I hadn't watched this movie in decades and I did not remember it being so bad. Ironically it is closer in tone to the Daniel Craig movies and actually Timothy Dalton mentions they wanted to come closer to the grittier novels of Ian Fleming (...as if such "orthodoxy" had mattered in the creation of the 007 screen persona and the subsequent phenomenon in the sixties).
Visually however, it is a different story: it all looks like a random Miami Vice episode. Maurice Binder's titles might have been innovative in 1962 but in 1989 they looked like your average softcore fodder. Bond girls are more useless than usual, real flower-plants. Action scenes are boringly weak, they look old and sluggishly edited. Incidentally we have a passive Bond, no longer smart and cunning but only in tow of his emotions. And the constrained budget probably explains the couple of supporting actors who are downright bad in a screenplay that drones, desperately uninventive and grossly violent - as opposed to depicting the mischievous plans of clever protagonists. One script too far before retirement alas for one of the original franchise builders Richard Maibaum.
The only thing to keep you interested is to spot a very young Benicio del Toro in a cliché lead henchman role. And you could as well check online pictures of him and save two hours.
Visually however, it is a different story: it all looks like a random Miami Vice episode. Maurice Binder's titles might have been innovative in 1962 but in 1989 they looked like your average softcore fodder. Bond girls are more useless than usual, real flower-plants. Action scenes are boringly weak, they look old and sluggishly edited. Incidentally we have a passive Bond, no longer smart and cunning but only in tow of his emotions. And the constrained budget probably explains the couple of supporting actors who are downright bad in a screenplay that drones, desperately uninventive and grossly violent - as opposed to depicting the mischievous plans of clever protagonists. One script too far before retirement alas for one of the original franchise builders Richard Maibaum.
The only thing to keep you interested is to spot a very young Benicio del Toro in a cliché lead henchman role. And you could as well check online pictures of him and save two hours.