Rating: 3.5* of five

For clarity's sake, I'll remind the assembled company that I'm reviewing the 1983 Eon-produced film, not the story from the collection of the title. Because really there's no connection between the two to speak of, except Octopussy (Maud Adams from the far-worse The Man With The Golden Gun) herself, and a swift recap by Bond and Octopussy of the story as they're out walking on her girl-island.

A paranoid Cold War fantasy of nuclear war. It got old,fifty years on. Plenty of chases and improbably accented Russians. A lot more of dear old Q, which I loved. The bits set in India had Louis Jourdan (Gaston from Gigi, the pervy old musical about a middle-aged man buying a pubescent girl's virginity from her grandmother, such a hoot!) playing an Afghan prince (hell with the French accent). Next to Octopussy, he's the main baddie; so yet again there was a lamentable lack of hunky blond henchrats for me to ogle. However, there was compensatory Indian hunk-a-rama action. Gawds bless Bollywood!

Boring old Simon Templar...I mean Roger Moore!...wasn't much interested in doing this film until Connery was announced to release Never Say Never Again the same year. Ah, jealousy.

The circus scenes, like all circus stuff, made me itch. I hate clowns. The crocodile submarine (you read that right) was laugh-out-loud funny. The tuk tuk races were fun. The Saint...dear me, Bond!...being droll wasn't funny.

The 5-series BMWs have aged well, the Alfa that Bond steals is cool, Mercedeses always look the same to me...the stolen jewelry plot is so lame, let's not discuss it...the "blue-ringed octopus" is a rubber model at least 10 times bigger than a real blue-ringed octopus...the girl ninjas in orange skin-tight cat suits...well, it's Bond flick.

The title tune, called "All Time High," was sung by Rita Coolidge. Rita Coolidge! I had utterly forgotten her existence. I had no memory whatsoever of the tune, either.

Three stars for making more plot-sense than most, a half-star for the Bollywood hunks, but really, unless you're a major Bondaholic, don't bother. ( )

Year - 1966
Tease - From the Iron Curtain to a Caribbean coral reef, three dazzling short stories which rival the best of the Bond novels for excitement and electric tension
Berlin: Across the death-strip that divides a city, a beautiful blonde killer lines up her sights - and for once OO7 stays his trigger-finger.
London: Bond is in on the bidding - for a fabulous Faberge objet de vertu - against a ruthless KGB spymaster.
Jamaica: OO7 handles a touchy case of murder - which leads to an octopus-turned-assassin.
Villains -
Major Dexter Smythe, is a fifty-four retired Service-man. A man with a dark past. During World War II, Smythe discovered the whereabouts of Nazi gold hidden on a mountain. He arrested an innocent guide to take him up the mountain. It is there he killed the guide and took the gold.
Maria Freudenstein, is a KGB double agent planted in the heart of the British Secret Service. Her devoted duties to Mother Russia is about to pay off with a huge sum from Sotheby's.
Trigger, is a Russian executioner who has been ordered to assassinate a British agent who will be escaping from East Berlin with vital atomic secrets.
Bond-Girl - None.
Minor Characters - Captain Paul Sender, Kenneth Snowman
Plot -
Octopussy - Major Smythe for years has been living in Jamaica off of the Nazi gold he stole. One of his favorite pastimes is swimming out to a coral reef and feeding an octopus. Life is grand until James Bond appears and informs him that he will be placed under arrest for the murder of Hannes Oberhauser, the mountain guide who led Smythe to the gold and was the man who taught OO7 how to ski.
The Property of a Lady - Bond is sent to observe Maria Freudenstein at a Sotheby's auction. The Russians intend to pay her (for spying on the British Secret Service for the last three years) by pushing the bid up high on a Faberge egg they have sent her and she is auctioning off. But most important, Bond is to identify the one who will push the bid up - a person who could be the resident director of KGB operations in London.
The Living Daylights - Has Bond assigned to assassinate 'Trigger', a KGB executioner. For three evenings Bond stations himself inside a building overlooking the 'no-man's land' between East and West Berlin. He waits for the moment when a British agent, known as 272, will attempt to escape East Berlin. While he sits and waits, he is struck by a beautiful blonde walking down the street carrying a cello case. On the third evening, 272 makes his move for West Berlin, Bond takes aim at the window from which Trigger's gun is pointing and is shocked to see that Trigger is the blonde cellist. Bond hesitates for a moment to ponder whether to kill her or not.
Highlights - Flashback scenes on top of mountain and the death of Smythe, the auction at Sotheby's and the shooting of Trigger.
Opening Sentence -
Octopussy - "You know what? said Major Dexter Smythe to the octopus. "You're going to have a real treat today if I can manage it."
The Property of a Lady - It was, exceptionally, a hot day in early June.
The Living Daylights - James Bond lay at the five-hundred-yard firing point of the famous Century-Range at Bisley.
Trivia - Argosy magazine in June of 1962 re-titled Fleming's story The Living Daylights to Berlin Escapes.
Source -- www.shatterhand007.com