Octopussy

''Octopussy'' is a 1983 spy film and the thirteenth in the ''James Bond'' series produced by Eon Productions. It is the sixth to star Roger Moore as the MI6 agent James Bond. It was directed by John Glen and the screenplay was written by George MacDonald Fraser, Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson.

The film's title is taken from a short story in Ian Fleming's 1966 short story collection ''Octopussy and The Living Daylights'', although the film's plot is mostly original. It does, however, contain a scene adapted from the Fleming short story "The Property of a Lady" (included in 1967 and later editions of ''Octopussy and The Living Daylights''). The events of the short story "Octopussy" form part of the title character's background and are recounted by her in the film.

In ''Octopussy'', Bond is assigned the task of following a megalomaniacal Soviet general ( Steven Berkoff) who is stealing jewellery and art objects from the Kremlin art repository. This leads Bond to a wealthy exiled Afghan prince, Kamal Khan (Louis Jourdan), and his associate, Octopussy ( Maud Adams), and the discovery of a plot to force disarmament in Western Europe with the use of a nuclear weapon.

''Octopussy'' was produced by Albert R. Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson; it was released four months before the non-Eon Bond film '' Never Say Never Again''. The film earned $187.5 million against its $27.5 million budget and received mixed reviews. Praise was directed towards the action sequences and locations, with the plot and humour being targeted for criticism; Maud Adams's portrayal of the title character also drew polarised responses.

Plot

After fleeing knife-throwing twin assassins Mischka and Grishka in East Berlin, mortally wounded British agent 009, dressed as a circus clown and carrying a counterfeit Fabergé egg, crashes into the British ambassador's residence and dies. MI6 immediately suspects Soviet involvement and, after the genuine Fabergé egg is to be auctioned in London, sends James Bond to identify the seller.

At the auction, Bond swaps the fake egg for the real one and subsequently engages in a bidding war with an exiled Afghan prince named Kamal Khan, forcing Khan to pay £500,000 for the counterfeit. Bond follows Khan to his palace in India. Bond defeats Khan in a game of backgammon using Khan's loaded dice. Bond and his MI6 contact, Vijay, escape Khan's bodyguard Gobinda. Later, Khan's associate Magda seduces Bond. Bond permits Magda to steal the real Fabergé egg, which is fitted with Q's listening and tracking device. Gobinda knocks Bond unconscious and takes him to Khan's palace. After Bond escapes, he listens in on the bug and discovers that Khan works with Orlov, a Soviet general seeking to expand Soviet domination to Western Europe.

Bond infiltrates a floating palace in Udaipur and meets its owner, Octopussy, a wealthy businesswoman, smuggler and Khan's associate. She also leads the Octopus cult, of which Magda is a member. Octopussy has a personal connection with Bond: her father is the late Major Dexter-Smythe, whom Bond arrested for treason. Octopussy thanks Bond for allowing the Major to commit suicide rather than face trial, and invites Bond to be her guest.

Earlier in Khan's palace and later in Octopussy's palace, Bond discovers that Orlov has been supplying Khan with priceless Soviet treasures, replacing them with replicas while Khan has been smuggling the genuine objects into the West via Octopussy's circus troupe. Orlov is planning to meet Khan at Karl-Marx-Stadt in East Germany, where the circus is scheduled to perform. Khan's assassins break into the palace to kill Bond, but Bond and Octopussy thwart them. Bond learns from Q that the assassins have killed Vijay.

Travelling to East Germany, Bond infiltrates the circus and discovers that Orlov has replaced the Soviet treasures with a nuclear warhead, primed to explode during the circus performance at a United States Air Force base in West Germany. The explosion would force Europe into seeking unilateral disarmament in the belief that the bomb belonged to the US and was detonated at the airbase accidentally, leaving the unprotected borders open to a Soviet invasion.

Bond takes Orlov's car, drives it along the railroad tracks and boards the moving circus train. Orlov gives chase, but is killed by border guards after he tries to rush a checkpoint. Bond kills Mischka and Grischka, and after falling from the train, commandeers a car to get to the airbase. Bond penetrates the base and disguises himself as a clown to evade the West German police. He convinces Octopussy that Khan has betrayed her, and realizing that she has been tricked, she assists Bond in deactivating the warhead.

Some time later, with the plan foiled, Khan has returned to his palace and prepares to flee. Bond and Octopussy also return separately to India. Bond arrives at Khan's palace just as Octopussy and her troops launch an assault on the grounds.

Octopussy attempts to kill Khan, but is captured by Gobinda. While Octopussy's team, led by Magda, overpower Khan's guards, Khan and Gobinda abandon the palace, taking Octopussy as a hostage. As they attempt to escape in their airplane, Bond clings to the fuselage and disables an engine and the elevator panel. Struggling with Bond, Gobinda plummets off the plane's roof to his death, and Bond and Octopussy jump off the plane onto a nearby cliff only seconds before Khan fatally crashes into a mountain. While the Minister of Defence and General Gogol discuss the transport of the jewelry, Bond recuperates with Octopussy aboard her private yacht in India.

Cast

Other actors in smaller roles include Andy Bradford as MI6 agent 009, Dermot Crowley as Lieutenant Kamp, Orlov's nuclear weapons expert; Peter Porteous as Lenkin, the Kremlin art expert; Eva Rueber-Staier as Rublevitch, Gogol's secretary; Jeremy Bulloch as Smithers, Q's assistant; Bruce Boa as Lieutenant General Peterson; and Richard LeParmentier as General Peterson's aide. Ingrid Pitt has an uncredited voice cameo as Octopussy's galley mistress.

Production

Writing

Despite financial problems at United Artists after the release of Michael Cimino's '' Heaven's Gate'', the studio greenlit another James Bond film to be produced and released in 1982. In March 1983, one month after the announcement, UA was purchased and merged into Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Michael G. Wilson, Richard Maibaum, and George MacDonald Fraser were hired to write a film based on short stories from Ian Fleming's posthumous collection ''Octopussy and The Living Daylights''. Little of the plot of the short story "Octopussy" is used, however, with its events simply related by Bond as the family backstory for one of the main characters. The scene at Sotheby's is, though, adapted from the short story " The Property of a Lady" (included in 1967 and later editions of the collection), while Kamal Khan's reaction following the backgammon game is taken from Fleming's novel '' Moonraker''. After initially intending the film to be set in Japan, Fraser chose India as the setting because of his extensive research on the country for his novel '' Flashman''.

Fraser was hired to work on an early draft of the script and he proposed that the story be set in India, as the series had not yet visited said country. The first draft was delivered shortly after the release of '' For Your Eyes Only'', whose writers Michael G. Wilson and Richard Maibaum went on to rework the script. They discarded his idea for the opening sequence, featuring a motorbike chase set at the Isle of Man TT, but still retained moments that producer Albert R. Broccoli had first criticized, where Bond dressed as a gorilla and later, a clown. The film was rewritten to focus on jewelry smuggling after a scandal in the Soviet Union involving General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev's son Yuri Brezhnev manipulating the Moscow State Circus to smuggle jewelry.

Casting

Following ''For Your Eyes Only'', Roger Moore had expressed a desire to retire from the role of James Bond. His original contract had been for three films ('' Live and Let Die'' in 1973, '' The Man with the Golden Gun'' in 1974 and '' The Spy Who Loved Me'' in 1977) which was fulfilled. Moore's following two films ('' Moonraker'' in 1979 and '' For Your Eyes Only'' in 1981) were negotiated on a film-by-film basis. Given his reluctance to return for ''Octopussy'', the producers engaged in a semi-public quest for the next Bond, with Timothy Dalton and Lewis Collins being suggested as a replacement and screen tests carried out with Michael Billington, Oliver Tobias, and American actor James Brolin. However, when rival Bond production '' Never Say Never Again'' was announced, the producers persuaded Moore to continue in the role as it was thought the established actor would fare better against former Bond Sean Connery. It has been reported that Brolin had been hired and was actually on the point of moving to London to begin work on ''Octopussy'' at the time, while Broccoli refused to dispute Tobias's public statements that he was about to be cast as Bond.

Sybil Danning was announced in ''Prevue'' magazine in 1982 as being Octopussy, but was never actually cast, later explaining that Albert R. Broccoli felt "her personality was too strong". Faye Dunaway was deemed too expensive. Barbara Carrera said she turned down the role in order to play Fatima Blush in the competing Bond film '' Never Say Never Again''. Casting director Jane Jenkins revealed that the Bond producers told her that they wanted a South Asian actress to play Octopussy, so she looked at the only two Indians in predominantly white Hollywood, Persis Khambatta and Susie Coelho. Afterward, she auditioned white actresses, like Barbara Parkins

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