Porky’s

The James Bond Project #13: For Your Eyes Only

~ Randy Blazak ~ 14 Comments

February 23, 2025

This series is intended to evaluate each product of the James Bond film franchise through a feminist lens, and the relevance of the Bond archetype to shifting ideas of masculinity in the 2020s.

For Your Eyes Only (1981, directed by John Glen)

The third decade of Bond! After the silly sci-fi spectacle of Moonraker, producer Cubby Broccoli wanted to get 007 back to basics for the first Bond of the 1980s. While there is no underground lair, there’s plenty of other Bond staples, like assassins on skis, James in his tux at the baccarat table, underwater battles, and sharks. First time director John Glen, who had edited several Bond films before this, was brought in to bring James back to earth with a plot that was back to spy vs. spy and less reliant on tech (much to the chagrin of Q who seems at his limit with 007 snark).

A 54-year-old Roger Moore (who seems a bit out of breath in a few scenes) is paired with this round’s Bond “girl,” 25-year old French actress Carole Bouquet. Her character, Melina Havelock, is the daughter of marine archeologists who are killed because the KGB is trying to retrieve some British spy technology from the bottom of the Mediterranean. This launches her into the role of sidekick as she tells Bond,  “I don’t expect you to understand, you’re English, but I’m half Greek, and Greek women like Elektra always avenge their loved ones!”

By 1981, we have established the tradition of the opening action scene being completely over the top. This one starts James at the grave of his wife, Tracy and ends with Bond captured in a remote controlled helicopter controlled by none other than Blofeld! (and his white pussy cat, presumably not the same one from Diamonds Are Forever). The scenes with the helicopter (with 007 hanging on for dear life) careening over London are eighties epic. The comic death of Blofeld was a long time coming and apparently meant as an FU to the producer of Thunderball, who claimed ownership of the Blofeld name.

For Your Eyes Only gives 007 fans the tropes they crave and, unlike Moonraker, has aged well. Moore’s Bond flirts with the problematic nature of his Lothario reputation while still throwing a solid punch. The quips are dialed back and much of the action is movie candy for the widescreen. For the first time the opening credits reveal females in roles like “production manager” and “continuity,” where previously women were relegated to costumes and make-up. Maybe some of these women whispered in filmmakers’ ears not to make Bond such a dick.

Let’s plug FYEO into our analysis.

Driver of Action – This is Moore’s Bond, but early in the film he is rescued by Melina and her crossbow, although in the mad escape car chase he does ask, “Mind if I drive?” Later in the film he is assisted by Milos Columbo, a pistachio-eating smuggler, and his band of thieves. No CIA help here, M (Bernard Lee) died of cancer before his scenes could be filmed, and Q was inserted merely for comic value. This James Bond is completely capable of solving all problems and escaping all sticky situations.

Role of Violence – There is a great relief of seeing 007 finally kill Blofeld, the man who had his wife killed, by dumping him and his electric wheelchair down an industrial smokestack on the Southside of the Thames. (We don’t know who got custody of the cat.) There are a bunch of henchmen killed, connected to various parts of the plot to get the spyware to the KGB. The most spectacular death is a henchmen in a deep diving suit, looking very robotic, who is blown up inside a sunken English trawler. Boom.

Vulnerability – Credit is given for reminding Bond fans that he was (briefly) married and she died in his arms. It was the only real glimpse we ever got into James the man. The epitaph on her tombstone is, “We have all the time in the world,” his last words to her in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Early in the film, Bond is captured by Cuban hitman Hector Gonzales and rescued by Melina. He seems a bit confused that he suddenly is the damsel in distress, but, like Jesus, he ultimately takes the wheel.

Sexual Potency – Here’s where we start to get a bit of a shift. Bond does not seem to be leering or sexually flirtatious with Melina, 29 years his junior. And between Bond and Moneypenny, the old spark is back, perhaps because they actors are now close in age (both were born in 1927!). Moneypenny, knowing Bond is about to arrive at MI-6 HQ, applies her makeup as James’ hat flies to the hatrack. “Moneypenny, a feast for my eyes,” James says, kissing her on the lips. “What about the rest of you?” she asks. “Well, I was going to get around to that.” There’s the old James Bond we love.

Another character is figure skater Bibi Dahl, played real life figure skater Lynn-Holly Johnson. She has a girl-like crush on Bond and climbs, naked, into his bed. In a shocking turn of events, he rejects her. “You get your clothes on and I’ll buy you an ice cream,” he says trying to kick her out of his room as she plants a kiss on him. Bond does sleep with the Countess Von Schlaf (played by Cassandra Harris, wife of future Bond Pierce Brosnan). The scene feels a bit like, “Oh, this is a Bond film, he needs to bed SOMEBODY.” But like a lot of James’ one night stands, she is killed by some bad guys shortly after bed with Bond. (Death by dune buggy.) And, as if a contractual obligation, James sleeps with Milena at the end of the film. (Can’t let the fans down.) But Bond ’81 seems noticeably less horny. Maybe he was worried about Blofeld’s cat.

Connection – Even though the the plot is pleasingly complex (for a Bond film), 007 is just here to get the job done. There is zero emotional connection. Even Q seems to get on his wick. Milena is strikingly beautiful but she seems to be just a pawn in his plan to stop the KGB from getting this thing (that looks like cheap lighting board). That’s why it’s a bit of a shock that the film ends with them in bed together (ON A BOAT!). Her neglige slides off and she tells James, “For your eyes only.” Roll credits.

Toxic Masculinity Scale: 2

FYEO has some boffo Bond moments. James and Milena in a mini-sub battling another mini-sub under the Mediterranean is pretty damn cool. The scene where 54-year-old Bond is scaling an Alpine cliff in Northern Italy while a henchmen is trying to dislodge the pitons holding his rope is pretty edge of the seat. And there’s a wild ski chase sequence in a bobsled track (that led to the actual death of a stuntman). There’s also some light comedy regarding Britain’s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher. “She’ll have our guts for garters,” the Minister of Defense says. The film ends with Thatcher (perfectly played by Scottish comedian Janet Brown) trying to congratulate Bond over the phone but actually talking to Milena’s parrot, who repeatedly says, “Give us a kiss.”

The misogyny in this 007 chapter seems to be dialed back a little. Bibi, the pigtailed ice skater, gets slapped by two men, but not by our hero. Gonzales’ Spanish villa is basically a swimming pool surrounded by bikini-clad women and KGB boss, General Gogal, has a secretary who appears to also be his young mistress. Posters for the movie featured Bond framed by woman’s bare legs, meant to attract male eyeballs. But for 1981, the year Porky’s came out, that all seems rather tame. It offers promise that 80s Bond can deliver the action that fans love with out the adjacent sexism.

For Your Eyes Only Premiered June 24, 1981 putting in direct competition with the Bill Murray film, Stripes. Aided by the popular theme song, sung by Sheena Easton, the film was second highest grossing Bond film (after Moonraker). Long, at 127 minutes, the film attempted to bring the grit back to 007 and find a place for the British spy in the new decade after 20 years of carving out the formula. Can Moore’s Bond age gracefully?

Next: Octopussy (1983)

The James Bond Project #12: Moonraker (1979)

The James Bond Project #11: The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

The James Bond Project #10: The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

The James Bond Project #9: Live and Let Die (1973)

The James Bond Project #8: Diamonds are Forever (1971)

The James Bond Project #7: On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)

The James Bond Project #6: You Only Live Twice (1967)

The James Bond Project #5: Casino Royale (1967)

The James Bond Project #4: Thunderball (1965)

The James Bond Project #3: Goldfinger (1964)

The James Bond Project #2: From Russia With Love (1963)

The James Bond Project: #1: Dr. No (1962)

Brett Kavanaugh and Bro Culture: Let’s Look in the Mirror

~ Randy Blazak ~ 18 Comments

Sept. 28, 2018

Judge Brett Kavanaugh and I are basically the same age. He’s almost a full year younger than me and a lot more bourgeoise. But the summer of 1982, we were probably pretty similar characters. He was hanging out at the country club in Deleware, and I was hanging out in punk rock bars in London. He was drinking a lot of beer at 17 and I was trying to be vegan at 18. But we were both teenage boys surrounded by Rocky images of masculinity and the patriarchal notion that God or the gods put all the world’s women on Earth for us to enjoy.

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The difference is that I never tried to rip the clothes off of 15-year-old girls. My warped perception of male entitlement only went as far as envying the shower scene in Porky’s. I was sexually shy that summer, but he seemed to have an action plan.

Watching the testimony yesterday morning of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford was gut wrenching. I have to think that millions of women (and plenty of men) were both transfixed and transported back to their own moments of violation. The trauma of sexual assault isn’t a wound that is just healed by time. We don’t expect war veterans suffering from PTSD to “just get over it,” yet there seems to be some statute of limitations on the waves of devastation caused by sexual violence. Dr. Ford was calm but fragile, as she relived her deep-rooted trauma. Kavanaugh’s hysterical testimony, full of conspiracy theories about the Clintons and “Democratic hit jobs,” would have been derided if he had been a female, but men are allowed to use their anger as a cudgel in absence of the truth. “He must be right, look how loud he is yelling.” (And aren’t judges supposed to be politically impartial. This is like giving Fox News a seat on the Supreme Court.)

Image: US-COURT-POLITICS-ASSAULT

The underlying message is that the starting assumption is men are truth tellers and women are liars or patsies. Welcome to Anita Hill Redux. You haven’t come a long way, baby. And yes, maybe Ford was mistaken and Kavanaugh is innocent, but his “defense” didn’t convince a single rape victim. No matter how impressive your resume is and how many times you’ve flown on Air Force one and how much you lean on the wisdom of your daughters, good men can do bad things. His credentials don’t shield him from abusive behavior. It’s not good people vs. evil monsters, us vs. them. It’s just us.

As I recently wrote with regard to race, not only do we all internalize white supremacy, infecting each of us with a degree of racism, so to we all internalize misogyny, infecting each of us with a degree of sexism. We might not say it out loud, but we (men and women) are socialized to believe that “male” is the norm (a message delivered by your mailMAN each day), and women are, as Simone de Beauvoir called it, the second sex. I’ve written a great deal about the challenges of being a male feminist when the go-to switch in your head says women are “girls” and secondary or sexual objects. I am a racist and a sexist. Brett and I both learned these lessons long before 1982. The difference seems to be that I seek to purge the sexism within me and he has chosen to deny its existence. I half expected him to pull a Trump and claim, “I’m the least sexist person you’ll ever meet!”

Part of the gendered message we get early on is that men stick together to maintain their authority. “Bros before hos,” the frat boys chant. That male bonding was evident in the predatory behavior of teenage Kavanaugh and his wing-man Mark Judge and it is evident in the Republican men of the Senate Judiciary Committee who are desperate to give this bro a lifetime appointment on the high court. Bro culture reinforces patriarchy from the ball field to fraternity row to the senate chambers.

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But it’s easy to point to Brett Kavanaugh as the supreme douchebag of the land, who may or may not have spent Beach Week ’82 plying underage girls with grain alcohol. Whether or not he makes it on the court, he will always be known as the “rapey judge.” Kavanaugh is “them.” We need to focus on us and how our own internalized misogyny creates the rape culture that allows credentialed dicks like Kavanaugh to rise to prominence. If the rise of the alt-right is an opportunity for this country to explore the damage done by white privilege and normalized racism, the Kavanaugh hearings are an opportunity for us to confront our issues with male privilege and normalized sexism.

Brett Kavanaugh isn’t the problem. He’s a symptom of the problem. As my wife and I watched Ford’s testimony, we wondered if our daughter would be telling her own stories of sexual trauma one day, trying to convince a panel of old men about the lifelong damage created by one single act. Trump and his old boy network are fighting tooth and nail to make sure that #metoo is just a fad and the old regime stands firm, so I am desperately worried my daughter will encounter her own Brett Kavanaugh at some point.

But if we men can take a deep dive into our own sexism, our simple dismissal of women and all things feminine, we might put an end to the uproarious laughter of boys who have a girl locked in a room and see her dehumanization as sport. We might delegitimize the delegitimization of women and girls. We might keep my daughter safe by surrounding her with boys and men who see her not just as somebody’s daughter but as somebody. We might be able to undo what we have done for so long.