You Only Live Twice

Name: You Only Live Twice
Genre: Action, Adventure, Thriller
Released: June 13, 1967
Duration: 117 min
Rating: 61
Cast: Akiko Wakabayashi, Bernard Lee, Desmond Llewelyn, Donald Pleasence, Karin Dor

1967

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Generally favorable reviews based on 14 Critic Reviews

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USER SCORE

Generally favorable reviews based on 71 Ratings

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6.8

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6.8	User Score Generally favorable reviews based on 71 Ratings

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You Only Live Twice

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Movie Details & Credits

United Artists Corporation | Release Date: June 13, 1967 | GP

Starring: Akiko Wakabayashi, Bernard Lee, Desmond Llewelyn, Donald Pleasence, Karin Dor, Lois Maxwell, Mie Hama, Sean Connery, Teru Shimada, Tetsurô Tanba

Summary: James Bond (Sean Connery) is sent to Japan to team up with their Secret Service to help stop SPECTRE’s Blofeld from starting a third world war by setting America and Russia against each by kidnapping their space crafts.

Director: Lewis Gilbert

Genre(s): Action, Adventure, Thriller

Rating: GP

Runtime: 117 min

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Metascore

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Critic Reviews

100

Empire Ian Nathan

Director Lewis Gilbert effortlessly marshals the intricacies of the plot (a nutty plan by SMERSH to ignite a world war), the exotic Japanese locations, and the extravagancies of having hundreds of ninja warriors abseiling into a huge enemy base unfathomably constructed in the belly of an extinct volcano (quite the engineering feat!). Read full review

The Guardian Phelim O'Neill

What I can say for sure is You Only Live Twice is the Bond film I have seen most often and I have enjoyed the hell out it every single time. Read full review

Peter Travers

From the Eastern flavor of the opening theme, hauntingly sung by Nancy Sinatra, to the Japanese setting, the fifth film is the Bond series just gets better and cooler with age. The tasty script by Roald Dahl junks most of the Fleming novel, spinning its own witty Cold War fantasy. Read full review

James Berardinelli

Unfortunately, this is also among the weakest of the early Bond films, although Connery is in peak form. Read full review

Roger Ebert

Connery labors mightily. There is still the same Bond grin, still the cool humor under fire, still the slight element of satire. But when he puts on his cute little helmet and is strapped into his helicopter, somehow the whole illusion falls apart and what we're left with is a million-dollar playpen in which everything works but nothing does anything. Read full review

TV Guide Magazine Staff (Not Credited)

Nancy Sinatra sings the wistful title song, and the action scenes are enhanced by some of composer John Barry's best work for the Bond series. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

Connery didn't want to play Bond anymore, and it shows in this forgettable picture. From a stirred, not shaken, martini to the ninja training school to the "surgery" to make Bond Japanese (by shaving his chest hair), there's nary a moment of this film that doesn't make any viewer cringe. Read full review

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User Reviews

freeridearts

Mar 4, 2021

James Bond is awesome!James Bond is awesome!James Bond is awesome!James Bond is awesome!James Bond is awesome!

0 of 1 users found this helpful01

Gamepro3093

Aug 19, 2020

A fun movie in the series. Sure it’s turning Japanese plot point has aged terribly but it’s only for about 15-20 of the movie. The rest is really fun and a major improvement over the dull Thunderball.

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

VidyaBum

Oct 27, 2021

Having watched 25 Bonds from Dr.No to Spectre, I place You Only Live Twice at 3/25.

And let me say right now, it doesn't deserve that rating. It deserves a good rating, but 3rd best? I rate this movie this high because it has 2 elements: - It's a Bond movie from its starter/golden era,Having watched 25 Bonds from Dr.No to Spectre, I place You Only Live Twice at 3/25.

And let me say right now, it doesn't deserve that rating. It deserves a good rating, but 3rd best?

I rate this movie this high because it has 2 elements:
- It's a Bond movie from its starter/golden era, where Bond was absolutely amazing
- It's set in Japan

Bond back in the 60s/early 70s had a very strong sense of escapism, and not just from the real world where plots need to make sense, but also from dreary old normal life. Travelling to Istanbul with From Russia With Love, to the Carribean in Dr.No, to Japan in YOLT was just wonderful.

You Only Live Twice starts off with Bond being "killed" and ends with him meeting the villain in a giant secret Space Station that's hidden in a volcano.

"Mr Bond, I thought you died"
"Yes this is my second life"
"You Only Live Twice, Mr Bond"

It's the epitome of these kinds of lines, now seen as cheesy and camp but honestly I think they've kept all of their charm. The visit to 1960s Japan, the Big Evil Secret Volcano Lair, the mad scientist villain, the fights, the girls, the banter, the army of Ninjas, the Rocket That Eats Other Rockets, the gadgets, the stupid ways they try to kill Bond, the everything really.

Bond always cared more about a solid amount of fun than a sensible storyline, and it was, back in the 60s, still managing to mostly have both. Here you escape to 1960s Japan with Bond, and you enjoy the ride from start to finish, easily brushing aside the silliness. This movie brings me joy in ways that no later movies in the franchise, and really very few movies, can.

The first half is all about escapism, and the latter half about fighting the Evil Villain, and even though I prefer the first half, the whole movie is joyful, witty, charming, all-around adorable and I love it to bits.

With that said, let me be a historian here: You Only Live Twice must be marked as the first "industrial" Bond movie. I have a personal theory that EON, after Dr.No, FRWL, and the brilliant Goldfinger, tried harder than normal to make an even more exceptional movie, and bombed with the nonsensical, terrible, absolutely ridiculous Thunderball. Thunderball was an immense directing and technical effort for a very boring movie, a stupendously complicated story for a stupendously retarded, nonsensical plot, it was the movie where EON tried its hardest to make a masterpiece and utterly went beyond their skills.

Thus out of the first 5 movies, there is the beginner, the reverser (FRWL is ultimately a classic thriller with a Bond coat of paint), the masterpiece, the failure, and the moment where the series just kind of accepts that it found its limits, sets itself in its formula, and keeps going straight forward, just toeing the guidelines the first 3 movies created. Of course, the later actors, especially Moore, the eras changing, and many other elements will demand changes. But the core "idea", the core "style", it's all set and followed starting this movie.

YOLT is the first movie to be an "industrial" Bond, being the moment where the franchise stopped being truly original and just applied what it knew and would keep doing it for 40 years and some (the last classic Bond was the last Brosnan, Craig is a really different beast).

But Bond was, long before it became this incredibly lengthy, unequal, sometimes decent sometimes bad series, fun. It was with so much banter, charm, wit, and good action for its time that it was just plain fun.

You Only Live Twice is where the series rested its feet into the concrete and solidifed. But even if it is the start of one of the longest-running series ever, a series that had its very large share of critics and fans that were increasingly tired of it, it is still carrying that brand of fun, that Bond-ness that is lost on us today.

I consider it historical, both the first industrial Bond movie, and the last movie of a golden age that will never return. After this movie, the series will delve into many lead actor changes, and questionable style problems. Bond will not stabilise again until 1977 with Moore's Spy Who Loved Me, a whole 10 years later.
It will have some good, and less good movies, but even the best of these movies will not equal the ones from the Golden Age. I can watch Moonraker or Licence to Kill and enjoy them to a point, I can watch You Only Live Twice and enjoy it more.

Whether it's for history, as a last dance before the fall, or it is for its own quality, You Only Live Twice is a thoroughly enjoyable piece of Bond silliness and plain enjoyment that deserves to be seen.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

FilipeNeto

Feb 18, 2018

Directed by Lewis Gilbert, produced by Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli and with a screenplay by Roald Dahl, this is the fifth 007 franchise film, who reached, after "Thunderball", a huge peak of popularity. As in previous films, this movie adapts the characters created by Ian Fleming toDirected by Lewis Gilbert, produced by Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli and with a screenplay by Roald Dahl, this is the fifth 007 franchise film, who reached, after "Thunderball", a huge peak of popularity. As in previous films, this movie adapts the characters created by Ian Fleming to an issue or problem of the current time, in this case the space conquest, held by US and Soviet Union, and the danger of Cold War, skillfully exploited in the film.

In this film, the English agent is in charge of investigating the disappearance of an American spacecraft, apparently abducted by another vessel that re-entered the Earth's atmosphere over the Sea of Japan. In the country of the rising sun, it will collaborate with local intelligence to investigate a chemical industry, concluding that is linked to SPECTRE, an association that he already knows very well. However, disappears another spacecraft, this time belonging to the Soviets, which increases the tension between the two countries. In order to investigate under-covered, Bond will need to take on a second life and identity, infiltrating among the people to discover the enemy base and fulfill his mission.

The film has the usual Bond recipe: exotic locations, beautiful women, lots of action and strange and expensive machines. One of the most famous is Little Nelly, a small collapsible helicopter, armed with several gadget's whose Bond uses against his enemies. One of the most popular and iconic scenes is the apparent death and maritime funeral of Bond, an act of MI6 to give more freedom of action to their agent, whose body is quickly rescued by a submarine. Other notable scene are the abduction of each space vessel (US and Russia), swallowed by the larger SPECTRE's ship. In this film, for the first time, we see the face behind this powerful criminal organization: Ernest Stavro Blofeld, with his famous white cat. This film is also the first where James Bond gets married, although the marriage was part of his disguise. The agent, one of the most famous womanizer's in cinema, will only marry again (this time for real) in "On Her Majesty's Secret Service".

This film has inherited from the previous its central cast, who plays not only Bond but the characters M, Q, and Monneypenny. To the actors who embodied these characters will join Akiko Wakabayashi (in the role of Bond-girl Aki) and Mie Hama (in the role of another bond-girl, Kissy, with which Bond marries); Donald Pleasence incarnated Blofeld, the villain and Tetsuro Tamba played the chief of the Japanese espionage, Tanaka.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

HeroicAge616

Oct 26, 2021

Bolstered by its iconic villain, You Only Live Twice is a satisfying finale to Connery's initial run as the British superspy.

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Robwinz

Dec 11, 2020

You Only Live Twice is a great James Bond movie. The movie's got a pretty interesting story, which is about an American space capsule which has been swallowed by a Russian spaceship.

After this happens, James Bond discovers SPECTRE is behind the theft and he wants to find out the motiveYou Only Live Twice is a great James Bond movie. The movie's got a pretty interesting story, which is about an American space capsule which has been swallowed by a Russian spaceship.

After this happens, James Bond discovers SPECTRE is behind the theft and he wants to find out the motive behind it.

The movie's got some great acting from all of the cast especially from James Bond (Sean Connery).

The pacing throughout this movie is pretty good and most of the scenes are built up pretty well.

Also, the action sequences throughout this movie are very clever and very explosive but they're pretty cool.

The villain who's called Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Donald Pleasence) does a brilliant job playing the role of the main villain who's in the movie.

Finally, the greenscreen effects have dated a bit, you can tell what's real and what's not. You can tell that the greenscreen backgrounds during the car scenes aren't real.

The movie's got a few stupid scenes scattered throughout but they're pretty funny though.

The movie's got some very funny moments throughout, which work very well in making me laugh.

Overall, You Only Live Twice is a great James Bond movie. The movie's got an interesting story, great acting, pretty good pacing, very clever action sequences, a brilliant villain and quite a few funny moments.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

GDsReviews

Jun 7, 2022

You can clearly see that Sean Connery had lost most of his passion for playing James Bond here, and the whole movie suffers as a result.

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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