Bond-arama: No. 0016 Octopussy (1983)

What’s that you say? Octopussy should be ranked higher than No. 0016 of 0023? Nope. Octopussy is one of those James Bond films that has all the elements, but lacks life. It was a decent film when it came out, compared to the competition, but in hindsight it feels dated and bland.

Plot Quality: Octopussy has a decent plot. Bond is sent to investigate a stolen Fabergé egg, found by 008, who gets killed in the process. This leads Bond to Kamal Khan, a low-rent smuggler and dealer in stolen art. Bond follows him to India, where he learns that Khan works for a woman named Octopussy, who runs an Amazon cult and circus. Khan and Octopussy are dealing with a Russian General named Orlov, who steals artwork from the Kremlin and replaces it with fakes. This leads Bond to Germany, where Octopussy’s circus will travel from East to West Germany and then perform on an American airbase. Unbeknownst to her, Khan has agreed to smuggle an atomic bomb onto the American airbase for Orlov and detonate it to turn public opinion against the presence of the Americans and their missiles. Bond saves the day and he and Octopussy chase Khan back to India. You can turn the film off at that point.

All told, the plot is fine. It has a lot of potential, it feels worthy of a Bond, and it is believable. It’s even exciting in parts. What keeps Octopussy from being ranked higher is the execution. First, there is the cheapness. The film starts in Cuba, but it sure looks like Pinewood Studios, Britain. They don’t even give a second-unit shot of Havana. India is the same. There are some outside shots, and it was filmed in India, but most of it feels like soundstages. Again, there are no skylines. Ditto on Europe. They definitely filmed the German parts in Germany, but all we see is one rail line, one highway, and an airbase that could just as easily be the Pinewood Studio parking lot.

The fight scenes are silly too. Women in matching catsuits, a hot-air balloon, a saw-like weapon that could only be used if your victim keeps standing in the right place. These feel like cartoon moments injected into an otherwise serious film. Not to mention Bond wears a gorilla costume at one point (see e.g. Trading Places) and he does a Tarzan yell while swinging through the jungle. Yeah, you read that right.

Beyond that, there’s not much more to say, and that’s kind of the problem. There’s little to love or hate about this film. It’s not a bad film, but little of it is memorable. It’s Bond at his blandest.

Bond Quality: 1981’s For Your Eyes Only brought Bond out of the lousy era of fantasy Bond that had beset the series in the 1970s, but it exposed one big flaw: Roger himself. Although he did well, it was clear that Moore was too old and too effete to play Bond. Octopussy feels like an attempt to make Moore seem more physical and more commanding. Too a large degree it worked as this is the most physical Moore has ever been. . . but that’s not saying a lot as he still lets women do his fighting. Unfortunately though, by this point, Moore has begun to feel like a parody of himself; he’s too stiff, too formal, and his one-liners are tiresome.

The Bond Girl: The main Bond girl is Maud Adams, who plays Octopussy, a jewel smuggler and owner of a circus. This is her second Bond as she was also the Bond girl in Man With The Golden Gun. She fits the specs, but isn’t very interesting. As an actress, she’s rather flat and she’s not given much to do here. In fact, her role is rather difficult to respect. On the one hand, she’s presented as the villain, as a savvy business owner, and as a cult-like leader of a troupe of Amazon circus women. But she is oblivious to what is going on around her as her number two ends up being the real villain. Moreover, after she learns of the betrayal, she then is supposed to play the vengeful warrior princess who turns her Amazons against the villain (who has managed to staff a castle without her noticing). Only, she plays this more like the helpless damsel who is constantly needing Bond to help her... “Help me, James!”

There’s another problem with her too. She’s supposed to be exotic because her cult consists of Indian street girls, yet they are all clearly upper-class, white British girls. That’s a bit like going to Shangri-La and then eating at McDonalds; it wipes out all the exotic. She also feels a tad lazy, i.e. inactive and emotionless, and I suspect that has to do with not showing up grandpa Moore: “Don’t run so fast Maud, Roger can’t keep up.” Her laziness too comes from her character being split into parts and distributed. For example, the other Bond girl is Kristina Wayborn, as Magda, who is Octopussy’s assistant. She’s kind of pointless and it seems like the things she does are things Octopussy should have done herself. The two roles should have been merged. Khan too should have been merged into Octopussy. The result is a character with little to do.

Villain Quality: The film starts with Octopussy as the apparent villain, but she’s just a jewel smuggler. The real villain here is Kamal Khan (Louis Jourdan), who is an exiled Afghan prince who shacks up with Octopussy, with an assist from alternate villain General Orlov (Steven Berkoff).

Orlov is one of the better Bond villains actually and has a decent plan. Orlov is a Soviet General who is dismayed that the Soviet Union won’t attack the West. He sees the massive numerical superiority the Russians had in terms of troop numbers, and he knows the Soviets will never be better positioned to conquer Europe. The problem is, in his mind, that the leadership is frightened of American nuclear missiles, particularly short range nuclear missiles of the type Reagan installed in Europe over much opposition around this time. He thinks that if he can detonate a small nuclear device at an American airbase in Germany, that the Europeans would throw the Americans out and that would leave Europe for the taking.

There are some issues with this, like the existence of American ICBMs which could do the job just as well as the short-range missiles, the French and British nuclear arsenals, and the fact that this would be seen as a first strike by the Russians and would lead to war in minutes. But these things don’t bother you during the film as they are explained away. That makes his scheme a good one. It’s devious. It’s BIG. It seems like it would achieve his goal. And it’s topical. He also plays the villain well, bringing just enough crazy to the role while staying normal enough to believe that he could make it to his present rank and yet come to decide to do this. Unfortunately, he’s not the focus of the film... he’s just the focus of the best part of the film.

Helping Orlov is Khan. Khan is a dealer of questionable artwork. He becomes the middle man for Orlov, who is selling stolen artwork from the Kremlin and replacing it with fakes. He will also smuggle the bomb onto the American airbase. Khan is not as well developed as Orlov. It’s not clear why he would get involved in this, and his motive seems to shift around from money to promoting chaos to money to anger at his boss (Octopussy) to money. The connection to Octopussy is strange as well as he seems to be running a parallel evil empire while acting as her lackey. The connection to Orlov is never explained. And ultimately, since his motive is money and boss-hate, he’s not a satisfying villain. The film should have ditched him, merged him into Octopussy and then made Orlov the villain.

All in all, this was a Bond film and it felt like a Bond film. It had all the elements. It was exciting at points. This film has decent re-watchability. It has a decent plot, a good villain, an acceptable Bond girl, and Moore was acceptable to the task even if he was a bit old and effete. That’s why this film isn’t lower. It’s not higher though because it’s just not that interesting. Octopussy’s character was ill-defined and the things she should have done were given to Magda and Khan to do. Khan is poorly defined and cartoonish. And the real climax, the bomb being defused, comes twenty minutes before the ending. That’s why this film is No. 0016 of 0023.