John Glen’s “License to Kill” (1989) is an easy candidate for the most underrated James Bond thriller.
It’s also among the most unusual.
The film’s brutal, risk-taking story made it the first 007 thriller to merit a PG-13 rating.
This was the second and last film to star Timothy Dalton as Bond. and it’s his best performance and installment.
Glen’s film begins with a pre-title sequence that, rather than work as a stand-alone mini-Bond, actually sets up a lot of the plot. Felix Leiter (David Hedison), Bond’s best friend and fellow agent, is getting married and interrupts his wedding to corral Sanchez (Robert Davi), a Latin American drug kingpin.
This prelude ends with a cheeky joke (both Leiter and Bond make it to the wedding on time) and showcases an amazing opening stunt. Yet the smiles and Gladys Knight’s elegant title song don’t entirely put us at ease.
Sanchez’s brutal intro has his cheating mistress being whipped and her lover getting murdered off camera. That, plus Davi’s suave, threatening presence, announce there has never been a 007 movie like this.
The savagery is out in the open from the very start and was a major surprise at the time. Bond movies were never this tough, at least until Daniel Craig showed up decades later.
After the wedding, there’s a deft touch – Leiter’s adorable bride forces Bond to catch her bouquet. The beautifully handled, melancholy bit references that Bond was “married once.” That this film would confidently dip back as far back as “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” (1969) to add that sad character detail is why these movies matter
The best in this series, which “License to Kill” certainly is, understands who this character is and how time and a violent life have taken a toll on the martini-loving agent.
After discovering that Sanchez has not only abducted but brutally tortured Leiter and his bride, Bond breaks protocol, loses emotional control and seeks revenge. With his license to kill revoked by the British Secret Service, he goes after Sanchez alone.
Sanchez is a cruel, casual sadist, not the colorful megalomaniacs we’re accustomed to Bond facing. Davi, who could be loose and funny in other films, makes Sanchez shark-like and disturbing.
Dalton and Davi are tremendous in this.
The pocket lighter that starts as a wedding gift becomes a crucial totem symbolizing the urgency of Bond’s mission. It’s also the humanity and self-discipline he’s sacrificing in carrying it out. Someone tells Bond, “You know we got laws in this country, too.” Yet, Bond isn’t going after Sanchez in his country as a righteous warrior, but a vigilante.
It’s interesting the way Sanchez and Bond wind up mirroring one another during the film (there’s even a large stretch where Bond pretends to be his ally).
Benicio del Toro, in a very early role, is effective as Sanchez’s loathsome brother. There’s a bar fight right of “Road House” (also 1989), in which Bond gets into a tussle with character actor extraordinaire Branscombe Richmond. Also, the terrific Cary Takagawa makes a strong impression in the second act.
Desmond Llewelyn’s Q enters the film later than expected and gives a sharp, welcome performance. Seeing Q active on the field is fun.
Carey Lowell is very good as CIA agent Pam Bouvier. She’s not playing Bond’s sidekick or sex kitten but someone who more than holds her own.
“License to Kill” is among the most disciplined of 007 thrillers, as it doesn’t pile on too many villains or subplots. While the focus is primarily Columbian drug lords, there is a subplot involving a corrupt televangelist, played by Wayne Newton.
To his credit, Newton does here what he did in “The Adventures of Ford Fairlane” (1990) – his villain is initially amusing but also reveals himself to be a vile corruptor of trust. Newton plays the role as a creep and stops short of camp.
In one of the most striking scenes, M (played here for the last time in the series by Robert Brown) confronts Bond in the Hemingway House. He correctly accuses Bond of having “a private vendetta.”
Bond lashes out and runs off.
After decades of dry scenes with the likes of Sean Connery and Roger Moore playing Bond and making puns in M’s presence, seeing Dalton’s no-nonsense take on the character as he ditches his superior is a jaw dropper.
There are little comic touches, such as the recurring visual of Sanchez’s diamond-necklace wearing pet chameleon, but they don’t take the edge away. The vicious carnage and tone of “License to Kill” was a lot in ’89, but it feels in line with the Daniel Craig era.
It also gels with the opening act of 2002’s “Die Another Day,” before the goofy, final Pierce Brosnan entry ditched the rough edges and began its second act in a literal ice castle.
Michael Kamen’s excellent score has the same emotional cues of his “Lethal Weapon” scores (it fits not having a lush John Barry orchestration this time out).
When it was released during the summer of 1989, its weak box office was blamed on the competition. Both the red-hot “Batman” and “Lethal Weapon 2” dominated theaters that summer. Yet, the mixed reviews and audience response (I can recall many confessing they found it “too serious,” “too dark” and “too violent” at the time) was also a factor in its quick exit from the multiplexes.
“License to Kill” presented the end of an era for these movies, and not just in the addition of real-world dangers and powerful monsters as the new villains. The title sequence concludes with old-school dissolves and optical effects, whereas “Goldeneye,” the first 007 to arrive six years later and with Pierce Brosnan in the lead, utilizes amazing CGI surrealism in the opening credits.
The latter is now a series staple.
The PG-13 rating was no joke in 1989, as the shockingly mean carnage is a huge contrast to the bloodless gunplay of the prior installments. What seemed a little too “Miami Vice” and not escapist enough in ’89 was truly ahead of its time.
While it lacked the tradition of “The Living Daylights” and the comfortable bravado Moore brought to Bond, “License to Kill” is a lot better.
The wild ending concludes with a final encounter between Bond and Sanchez that is satisfying and poetic. Not even the comeuppance of Auric Goldfinger was this good.
The stunt work throughout is incredible, particularly a wow bit of a tanker truck making a wheelie. The climax is even more exciting for its lack of a music score.
FAST FACT: Timothy Dalton hoped to play Bond a third and final time and flirted with such a project. The franchise’s producers insisted he stick around for multiple installments, though, and he didn’t want to commit to such a long-term deal. Pierce Brosnan took over with 1995’s “GoldenEye.”
The end credits are worth mentioning because they declare “James Bond Will Return” (which was true, just not as soon as anyone predicted) and there’s a surgeon general warning about smoking.
I guess the barbaric torture Sanchez inflicts on his victims is nothing compared to the dangers of secondhand smoke.
Also, Patti Labelle’s beautiful “If You Asked Me To” sounded like a hit in 1989 but wouldn’t emerge as one until it was covered by Celine Dion three years later.
Finally, if you only recall “License to Kill” as a footnote, the “too-serious” entry in the mostly oversized and flamboyant series and think of Dalton as the Trivial Pursuit equivalent of George Lazenby (Dalton the two-time Bond, Lazenby the one-timer), here’s the thing:
Revisiting these movies reverses the order of value considerably. “License to Kill” is easily the best Bond movie of the 1980s (if you’re curious, I’d state that “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service,” the one starring Lazenby, is still the best Bond movie in the entire series).
That’s not an insult to what Sean Connery, Moore, Brosnan and Craig contributed, it’s just that time is not always kind to a movie franchise that began in 1962 with “Dr. No.” Yet the gems in this series still sparkle, and “License to Kill,” an underdog in the history of James Bond thrillers, remains excellent.