Why Octopussy is the Worst EON James Bond film

(Never Say Never Again is still worse)

Octopussy (1983)

Directed by: John Glen

Written by: George MacDonald Fraser, Michael G. Wilson, Richard Maibaum

Starring: Roger Moore, Maud Adams, Robert Jordan

IMDB Ranking (as of publication): 6.6/10

1. Introduction.

First thing's first: when a James Bond fan tells you which Bond film he or she thinks is the worst, that doesn't necessarily mean that the fan in question 'hates' that movie. James Bond movies & their fans are kind of unique in that way - no matter how bad a Bond film manages to be, there will always be some fans who love it, or have a love-hate relationship with it. And the general consensus is that a Bond film gets a pass for cliches, plot holes, and temporary suspensions of the laws of physics as we know them.

Well, I'm no exception to the rule. I love all James Bond movies, and I like them for different reasons. But that doesn't mean, as a fan, that I don't like to complain about various parts of the franchise. And when I see lists of the worst Bond movies, or even just general rankings, I'm always surprised by where Octopussy lands. For one, there doesn't seem to be as much of a universal consensus on Octopussy as on some other films. It's no Die Another Day - almost universally hated by critics and the fandom - but it's definitely no Casino Royale, either (ironically, the two films which are most reviled and praised came one after the other). And it's definitely no Goldfinger, even though the entire film is basically an attempt to remake Goldfinger. For some reason, some people think this movie isn't that bad, and I'm here to tell them that their opinion is wrong (of course, that's just my opinion).

"The Battle of the Bonds"

But let's start from the beginning. It was 1983, and Kevin McClory had won the rights to make his own James Bond film, separate from the established franchise by EON Productions that we all know and love. The events leading up to this are complicated and have been talked about extensively elsewhere (read about it here, if you're interested). We'll just leave it at the fact that a competing studio had managed to land the rights to make a remake of Thunderball, one of the most successful James Bond films ever made. EON was obviously nervous; more so when Sean Connery was reeled in by McClory to reprise his role as Bond.

What many people don't know, however, if that Roger Moore is actually older than Sean Connery, and this fact was definitely brought up by the media. The "Battle of the Bonds", as they so christened it, saw Octopussy as the first official Bond film to have to compete with a rival franchise. Never Say Never Again ended up being so terrible that the producers at EON never really had anything to worry about. Nevertheless, you can see their thought-process, looking back. They'd gone so over the top with Moonraker - taking the series to space, no less - and brought things back down to Earth with For Your Eyes Only. Where to go from here? How to compete with Sean Connery in a remake of one of their most lucrative adaptations?

Well, they decided to steal the plot of another incredibly successful Bond film: Goldfinger. And this is why Octopussy is the worst Bond film ever. Because they took the plot of Goldfinger and basically grafted it on to a new set of exotic locations and characters. And, in the course of this process, the details of the plot became utterly nonsensical.

2. The Rip-Off.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Goldfinger (I'm sure you're out there somewhere?), here's a run-down of the plot (which you should probably read even if you are familiar with Goldfinger, because of the point I'm trying to make):

Goldfinger is a movie that begins with James Bond undertaking a mission unrelated to the main plot where he foils the plans of the communists by blowing up a drug-smuggling facility in a Latin American country, establishing him as a super-spy in a Cold War setting.

Then, M gives Bond a mission to investigate the smuggling activities of a mysterious, wealthy industrialist - Auric Goldfinger. Bond meets him formally, and discovers that Goldfinger has a penchant for cheating at the games he plays. Bond foils Goldfinger's cheating, and in response, Goldfinger's strong, silent, stereotypical henchman - Oddjob - crushes a golf ball with his bare hands. Eventually, after being captured, Bond discovers that Goldfinger is working with a representative of an eastern communist power, and is planning to detonate an atomic bomb inside a U.S. base in order to cripple the west economically and pave the way for communist dominance. Oh, and Goldfinger gets to make a lot of money.

Oddjob is menacing.

However, Goldfinger employs a young woman named Pussy Galore, who leads a flying circus staffed by beautiful women. She sleeps with Bond, and ultimately realizes, in part as a result of this, that Goldfinger's goals are evil. Because of her intervention, they are able to stop the atomic device from detonating - although it is actually disarmed by a nuclear specialist, since it would be absurd for Bond to suddenly know how to disarm an atomic bomb. Goldfinger escapes, only to have a final confrontation with Bond on an aircraft - which Bond wins, crashing the aircraft. The day is saved.

But we're here to talk about Octopussy.

Octopussy is a movie that begins with James Bond undertaking a mission unrelated to the main plot where he foils the plans of the communists by blowing  up a military facility in a Latin American country, establishing him as a super-spy in a Cold War setting.

Then, M gives Bond a mission to investigate the smuggling activities of a mysterious, wealthy prince - Kamal Khan. Bond meets him formally, and discovers that Khan has a penchant for cheating at the games he plays. Bond foils Khan's cheating, and in response, Khan's strong, silent, stereotypical henchman - Gobinda - crushes a pair of dice with his bare hands. Eventually, after being captured, Bond discovers that Khan is working with a rogue faction of an eastern communist power, and is planning to detonate an atomic bomb inside a U.S. base in order to cripple the west militarily and pave the way for communist dominance. Oh, and Khan gets to make a lot of money.

Gobinda is menacing

However, Khan employs a young woman named Octopussy, who leads a circus staffed by beautiful women. She sleeps with Bond, and ultimately realizes, in part as a result of this, that Khan's goals are evil. Because of her intervention, they are able to stop the atomic device from detonating - and Bond disarms it while dressed as a clown. Khan escapes, only to have a final confrontation with Bond on an aircraft - which Bond wins, crashing the aircraft. The day is saved.

As you can see, I've only had to change a few proper names. Wherever a plot element is significantly different from Goldfinger, it's almost universally a change in the wrong direction.

Yep.

I have no problem with a respectful amount of tasteful plagiarism. How many great works of cinema have been conceived as homages to past styles and landmark classics? On the other hand, while stealing from the greats is understandable, cannibalizing your own past material seems unforgivable. And really, one or two plot elements being re-used is one thing - but when you start to notice that Octopussy steals every last detail, down to the finest points, such as Gobinda crushing the dice, or Octopussy's circus, you start to suspect that this had to have been outright theft. The whole project comes off as so cynical to me, an attempt to appeal to the widest audience possible and make the safest possible decisions in order to compete with McClory's film. Instead of writing interesting characters - such as allies you grow to love before they get killed off, or villains you love to hate, or Bond girls that actually have a bit of personality and a real relationship with Bond - the writers seem to have focused on cramming as many set-pieces, stunts and formulaic chase scenes and assassination attempts as possible into the story.


3. The Plot.

Almost every driving plot point from the beginning of the main storyline onward makes absolutely no sense. We're treated to a scene of a man in a clown costume running from knife-throwing assassins - admittedly, the filmmakers succeed in creating genuinely surreal and unsettling visuals, like something out of a David Lynch movie, and the victim seems truly terrified. He's killed, and a Faberge Egg is found on his body. But then we learn that this guy was... 009? Would a double-0 agent being chased by assassins really act like such a total coward? After M shows Bond the egg, Bond gives us a lecture on the history of Ferberge Eggs, reminding us that Moore's Bond is an obnoxious  know-it-all. Except - the egg is fake.

But more importantly, they conclude his briefing by revealing that they found it on 009's body... and they have "very little to go on". What? Why wouldn't MI6 know what their own agent was doing, who he was investigating and what mission he was assigned to? Didn't he report in, even once? Even the fact that he's dressed as a clown should clue you in to something. It's sloppy writing like this that plagues the film. But whatever, we're told the egg is priceless, and several others have come up on the market recently. Since the fake has appeared, British Intelligence suspects a Soviet plot to raise funds.

Soviet Intelligence puts SPECTRE's HQ to shame.

We learn that General Gogol, a radical in the Russian military command, is presiding over some kind of smuggling operation involving the Russian treasury. One of the knife-men reports to him that the fake egg was lost, and because they have a surprise inventory check, they need the real egg back. Okay, so the Russians are making fake eggs to replace the real ones in the treasury, then selling the real eggs for a profit, got it.

So Bond goes to bid on the egg; I personally would have assigned him to follow up on whatever 009 was doing. In any case, at the auction, we learn from the supposed expert that anything more than 300,000 pounds would be 'crazy' - even though we were just told the egg was priceless. To further complicate this, Bond suspects Kamal Khan as involved in this hypothetical Soviet scheme, because no matter how much Bond bids for the egg, in his own words, "[Khan] had to buy it." The only information he bases this on is that Khan is normally a seller, not a buyer. How does he know that Khan isn't just a really passionate art collector who loves Faberge Eggs? And why does Khan look so pissed off while he's bidding for the egg? If he's part of the smuggling organization which is selling the egg, isn't he just taking money out of one pocket and putting it into the other? And if it is costing Khan money, why would Khan even agree to spend his own money to save Orlov's ass? Isn't he in this to make money?

Based on this dubious evidence, M sends Bond to India. There he meets Vijay, who is playing the James Bond theme on a flute whilst charming a snake. Bond recognizes his contact, and Vijay ditches the basket, leaving with Bond. "I think I chose the wrong cover," he muses. "I hate snakes." Isn't the whole point of a cover to avoid any attention from the opposition, on the assumption that they may be watching? Why would MI6 suspect this in this case? Also, what exactly would an enemy agent think if he observed that exchange? A random tourist approaches a snake charmer, who then kicks over his basket and walks off with the guy? What? Consider Quarrel Jr.'s cover in Live and Let Die - he takes the guise of a local fisherman, so that when Bond leaves with him in his boat, it wouldn't arouse suspicion. And given the number of incidents they'd had with the enemy surveying them in that movie, it was understandable. Furthermore, Bond and Vijay walk up to their ride - which is furnished by... the head of the Indian Intelligence Station. So he doesn't need a cover?

Khan then proves what an idiot he is by ordering his men to chase Bond down and kill him, as Bond is leaving from Khan's private property in broad daylight, on a crowded street. If anything, this only confirms Bond's otherwise-dubious suspicions about Khan.

Kamal Khan. Not the brightest Bond villain.

As a side-note, I've never understood why certain villains just take to trying to kill Bond in front of a bunch of witnesses. Remember the days of Dr. No, where gunmen crouched in the shadows, hesitating to fire even as a car drove by? But here, these bloodthirsty psychopaths have no sense of discretion and are willing to just try and murder James Bond where everyone can see them. Maybe Bond should have acted like the coward 009 was, and started running around and screaming for help. That guy had the right idea.

4. The Scheme

Things start to get really confusing at around this point. See, my problem with this movie is that it wants to distract you with the outlandish 'Indian-themed' Q-gadgets and the spectacle of the chase sequence so you don't think about the fact that almost everything everyone does should make you think, "Huh?" Once Bond is captured and witnesses Orlov meeting with Khan, listening in to part of their plan, then the plot starts to get really confusing - why does Khan try and deceive Orlov about the eggs, switching the fake one for the real one? Why does Orlov smash the supposedly fake egg? Why doesn't Magda intervene?

Is Khan really keeping Bond alive under the assumption that he's some kind of 'mercenary' that he needs to pump for information? I'm not sure why he didn't just take the egg and leave things be, or kill Bond and be done with it. But whatever - at least Khan has a justification for his reasoning. But I can't help but wonder if the entire reason why Bond is captured only to overhear Khan and Orlov talking about their plan is because that's exactly the way it unfolded in Goldfinger.

This doesn't even touch the byzantine complexities of Khan's organization, or his agreement with Orlov. While it was clear what Goldfinger brought to the table in his deal with Mr. Ling, and vice versa, as well as what each party stood to gain, I have no idea what the nature of the deal between Orlov and Khan is. It's never explained how smuggling jewels relates to blowing up a U.S. base. You might think that the gems were to pay Khan for providing the bomb - but in fact, Orlov's men provide the bomb, and the knowledge of how to use it. If Khan is getting money out of this deal, why is he constantly spending his own money for the sake of the plan, literally throwing bags of gold around to get it done?

But Khan is the smuggler, right? No, Octopussy's circus does all the work when it comes to smuggling. And besides, Orlov just flies up to Khan's palace in a helicopter and takes the egg with him back to Russia, so I'm not even sure why they needed to smuggle anything. Well I guess Khan just was a Russian sympathizer, working for Orlov's common goal of bringing down the west? Aside from the fact that this is never stated, why smuggle the gems, then? Isn't that a capitalist ambition? What exactly did they tell Octopussy about this arrangement? What did she think Orlov and the Russians were getting out of the deal, since they didn't tell her about the bomb?

Further, I have no idea who's working for who, or who's in charge. Octopussy runs the circus... but Magda seems to be Khan's woman, and the knife twins seem to answer to Orlov, even though they work for the circus. Did Orlov insert his own agents into Octopussy's ranks? Meanwhile, Khan alternates between apparent deference towards Octopussy and antagonism. Really, Orlov is the only villain who has a clear motivation, and seems to be the architect behind the plan (even though he tries to escape with the jewels at the end of his arc, which seems out of character). But, tonally, Khan is presented as the 'main villain'. I don't know what function Khan serves in this villainous alliance, however - he seems to just be a middle-man between Orlov and Octopussy. Since Orlov and Khan planned on eventually killing Octopussy (I guess so they didn't have to pay her?), why didn't Orlov just approach Octopussy directly and avoid bringing Khan into the deal, seeing as how he's just the middle-man?

This crazy fucker would have been a better main villain.

5. The Characters.

But all this only underscores the real problems with this movie. I don't even know why Khan wants money, when he's already rich enough to own a palace and a private club. This is because he's possibly the blandest villain in the series. He get nothing for a background, except that he's an "exiled Afghan prince". We don't know what he wants, or what drives him. He has no distinguishing characteristics from any of the other villains in the series.

Compare him with Goldfinger - Goldfinger was filthy rich, but we learn that it isn't money that drives Goldfinger, but the literal acquisition of gold itself. Goldfinger is a man obsessed, and so megalomaniacal that he's willing to kill whoever he needs to kill to achieve his goal. It's these character traits that create the conflict in Goldfinger and make the struggle between the villain and Bond interesting. In the case of Khan, I'm not sure what sets him against Bond, what his motivation is. I don't even know what he's good at, what skills he brings to the table, or where he really stands within the 'organization' of which he's a part. They're just the 'bad guys'. Bond's gotta get 'em.

Kamal Khan: the most threatening Bond villain.

Eventually Bond learns of Octopussy's circus and comes to suspect that this the method by which the villains smuggling operations are being carried out. You could've probably figured that out by following up on 009's activities, but I guess swinging from the vines and shouting like Tarzan was more fun than all that. Vijay is killed off in a horrific manner, which is just fine because we know very little about him and Bond's allies were just basically redshirts at this point in the series whose job it was to give Bond something to get pissed about. I could talk about Bond dressing up in an ape costume or changing into clown make-up in less than thirty seconds, but these are only symptoms of the core problem underlying this movie, not the problem itself.

The thing is, the action sequence on the moving train is actually fairly exciting, as is Bond's race to disarm the bomb. It's utterly ridiculous for Bond to do this himself, but whatever. Despite the film's many problems, John Glen always was a good director of action, and when you compare stunts performed by real people and vehicles to the CGI nightmare our eyeballs are subjected to in modern cinema, the classic Bond films are a delight to watch. When you realize that real people actually did a lot of these stunts, it makes it more enjoyable and engaging - when it comes down to it, it's fun to watch people perform impressive feats of driving, fighting and physical prowess. But if you don't care about the characters who are fighting atop the moving train, however impressive the stunt may be, it doesn't stir us on an emotional level.

Having said all this, it's important to bring up that Khan is bland until the very end. He rarely makes any facial expressions, or has any outbursts or idiosyncrasies, except to look disapproving now and then - which I thought was Roger Moore's job. Those two compete for most boring character throughout the film, and Orlov - easily one of the more compelling secondary characters in the series - is pushed to the side. And given that the movie is called Octopussy, the character of Octopussy is underused. She ends up just being a clone of Pussy Galore. The film only draws attention to the opportunities the filmmakers missed by having Bond and Octopussy recount the plot of the Flemming short story for which the film is named, basically turning it into exposition. I would've preferred to see those events unfold, maybe in a pre-credits sequence. Having Bond and Octopussy just talk about more interesting events and characters than what we're seeing on the screen reminds us of just that - how uninteresting everyone is in this movie.

"Remember that time when I forced your father to kill himself?"

6. The Formula.

I would argue that the reason for most of these nonsensical plot elements and boring clone-characters with confusing motivations is because of the slavish adherence to copying plot elements from Goldfinger. Wouldn't it be more compelling to show the backstory of Octopussy rather than tell? I'm sure the thought never crossed their minds - merely the thought of how to force the character of Octopussy into the role of the similarly-named Pussy Galore. How does the smuggling of gemstones relate to blowing up a U.S. base? Well... Goldfinger wanted to smuggle gold and blow up a U.S. base, so Khan should too! I suspect that they didn't examine the details of the plot of Goldfinger that explain how these two plot elements relate, and when they were crammed into a new narrative, the details stopped making sense.

Ultimately, Octopussy ends up being a 'series of things that happen' rather than a film with a narrative structure, where one event unfolds into the next one. Whenever the plot is talked about, it's a bit rushed and confused, as if the filmmakers are eager to get it out of the way and onto some action. In truth, they lazily cobbled together the shell of a storyline proven to be successful, and inserted flashy setpieces and action sequences, not based on what the plot required, but in order to plug in all the right elements of a formula.

And that's the main reason why I argue that Octopussy is the worst Bond movie: the plot and even the characters are ultimately unimportant to this movie. It's all just window-dressing for the first Bond film that was formulaic, down to the very core. Even among some of the shittier previous entries in the franchise, you can usually point to one or two elements that are creative, or at least suggest that the filmmakers were taking a risk or pushing the envelope in some way, for better or worse. Octopussy took no risks at all, the end product is a movie with no plot and characters who are boring. It's a movie that's all style, but no substance.

Rating:

Not gonna stop me from re-watching it and every other Bond film
approximately 800 more times before I die, though.