Features and Columns · Movies

The Best Bond You’ve Never Heard Of: Reflections On The Lazenby Era

Surprise! An Australian first-time actor is one of the best Bonds.
George Lazenby
By  and  · Published on April 9th, 2020

Villain Ohmss

Are the villains effective?

Bond Beginner
Telly Savalas is a legend and by far the best Blofeld. In fact, I have decided that the real Blofeld was always Telly Savalas. The clownish Blofelds played by those other losers were just body doubles. Savalas’ Blofeld feels like an actual goddamn person. Not only that but you can’t help but like the guy!  Even though he wants to, you know, starve humanity to death, the man’s endearing as hell! He’s Telly Savalas! All prior Bond big bads had the plans of an eccentric and the personality of a loofa. Savalas has personality coming out of his ears, and the film’s better for it. A Bond villain hiring a genealogist to prove his aristocratic claim…during the execution of his world-domination scheme? Ridiculous. But Savalas sells it; this guy would do that. If you want a cookie-cutter grunt, you can still get your fix with the Irma Bunt. Blofeld’s sinister second in command whose entire purpose seems to be cock-blocking Bond. Which is admittedly a very good bit. Anyway. Telly Savalas is the only Blofeld there is. Besides him, there are no real Blofelds.

Bond Veteran
Meg and her love of high stakes has already pointed this out, but in addition to Savalas being a pitch-perfect villain, this characterization of Blofeld also cuts deep. More than we did with Connery, in OHMSS we care about the collateral damage that comes with Bond’s exploits. As much as death by paint suffocation or shark attack are sinister ways to dispose of those aligned with Bond, Tracy’s death — no matter how it could have potentially been executed — hurts. This Blofeld took the one person that really meant something to Bond. If that’s not a good villain, I don’t know what is.


Ohmss

Will you revisit OHMSS?

Bond Beginner
Spoiler alert: I already have. And if that’s not proof that people can change I don’t know what is.

Bond Veteran
This was already on a semi-regular rotation for me, but it’s probably jumped towards the top of the queue. And for the record, when Meg told me she was rewatching it, of her own volition, just a couple weeks after her first viewing, I yelped with joy.


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Based in the Pacific North West, Meg enjoys long scrambles on cliff faces and cozying up with a good piece of 1960s eurotrash. As a senior contributor at FSR, Meg's objective is to spread the good word about the best of sleaze, genre, and practical effects.