When asked if your favourite James Bond is Sean Connery, Roger Moore or Pierce Brosnan (we’ll forget Niven, Lazenby and Dalton), the answer usually depends on your age. Older people like Connery, younger people like Brosnan, but I’m of the Roger Moore era.

“Live and Let Die” was Roger Moore’s first outing as James Bond, and in my view the finest Bond film, closely followed by “The Spy Who Loved Me”. It has everything a good Bond film should have: stunts, chases, gadgets, humour, a top quality Bond girl (Jane Seymour) and brilliant music from George Martin, Paul McCartney and Wings.

The plot is never really the most important part of a Bond film. Basically, Bond has to unmask an evil drug lord called Kananga (Yaphet Kotto) who’s a bit mixed up with Voodoo, and has designs on conquering the world. His quest takes him through Louisiana and Jamaica driving a speedboat and a double decker bus and defying death on a number of occasions.

The score for Live and Let Die was another break with tradition. George Martin filled John Barry’s big boots, and created in my view the best Bond score. To round things off, he also produced Paul McCartney and Wings for the title track, which was good enough to earn an Oscar nomination for Best Song in 1973.

The DVD release brings all this together in a superb package. There are two audio commentaries, one by the director Guy Hamilton and the other by the screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz. A documentary entitled “Inside Live and Let Die” shows the secrets of the film right from choosing Roger Moore as the new Bond. All offer a fascinating insight into Live and Let Die. One interesting fact is that the villain’s name was taken from the owner of the crocodile farm, Ross Kananga. Kananga was himself responsible for perhaps the most dangerous stunt where he runs across a from an island in a crocodile infested lake across bridge of crocodiles
to the shore. It took five takes to get the shot, and the documentary shows a couple of the less successful attempts. Insane!

If you don’t own a Bond film, buy this one on DVD as soon as possible. It comes in widescreen format. The only downside is that it’s mastered in Dolby Digital 2.0, so there won’t be any nice surround effects.