With all the Marvel films that make up the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), not to mention the television/streaming series, there is a complaint that their ever-growing number of entries are leading to comic book movie fatigue.  I was reflecting on this notion earlier today in comparison to the James Bond franchise.  The parallels are striking.  While there are more MCU titles, there are twenty-five iterations based on Ian Fleming’s famous military intelligence, section six (MI6) operative, James Bond.  When the series began, they were being released once a year.  During the 1960s, the only years when there was not a Bond release were 1966 and 1968.  These days, you get a few MCU debuts a year, but those are not all about the same character.  It is also interesting to look at how they each responded to dips in the box office.  The MCU is currently undergoing some upheaval in the post-Avengers: Endgame (2019) world as MCU mastermind Kevin Feige works out a new direction.  With Bond, when their customary nine figure earnings fell short of that mark with On Her Majesty’s Service (1969), it was time for a course correction.  Thus, it is out with George Lazenby after one go at playing the popular British spy, and giving Sean Connery anything he wished for in terms of salary to reprise the role in Diamonds Are Forever (1971).  Does this mean it was better than its immediate predecessor?  Well. . . .

At the end of On Her Majesty’s Service, James Bond’s (George Lazenby) wife of a couple hours is gunned down by Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Telly Savalas), the head of the Special Executive for Counter-Intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion (SPECTRE).  By this point in the franchise, I would say Ernst is James’ arch-nemesis.  I am not sure what else to call their relationship.  This feeds directly into Diamonds Are Forever as we pick up with James (Sean Connery) in the middle of his revenge rampage to find Ernst (Charles Gray), and murder the villain for good.  After working his way violently through a number of informants, he kills Ernst before he can make a body double of himself.  Once back in England, James’ boss, M (Bernard Lee), wants to get 007 back to regular espionage work.  This consists of having James look into a suspected diamond smuggling ring, with the gems originating in South Africa.  However, instead of traveling to the southernmost country on that continent, he is sent to Amsterdam.  He makes it across the English Channel in time to be there for when one of the many dead bodies left behind by Mr. Kidd (Putter Smith) and Mr. Wint (Bruce Glover) is brought up from one of the canals.  They are after anyone who gets their hands on the latest shipment of the precious stones that have been shipped to Europe.  James has disguised himself as gemologist Peter Franks (Joe Robinson), and makes contact with Tiffany Case (Jill St. John), another smuggler.  Because of James’ “way with the ladies” (I am not sure how to put this in a non-cliché manner), their romantic liaison turns into a partnership to take the diamonds for themselves and run away together.  This takes them to Los Angeles where James makes contact with his friend in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Felix Leiter (Norman Burton), who is to help bring down the operation.  The next leg of this endeavor is at a funeral home in Las Vegas, where James supposedly gets the real diamonds.  This is where Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint catch up with James, knocking out the MI6 operative and sticking him in a casket to be cremated.  James is saved when Felix and his men pull him out of the furnace.  We then shift to the Las Vegas hotel owned by Willard Whyte (Jimmy Dean), where James eventually reconnects with Tiffany.  James strikes a deal with Tiffany to retrieve the real diamonds, but she instead attempts to flee.  He finds her at the place where they were to rendezvous, and are given a reminder of the seriousness of their situation when they find a dead body in the pool.  They then put their differences aside to follow the next person in the smuggling chain to a remote research lab in the desert that is owned by Willard.  There is evidently some nefarious activity taking place here to the point that James is barely able to escape with his life. Thus, despite objections from Felix, James commits to confronting Willard in his hotel.  After scaling the walls to get to a man who has not ventured outside in years, James comes face-to-face with the man he thought he had killed: Ernst.  Actually, there are two of the villain, which explains the earlier mix-up.  Unfortunately, the real Ernst escapes.  Whatever else is going on, James decides that they must find the person Ernst has been impersonating.  To do so, he travels to Willard’s desert home, and after taking care of his two female bodyguards, is able to locate the businessman.  At this point, Ernst launches his plan, which is to use the diamonds he has collected to create a laser that is attached to a satellite.  From here, he strikes at military installations around the world, destroying nuclear missile sites among other pieces of hardware.  James is able to deduce where Ernst has set up shop to carry out this new reign of terror, which is a base of operations within Willard’s network located off the coast of Baja California.  James goes in first, working with Tiffany to put a stop to the signal Ernst is transmitting to the satellite.  Felix arrives with Willard, bringing with them a fleet of helicopters to take care of Ernst’s henchmen.  James also prevents his arch-nemesis from escaping, before jumping off the platform into the water with Tiffany.  This final shot is of them pondering how they will get all those diamonds from the satellite.

Most of Diamonds Are Forever is your standard James Bond fare, at least to this point in the franchise.  Thus, I am not sure what more there is to say about it that I have not already covered.  This is a worrisome notion considering I am only on film seven.  There are still eighteen to go.  Nonetheless, there is one aspect that caught my Catholic attention, and that is the title and the theme song that went with the opening credits of the same name.  For my younger(ish) readers, you might recognize this tune as having been covered by Kanye West in “Diamonds from Sierra Leone.”  At any rate, the easiest place to start is in the lie implied in the phrase “Diamonds Are Forever.”  There is only one eternal, and that is God.  It is some of the other lyrics that makes this idea worth analyzing.  Later on, it says that they will not hurt or leave you.  Again, these ideas are better applied to God.  While gems are not physically capable of getting up and walking away on their own, they can be taken away.  If there is one thing that age-old wisdom has handed down to us, and the Bible reinforces this concept, it is that riches are fleeting.  In Scripture, Matthew 6:19-21 talks about how the treasures of this world are transitory, whereas that which you store in Heaven can neither be destroyed or stolen.  That is not the case with diamonds, and the pursuit of them can be even worse.  Granted, in the movie there is a slightly higher purpose, such as saving the world, but the trouble they go through to attain these rocks does not seem worth it.

What else is not worth it is watching Diamonds Are Forever.  Again, you are not seeing anything new here when it comes to James Bond movies, but there is a bit of the hokeyness I have observed in many of these early entries.  I am about to enter the Roger Moore era for the character, so hopefully there will be something different.