You Only Live Twice (1967)

This is in the hay day of 007 films.
Made when 007 was exciting and entertaining.
That gets a lot of hate from people with Generation Xenophobe ideology.
But it's totally exciting.
Here, we get almost all the venues. We even get outer space. We get super beautiful scenery that pretty much make this one of the great Bond films, secure at number 5 in my opinion.
Most of this is set in Japan, and much of it is filmed there.
While Thunderball inspired the most in Austin Powers, this is probably second place in inspiration for Austin, and that's a good thing. Let us face the fact that the modern day 21st century Bond movies couldn't inspire Nolan Ryan to throw a baseball.
This was made in the era when piranha were considered dangerous, and that plays a big part in the film. "Blowhard" (my name for Number 1) likes to feed his piranha. And you can guess what he feeds them.
Lots of action, lots of scenery, lots of beautiful women, lots of wit, lots of gadgets. It has everything, which is probably why so many critics are so jealous of it.

Yeah... forgotten isn't it?
Maybe it's forgotten because they try and turn Sean Connery into a Japanese man to hide him and he just ends up looking like a harry chested Leonard Nimoy.
Or maybe it's forgotten because little choppers are more Roger Moore than Sean Connery.
Whatever the case, it starts off pretty strong and then falls apart at the end. The first half of the movie is Connery Bond, and in places it's almost surreal in it's imagery.... but it ends up with 007 Leonard Nimoy, and that is just a shame.
I can't really hate on the movie, because parts of it are seriously good. I just can't get disguised as a Japanese man 007 Leonard Nimoy with a harry chest out of my head, and that is really the memory that stays with you decades after watching this film.
But, if you can get beyond that, it's still a pretty darn decent 007 film.