Guy Hamilton directs Roger Moore, Christopher Lee and Britt Ekland in this adventure where Bond goes cat and mouse against a very accomplished assassin.

Roger Moore was my Bond growing up and while I can see everything wrong, dated and daft about his entries in the canon it doesn’t change the fact he’ll always be the purest distillation of what 007 means to me. And the great thing about TMWTGG is it takes everything “wrong”, “dated” and “daft” about this period and plays those notes as loudly as possible. Goodnight’s desperate incompetence, all the jokes at little Nick Nack’s expense, the improbable return of Sheriff JW Pepper (let’s just accept he’s gone on an surprisingly exotic vacation to Thailand… but why would he be test driving a new car on it?)  and that time the school girls take down an entire dojo then leave poor Rog behind as their car spins off into the dust just so we can get a bonus chase sequence. Those bits are just as fun as all that genuinely does work; Lee’s brillianty oily Scaramanga (his best performance?), Lulu’s freakout theme song, the surreal secret base in the harbour shipwreck, Maud Adam’s trapped moll, both visits to the funhouse death maze, the enjoyably intense finale, the bikini Goodnight wears while fucking up consistently during the intense finale, and Roger – ever the gentleman – treating the whole thing with the same effort and poise as a man accepting his caviar delivery from Harrods while on a phone call. Brilliant stuff!

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Clint Eastwood directs himself, Mario Van Peebles and Marsha Mason in this comedy drama about a hard drinking, hard talking, hard punching military lifer put in charge of some new recruits. 

Ever wondered what would happen if Clint starred in a Police Academy rip off? Wonder no more. A terrible film, albeit intermittently entertaining, with a discordant A grade Clint performance at its centre. Marine Sgt. Thomas Highway is a terrifyingly likeable creation, one of Clint’s best, so much so he all but repeats the brilliant schtick in the far more accomplished Gran Torino decades later.

5

Clint Eastwood directs Tom Hanks, Aaron Eckhart and Laura Linney in this fractured look at the life, fears and heroics of Chesley Sullenberger’s January 2009 emergency landing of US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River.

“Birds. Birds. Birds.” This is a classy affair carried by Hank’s easy charm and Eastwood’s assured direction. But the fake drama of an inquiry that is only going one way, the emergency ditching visited over and over and over from differing perspectives and the weak punchline ending highlight that there really is only a few minutes of story here. An expert took his years of experience and landed a plane in a way few others could saving 155 lives. Sully deserves a film but the process itself took 208 seconds (we are repeatedly told) and 208 seconds does not 90 minutes fill. And as those additional 86 minutes roll on with flashbacks, nightmares, calls home, references to the 2008 economic crash and footage of real survivors cuddling the real Sullenberger… well… Sully sinks under its own padding.

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Morten Tyldum directs Jennifer Lawrence, Chris Pratt and Michael Sheen in this glossy sci-fi about two star crossed lovers who find themselves woken up decades early on a malfunctioning space voyage. 

Ah… take a handful of Titanic, Mr and Mrs Smith, Event Horizon, Wall.E (Wall.E?!), The Shining (THE SHINING!?!?) and pour over the two coolest stars and you get this… a mish mash with occasional interesting spikes. Swinging wildly from funny to introspective, action adventure to sexy romance, ethical debate to FX fest, Passengers tries to please everyone without ever really doing enough to satisfy anyone… except me but then again I’m a sucker for a bit of smooching and a bit of stardust. So if you are put off by Pratt’s decision to crack open the hypersleep pod of the yummiest face on the ship, then sadly there really is not and could not be enough meaty chew to win you around. If you came for futurelit bods shimmering against each other then sparks just about fly adequately in the middle section – the ever watchable Lawrence has never been saucier. And if you came for outer space action, then you have to settle patiently for some slick production design until the final clunky but engrossing 20 minutes of explosions and heroic sacrifice. In all honesty, I was charmed by the pretty stars, the even prettier starcruiser and the diverting disaster that eventually emerges. I came for frothy, beautiful entertainment and Passengers, at a squeak, delivers. Pratt waking Lawrence up (out of necessity in more ways than one by end credits) doesn’t feel quite as harsh a moral dilemma for the viewer to forgive as Winslet not pulling DiCaprio up onto her kingsize wardrobe… but I only care if a movie is worth watching, not if its gender political content is currently palatable, so what do I know?

6

Alfred Hitchcock directs Cary Grant, Joan Fontaine and Nigel Bruce in this thriller about a newlywed who fears her playboy husband is plotting a murder… possibly hers. 

Silver grade Hitch; starry, classy and full of keen visual innuendo but perhaps the plot is spread a little too thinly over the running time and the ending is (rather pointedly) coyly abrupt. Joan Fontaine is compelling as the honeymooner who slowly realises the cage she is trapped in.

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Steve Miner directs William Katt, Kay Lenz and George Wendt in this horror comedy about a slasher writer who inherits a unhinged property.

Absolutely all over the shop but never dull. One scene will drip with sitcom farce, the other with fantastically gooey practical creature effects work. Nam flashbacks share running time with a man fighting a wall mounted marlin. While it never marries its smorgasbord of tones as well as say Evil Dead 2 or Beetlejuice, there’s enough fun on offer that you look forward to another viewing of the schizophrenic thrills of House almost as soon as the credits roll.

7

Lewis Gilbert directs Sean Connery, Mie Hama and Donald Pleasence in this fifth 007 adventure featuring spaceship theft and Far East intrigue.

Scripted by Roald Dahl, this is cunning mix of twisty cliffhangers and PC obliterating swagger (dated sexism and racism the way only Bond can seemingly make palatable). It is also one of my favourite action thrillers. There are stylistic risks taken here not quite dared again in the series until Quantum rears its divisive head; the incredible yet minimalist one shot rooftop barney, Little Nellie’s elegant flight, the opening death of the Commander himself, that other shock murder of an untrustworthy character, the pop art grand finale of ninjas versus henchmen in a fucking volcano. Budget excess, sugar rush storytelling and cinematic confidence. Forget Jaws, the modern blockbuster was born here.

9

Jason Zada directs Natalie Dormer,  Taylor Kinney and Yokiyoshi Ozawa in this weak horror about a forest in Japan, infamous for its suicides. 

The kind of flick that does absolutely nothing wrong except fatally forgets to be scary. There are a few scenes with the potential to have been more intense, a few clumsy jump scares that sit safely within the PG-13 remit of nasty (Uggghhh! Old people…. Aaaarrggghh! Foreign people….) but really all this boils down to is mucho treading of watero until a rushed twist finale that has all the emotional weight of a dry leaf. A waste of Dormer, who I’d bet most Game of Throne fans would like to see breakout into better things. A nothing film.

3

Nicolas Roeg directs David Bowie, Candy Clark and Rip Torn in this tale of an alien visitor who becomes a reclusive capitalist, a captive of the state and alcoholic lover while all age around him. 

A unique yet frustrating mixture of esoteric connections, dull longuers and visually exciting bonking and commerce, this represents the very best and worst of Roeg’s distinct style. For example he gets a fine performance from the normally wooden yet hammy Bowie – he can milk gold top cream from a pop star like few can. And taken as a quirky sex film (there be a lot more craftily edited fucking than rocketships or rayguns) then the writhing shots of the enigmatic protagonist and a lovely Candy Clark have a winning charm and energy. Alienating but intentionally so, if you are in the right mood there’s enough to explore but trad sci-fi fans take heed, Star Wars this ain’t.

7

Fred Zinnemann directs Paul Scofield, Wendy Hiller and Robert Shaw in this tale of the state persecution of Thomas More, who refused to comment on Henry VIII’s second divorce. 

Fans of Wolf Hall will absorb this classy earlier take on that cracking true drama. The bonus here is the breadth of the playbill – with tons of great parts (maximum weight Welles, a terrifyingly young John Hurt, a gregarious yet vicious Robert Shaw) all orbiting the ever marvellous Scofield. His calm, stately performance warps the rhythm of the events and machinations. He quietly dominates, determining that this aged Oscar sweeper actually still feels really valid.

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