Best Bond Films?

Daylights is #3 for me, just after GoldenEye. I know a lot of people swing for Licence to Kill's grittier tone and rogue agent, but for me, it's the definitive 80s film with the Cold War front-and-centre in the best possible way. Dalton's 007 and D'Abo's Kara have a great sense of chemistry and I think it's the first time that Bond's been dispatched first and foremost as, well, a political assassin. And the competition he's up against is fantastic, the raid on MI6's safehouse? One of the best parts of the film.

As for GoldenEye... *polite cough* Gimme one minute and twenty-one seconds to explain.

*Starts sweating nervously*

*gestures* Allow me to introduce you to Head of Operations for SMERSH. Sit, Comrade, we will talk pleasantly of your zapiska.

Another vote for Diamonds as a novel, I'd have loved to have seen it be adapted straight as a film. My favourite's got to be From Russia with Love, though. The first half of the book is dedicated entirely to the activities of Soviet intelligence. It reads like a David Lean film. Never has there been so much lethal potency in the word "displeasure" as uttered by a secret committee. Live and Let Die has a fantastic villain in Mr Big, I always picture James Earl Jones reciting the soliloquies where he's explaining what it means to be an extraordinary man above the moralities of others. Bond admires him, despite his criminality, and it's hard to dispute.

Outside of Fleming, Colonel Sun's a terrific find if you can scrounge it up, but I have to make special mention to Christopher Wood's novelisation for The Spy Who Loved Me. He captures Fleming's sweep to a virtual tee. It reminds me a lot of the Dr No novel, an ordinary man caught up in the machinations of an extraordinary world. JB Radio did a reading of it a while ago that can be found on Youtube here.

I believe that Ian Fleming was a brilliant novelist who was way ahead of his time. For several months last year I was able to say what I liked about the Bond novels in my role as a critic. Unfortunately I only got as far as The Spy Who Loved Me before the site's editor lost interest and stopped updating it. Short story: I think they're a brilliant set of books that deserve a more discerning readership.

I got into reading them for a while in 1996 whilst at a loose end. Casino Royale is perhaps the most memorable of those I read, and the 2006 Casino film kept in a fair amount or key scenes and plot, which is to be expected, having finally got the rights back for the title. It seems a shame as I had all but You Only Live Twice as early 60's editions, but they got thrown out whilst I was away at Uni (just old paperbacks). As I say, I think Casino Royale, being the first, is perhaps the strongest, whilst the film From Russia with Love has always been cited as giving the closest flavour of the books on film.

Oh, and their influence on modern media is just staggering. Moonraker and Thunderball are the two novels I'd put as required reading for a university course on the genre. One pretty much invented the "megalomaniac with a rocket" scenario you'd see time and time again, while the other practically invented the Broken Arrow, theft of a nuclear weapon, for popular culture. Both were really revolutionary concepts at the time and one is still very much thriving in things like Mission Impossible: Fallout today.

They're actually in the Canadian public domain on things like Project Gutenberg if anyone wants to look at them.

Good question, I'd say start with the films and work back to the books. Once you get out of the early 1960s, the films -- barring OHMSS -- become their own stories, so you don't have to worry too much about spoilers between mediums. As to where to start, you really can't go wrong with the recommendations on the thread. Have fun with them, they're great movies.