The 10 worst James Bond quotes
Over the course of its existence, the James Bond franchise has experienced its fair share of ups and downs, which is unavoidable for any franchise that kicked off in 1962 and is still going strong today.
There have been 25 official entries in the series and one unofficial movie to date, and there was never a hope in hell that the end result was going to be 26 unimpeachable screenplays. His penchant for quippery has long defined 007, but not every one-liner is destined to be a zinger of the utmost quality.
In the interest of complete and utter fairness, every single actor who has played the role over the years is included as an offender in one way or another. Not that it was all that difficult when they’ve each been responsible for their share of verbal diarrhoea, no matter how many films they headlined, regardless of whether it’s coming from their mouths or not.
Not all of them are derided sex puns, either, which just goes to show that Bond can be responsible for his fair share of unsavoury soundbites whether he’s caught in the throes of passion or otherwise engaged.
The 10 worst James Bond quotes:
10. Skyfall (Sam Mendes, 2012)
“I didn’t order anything, not even you.”
The Daniel Craig era made a point of taking Bond back to basics and putting a more grounded spin on the hero’s globetrotting adventures, but the occasional nod towards the character’s more lascivious past did appear on occasion.
Sam Mendes successfully channelled Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight when making the one and only 007 flick that’s earned over a billion dollars at the box office, but being lauded as one of the franchise’s best-ever efforts didn’t stop Naomi Harris’ Moneypenny from being treated like a piece of meat.
Answering the door while shirtless, Craig’s suave secret agent implies that Moneypenny standing in his doorway makes her worthy to the comparison of a sex worker who can be ordered from a menu and turned into coital room service. It may have worked in the 1960s, but in 2012? No chance.
9. The Living Daylights (John Glen, 1987)
“Khaista. It means ‘beautiful’ in Afghan.”
Timothy Dalton was the right Bond at the wrong time, with the actor’s harder-edged iteration beating Craig to the punch by almost two decades, even if the series was struggling to hold onto its cultural relevance during his two-film tenure.
He was a modern 007 who suffered from a lack of audience interest. Dalton was nowhere near as sordid as Sean Connery or Roger Moore could be when they wrapped their filthy little minds around a one-liner, but he still managed to miss the mark when attempting to be romantic.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with what he says to his love interest, Kara Milovy, other than the fact that Afghan isn’t a language. The country has two official languages, Pashto and Dari, and while ‘khaista’ might mean ‘beautiful’ in the former, that doesn’t excuse the fact that nobody thought to double-check something as simple as whether or not the language even existed, which it doesn’t.
8. For Your Eyes Only (John Glen, 1981)
“Now, put your clothes back on, and I’ll buy you an ice cream.”
Even Roger Moore would admit that he was far too long in the tooth to still be playing James Bond by the time his tenure drew to a close, especially when his quips were becoming so creepy.
It’s an unnerving statement at the best of times, but to hear it coming from a man in his 50s who seemed to exclusively bed women decades younger than him, it becomes something else entirely.
The writers were struggling with this one, to begin with, and even though it’s terrible and no actor on the planet could make it anything less than cringeworthy, Moore’s crinkled face creates some seriously questionable undertones.
7. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (Peter R. Hunt, 1969)
“This never happened to the other fellow.”
George Lazenby did such a stellar job stepping into Sean Connery‘s shoes that he lasted one whole movie before his predecessor was drafted into the fold, and it was a situation that may have been entirely of his own making.
Connery even called him “a prize shit” for being a difficult presence on set who subsequently quit what turned out to be the biggest and most prominent role they ever had as an actor, but the best thing for On Her Majesty’s Secret Service to do would have been to carry on as if nothing ever happened.
Instead, Lazenby may as well have stopped, turned to the camera and winked after dropping this verbal clanger, which only served to remind audiences that he wasn’t Connery, was fully aware he was standing in the Scotsman’s iconic shadow and placed even more scrutiny upon himself as a result.
6. Moonraker (Lewis Gilbert, 1979)
“I think he’s attempting re-entry.”
For Your Eyes Only – more on that again later – was supposed to be Roger Moore’s fourth outing as Bond, but thanks entirely to Star Wars and the sci-fi boom that followed in its wake, Moonraker sent 007 off to outer space instead.
There are puns galore to be found along the way, the overwhelming majority of which are derived from the female lead being called Holly Goodhead. Har-har, indeed. Never mind the fact the character is written as an astronaut, scientist, and CIA operative, she was obligated to be reduced to the butt of the joke.
Ending on a note of zero-g lovemaking, a technician ensures – not for the last time, it should be noted – that a Bond movie ends on the note of an eye-rollingly painful sex gag.
5. Dr. No (Terence Young, 1962)
“Alright, then. We’ll be back! We’ll be back with the dogs!”
Gormless henchmen were such an integral part of Bond’s early years that they went on to become an integral part of the Austin Powers franchise, too, with Dr. No‘s goons hitting the nail on the head.
Bond, Honey Ryder, and Quarrel are investigating the mysterious shenanigans on Crab Key, the home to the titular villain’s secret base. They get spotted by a boat, end up pinned down by machine fire, and are then issued with the most pointless threat imaginable.
Shockingly, after informing the heroes of their plans to exit the area and revealing the specifics of what will happen if they’re still there when the baddies come back, the good guys disappear before the explicitly stated plans have time to unfold.
4. Die Another Day (Lee Tamahori, 2002)
“I have been known to keep my tip up.”
Die Another Day was so detrimental to the health of the Bond saga that a complete rebuild from the ground up was instigated in the aftermath, leaving Pierce Brosnan to gurn his way through a series of puns that would give Moore pause for thought.
Fittingly, then, Brosnan repurposes Moore’s “just keeping the British end up, sir” from The Spy Who Loved Me and somehow makes it even worse. To compound matters even further, it guarantees Madonna’s wooden performance isn’t the worst thing about the scene in question.
Introducing fencing into Bondian canon was always going to lead to a double entendre, with the debonair MI6 agent having seemingly been waiting 40 years to reference his bellend on-screen.
3. The Man with the Golden Gun (Guy Hamilton, 1974)
“Miss Anders, I didn’t recognise you with your clothes on.”
It’s not exactly a revelation to say women were largely treated as objects in the early Bond movies, but it’s the entire scene that serves to reduce more than one of them to window dressing in one fell swoop.
Immediately beforehand, 007 is getting hot and heavy with Mary Goodnight. Still, the second Andrea Anders arrives, he tosses a former in the cupboard and then appears to intonate that she may as well not have a face because his eyes don’t travel that high up.
Dripping in nothing but pure sleaze, Anders then proceeds to sleep with Bond because that’s what the women were there for at the time. What happens to Goodnight during all of this? Why, she remains cloaked in darkness in the cupboard when the shagging commences.
2. For Your Eyes Only (John Glen, 1981)
“Mr. Bond! We can do a deal! I’ll buy you a delicatessen! In stainless steel!”
In the movie‘s opening scene, the villain—who, thanks to rights issues and legal red tape, is definitely not Ernst Stavro Blofeld in any way, shape, or form—is unceremoniously killed to remove Bond’s most iconic antagonist from the equation.
Before he gets dropped into an industrial smokestack, he pleads with 007 that should he spare his life, the spy would be rewarded with not only a brand new delicatessen, but one made of stainless steel to call his very own. Suffice it to say, it really is just nonsense.
Or is it? Apparently, Cubby Broccoli added the line because it was a reference to a practice of the Mafia in New York City, which bribed people with delicatessens boasting stainless steel countertops to let them use the premises as a front for illegal acts. It probably made him laugh, but nobody else got the joke.
1. The World Is Not Enough (Michael Apted, 1999)
“I thought Christmas only comes once a year.”
Casting Denise Richards in a Bond film as a nuclear physicist named Christmas Jones was begging for trouble, which the character even references in what proved to be a pointless exercise.
She explicitly says to Bond, “Don’t make any jokes, I’ve heard them all,” which the narrative failed to mention only means something so long as he isn’t balls deep at the time. It sounds uncouth, but she doesn’t seem to mind Brosnan cracking wise about multiple orgasms under the watchful eye of MI6 satellites, which is a bizarre set of circumstances.
Fair play to screenwriters Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, and Bruce Feirstein for at least attempting to offer equal opportunities in terms of ejaculatory content, but the final line of The World Is Not Enough is just awful.
