James Bond #5 - You Only Live Twice / 1967
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This series has been put out in honor of my favorite action hero - James Bond, Secret Agent 007.
You Only Live Twice (1967) is the fifth spy film in the James Bond series, and the fifth to star Sean Connery as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. The film's screenplay was written by Roald Dahl, and loosely based on Ian Fleming's 1964 novel of the same name. It is the first James Bond film to discard most of Fleming's plot, using only a few characters and locations from the book as the background for an entirely new story.
In the film, Bond is dispatched to Japan after American and Soviet manned spacecraft disappear mysteriously in orbit. With each nation blaming the other amidst the Cold War, Bond travels secretly to a remote Japanese island in order to find the perpetrators and comes face to face with Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the head of SPECTRE. The film reveals the appearance of Blofeld who was previously a partially unseen character. SPECTRE is extorting the government of an unnamed Asian power, implied to be Red China, in order to provoke war between the superpowers.
It was announced during the Japanese location filming that Sean Connery would retire from the role of Bond; but Connery returned, after a hiatus, in Diamonds Are Forever and the non-Eon Bond film Never Say Never Again. You Only Live Twice is the first Bond film to be directed by Lewis Gilbert, who later directed the 1977 film The Spy Who Loved Me and the 1979 film Moonraker, both starring Roger Moore. These three Bond films are notable for being epic in scale.
The first Bond film to be released in the northern hemisphere summertime, the film was a great success, with positive reviews and over $111 million in worldwide box office and has subsequently been parodied, most prominently by the Austin Powers series and its scar-faced, Nehru suit-wearing Dr. Evil.
PLOT
An American spacecraft is hijacked from orbit by an unidentified spacecraft. The US suspect it to be the Soviets, but the British suspect Japanese involvement since the spacecraft landed in the Sea of Japan. To investigate, MI6 operative, James Bond, agent 007, is sent to Tokyo, after faking his own death.
Upon his arrival, Bond is contacted by Aki, assistant to the Japanese secret service leader Tiger Tanaka. Aki introduces Bond to local MI6 operative, Dikko Henderson. Henderson claims to have critical evidence about the rogue craft but is killed before he can elaborate. Bond chases and kills the assailant, disguises himself and gets in the getaway car, which takes him to Osato Chemicals. Once there, Bond subdues the driver and breaks into the office safe of president Mr. Osato. After stealing documents, Bond is chased out by armed security, eventually being picked up by Aki, who flees to a secluded subway station. Bond chases her, but falls down a trap door leading to Tanaka's office. The stolen documents are examined and found to include a photograph of the cargo ship Ning-Po with a microdot message saying the tourist who took the photo was killed as a security precaution.
Bond goes to Osato Chemicals to meet Mr. Osato himself, masquerading as a potential new buyer. Osato humours Bond but, after their meeting, orders his secretary, Helga Brandt, to have him killed. Outside the building, assassins open fire on Bond before Aki rescues him. The assassins are disposed of via a helicopter with a magnetic grab. Bond and Aki continue driving to Kobe, where the Ning-Po is docked. After being discovered by more SPECTRE henchmen, they give chase but Bond eludes them until Aki gets away; Bond, though, is captured. He wakes, tied up in Helga Brandt's cabin on the Ning-Po. She interrogates Bond, who bribes his way out of imprisonment. Brandt then flies Bond to Tokyo, but, en route, she sets off a flare in the plane and bails out. Bond manages to land the crashing plane and escapes. Bond then investigates the company's dock facilities and discovers that the ship was delivering elements for rocket fuel. Bond and Tanaka learn that the true mastermind behind this is Ernst Stavro Blofeld and SPECTRE. Blofeld seems to let Brandt's failure slide, but activates a collapsing section of walkway under her, dropping her into a pool of piranha; he then demands of Mr. Osato, "Kill Bond!"
After finding out where the Ning-Po unloaded, Bond investigates the area by a heavily armed autogyro, Little Nellie. Near a volcano, Bond is attacked by helicopters, which he defeats, confirming his suspicions that SPECTRE's base is nearby. A Soviet spacecraft is then captured by SPECTRE, heightening tensions between Russia and the US. Bond prepares to conduct a closer investigation of the island by training with Tanaka's ninjas, during which an attempted assassination on Bond kills Aki. Bond is disguised and stages a marriage to Tanaka's student, Kissy Suzuki.
Acting on a lead from Suzuki, the pair sets out on reconnaissance to the cave—investigating the cave and the volcano above it. Establishing that the mouth of the volcano is a disguised hatch to a secret rocket base, Bond slips in through the crater door, while Kissy returns to alert Tanaka. Bond locates and frees the captured astronauts and, with their help, steals a spacesuit in attempt to infiltrate the SPECTRE spacecraft "Bird One". Before he can enter the craft, Blofeld notices Bond and he is detained while Bird One is launched.
Bird One closes in on the American space capsule and US forces prepare to launch a nuclear attack on the USSR. Meanwhile, the Japanese Secret Service ninjas climb the mountain to attempt to enter through the upper hatch, but are spotted by the base's security and fired upon. Bond tricks Blofeld and manages to create a diversion that allows him to open the hatch, letting in the ninjas. During the battle, the control room is evacuated and Osato is killed by Blofeld. Bond escapes and fights his way to the control room via Blofeld's office, where he defeats Blofeld's bodyguard, Hans, dropping him into the pool of piranha. Bond activates the spacecraft's self-destruct before it reaches the American craft and the Americans stand down their weapons.
Blofeld activates the base's self-destruct system and escapes. Bond, Kissy, Tanaka, and the surviving ninjas escape through the cave tunnel before it explodes, and are rescued by submarine.
CAST
Sean Connery as James Bond: An MI6 agent.
Akiko Wakabayashi as Aki: An agent with the Japanese SIS who assists Bond.
Mie Hama as Kissy Suzuki: An Ama diving girl who replaces Aki after her death.
Donald Pleasence as Ernst Stavro Blofeld: Main antagonist. A megalomaniac and the head of SPECTRE. He plans to ignite a global nuclear war.
Tetsurō Tamba as Tiger Tanaka: Head of Japanese secret service.
Teru Shimada as Mr. Osato: A Japanese industrialist secretly affiliated to SPECTRE.
Karin Dor as Helga Brandt: Osato's secretary and a SPECTRE assassin.
Bernard Lee as M: The head of MI6.
Charles Gray as Dikko Henderson: British contact living in Japan.
Lois Maxwell as Miss Moneypenny: M's secretary.
Desmond Llewelyn as Q: Head of MI6 technical department.
Ronald Rich as Hans: Blofeld's personal bodyguard. He follows the archetype of a tall, muscular blond henchman, starting with From Russia with Love's Red Grant, and continuing with Erich Kriegler of For Your Eyes Only, Necros of The Living Daylights and Stamper of Tomorrow Never Dies.
Tsai Chin as Ling: Undercover MI6 agent in Hong Kong.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
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