'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' revisited

With 'Quantum of Solace' due to hit our screens soon, we take a daily look back at the 21 official Bond films. Day 6: ‘On Her Majesty's Secret Service’

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969, Peter R Hunt)
Villain: Blofeld again
At stake: ‘Twelve Monkeys’-style sex plague
Candy: Diana Rigg as Contessa Teresa ‘Tracy’ di Vincenzo
Gizmo: Radioactive lint…
Theme Song: ‘We Have All the Time in the World’ by Louis Armstrong
Quote: 'I’ve taught you to love chickens – to love their flesh… their voice.'

'It’s alright. It’s quite alright, really; she’s having a rest. We’ll be going on soon… There’s no hurry, you see. We have all the time in the world…'

The last knockings of the Sixties and it’s all change as Aussie beefcake George Lazenby takes over from Sean Connery and the series shifts into a more adult, serious gear as James Bond, serial philanderer and gold-standard sexist, finally gets hitched.

Despite looking like hardnut Chelsea defender Dave Webb, Lazenby is expressive, athletic and as cheeky as his predecessor and it’s interesting to speculate as to the line subsequent Bonds might have tread had his far-sighted agent not persuaded him that 007 was a Sixties dinosaur who was woefully out-of-step with the rapidly changing times.

Blofeld (an enjoyable Telly Savalas) is up to his old tricks and James is charged with infiltrating his mountain lair disguised as an asexual scholar. Unfortunately, SPECTRE’s latest scheme involves a harem of beautiful women and Bond’s ongoing trouble with keeping it in his pants leads to his unmasking.

The whole thing is fairly light on action – and joins many other of the Bond films in confusing ‘epic’ with overlong – until a manic and quite ludicrous chase down the Cresta run in which Blofeld runs afoul of an overhanging tree while James glides on his merry way. Quite how such a conspicuous and incredibly hazardous branch has been allowed to grow across an Olympic standard toboggan run is unclear, but such concerns are soon forgotten as we are whisked off to James’s ill-fated marriage.

When his new bride is riddled with bullets by Blofeld, the emptiness and sadness that previous instalments had always hinted were at the heart of 007 are made plain, 'We have all the time in the world…'

James Bond will return in… ‘Diamonds Are Forever’

Read our original 'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' review

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