Roger Moore and the IKEA tiger

ITV are currently making the most of their deal to show Bond films and have been running Roger Moore for the last few weeks. It reminded me that I have always had such a soft spot for the spy, even in the face of ridiculousness.

I think growing up I used to love watching them on ITV (or as I knew it - TSW, Television South West) for the glamourous locations and stunts. I don't think I paid much attention to the plots, but watching them again I can understand why in some cases - they were rubbish.

Anyway, here are my top (00)7 bond moments. They aren't the best, they are just the bits that I always remember for all the wrong reasons.

1 - Octopussy - Roger Moore and the IKEA tiger
Bond is being pursued by hunters on Elephants somewhere in India. He evades them by ducking into dense jungle. Suddenly a tiger leaps out of the bushes. Bond evades and manages to escape in heroic fashion. Brilliant when I was 11 years old. Even better now when I watched it on DVD, the initial moment that Bond is attacked by the tiger it's clearly a stuffed one ON WHEELS being shoved in by a stage hand. It then cuts to stock footage of a Tiger snarling at a camera. Utterly brilliant. I can see the director now "Yes, you run into the forest and at that point we'll wheel in the Tiger". "Then we pay you".

2 - Tomorrow Never Dies - When Time Goes Bond
The best Brosnan film and a cracking opening sequence where Bond has to escape an arms bazaar with nuclear weapons before a cruise missile arrives. Tense and full of great lines as Mi-6 watch back at base "What the hell is he doing?" asks Admiral Roebuck "His job!" snaps M. Even better because the two are played by national treasures Geoffrey Palmer and Judi Dench - who are normally the happy elderly couple in When Time Goes By.

3 - Goldeneye - Bond UTTERLY DEFIES THE LAWS OF PHYSICS
Bond escaping secret Soviet bunker, already has improably survived explosions, gunfights etc. but has to catch the only plane out. Chasing after it on a motorbike, the plane topples off the edge of a cliff. Bond follows on his bike of the cliff. Leaps off the bike. Then, UTTERLY DEFYING THE LAWS OF PHYSICS, catches up with the plane in mid-air. Gets in, steers it away from certain doom and flies off. Any secret agent who can, and I repeat, UTTERLY DEFY THE LAWS OF PHYSICS in a mission is one that I want on my side

4 - Moonraker - Oh, come on, you're really called that?
Bond meets implausibly beautiful CIA agent. "My name's Doctor Goodhead". I was 10. I didn't get it. I saw it again when I was 19 and can't believe they got away with that. Makes the "I think he's attempting re-entry" gag at the end seem like a vicar giving a sermon in comparision. Most ludicrous Bond name until they merge Blofeld with Oddjob...

5 - The Man With The Golden Gun - The flying car, honest
Christopher Lee, as 3 nippled hitman Scaramanga, is cornered by Bond after a mammoth car chase. But what's this? Suddenly his car zooms out of a garage with wings and an engine attached and takes to the skies. Amazing. Sadly, like the Tiger on Wheels, the cut to a model plane with dolls in is about as subtle as Dr Goodhead's birth certificate and you can see the poor thing flapping around like a £1.99 kite in the wind on a Torquay beach.

6 - Diamonds Are Forever - I'm Bambi, I'm Thumper and I'm confused
Bond is attacked by Bambi and Thumper, two gymnastic lovelies employed by Blofeld. Now, I'm no oil painting and I don't know what the 70's were like, but they'd clearly run out of dolly birds by this. They appear to be being played by Hungarian shot-putters and dressed like The Flintstones. It's like an awful 70's skin-flick and you can even see Connery thinking "Has there been a casting mistake?"

7 - A View to A Kill - James, I love yo...Oh, I've been captured
Bond's girl Stacey Sutton is relieved to see Bond is alive after thwarting a bomb plot. She waves at him, not noticing or hearing the MASSIVE AIRSHIP about 500 yards behind her. Bond shouts back, but by now the MASSIVE AIRSHIP has snuck up on poor Stacey and a henchman has leant out and grabbed her. How a MASSIVE AIRSHIP sneaks up on anyone, I don't know. Still, they blew it up over the Golden Gate Bridge and that made me want to go to San Francisco, so good job.