licence to kill

Bon appetit!

Licence To Kill (1989)

I remember watching Licence To Kill on TV when I lost my first tooth. The above GIF was the first scene I remember watching from a James Bond movie!

Yaphet Kotto as Kananga from LIve And Let Die (1973)

Who was the better drug kingpin?

Licence To Kill (1989)

Kananga/Mr. Big (Yaphet Kotto) from Live And Let Die (1973) or Franz Sanchez (Robert Davi) from Licence To Kill (1989)?

Freaky fish

Licence To Kill (1989)

If I was Bond and woke up to this, I’d have gone back to sleep!

Brutal

Licence To Kill (1989)

There isn’t a more brutal James Bond villain than Franz Sanchez (Robert Davi) from Licence To Kill (1989). In this scene alone, Sanchez shows his true self: a murderer, torturer and abuser.

Unlike other Bond villains, Sanchez is intimately involved in the cruel ways he shows his power. He doesn’t sit on a throne and stroking a white cat or avoid conflict by pushing a button in an escape pod. No – without hesitation, Sanchez orders a murder and tortures a defenseless woman.

Lupe’s somber “por favor, Franz” and the unsettlingly compliant way she bows to him for punishment is just awful and an obviously regular occurrence. And it’s telling that Sanchez comes with the small whip on his person – he knew Lupe’s fate before listening to any explanation.

Although disturbing, it’s scenes like this that define a Bond villain. It distinguishes Sanchez’s darker persona from other villains that take a more hands-off approach to evil.

Franz Sanchez (Robert Davi) in Licence To Kill (1989)

Felt so bad for Felix in LTK…

Licence To Kill (1989)

Fish Food Food

Licence To Kill (1989)

In Licence To Kill (1989) as Bond investigates Leiter’s shark attack at Milton Krest’s warehouse, 007 tosses a security guard into a fish food drawer to a seemingly horrifying death. “Food for the fish food.”

This scene has a particular significance for me, as it’s the earliest memory I have of watching a James Bond movie in my life. I can distinctly remember this scene during a live ABC or NBC broadcast of this movie in the early 1990s. I also distinctly remembering the pity I felt for the security guard, banished to die by tiny bites in a claustrophobic drawerful of menacing-looking fish food.

At the same time, I can remember wiggling and eventually pulling a tooth out of my mouth. I was six or seven years old.

"James Bond Will Return" from the end of From Russia With Love (1963)

All “James Bond Will Return” Screenshots

General

“James Bond Will Return” is a signature phrase splashed at the end of (almost) every James Bond movie that promotes 007’s never-give-up/against-all-odds attitude and shows a sense of pride in the world’s longest running movie series.

Throughout the years, it has been used to reveal the movie title of the forthcoming James Bond movie, albeit sometimes in error. It has also not been used at all. Some quick facts:

It does not appear at the end of any of the unofficial movies (Casino Royale (1954), Casino Royale (1967) and Never Say Never Again (1983)
It does not appear in Dr. No or Thunderball
It has been bland with just words (The World Is Not Enough), has had a fancy backdrop (The Living Daylights), and has had a custom image to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the James Bond movies (Skyfall)
The incorrect next movie is listed at the end of The Spy Who Loved Me as For Your Eyes Only – the next movie is in fact Moonraker (thanks, Star Wars)
The title of A View To A Kill is incorrect at the end of Octopussy, adding “From” to the beginning of the title