Before Their Time: License to Kill
By Daniel MacDonald
July 1, 2009
Welcome to Before Their Time, a column dedicated to featuring groundbreaking, influential, or otherwise well regarded films that were overlooked either critically or by audiences on their initial release. In some cases, it will be hard to believe that these movies were ever unappreciated, while others you may never have seen or heard mention of before.
The two most recent James Bond adventures, Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace, have been praised by critics and audiences alike for their gritty realism, exhilarating stunt work, and depictions of an ill-tempered Bond driven more by personal vendettas than a desire to please his superiors. Indeed, compared to the increasingly ridiculous Pierce Brosnan outings, these films are cinéma vérité. Contrary to what the young and those with short memories might believe, though, Daniel Craig was not the first brutish Bond. Twenty years ago, Timothy Dalton explored similar territory in one of my favorite 007 outings, Licence to Kill.
Sure, Licence to Kill retains some of the comic and fantasy elements that show up in nearly every Bond picture. The opening sequence, featuring a wonderful showdown between a plane and a helicopter, is capped off with our hero and his close friend Felix parachuting to Felix's wedding ceremony (good thing they were wearing their tuxes!) and being treated by the assembled guests like they had just pulled up in a cab. Bond girl Pam Bouvier (former model Carey Lowell) nearly kills Bond in his hotel room while Q is showing off a new assortment of gadgets. And, why does Bond need a gun that looks like a movie camera anyway?
Those types of quibbles are standard for nearly all Bond pictures, and if anything they draw even more attention to Licence to Kill's gritty tone in contrast. The plot is built upon Bond's unstoppable drive for revenge after Felix's new bride is killed, and he loses limbs in an evil genius-approved great white shark tank. When M tries to halt his mission, Bond resigns on the spot - taking not even a moment to think it over - and becomes a hunted man by his own agency, refusing to hand over his PP7 and go quietly into the night. Does he care at all about his career? Does he fear for his life? Nope - Bond has only one thing on his mind, and it starts with "V" and ends with "engeance".
Bond manages to infiltrate the ranks of drug kingpin Franz Sanchez (played with hairy-chested panache by the great, great Robert Davi), and uncovers an elaborate scheme to dissolve cocaine in gasoline, with price negotiation taking place in code through a slimy televangelist played by Wayne Newton. Sanchez is a bad hombre: when we first meet him, he whips his lady friend Lupe Lamora (Talisa Soto) for being unfaithful, and then has one of his henchman (a very young and very skinny Benicio Del Toro ) cut her suitor's heart out. Later, Sanchez locks a traitorous associate in a decompression chamber, cranks the dials, and watches the man literally burst.
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