You Only Live Twice

Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi, Thriller

Sean Connery	James Bond
Akiko Wakabayashi	Aki
Mie Hama	Kissy Suzuki
Tetsuro Tamba	Tiger Tanaka
Teru Shimada	Mr. Osato
Karin Dor	Helga Brandt
Donald Pleasence	Ernst Stavro Blofeld
Bernard Lee	M
Lois Maxwell	Miss Moneypenny
Desmond Llewelyn	Q
Charles Gray	Henderson

Director	Lewis Gilbert
Producer	Harry Saltzman
Writer	Ian Fleming; Roald Dahl

The film boasts the best of the Bond title songs (this one sung on a dreamy track by Nancy Sinatra), but the movie itself is one of the weaker ones of the Sean Connery phase of the 007 franchise. The story concerns an effort by the evil organisation SPECTRE to start a world war, but the not-so-super villain behind the plot is the awfully civilised Donald Pleasence. The thin script is by Roald Dahl (shouldn't we have expected a better Bond nemesis from the creator of mad genius Willy Wonka?), and direction is by British veteran Lewis Gilbert (Alfie). But the movie can't hold a candle to Dr. No, From Russia with Love, or Goldfinger. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com

On the DVD: This was another troubled production according to the insightful "making of" documentary: director and producers luckily avoided boarding a plane out of Tokyo that crashed and killed everyone on board; the Japanese actresses couldn't speak English and one threatened suicide if she was dropped from the part; and the aerial cameraman filming the helicopter fight had his leg sliced off by a rotor blade. Maurice Binder's evocative main title designs are the subject of the second documentary, "Silhouettes", in which his colleagues voiceboth their admiration of his art and frustration at his chaotic working practices. The commentary is another edited selection of interviews with principal cast and crew. An animated storyboard sequence, trailers, radio spots and a handsome booklet add up to another winning entry in this series. --Mark Walker