Moore is back for his second outing as James Bond. How does he fare from his first outing? Well, pretty much the same. For those who read my review of Live and Let Die, I wrote that I would further get into the character that Roger Moore brought to Bond. Before I get on with reviewing Man with the Golden Gun, let me state that Moore's portrayal of 007 is more comedic and cocky than what Connery brought. This works to some degree yet I have also found it to be somewhat overused as well. You see much of Bond's arrogance in Man with the Golden Gun probably more so than the future bond films that follow. Does this ruin the overall experience? No, it doesn't. However, it does affect my rating for this movie in particular. This is especially the case with the character of the British Agent known as Goodnight. This was her only appearance and I'm glad. Her character while certainly attractive was simply annoying to me for reasons that I won't go into because it would somewhat give spoilers for those who haven't seen this. All that being said, there is much to like about Man with the Golden Gun which is why I generously give it 8 out of 10 stars. For one, a trend that we see in the Roger Moore series is the return of certain characters for later films other than Felix Lighter and the British secret service. In Golden Gun, we get the return of J.W. Pepper from Live and Let Die. Now some reviewers and critics have stated that Pepper's return wasn't needed. While that might be true, I still found him enjoyable especially when he and Bond play off each other. Now getting to the other main character and memorable villain of the Bond franchise... Christopher Lee as Scaramanga. To me, this character is part of why I generously give Golden Gun my preferred rating. If I may go off subject for a moment, Christopher Lee was outstanding as the villains he played; mainly Dracula from the Hammer series. For him to have played Dracula eight times says something about the performance he put into that character. OK, now back to the subject at hand... The famous duel near the end of Golden Gun is still exciting as when I first viewed it. As for the other characters in Man with the Golden Gun, most are somewhat interesting except for Agent Goodnight. While some will not agree with me on this, they can at least agree that her character did not add anything significant to the franchise although it could be argued that a number of Bond girls were no different in that aspect. Despite the minor flaws, the major attributes are what make Man with the Golden Gun worthy of the 007 series. In fact, Man with the Golden Gun contains the second of the James Bond theme songs that I really like with the first being the theme song from Goldfinger. I will include preferences to other Bond theme songs in my future reviews of the 007 franchise.
