Every James Bond fan has their own favorite Bond movie. There are so many gems from the franchise’s nearly 60-year history that it’s easier to name which Bond movies definitely aren’t the best – Octopussy, The World Is Not Enough, Quantum of Solace – than the one that actually is the best. There are plenty of strong contenders for the title of greatest Bond film. Each of the six Bond actors has at least one movie that could lay claim to the throne.
Terence Young set a very high bar with the series’ first two installments, Dr. No and From Russia with Love. In collaboration with Sean Connery, Young defined 007’s endearing characterization from the offset. The movies also featured some action sequences that still rank among the franchise’s all-time greatest set pieces, like Dr. No’s steam vent escape, and From Russia with Love’s hard-hitting train fight.
After Young laid out all the elements that would become the familiar Bond movie formula, that formula wasn’t perfected until Guy Hamilton helmed the third movie, Goldfinger, one of the most common picks for the best Bond movie. Connery’s 007 came into his own in this movie, striking the perfect balance between wry cynicism and level-headed pathos. From the opening drug lab explosion to the Fort Knox-set finale, Goldfinger is an action masterpiece. It has an endless supply of iconic moments, like the laser beam between Bond’s legs and the gadget-laden car chase. Not only is Gert Fröbe’s Auric Goldfinger an unforgettable villain; his sidekick Oddjob is an unforgettable side villain, too. Shirley Bassey’s sumptuous, melancholic theme set the trend of Bond themes being recorded by contemporary pop icons, and it remains a benchmark that has yet to be topped.
When Connery departed from the role of Bond, before Roger Moore took it on, George Lazenby played 007 in just one movie, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. While Lazenby wasn’t a particularly great Bond (nor a particularly terrible Bond), the movie itself holds up as the best Bond installment from a technical standpoint. Cinematographer Michael Reed captured gorgeous shots of every location, and the movie’s tonal balance of action, romance, and tragedy is spot-on. The final scene – in which Bond finally gets married, only for his bride to be gunned down by the villains in a drive-by – is one of the most unforgettable and emotionally impactful endings in a franchise that usually ends its movies with a sexual double entendre.
Although Moore’s stint as Bond was pretty hit-and-miss to say the least, The Spy Who Loved Me is arguably the most thrilling and cinematic Bond movie ever made. It establishes itself as such in just its opening scene, as 007 skis off the edge of a cliff in the midst of a heated chase, soars through the air in breathtaking silence, then deploys a Union Jack parachute before Carly Simon plays him out and the opening titles begin. From there, the movie only gets bigger and bolder. The Spy Who Loved Me is two hours of sheer entertainment, with memorable side villains like Jaws, cinematic set pieces like the supertanker climax, and fun gadgets like the Lotus Esprit submarine car. And most importantly, The Spy Who Loved Me puts a nice restraint on the goofy slapstick humor that came along with the Moore era.
With popularity in the Bond franchise waning after the last few Roger Moore movies soured public opinion and the Timothy Dalton movies didn’t really take, Eon brought on Martin Campbell to introduce Pierce Brosnan as 007 in GoldenEye, which saved the franchise. GoldenEye is a crowd-pleasing blockbuster that conforms to beloved traditions with a modern sensibility. It updates the Bond tropes without losing sight of why audiences fell in love with them in the first place, namely by introducing a female M played by Judi Dench who isn’t afraid to put Bond in his place. Brosnan made for a terrific Bond, a double-crossing former 00 agent made for a unique kind of villain, and explosive set pieces like the tank chase made GoldenEye a must-see all-out actioner.
After the triple whammy of Austin Powers ridiculing the franchise’s tropes, the Bourne movies offering a grittier alternative, and audiences not responding to the silliness of the later Brosnan films, the Bond producers dug themselves out of an unenviable hole with Casino Royale. Daniel Craig’s 007 debut acted as a sort of origin story for Bond, presenting him as a young, inexperienced, rough-around-the-edges spy. When he kills people, it’s messy – and he certainly doesn’t sign off with a cool one-liner. The gritty realism of Casino Royale was an interesting change of pace that saved the franchise from certain doom after the bitter disappointment of Die Another Day.
These aren’t the only contenders, of course. Thunderball culminates in an ambitious underwater battle sequence, and Licence to Kill was refreshingly dark and brutal. It would be impossible to name just one Bond movie as the greatest, but Goldfinger is the (pardon the pun) gold standard against which every subsequent Bond film has been judged, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is the most masterfully crafted entry from a cinematic point-of-view, and The Spy Who Loved Me is the quintessential fun, action-packed, episodic Bond movie.