Detente – James Bond Connections

19 JUNE 2023

JBC rating: ***

James Bond Connections (5):

Soundtrack composed by John Barry (Bond composer, various, 1962 – 1987).
Song lyrics by Don Black (Bond lyricist, various 1964 – 1989).
Director of Photography Freddie Young (Cinematographer, You Only Live Twice)
Title sequence designed by Maurice Binder (Bond titles, various, 1962 – 1989)
Featuring actor Bryan Marshall (Commander Talbot in The Spy Who Loved Me) as security officer George MacLeod

The 1974 UK produced spy drama The Tamarind Seed features English star Julie Andrews as British Home Office official Judith Farrow, who unwittingly becomes involved in international intrigue after a holiday romance with Omar Sharif’s Soviet attache Major Feodor Sverdlov. In writer-director Blake Edwards’ intelligent adaptation of Evelyn Anthony’s 1971 novel, Sverdlov hopes Judith will help facilitate his defection to the West and in return he will expose the identity of ‘Blue’, a Soviet mole working at the highest levels of the British state. The east meets west plotline anticipates themes in The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and both films provide a snapshot of contemporary thinking regarding the Soviet Union in the age of détente. The film can also be seen as a companion piece to Alfred Hitchcock’s underrated Torn Curtain (1966), another spy thriller featuring Julie Andrews unwittingly involved in a defection plot. However, in contrast to these two films, the quietly satisfying spy drama The Tamarind Seed largely eschews large-scale action or suspense sequences in favour of characterisation and acting fireworks.

23 MAY 2023

JBC rating: ****

James Bond Connections (2):

Featuring Timothy Dalton (James Bond, 1987 – 1989) as Foreign Office official Charles Lord.
Director of Photography Freddie Young (DOP, You Only Live Twice).

A decade before his casting as 007, rising Welsh leading man Timothy Dalton appeared in Permission to Kill, an ensemble spy drama with some similarities to Munich (2006), another espionage thriller featuring a future Bond (Daniel Craig). Opposite in tone to the comedic and increasingly fantastical Bond films of the 1970s, this dark and gritty spy movie contains themes reflecting a morally uncertain world dominated by increasing cynicism about Western governments following Vietnam and the leaked Pentagon Papers. The presence of Dalton, playing a British Foreign Office official with the same depth, coolness and world-weary nature he would later bring to 007, anticipates the more grounded films of the 1980s. The film also points toward the moral complexities of the Daniel Craig era.

Tag: Detente

The Tamarind Seed (1974): the spy who loved Julie Andrews

Permission to Kill (1975): the Timothy Dalton spy movie you need to see