Review: Licence to Kill

Drug kingpin Sanchez (Robert Davi) gets on the wrong side of James Bond (Timothy Dalton) when he has the wife of Felix Leiter (David Hedison, returning for the first time since “Live and Let Die”) murdered on their wedding day. Leiter was instrumental in Sanchez’s arrest, but after bribing a DEA agent (Everett McGill), Sanchez escapes and immediately targets Leiter (who is tortured) and his aforementioned wife (Priscilla Barnes). Bond, with his own unhappy history with weddings is incensed by this as well as MI6’s inadequate response. He leaves M (Robert Brown) hanging in order to go on a revenge mission against Sanchez. Talisa Soto plays Sanchez’s mistress Lupe, Carey Lowell plays CIA agent/pilot Pam Bouvier, Anthony Zerbe plays Sanchez’s business partner whose marine company is a mere front for Sanchez’s drug trade. Benicio Del Toro plays a snazzy-dressing henchman named Dario, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa turns up as an undercover operative, Don Stroud is Sanchez’s chief bodyguard, Grand L. Bush is another DEA agent, and Frank McRae plays Bond’s buddy Sharkey. Wayne Newton (!) turns up as a shonky TV telethon host/Evangelist somehow connected to Sanchez.

I wasn’t entirely sold on this 1989 John Glen (“Octopussy”, “The Living Daylights”) 007 picture the first time I saw it about a decade ago. It didn’t feel like a 007 adventure the way I see James Bond films as needing to be. Seeing it again in 2017 I feel I wasn’t quite seeing it for the solid film it actually is, even if I maintain that people are misrepresenting Ian Fleming when saying Timothy Dalton’s 007 is a close approximation to Fleming’s vision (I’d say Connery, Bronson, and Lazenby are closer).

The opening gun barrel theme has some nice guitar to it but starts in oddly different fashion, throwing you off momentarily. The opening scene plays a bit like a re-working of an unused script for a sequel to “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” (only this time it’s Felix Leiter’s wife killed, not Bond’s) and actually plays out pre-and-post the opening credits. Scripted by Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson, the basic plot is a little like a re-purposed unfilmed Cannon-era Chuck Norris flick. It felt Americanised, if anything and Sanchez’s criminality might seem a little small-fry for Bond. That bothered me first time around, but I’ve got to say, once you put aside your expectations of what a Bond film should or must be…it at least proves to be an entertaining film. I think that might be all that is truly required, and besides, “Diamonds Are Forever” (which more directly but less effectively referenced the tragic end of “OHMSS”) and “Live and Let Die” were pretty damn Yankee too. Also, with Bond’s history with weddings it ends up being a little more Bond-esque. At any rate, the opening half hour is pretty exciting stuff and it’s not anti-Bond or anything. The music score by the late Michael Kamen (“The Dead Zone”, “Highlander”, “Lethal Weapon”, “Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves”) is certainly a vast improvement over the previous few entries, probably one of the series’ best scores. He incorporates the Bond theme in interesting ways throughout. Even better, Gladys Knight provides one of the best and most underrated Bond title songs ever, probably the one I listen to the most often of any Bond song. I love it, and Patti LaBelle’s end titles song ‘If You Asked Me To’ is very fine too (The more famous Celine Dion version stinks, accept no substitutes). Series veteran Maurice Binder was still doing the titles design here and they’re a bit racy this time I must say.

The villain this time out is drug kingpin Sanchez, played by Robert Davi in the same fashion he has played anything ever. That’s fine for this specific film, he’s well-cast and clearly enjoying himself. They got the bad guy right this time, and his mansion is freaking gorgeous. Although I kept expecting the very Casey Kasem-sounding David Hedison to tell us to tune in next week for more “Scooby-Doo” mysteries, it’s nice to see a Bond film giving a little time to show Felix Leiter’s friendship with Bond. Meanwhile, a young Benicio Del Toro shows early promise and obvious charisma as henchman Dario. He makes for a wonderful smiling sadist. A well-cast Everett McGill perhaps leaves the picture a bit early (and may be a little transparently cast), but the likes of the scene-stealing Del Toro and veteran Anthony Zerbe are there to compensate. In fact, if anything the film has too many characters, with Don Stroud and Anthony Starke not especially necessary in particular. Desmond Llewelyn’s Q is fun as usual (in his longest appearance), he seemed pretty well-served in the Dalton and Brosnan films. Although this is his best performance in the part of M, Robert Brown is no Bernard Lee. Bernard Lee is, was, forever will be M, whilst Brown always came off as a poor man’s Ralph Richardson playing a private school headmaster. One superfluous character I didn’t mind was Vegas legend Wayne Newton playing a phony telethon host named Prof. Joe Butcher. He’s so bizarre that he’s strangely compelling, and he doesn’t take up too much time anyway. At least his character serves a real plot purpose.

The Bond girls are a mixed bag, but I’m probably going to be on my own on this one; Talisa Soto, as your more traditional ornamental Bond girl is quite clearly one of the most stunning women to have walked the Earth.  You’re an incredibly lucky man, Benjamin Bratt. Her performance is also underrated if you ask me. Then there’s Carey Lowell, who in addition to looking a little too androgynous for my tastes (James Bond movies are the one place where physical attractiveness is actually somewhat relevant, if entirely subjective. They are a part of the formula), is a really terrible actress, and has zero charisma. Her character also doesn’t even turn up until around the halfway mark, which is really too long. Speaking of the character, her petty jealousy towards Soto’s character completely undermines what is otherwise a competent, self-sufficient female character. Add to that Lowell’s smug and annoying performance and my personal preference for non-smokers and yeah…not among the best Bond girls, I’m afraid. The unofficial third Bond girl is a returning Caroline Bliss as Miss Moneypenny, and she looks rather different and nerdier this time out, which is a bit of a shame.

As for Mr. Dalton, he’s not my kind of Bond but he was settling nicely into his own interpretation of the character here, and a revenge-motivated plot suits him well. He may have shown more typically 007 traits in “The Living Daylights”, but they belonged to previous interpretations of the part, here he’s much more assured playing things his own way. Meanwhile, the action has a really nice snap and energy to it lacking in many Bond films, and action is something the Dalton 007 films tended to do well. There’s a particularly bravura moment with Bond evading a threat underwater by using a spear gun to hook onto a sea-plane, basically water-skiing and then eventually working his way to getting on the plane for a scuffle with the pilot. That’s 007 action as 007 action should be, quickly paced and no comedic slide whistles necessary. Keep an eye out for perennial action movie bar fight loser, Brandscombe Richmond getting punched by Bond. It’s a living, I guess.

Timothy Dalton’s second-go-round as 007 is actually a pretty underrated, rather action-packed outing with a fine villain and a gorgeous Bond girl in Talisa Soto. It’s far from perfect, but it’s pretty good and Dalton is much more confident this time out. Give it another look if you dismissed it on initial release. On second viewing I’d probably rank it #9 in between the overrated but iconic “Goldfinger” and underrated “SPECTRE”.

Rating: B-