MovieChat Forums > The Living Daylights (1987) Discussion > 'The Dalton Trilogy'

'The Dalton Trilogy'

posted 10 years ago by friendly_poison
9 replies | jump to latest

Watching this as I type and I have to say that tonight, I reached the realization that this is actually the first in what I will now call: 'The Dalton Trilogy'

Let me explain. Firstly let me say that Dalton is probably my favorite Bond actor as, aside from Pierce in GoldenEye, this and 'License to Kill' were the Bond movies of my childhood. As the years have gone on I have watched, re-watched, studied and examined near enough every movie in this iconic series and I always come back to Dalton as the man in tux.

Most recently I have revisited GoldenEye and with it following Dalton's brief but damn sure memorable tenure as Fleming's superspy I started imagining it with Dalton in the lead role. I think GoldenEye was written for Dalton in mind but I'm not 100 percent, perhaps someone can help me? Throughout GoldenEye, the style, the tone and the way it goes on, it seems to be the final 'classic'
Bond movie. I do love Pierce Brosnan don't get me wrong, theres no way I'm trying to subtract from his powerhouse debut but with Daylights and License closer to GoldenEye than TND, TWINE and DAD in terms of their true Bond factor I hope I'm not alone in this. What do you think?

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[–] tim-stein 10 years ago

You're right. GoldenEye was in fact written for Dalton. This is why I think it is the best of all of Brosnan's works as Bond.

[–] Irishdrummer007 10 years ago

" GoldenEye was in fact written for Dalton. This is why I think it is the best of all of Brosnan's works as Bond"

Agreed on both points.

[–] adamjgallant 9 years ago

Agree! Goldeneye was my gateway to the Bond universe so it will always have a special place in my heart. Brosnan was good in it but unfortunately his next two did not measure up and do not get me started on what a mess DAD is. I often wonder what Goldeneye would have been like with Dalton. I would love to see that version or the other film that was slated to be released around 92 but was delayed over legal issues. I really wish we had gotten at least one more from Dalton as well as Lazenby.

[–] RParmly-3 9 years ago

I didn't know that. Actually, now that I think of it, I could see Dalton fitting into the role in Goldeneye. Not in any of the later Brosnans, but that one, yes.

As far as "trilogies" go... I feel like For Your Eyes Only and the two Dalton Bonds form a loose trilogy. FYEO being the moment when they abandoned the camp of the "classic" era (even symbolically killing off Blofeld) and moved off into the more low-key and "realistic" world of Cold War espionage, with the villains being crooks with smaller ambitions rather than Silver Age supervillains. Of course, they reverted to camp with Octopussy and A View To A Kill. FYEO feels much more in line with the later Dalton films.

Which makes sense, as I think it was originally supposed to be the first Dalton film. I don't know if it was actually written with him in mind or if that idea was already shot down when they started writing, though.

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[–] tim-stein 9 years ago

They "killed off" Bloefeld as a shot at Kevin McClory for buggering the Bond franchise after Thunderball. McClory finally exercised his option on Thunderball and re-made it as Never Say Never Again. The fallout from Thunderball not only allowed McClory to option a remake, it basically gave him the rights to SPECTRE, of which Bloefeld was the leader.

Killing Bloefeld was a symbolic way for Broccoli and Eon to basically tell Kevin to "fnck off, you got what you wanted, now move on". Now of course with ALL Bond rights reverting back to the originators, they were finally able to make the upcoming movie, "SPECTRE".

[–] Irishdrummer007 9 years ago

I also think Dalton should had been in A View to A Kill. The pre credit scene would had been perfect to introduce the new Bond.

[–] lilwith 9 years ago

Should've been Dalton. Agreed.

[–] ericthorpe 8 years ago

Pretty cool theory.

[–] ericthorpe 8 years ago

Also like the idea of the trilogy ending with Bond settling down with Natalya Simonova, she seemed like one of the few Bond girls that I could actually see him with long term.