleged 50 year storm is set to come around. And Bodhi tells his gang and Johnny "And it when it comes it will turn itself into the biggest surf this planet has ever seen and I will be there!". But then he says "If you want the ultimate, you've gotta pay the ultimate price.  Its not tragic to die doing the thing you love."

Another good scene is when the gang discuss what to do with Johnny after they discover he is an FBI agent when Johnny chased them at the scene of a robbery. So, Bodhi tells his gang "This was never about the money, this was about us against the system. That system that kills the human spirit. We stand for something. We are here to show those guys that are inching their way on the freeways in their metal coffins that the human sprit is still alive!". And as his gang look at him, Bodhi asks them "So you trust me?" and they all nod and Bodhi smiles and says "Then don't worry about this guy, I know exactly what to do with him".

Then there is the scene where Bodhi plays Utah the tape of Tyler tied up screaming "Fuck you!" at the camera while she is being held captive by Rosie (Lee Tergesen) and Bodhi turns off the tape and says "She is a wild one, isn't she, special agent Utah?".  And all of a sudden Utah grabs hold of Bodhi and slams him against the inside of the truck and shouts "You're a fuckin dead man!!" but Bodhi pleads with Utah to hear him out, which he does.  And Bodhi warns Utah "But if I don't make it to Rosie by 3pm, he will get her like a pig and try not to get any on shoes.  So I guess that makes us partners, as we both need to get me where I need to go" and Utah then says "We're wasting time!" and Bodhi just smiles and says "Oohh, that's what I love you about you, Johnny!  You are just as sharp as a razor!".  

Then we have the following scene where Bodhi and his gang get dressed up as the ex-presidents as they drive to rob their last bank.  And Bodhi says to Utah re Tyler's kidnapping "All I'm asking for is 90 seconds of your life, Johnny. That's a small price to pay for someone who loves you.  She does you know.  Its not her style to fall so hard, I don't think she did with me".  Bodhi then throws the president masks to his crew and he says to Utah "Well, Johnny....looks like you don't get to be president!" and he puts on his Ronald Regan mask.   

Another good scene worth mentioning comes when Bodhi forces Utah to join him on the plane as Bodhi prepares to do his skydive to reunited with Rosie.  And just as Bodhi is about to do his jump he says to Utah "I know its hard for you, Johnny. I know you want me so bad it's like acid in your mouth. But, not this time!" and Bodhi chucks his gun aside and says to Utah "Adios amigo!" and he jumps out the plane, leaving Utah furious, who simply decides to go after Bodhi and he grabs the gun and shouts "FUCK IT!!" and dives out the plane. 

Then in the next scene, Utah dives through the sky and catches up with Bodhi and holds him at gunpoint and tries to force him to pull the chord on the parachute but Bodhi defiantly says "Nah, you pull it!".  And after they finally land, they writhe around painfully as Bodhi attempts to get up he says to Utah "Goddamn!  You are one radical son of a bitch!".  And as Bodhi moves away from Utah, who has injured his knee again he says to him "That knee again, huh?  Too bad.  Looks like this time you won't be getting your man.  This game we both lose!".  And as Bodhi reunites with Rosie, who let's Tyler go, just before Bodhi drives off he shouts to Johnny "Yo, Johnny!  I'll see you in the next life!".

WARNING: BIG SPOILER COMING UP RE: THE END OF THE FILM!

And last of all is the scene where Johnny finally tracks Bodhi down to Bells Beach in Australia where await his final surf and date with destiny. So, in the scene the two men fight each other and even though Bodhi gains the upper hand, Johnny manages to cuff him.

So, in the scene, Bodhi yells "NO!!! There's no way I can handle a cage, man!" and Johnny tells him "I don't care! You gotta go down! Its gotta be that way!". So, Bodhi after a long pause smiles and says "OK, man! OK, I'm screwed! I'll go to jail and I'll pay and Johnny Utah gets his guy! You're gonna be a big hero now. Good for you". However, Bodhi then pleads with Johnny "But look at it, Johnny. LOOK AT IT!!! This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, man! Let me have just one wave before you take me in! One wave! Where am I gonna go man?! Cliffs on both sides, I'm not gonna paddle to New Zealand! My whole life has been about this moment, Johnny. Come on, compadre! Come on". Johnny however just stares at Bodhi as he thinks it over and Bodhi yells "COME ON!!" and Johnny relents and uncuffs Bodhi and tells him "Vaya con dias!" and Bodhi smiles and walks off to surf one last time. 

Gary Busey is also really good as Utah's veteran FBI partner, Pappas, who comes up with the surfer theory for the ex-presidents.  Busey who is no stranger to being manic (and let's face it in real life he does have more than one screw loose!) plays Pappas with a hyperactive quality (or at least a bloated agent who has had one coffee too many and a few doughnuts!) and he quickly develops a good rapport with Utah.

Busey also get's plenty of good moments, such as when he argues with Utah who goads him by saying he is an "over the hill burnout" and he Pappas replies "Listen you snot nosed little shit!  I was taking hits in Khe Sang, while you were still crapping in your hands and rubbing it in your face!".  And Utah shouts back "Well since you're not quite in the box yet, why don't you tell me this great theory of yours and we'll go get the guys!!".  And Pappas sighs and says "OK, hotshot!  You wanna nail the robbers and be a big hero?" and Utah says "Definitely!" and Pappas says "Definitely!  Then here it is....the ex-presidents are surfers!" and Utah looks at him incredulously and says "Surfers???" and Pappas says "Surfers!". 

And also in the scene where Utah tells Pappas about his theory of trying to get a hair sample from surfers to try and locate the beach where the ex-presidents might surf. So, Johnny says to Pappas "If we can get a hair sample from one of these surfers, we can find out which break the ex-presidents surf" and he leans toward Pappas and asks "So, are you buying this?" and Pappas says "No.  But let's do it anyway!  It will bug the shit out of Harp!".  

And also in the scene when he confronts Utah over not shooting Bodhi and he says to him "Johnny, I wanna see you in my office right now!". So, they go into Pappas's office and Pappas tells Johnny "I want you to know something. When you shoot, you don't miss" and Johnny says "I missed" and Pappas irritated tells Johnny "No, I believe you're either scared or your getting too goddamn close to this surfing guru buddy of yours!" And Pappas leans into Johnny's face and says to him "I don't believe your scared!" and then tells Johnny "I want you to go home and get some rest you look like hammered shit! And if I see something resembling your boy, I'll beep you. Now go home!".

And also later when he says to Harp "Let me tell you something, Harp.  I've been in this bureau while you were still popping zits on your funny face and jacking off to the lingerie section of the Sears catalogue!".  And in the scene Pappas continues "And in all these years I've learned something you still haven't got!" and Harp scornfully says "Yeah?  Why don't you astonish me, shitface?!" and Pappas then punches Harp, knocking him to the floor saying "Respect for my elders!  Plain and simple!".   

Lori Petty also makes a good impression as Utah's love interest, Tyler Endicott, and she is quite defensive and obnoxious at first as she grudgingly saves Utah from drowning and she insults him and his crap surfboard. So, Tyler drags Johnny to shore, she shouts at him "Crazy son of a bitch! You wanna kill yourself, go do it someplace else!" and she looks at his surfboard and says "Look at this pigboard piece of shit!  You've got no business out here whatsoever!". Tyle then heads back out to surf and Johnny calls after her saying "Hey my name's Johnny Utah!" and she says "Who cares???!" as she paddles into the water. 

Then there is the scene where Johnny meets Tyler again where she works at a diner and she looks irritably at him and asks "What do you want?" and Johnny says "Shrimp and fries" and Tyler says "No, I mean what are you doing here?!". Johnny then asks her "I need you to teach me how to surf. I'm serious!" and Tyler says "I can see that you're serious. Forget it! Stick to tennis!". Johnny however manages to persuade as he tells a fake story about how his life goals were wrong as he did what his parents wanted him to do but they died in a car wreck. So, Tyler sighs and says "Alright. Tomorrow, here, 6 am. If you are one minute, I am gone! Listen, stud, I didn't take you on to raise, so I'll teach you a few things and after you're gonna be on your own, okay?".

Then there is the scene at Bodhi's party where Bodhi admits to willing to die for his thrill ride lifestyle as does the rest of his gang and Tyer get's up and says "There's too much testosterone here!" and walks off and Johnny follows her. So, as Johnny finds her inside Bodhi's house she says to him "I hope you aren't buying into all this bonzai bullshit like the rest of Bodhi's moonies".  And Johnny asks her "What are you talking about?" and Tyler says to him "You've got the kamikaze look, Johnny, I've seen it.  And Bodhi can smell it a mile away.  He'll take you to the edge and past it."

And lastly there is the scene (SPOILER!!) where she finds out he is an FBI agent and he tells her he lied about his parents. And in the scene, Tyler fires a shot at a bed pillow where Johnny, prompting him to leap up and Tyler yells "A lawyer??!! You lied to me!" and she throws his FBI ID down at him. Tyler then points the gun at Johnny and shouts "I bet you lied about everything! I bet you lied about your parents! Just tell me if you're parents died in a car accident, Johnny? DID THEY??!!". Johnny finally admits "My parents are alive and live in Colubmus, Ohio. I work bank robbery and I need you for the guys but after that..." and Lori cuts him off and shouts "FUCK YOU!! Don't you have a soul?!" and she drops the gun in disgust and says quietly "Goddamn you to hell" and runs out. 

John C. McGinley is also great in his role as the arrogant FBI agent, Harp, who takes a real dislike to Utah throughout the film. 

And his first scene is really good one where Johnny and Harp walk together as Harp fills him in on what his department. And Harp tells Johnny "I know you might be the hotshot back in training room but out here you have absolutely no experience in the field. You know nothing! In fact you know less than nothing! If you knew the fact that you don't know nothing that would be something but you don't!". 

So, as he finishes his spiel, Harp asks Johnny "Special agent Utah, are you receiving my signal?!" and Johnny, having taken a doughnut says cockily "Zero distortion, sir! I love these things". So, Harp laughs and tells Johnny "I see you're a real blue flame special, son.  Young dumb and full of cum, I know!  But what I don't know is how you got assigned out here with us.  I mean hell, I guess we must just have ourselves an asshole shortage, huh?" and he winks at Utah and walks away with Utah saying to himself quietly "Not so far".

Also McGinley's best line in the film comes when he berates Utah and Pappas for their lack of progress in the case with Utah in undercover surfer gear and a big surfboard in Harp's office. And Harp says "Special agent Utah. This is not some job flipping burgers at the local drive in.  Yes the surfboard bothers me, yes you're whole goddamn approach to this case bothers me, and yes YOU BOTHER ME!!  And over the last two weeks you have produced exactly SQUAT! SQUAT!!".  Harp then continues shouting "And in the meantime, the ex-presidents have robbed three more banks!! Now for Christ sakes, has either one of you got anything even remotely interesting to tell me!!" and Utah says "I got my first tube this morning, sir!" (a surfing term of course!).  

And last of all is the scene where Harp has Johnny arrested at the scene of the ex-president's final robbery and Pappas turns up to see him. So, as Pappas turns up and says about Johnny, who has been cuffed "Can we take those cuffs off him?!" Harp yells "Leave em on! You're partner's an accesory to murder, Pappas. Three people are dead. One's a police officer!" and he grabs Johnny and shows him the dead police officer "There! How does that sit in your stomach?!" and Johnny angrily says to Harp "Take your hands off me right now!".

Pappas then grabs Harp aside and says "Harp, look at me! Look at me! Don't ride him in with a blank and white like some punk, let ME ride him in!". Harp takes a moment and then scornfully says to Pappas "Yeah, sure Angelo, why not?! That's why I put you two screw-ups together in the first place, you deserve each other! You're just as bad as he is...only you're a little slower, little fatter and more pathetic! Christ, its like the blind leading the blind with you!". Pappas then angrily puts Harp in his place and says "And after all these years I still have something you haven't got!" and Harp asks "Oh yeah? Why don't you astonish me, shit face?!". So, Pappas turns and punches Harp right in the face and he goes down on the floor and Pappas tells him "Respect for my elders! Plain and simple!". 

Tom Sizemore also gives a brief but good account of himself as an agent working for the DEA who's cover is blown when Utah and Pappas raid the wrong surfers.  

And Sizemore who is always good with explosive dialogue delives another bit of stern dialogue to Utah when he says to them regarding his hair "You think I like this hair, man?!  You think I like these clothes?!  My wife wants me to move out to Ramada!".  And he continues angrily "I've been working on these fuckers for THREE MONTHS!!  THREE MONTHS!!  Now I've got them playing the wheel of fortune, so I can find out who their suppliers are and you fucking cowboys show up!".  And he asks Johnny "All I wanna know smart guy, how could these guys have robbed the 3rd National bank on August 2nd, when they were Fort fuckin Lauderdale on August 2nd, how did you figure that one out?!". The agent then shoves the packet of coke right at Johnny and says "You fuckin jerks!" and storms off leaving Johnny frustrated. 

Last of all its worth mentioning the performance of the Red Hot Chili Pepper's lead singer, Anthony Keidis who appears in the film as one of the Nazi surfer gang members, Tone.  And Keidis's two most notable scenes in the film are when the Nazi surfers confront Utah on the beach after he accidentally knocks into one of them while surfing.  And as the gang surround Utah and he says to them "I know.  This is where you tell me that locals rule and the yuppie insects like me shouldn't be breaking your waves, right?" and Tone says to him "That would be a waste of time!".

And later on there is of course the scene where Utah and Pappas raid the Nazi gang's hideout. So, in the scene, Tone tries to calm Bunker down as they see the FBI outside and Tone says "Chill the fuck out man, its nothing!" and Bunker angrily shouts "Will you shut the fuck up??!". So, as they spot more out back Tone suddenly panics and says "Oh shit! Shit! We're fucked!!". Then shortly after, as the gang are taken down one by one, Tone tries to run through the house one of the agent, Alvarez, opens the door behind him, causing Tone to shoot himself in the foot and he screams in agony!    

DIRECTOR AND MUSIC 

Getting onto the director Kathryn Bigelow (who also directed Strange Days, Near Dark and The Hurt Locker) who does an excellent job here, proving to be one of few female directors known for directing Hollywood action films. Bigelow herself had to overcome a lot of hurdles to get the film made and also fought hard for Keanu Reeve's casting. Bigelow also co-wrote the film with her then husband, and writer/director, James Cameron, which went under many re-writes.  

Bigelow also skillfully paces out the action and the bank robberies, car chases, sky diving and surfing scenes are all done really well and you do get a sense of the adrenaline rush the characters are getting.  Bigelow also brilliantly directs the big foot chase scene with Utah chasing Bodhi on foot through a neighbourhood as a hand held camera follows them, which is often lauded as one of the best chase sequences in cinema history. 

As for the music it features a pretty good score by Mark Isham which is a mixture of synthesizers and orchestral compositions and it is pretty well suited to the tone of the film.  It also features a notable and memorable track during the scene where Utah goes sky diving with Bodhi and his crew, which is quite an atmospheric track that really captures the scene itself pretty well.

In addition to Isham's score the film also features tracks from various different artists such as Jimi Hendrix who's track "If 6 was 9" is used, Public image Ltd "Criminal", Ice-T's "Original gangster", Wire Train's "I will not fall" and Sheryl Crow's "Hundreds of tears" and the last song of the film "Nobody rides for free" by the metal band Ratt. So overall the film has a pretty good soundtrack.    

FLAWS (Warning may feature spoilers!) 

So getting onto the flaws, does Point Break have some worth mentioning???  Well yeah it does.

And to kick off while it is very entertaining it is also quite cheesy at times and one scene that sticks in my mind that is really silly is when Bodhi and his gang playball American football with Utah, as it just seems a bit macho and naff.  And what is even more daft about that scene is that Utah isn't even formerly introduced to Bodhi and his crew until Bodhi twigs who he is himself, realising that Utah was once a quarterback football player! I mean they meet the guy and play football with him and don't even ask him his name??!! Perhaps Johnny told them his first name but it seems bizarre that it took until Johnny tackled Bodhi in the water before they got to that bit. 

It also has to be said that Bodhi as a character is also up his own ass and while he has the charisma to engage his gang and Utah, he is also somewhat delusional and lives in his own dreamworld.  And Swayze's corniest line in the film comes when Bodhi says to his gang "What's the matter with you guys? This was never about the money, this was about us against the system. That system that kills the human spirit. We stand for something. We are here to show those guys that are inching their way on the freeways in their metal coffins that the human sprit is still alive!". Shut up, Bodhi!     

It also seems strange that such an inexperienced FBI agent as Utah would be put on a high profile case in the first place, as he is just signed up with his older partner in Pappas and off they go!  But then again perhaps that's how it works down there! ;-).  I also think its a bit silly how Utah and Pappas suss out that the ex-presidents are surfers purely from videotape footage of one of the robber's mooning their ass!  So the case was in a way eventually unravelled thanks to an ass! Literally! Well that and a ponytail hair from one of the other robbers, so an ass hair and a ponytail was the ex-president's undoing!  

So if it wasn't for that robber (who was Roach) mooning his ass and for the surfers having ponytails they would have gotten away with it scot free!! Plus Roach decided to moon his ass again while surfing later in the film, which get's them rumbled AGAIN! In fact, Roach basically sunk the whole crew by doing this and Bodhi really should have told him to cut it out.  

And another issue I have is the whole sub-plot of Utah and Pappas doing a raid on the wrong surfing gang only to find an undercover DEA agent was already on the gang's case.  Now surely to God if this man was an undercover FBI agent they would have checked with the other departments of the FBI that someone was already working on the case of this gang in the first place!!  But instead Utah and Pappas are allowed to go ahead with the raid and screw things up but realistically this is something that should have been checked by their superior, Harp, before it even went ahead! 

I also found the whole concept of Utah still bonding with Bodhi and his crew and going for a sky dive AFTER finding out they are in fact the ex-presidents was a bit daft to say the least!  I mean its almost like after they share the amazing experience of skydiving and bonding together as they do it, is enough for Utah to let things slide! 

But of course in the end Bodhi brings it all crashing down to earth when he shows Utah the tape of Lori tied up and being held at knifepoint.  Now that I can almost buy that bit but the whole bonding experience before it just makes it all that more stupid!  It would have made more sense for Bodhi just to try and summon Utah to drive along with him to the van to show him the video rather than go through a whole elaborate skydirve in the first place!  But I guess Bodhi did the sky dive to gain Utah's trust before landing him in it.       

There is also some inconsistency in continuity where Johnny is supposed to have injured his leg and we see him limp in some scenes but in others he doesn't limp at all. As an example, we see Johnny limp when Bodhi drops by to take him skydiving and then also after he exits the van when Bodhi shows him the blackmail video of Tyler. However during the bank robbery, we never see Johnny limp nor do we see him limp when he confronts Bodhi at the airfield as he even runs over to Angelo with ease after he is shot. So, there is definitely some continuity issues with Johnny's injury to be found here. 

I also found it a bit silly how during their last robbery that Bodhi suddenly wants his guys to rob the vault of the bank when they should know full well that it burns more time and increases the risks of them being caught. Even Bodhi's man, Roach says that its a bad idea and they never go to the vault, so why start now and we see how it all turns out as a result! I guess greed got the better of Bodhi in that moment but it was still a pretty dumb decision. 

Then we have the ridiculous moment where Utah jumps out of the plane after Bodhi, who already dived out wearing his parachute, only for Utah to catch up with him and hold a gun to his head and threaten him to pull the rip chord but Bodhi refuses to and insists that Utah do it and Utah pulls it out just at the last second before they impact and land on the ground!  Now there is no way in hell they would have survived the impact with Utah having opened the parachute maybe just merely maybe a few hundred feet from the ground!  And in this case in reality they would have been what Bodhi said just before they landed "meat waffles!" instead!  

Its also very unrealistic that Johnny could have even been able to skydive out the plane after Bodhi WIHOUT wearing a parachute pack on his back! However, there is a known form of skydiving known as banzai diving, where a diver will jump out of their plane without their chute and it is thrown out to them and there has been some incidents of skydivers surviving without a parachute but these are very rare I'd imagine.

And last of all I find it bizarre how the FBI would allow Utah to stay on the case to find Bodhi when he had in fact been framed earlier by Bodhi and his gang for robbery and arrested by Harp.  I guess Utah either has amazing powers of persuasion that let him stay on the case or maybe he cut a deal with them to capture Bodhi and then after that his career would be over, which might have been possible given that we see Johnny throw his badge away at the end.

Anyway so that's it for the flaws. 

SUM UP

So to sum up, Point Break is still a very entertaining action film that is packed with some exciting action sequences and some good performances from the lead cast, particularly Swayze and Busey and even if Reeves struggles with the film's more dramatic moments at times (his ridiculous "No!!" line delivery  and "I am an F...B...I agent!!" being a case in point).  

The film however of course is pretty ridiculous and cheesy aswell as over the top at times and its whole plot is far from solid and is simply more fantasy than anything else and is hardly realistic.  But if you can forgive all this then there is still much to enjoy with Point Break and after 35 years its still worth checking out.

And I will give Point Break:

8.9 out of 10 

So, that's it for this one guys and I will be back soon with another post next month. 

Until then its bye for now!