Film / Diamonds Are Forever

♫ They are all I need to please me
They can stimulate and tease me... ♫

"Curious... how everyone who touches those diamonds seems to die."

— Mr. Wint

The One Where Sean Connery came back (for the last time in the official series).

Diamonds Are Forever is the seventh Eon Productions James Bond film, the second to be directed by Guy Hamilton and the last to star Sean Connery, coming out in December 1971. Shirley Bassey performed the Title Theme Tune for the second time in the series.

After Bond kills Blofeld in the opening sequence, he is assigned to an international diamond-smuggling case. A huge amount of diamonds have been stolen from the South African mines and two Camp Gay assassins are killing everyone in the smuggling ring ladder, rung by rung. Bond infiltrates the group by managing to kill smuggler Peter Franks and poses as him in an effort to find out what is going on. He discovers that the head of the smuggling ring is none other than a not-so-dead-after-all Ernst Stavro Blofeld, who found a way to create doubles of himself through plastic surgery. The diamond smuggling is revealed to be part of a plan by to build a Kill Sat and hold the world hostage.

Of note, Sean Connery, who felt he was done with the series after You Only Live Twice, was lured back to playing Bond by Eon Productions thanks to a massive paycheque after the turmoil caused by George Lazenby's departure after On Her Majesty's Secret Service. He used half of it to establish a charity to support deprived children in Edinburgh. When asked if he would ever play the character after this, Connery replied "Never again." This later served as inspiration for the title of the non-Eon produced Bond film Never Say Never Again in which Connery reprised the role one last time.

Preceded by On Her Majesty's Secret Service and followed by Live and Let Die, with Bond now played by The Saint himself, Roger Moore.

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Tropes Are Forever:

• Accidental Aiming Skills: Mooks come into Bond's hotel room where he's stripping down the lovely Plenty O'Toole, and toss her out the glass door and off the balcony, where she falls about 100 feet clad in nothing but her panties and her high heels to land dead centre in the hotel pool. In response to Bond's lampshading that it was a fantastic shot, the astonished mook admits, "I didn't know there was a pool down there!"
• Actually a Doombot: Blofeld has been using plastic surgery to turn henchmen into doubles to fool Bond. It works, and Bond kills two of them mistaking them for the real deal, plus a third in the first scene who is in between procedures.
• Adaptational Context Change: One of the few details the film retained from the book was a character being attacked with hot mud in a mudbath. In the book, Wint and Kidd do it to a jockey who beat a horse owned by the Mafia, and the jockey doesn't actually die, though he might be permanently injured. In the film, Bond does it to kill one of Blofeld's doubles.
• Adaptational Location Change: The film visits all the locations of the book, with the exception of New York.
• Adaptation Dye-Job: Tiffany was blonde in the book, as opposed to a redhead in the film. To confuse things further, the movie version has a range of wigs. Lampshaded when Bond asks, "Weren't you a blonde when I came in?"
• Adaptation Expansion: The diamond smuggling pipeline is the entire Evil Plan in the book, and is run by comparatively mundane gangsters. In the film, it's just one arm in another of Blofeld's grandiose schemes.
• Adapted Out: The main villains of the book - Jack and Seraffimo Spang - are completely absent from the film.
• Ambiguously Gay: In the novel Felix Leiter speculates that Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd are homosexual, and in the movie the Homoerotic Subtext is laid on thick. They're shown Holding Hands after committing their first on-screen murders. Wint uses a cologne that makes him smell "like a tart's handkerchief" (implying it's actually women's perfume) and death-glares at Kidd when he notes that Tiffany is attractive "for a lady".
• America Saves the Day: A force of armed U.S. helicopters attacks Blofeld's oil rig after receiving Bond's signal.
• Animal Assassin: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd use a scorpion to kill Dr. Tynan.
• Anti-Air: Blofeld has concealed 20mm Oerlikon cannons defending his oilrig. However they're outgunned by the US Air Cavalry helicopters who are armed with air-to-ground rockets.
• Anti-Climax: The ending is very underwhelming with Blofeld, his mooks, and even Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd so easily defeated. This is somewhat justified as the the lion’s share of the film’s budget went to Sean Connery’s then unheard of salary demand meaning they likely did not have any money for huge climactic battles like were seen in previous Connery Bond movies.
• Anti-Love Song: I don't need love/For what good will love do me?...
• The Anticipator: Bond drops into Willard Whyte's penthouse suite and, having been observed by Blofeld, is greeted by Willard Whyte (actually Blofeld with a disguised voice) with the words, 'Howdy. Welcome, son. We've been expecting you'.
• Artistic Licence – Biology: Dr. Tyan is killed by a scorpion sting and dies almost instantly. Most scorpion stings aren't fatal, and even then can take hours to kill.
• Artistic Licence – Geography: The narrator of a circus sideshow mentions "Nairobi, in South Africa". Even if they didn't mean the republic, the city is in Kenya in east Africa.
• Artistic License – Law Enforcement: Ian Fleming has Felix Leiter retire from the CIA and join the Pinkerton Detective Agency to explain why he's working with Bond inside the United States, which should be the jurisdiction of the FBI. Here the CIA run the entire investigation without J. Edgar Hoover (who was still running the FBI at this stage) having any objection.
• Artistic License – Nuclear Physics: Those "radiation shields" that Klaus Hergesheimer is handing out are just a tiny badge that wouldn't shield you against anything. They're clearly meant to be a dosimeter badge, used to indicate how much radiation the wearer is absorbing.
• Artistic Licence – Physics: Unlike what Bond says in the film, the first laser was generated using a ruby, not a diamond. Diamonds are not a very good material for making lasers, anyway, so the fact that Blofeld's laser uses them is more due to Rule of Cool than any kind of realism.
• Artistic Licence - Space: The first sign the satellite is being independently controlled is when it prematurely separates at least two sections to deploy itself ahead of schedule. Since the rocket explicitly hadn't reached an orbit point yet, the satellite really should have just come crashing back down through the atmosphere.
• Ass Shove: When Felix Leiter questions Bond about where he managed to hide the diamonds on a dead body, Bond alludes to this trope by answering "Alimentary, Doctor Leiter."
• Assassin Outclassin':
  • Wint and Kidd attempt to kill Bond three times. Firstly by placing him in a coffin that's about to be cremated, secondly by placing him in a pipe and thirdly with a bomb on a ship. Naturally, he survives through guile and sheer luck.
  • Blofeld sends Bert Saxby to kill Willard Whyte. He's killed by the CIA.
• Auction of Evil: After Blofeld launches his satellite, he sets up "An international auction, with nuclear supremacy going to the highest bidder."
• "Bang!" Flag Gun: In a deleted scene, Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd kill Shady Tree with a "BANG!" Flag Gun that also shoots a real bullet.
  Mr. Wint: Shady Tree! Shady, we just adored your act.
  Mr. Kidd: What taste and style.
  Mr. Wint: And we have a few suggestions.
  Shady Tree: Critics and material I don't need; I haven't changed my act in 40 years!
  [Mr. Kidd pulls out a water gun flower.]
  Mr. Kidd: Ah, but this one's surefire...
  Shady Tree: That's the oldest Godda—
  Mr. Wint: And this one... will kill you.
  [Mr. Wint puts a gun to Tree's head; the BANG Flag Gun pops out reading BANG! You're Dead!]
  Shady Tree: Come on, fellas! The popping gun and the squirting flower routine? You gotta be kidding!
  [Mr. Wint empties a live bullet into Tree's brain.]
  Mr. Kidd: Two's company, Mr. Wint...
  Mr. Wint: And Tree was a crowd, Mr. Kidd.
  [James Bond continues toward Tree's dressing room as Albert R. Saxby intercepts Wint and Kidd on departure.]
  Albert R. Saxby: Hold it! Don't go in there. We didn't get the real diamonds, so we need Tree... alive.
  Mr. Kidd: That's most annoying...
• Bavarian Fire Drill: Seeing that a keycard is needed to enter Dr. Metz's lab, Bond waits till Klaus Hergesheimer walks up to the door and inserts his card, then pretends to do the same before tailgating through the door with Klaus. He then borrows a radiation shield off Klaus, grabs a Clipboard of Authority and Labcoat of Science and Medicine and pretends to be "Klaus Hergesheimer, G Section, checking radiation shields" to explore the laboratory where the satellite is being constructed. It works until the real Hergesheimer walks into the lab that Bond has just exited.
• The Big Board: Willard Whyte has on his financial holdings across US, which provides the location of Blofeld's endgame operation.
• Bigger Is Better in Bed: Bond is implied to be this, not surprisingly, when he strips down out of his tuxedo for Tiffany Case, who becomes progressively more aroused as she watches Bond (who she still thinks is Peter Franks at this point) relieve himself of his clothes for her - she even encourages him at one point to "keep going." Once Bond is standing completely naked in front of her a smiling Tiffany is so overwhelmed by the sight of his manhood that she affectionately compliments him by saying "I'm very impressed. There's a lot more to you than I had expected."
• Blatant Lies: While Sir Donald is doing a voiceover narration of the "airtight security" of the South African diamond mines and its "loyal and devoted workers", we're shown a montage depicting how those workers are smuggling diamonds out of the mines with the aid of a corrupt dentist.
• Bluff the Impostor: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd pretend to be room service and serve Bond and Tiffany dinner. After they serve the drinks, Bond remarks he would have liked to drink a claret. Mr. Wint apologizes and says they ran out, then Bond points out the drink they served was a claret. Given that Wint is wearing the tastevine of a sommelier, this is something he should know.
• Body Double: Blofeld has multiple copies; they all die painful deaths.
• Bodyguard Babes: Willard Whyte is guarded (from rescue or escape) by two beautiful and under-clad young women named Bambi and Thumper. Bond is forced to beat them.
• Bond One-Liner: The main quip-master is in fact not Bond, but the Bantering Baddie Buddies Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd:
  • They drop a scorpion down someone's neck and explain his absence by saying he was "bitten by the bug."
  • They dispatch a guy by blowing up a helicopter:
    Mr. Kidd: If God had wanted man to fly...
    Mr. Wint: He would have given him wings, Mr. Kidd.
  • Other henchmen try their hand, but they're not nearly as good, as shown when they kill Shady Tree:
    Bert Saxby: We didn't get the real diamonds, so we need Tree... alive!
    Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd: That's most annoying...
  • While on Saxby, after he tries to kill his supposed boss Willard Whyte but is gunned down instead, Whyte responds with: "Bert Saxby? Tell him he's fired!"
  • Bond himself gets one after killing Mr. Wint:
    Bond: Well, he certainly left with his tails between his legs.
  • An inversion is Bond doing one-liners after surviving murder attempts: once he's saved from an attempted cremation, "My condolences, gentlemen", and after being left to die in a pipeline and being awakened by a mouse, "I was just out walking my rat, and I seem to have lost my way."
• Bond Villain Stupidity: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd have Bond unconscious and they simply dump him in an unfinished pipeline and leave, assuming he'll eventually die. Doubly stupid, as this is the second time the pair have been given an unconscious James Bond to dispose of; the first time they tried to burn him alive, and it didn't work then; Shady Tree and Morton Slumber get him out of the retort when Tree discovers that Peter Franks' remains had been stuffed with fake diamonds planted by Bond and the CIA before being transported to Slumber, Inc. to be burned, and Bond takes the opportunity to just waltz out of Slumber, Inc. when Tree tries to question him about the whereabouts of the real diamonds.
• Book Safe: Mrs. Whistler, the missionary teacher who's part of the diamond smuggling chain that Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd are killing off, hides the goods in a hollowed Bible.
• Borrowed Biometric Bypass: Played With; Tiffany takes a drink tumbler off Bond and lifts a thumbprint off it, comparing it to a thumbprint of the real Peter Franks. Bond is then shown peeling fake skin off his thumb and fingers.
• Brick Joke: Bond climbs into the window of Willard Whyte's penthouse and finds himself in the bathroom, which the billionaire has set up so he can conduct business even while doing his 'business', including banks of phones. Later Whyte gets a phone call from the White House and says he'll take it "on the john".
• Bring Him to Me: When Bond turns up at his oil-rig headquarters, Blofeld order his mooks to search him thoroughly and then have him brought into his office and later the command centre.
• Broad Strokes: The opening sequence. Was Bond hunting down Blofeld for escaping in You Only Live Twice, or for murdering Tracy in On Her Majesty's Secret Service? It's ambiguous enough for the audience to pick.
• Buried Alive: Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint dump an unconscious Bond in an oil pipeline under construction out in the desert. Bond gets out by short-circuiting a welding robot sent down the pipeline, so a repair crew will turn up and rescue him.
• …But He Sounds Handsome:
  • Bond, posing as smuggler Peter Franks, kills the real Franks and switches wallets with him. When Tiffany Case discovers he's "killed James Bond" he feigns surprise and comments "It just goes to show you, no-one's indestructible!"
  • Later when Bond's using the voicebox to pose as Burt Saxby, he goes on about how smart and dangerous Bond is.
• Call-Back:
  • Bond exposes Wint and Kidd as assassins by catching them out about their knowledge of fine wines. This is similar to him deducing that Grant in From Russia with Love was a fraud when he ordered red wine with fish.
  • When Bond discovers that Tiffany Case is a natural redhead after having paraded blonde and black wigs in front of him, he notes that he doesn't care much for redheads. Understandable, since the last one he slept with tried to kill him.
• Camp Straight: Charles Gray's portrayal of Blofeld is decidedly more Camp than in previous films. He's even in drag at one point in the film.
• Can't Bathe Without a Weapon: A mook is lying in a mud bath before undergoing the plastic surgery that will turn him into Blofeld's double. He sees Bond sneaking around and lifts a revolver from under the mud. It might not have been able to fire but Bond isn't taking that chance—he lunges for a pullcord that dumps a lot more mud on top of the mook until he drowns in it.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You:
  • Shady Tree rescues James Bond from Kidd and Wint's incineration attempt because he had passed phony diamonds on to Shady, and they need the real diamonds for Blofeld's Evil Plan. Albert Saxby tries to rescue Shady Tree for the same reason but gets there too late.
  • Blofeld has the real Willard Whyte locked up in Whyte's own desert hideaway. As he's trying to impersonate Whyte over a long period of time, this makes sense as there are things that only Whyte would know. However when Bond escapes again, he figures Whyte has outlived his usefulness and orders him killed. Fortunately, Bond and Felix get to him first.
• Captured on Purpose: Downplayed as there's nothing covert about it; Bond gets thrown out of a passing helicopter in broad daylight and rolls up to Blofeld's oilrig in a large balloon. Blofeld scoffs at the idea that he's come to negotiate, and orders Bond thoroughly searched to find out what he's hiding—an ordinary tape hidden in the lining of his jacket that he planned to switch with the control tape.
• Car Skiing: While being pursued by Las Vegas police, Bond uses a loading ramp to put his car up on two wheels to fit through an alley that would normally be too narrow. The police car following him also tries it, but flips over on its roof instead.
• Cement Shoes: Mr. Kidd and Mr. Wint kill Plenty O'Toole in a swimming pool; Fridge Horror suggests this is a particularly sadistic method, as the concrete block would inch down the slope of the pool as she struggled, slowly pulling her underwater. Ironically enough, this is almost exactly what happened to Lana Wood when it came time to film the scene, but attentive crew members jumped in and were able to help.
• Chair Reveal: After Bond enters Willard Whyte's penthouse apartment, Blofeld reveals himself by spinning his chair around.
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • When Bond first meets Tiffany Case she's wearing a black wig. Later she sees black hair in a pool and thinks it's her wig: it's actually the hair of Plenty O'Toole. Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd thought Plenty was Tiffany wearing the wig.
  • Two of them help Bond Spot the Imposter in the final scene. Wint's aftershave falls out of his pocket and gets smashed when Bond is dropped into the trunk of Wint's car. Bond wakes up covered in the smell and recognises it when Wint is posing as a waiter. He confirms his suspicions with a trick question about the claret that Wint gets wrong—Bond's knowledge of wines was established in his briefing with M.
  • Bond notices a cassette tape of military marching music in the laboratory of Dr. Metz, an odd choice for a self-declared pacifist. It contains programming instructions for the satellite.
• Chekhov's Skill: Early in the film, Bond once more demonstrates his extensive knowledge in wine. Near the end of the movie, this same knowledge saves him from an attempt on his life by Wint and Kidd.
• Clipboard of Authority: Bond grabs a clipboard and masquerades as "Klaus Hergesheimer, G Section" (whom he had met earlier) to explore the secret installation where the Kill Sat is being created.
• Clone by Conversion: Blofeld attempts this at the start. Bond subverts the trope by drowning the would-be clone in mud.
• Cloning Gambit: Blofeld pulls this trick on James Bond with variable success.
• Clothing Combat:
  • In the opening sequence, Bond strangles a woman with her own bikini top. "There's something I'd like you to get off your chest."
  • In the closing sequence, Bond gives Wint a Groin Attack with his own coattails. "Well, he certainly left with his tails between his legs."
• Clutching Hand Trap: Played With. A mook, frisking James Bond, reaches inside his jacket to go for the gun...and receives a nasty surprise, courtesy of Q-Branch.
• Co-Dragons: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, as well as Bert R. Saxby and Bambi and Thumper.
• Coffin Contraband: James Bond impersonates a diamond smuggler he has killed and smuggles the diamonds inside the corpse inside a coffin.
  Felix Leiter: I give up. I know the diamonds are in the body, but where?
  Bond: Alimentary, Dr. Leiter...
• Collapsing Lair: Willard Whyte's oil rig, as a result of the helicopter attack.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Bond's Roaring Rampage of Revenge at the start of the film seems to have been motivated by Blofeld killing Tracy at the end of the last movie.
  • Bond tells Tiffany that he doesn't care for redheads due to their terrible tempers. He could be referring to Rosa Klebb, Fiona Volpe and Irma Bunt.
• Convection, Schmonvection: Wint and Kidd place Bond inside a coffin about to be cremated. It starts, but Shady Tree cancels the thing and opens the coffin nonchalantly... despite the fact that it had been inside a lit crematory and thus would be as scalding as a cake just out of the oven.
• Conveyor Belt o' Doom: Bond is knocked out, placed in a coffin, and conveyed into an incinerator at a Vegas-style funeral parlor. It even has music.
• Cool Car: The 1971 red Ford Mustang Mach 1 that Bond drives during the Vegas chase. It may not have had ejector seats or go underwater, but it left the cops in the dust.
• Corporate Conspiracy: Blofeld kidnaps and impersonates the reclusive billionaire Willard Whyte, using his business empire and space research facility to build and launch a Kill Sat to destroy nuclear weapons in China, the Soviet Union and the United States, then propose "an international auction, with nuclear supremacy going to the highest bidder."
• Creepy Crossdresser: Blofeld does this as a disguise to escape.
• Creepy Monotone: The minion counting down the Kill Sat moving into firing position.
• Cruel and Unusual Death:
  • A fake Blofeld drowns in a pool of superheated mud.
  • The Cement Shoes of Plenty O'Toole (see above).
• Curse Cut Short: Done to the sheriff who stops Bond in Las Vegas, only for Bond to back away to start a car chase between him and the local lawmen.
  "Why, you dirty b—"
• Dangerous Backswing: Bond's fight with Peter Franks is started because Bond pulls his fist back to punch him and accidentally connects with the glass pane behind him, alerting Franks that someone is trying to attack him.
• Danger Takes a Backseat: Spoofed when the trio of obvious gangsters from Slumber funeral services insist that Bond take the front seat in their hearse. Bond does but makes it there unharmed (at least till after he hands over the diamonds). Later Bond smuggles himself into the restricted laboratory of Dr. Metz by hiding in the back of his van, but not with any lethal intent.
• Dead Person Impersonation: Bond is already impersonating smuggler, Peter Franks, but Franks escapes custody. In order to preserve his cover, Bond kills Franks and plants his own ID on him giving him cred as the guy who killed James Bond. Being a Bond film, it doesn't last as the Big Bad turns out to be Blofeld who knows who Bond is.
• Deadpan Snarker: The entire film is practically a war of snark between Bond and Blofeld.
• Depraved Homosexual: The vicious assassins Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd are heavily implied to be in a homosexual relationship.
• Destination Defenestration: In order to clear the way for Tiffany to seduce Bond, her mooks grab Plenty O'Toole and throw her out the window.
• Diamonds in the Buff: The title/credits sequence. And of course, Plenty O'Toole, initially with clothes, and later without clothes (and then she loses the diamonds after losing her clothes).
• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In the novel, Bond merely shoots Wint and Kidd. In the film, he sets Kidd on fire and tosses Wint off a ship attached to a bomb.
• Digital Bikini: When ABC aired the film, they put black bra straps across Plenty's back in one scene, and coloured her tan briefs to match.
• Disguised in Drag: While the feds are moving into the Whyte House to arrest him, Blofeld slips out disguised as an old lady.
• Dispense with the Pleasantries: Willard Whyte isn't happy to find that his satellite has been shipped off to Vandenberg for launching and gets them on the phone.
  Mission Control: This is a real honor, sir!
  Whyte: Shove your honor—where's that satellite?!
• Distracted by the Sexy:
  • Felix is fuming about Bond sharing the bridal suite with a known criminal, but runs out of steam at the sight of Tiffany reclining in a bed with only a white fox throw hiding her nakedness.
    Tiffany: I'm cooperating, Mr. Leiter. Really, I am.
  • Lampshaded when Blofeld asks Tiffany to put something on over her revealing bikini, saying "I've come too far to have the aim of my crew affected by the sight of a pretty body.".
• Disney Villain Death: Peter Franks falls to his doom after his brawl with Bond is out of the elevator.
• The Dividual: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd hang out together, they work together, they are always together.
• Doctor's Orders: M declines Sir Donald's offer of a sherry for this reason. This is possibly a nod to the fact that Bernard Lee was infamous for his heavy drinking, which made him unreliable.
• Double Entendre: Used by a Bond Girl for once; Bond is casually undressing while summing up the situation to Tiffany Case, whose comments ("So far, so good—keep going" and "I'm very impressed! There's a lot more to you than I had expected!") can be taken either way.
• Dragon Their Feet: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd. For that matter, they and Blofeld are never onscreen at the same time, nor are they ever seen directly communicating with him.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: Tiffany's mix-up with the tape is understandable. When she enters the control room it looks like Bond has been caught trying to remove the tape, and is being forced at gunpoint to put it back in the computer. What actually happened was that Bond 'accidentally' ejected the tape onto the floor, then switched them while picking it up. Because Blofeld orders his minions to search Bond again, he tucks the tape into Tiffany's bikini bottom while pretending to pinch her, saying: "Your problems are all behind you now." Tiffany thinks that means it's up to her to replace the tape now Bond has failed, when actually he just wants her to get rid of it.
• Dress Hits Floor: When Bond decides to strip Plenty O'Toole down to her bare essentials, the camera pans down her shapely body as Bond unzips her purple satin dress and we watch the dress fall, first showing us her bare ankles before pulling back to reveal Plenty in all her glory, clad in nothing but her pink sheer panties, purple high heels and gold and diamond necklace.
• Dressing as the Enemy:
  • In the opening segment Bond takes out one of Blofeld's doctors and steals his clothing so he can infiltrate an operation room.
  • After infiltrating Willard Whyte's top secret facility, Bond acquires a white lab coat and pretends to be from G section (which checks radiation badges) so he can get into the satellite-creation section and find out what's going on there.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Blofeld, assuming that you count his final demise as happening in this film. Despite having been the Greater-Scope Villain of the film franchise since its second entry, his fate — with him last being heard complaining over the radio as Bond gently smashes his mini-sub into the oil rig's control room — is underwhelming to the point of the finished film not even making it clear whether he actually was killed off or not. In fairness, they were apparently planning to bring him back for one last outing in the next film, but Kevin McClory demanded that the producers stop using Blofeld. He is finally Killed Off for Real in the Bond Cold Open of For Your Eyes Only, though for legal reasons the studio couldn't confirm that until decades later and he is credited as "man in wheelchair".
• The Easy Way or the Hard Way: Bond realises that Tiffany turning up in his bedroom Ready for Lovemaking is the easy way; the three goons who just threw a woman out of the window are the hard way. Bond pretends to cooperate because he wants to follow the diamonds to their source. And it also gets him laid.
• Elevator Action Sequence: Bond starts a fight with smuggler Peter Franks in an elevator and ends up killing him outside it. A damn small elevator — might as well have been a phone booth.
• End of an Age:
  • Due to endless litigation between the producers and Kevin McClory, this would be the last Eon Bond film where Blofeld and SPECTRE would appear as Big Bad and Nebulous Evil Organisation, respectively, until the 2015 movie Spectre.
  • It was also this for classic Bond, since Sean Connery only agreed to one additional movie with UA boss David Picker, and, minus McClory's Never Say Never Again, refused to deal with any part of the franchise ever again ^note or at least until the 2005 From Russia with Love video game, which bridged the gap between Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig. EON had to recast the role for the third time in a row, going with Roger Moore, who was considered originally.
• Energy Weapon: Blofeld's Kill Sat has a laser that could destroy a submarine deep underwater and a missile inside its silo.
• Everything's Sparkly with Jewelry: Including Kill Sats.
• Evil Plan: Blofeld's plan is to use stolen diamonds to build a Kill Sat and hold the world hostage.
• Expospeak Gag: Q demonstrating his slot machine tampering gizmo to Tiffany Case, that is until she got up and followed a lady holding a Persian cat.
• Fake-Out Make-Out: Bond does this with himself.
• Faking the Dead:
  • When Bond kills Peter Franks, he switches their IDs to impersonate Franks while convincing everyone he's "killed" James Bond.
  • Also, Blofeld uses Magic Plastic Surgery on a henchman to make Bond believe he'd succeeded in killing him.
• Famed In-Story: After Bond disposes of Peter Franks, he switches wallets with the body. When Tiffany Case inspects the corpse and finds the wallet, her first reaction is a disbelieving "You just killed James Bond!" Given how often Bond drops his name in the films, it makes sense that he'd develop something of a reputation.
• Fauxshadowing: When Bond is in the bath right before he goes to the casino, he sees a picture of Sammy Davis Jr. in the brochure he's reading. This was supposed to lead into a cameo from Davis, but it ended up on the cutting room floor.
• Fiery Redhead: When Bond first meets Tiffany Case, she's outspoken, quite rude to him, and has a bit of a temper. She changed wigs (from blonde to brunette), then appeared as a redhead.
  James Bond: I don't care much for redheads. Terrible tempers. But somehow it seems to suit you.
  Tiffany: It's my own.
• The Film of the Book: The second film where they started taking serious liberties with the source material (the first being You Only Live Twice); not necessarily worse, but still noticed. For instance, Blofeld and SPECTRE are not in the novel - the villains are the smuggling ring The Spangled Mob.
• Fingore: The "mousetrap" Bond carries in his jacket at the beginning slices into a henchman's fingers.
• Fixing the Game:
  • Tiffany gets the diamonds—which are hidden in a large fluffy toy—via a blatantly rigged water balloon game. Tiffany isn't even bothering to aim but still wins, to the annoyance of the kid next to her.
  • Q has created a ring that allows him to win at slot machines; it contains a magnet that stabilizes the tumblers in such a way that every machine always brings out a jackpot. Since Q doesn't hand this device over to James, or even collect his winnings when he does this to various machines, he appears to have just created it for his own amusement.
• Fluffy the Terrible: Two of Blofeld's minions who are keeping Willard Whyte prisoner in his house are named Bambi and Thumper. They prove to be a little difficult for Bond to deal with.
• Foreshadowing:
  • While Bond is in the Whyte House he sees a painting of the owner, Willard Whyte. Later he meets and rescues Willard Whyte and discovers he looks just like his picture.
  • Plenty O'Toole is thrown out a window and ends up landing in a pool. Later she's killed by Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, who tie her to a weight and throw her into a pool to drown.
• Four Is Death: When trying to kill James Bond at Slumber Inc., Albert Wint pushes the button labelled "4" on the incinerator control panel's Oven subpanel. Thanks to some well-placed forgeries, it doesn't work.
• Free Wheel: One of the more visible continuity goofs is the loose wheel from the moon buggy that bounces through the chase while the buggy continues on with all its wheels.
• Freestate Amsterdam: Surprisingly, considering the series' tendency to have 007 visit The Theme Park Version of any given country (see Octopussy), when he visits Holland, all he really indulges in is a rather vicious fight in a lift.
• Flyover Country: Seeing his Kill Sat is currently orbiting over Kansas, Blofeld quips that if they destroy Kansas, the world may not hear about it for years.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: During the hot coffin scene, you can see the burners in the retort appear to shut off for a split second before cutting back to inside the coffin in which James Bond is being cooked alive to a Wagnerian soundtrack. The payoff comes seconds later when light unexpectedly shines on Bond and the Wagnerian music suddenly and abruptly cuts out just before Shady Tree, who had gotten him out, yells at him for passing him fakes.
• Gambler Groupies: A man is gambling at a Las Vegas casino with a beautiful woman named Plenty O'Toole at his side. Unfortunately he loses all his money, so she dumps him and latches on to James Bond when she sees how he's throwing money around.
• Gayngst: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd, vicious killers who are never apart and hold hands while walking away from helicopter explosions. Once, Mr. Wint compliments one of their female targets, and gets a glare from Mr. Kidd before adding "...for a lady,". Mr. Kidd remains unimpressed.
• Gem-Encrusted: The solar focusing dish of the Kill Sat.
• A Glass of Chianti: 007 defeats Wint and Kidd using his knowledge of fine wines. Earlier in the film, he identifies the vintage of a sherry by taste. When sarcastically told sherry doesn't have vintages, he states that he meant the wine the sherry was made from, setting up Bond's superior knowledge of wine for later.
• Go-Go Enslavement: Blofeld abducts Tiffany Case, and the next time we see her, she's sunbathing in a purple bikini on Blofeld's oil rig.
• Good Is Dumb: Tiffany Case after her High-Heel–Face Turn.
• Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: Blofeld uses a cigarette holder; he must be evil.
• Grand Finale: Can be seen as this to the Sean Connery era as a whole. In addition to being Connery's last appearance in a main series Bond film, it also saw the last appearances of Blofeld and SPECTRE as primary antagonists, with future films mostly having Bond facing off against rich megalomaniacs and/or political renegades rather than large criminal organizations.
• Grappling-Hook Pistol: Bond uses a handgun that fires pitons. How the piton is able to pierce the building when it travels as relatively slow as it does, and support Bond's weight, is anybody's guess.
• Groin Attack
  • Thumper knees Bond in the groin off camera. Made clearer in a alternative cut recently revealed on the revamped Ultimate Edition of the film.
  • Bond squeezes Wint's groin while tying his hands and the bomb together with his coattails, causing Wint to squeal with delight before he has a chance to realize that he's screwed.
• High-Heel–Face Turn: Diamond smuggler Tiffany Case—justified as it's the only thing that keeps her out of prison. However Blofeld thinks she'll change back to his side for equally pragmatic reasons, but she seems to prefer Bond.
• Hollywood Darkness: Bond finds himself in a closed coffin in one scene, and in an underground pipeline in another — the light is good enough for reading in both places.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Blofeld's Mad Scientist, Professor Dr. Metz, rather stupidly believes that SPECTRE is dedicated to nuclear disarmament despite previous films showing them as a terrorism-for-profit group. Of course Metz might not know this; if Blofeld can pose as Whyte he can certainly adopt the facade of a Well-Intentioned Extremist. The real Whyte also mentions he's never met Metz (though he's aware of his reputation) so Blofeld was likely posing as Whyte.
• How Did You Know? I Didn't: "I didn't know there was a pool down there."
• Howard Hughes Homage: Willard Whyte, a reclusive aerospace billionaire inspired by Hughes in his old age. In fact, the plot emerged from a dream Albert R. Broccoli had, where he went visiting his friend Hughes and an impostor was there instead.
• Hypocrite: When Dr. Metz begs Blofeld to surrender, Blofeld threatens to have him shot if he doesn't get back to his post. Right after this, he quietly orders his personal submarine be readied so he can escape.
• Idiot Ball: Blofeld locks billionaire Willard Whyte up in one of his penthouses, takes his empire and his identity, and places his super-villain base somewhere in North America, disguised as one of Whyte's many oil rigs. Instead of putting it somewhere in the middle of the country, where it won't stand out, Blofeld places it on the Baja peninsula, where Bond and Whyte spot it almost instantly.
• Impersonation Gambit: Bond infiltrates the diamond smuggling operation by impersonating Case's contact, Peter Franks. Naturally, this necessitates a bit of improvisation when the real Peter Franks comes calling.
• Improvised Weapon:
  • During the elevator brawl, Peter Franks tries to kill Bond with a broken glass shard. After losing it Franks picks up a crowbar, which is then countered by Bond with a fire extinguisher.
  • Blofeld mocks Bond for eyeing a model rocket on The Big Board, saying it's not a practical weapon, but Bond still has his piton-firing device to Boom, Headshot! kill his target. Unfortunately it's only single shot, and Bond shoots the wrong Blofeld.
  • When they realise that Bond is onto them, Wint wraps the chain holding his sommelier's tastevin around Bond's neck while Kidd tries to impale him with flaming skewers.
• In Name Only: Bond films have never been known for strict fidelity to the source material, but this movie takes it to a new level. Whatever changes the last six movies made to the corresponding books, they at least kept the names and general gimmicks of the Big Bads. This one swaps out the novel's Spang brothers with Blofeld, who hadn't even been created when the former was published, and pretty much rewrites the entire plot to revolve around a Kill Sat.
• Insufferable Genius: During Sir Donald's Exposition scene, Bond shows off his knowledge of sherry but admits he knows little about diamonds, causing M to gripe that at least there's one subject he's not an expert on.
• Island Base: Blofeld holds headquarters on an oil rig, technically an island.
• I Surrender, Suckers: Bond and Tiffany get pulled over by the police. The cop walks up to Bond shaking his head...and Bond reverses the car, does a U-turn and screeches off.
• Instant Sedation: Bond and the Knockout Gas in Willard Whyte's elevator.
• Interrupted Intimacy: Plenty O'Toole comes this close to having a night of passion with Bond, but after Bond strips her down to her bare essentials she gets thrown out the window in nothing more than her underwear and her high heels.
• Ironic Echo: After Shady Tree gets James Bond out of the retort to question him about the fake diamonds that he and Felix Leiter had loaded into Peter Franks' body, Bond proceeds to leave the funeral parlor as he tells him and Morton Slumber, "My condolences, gentlemen!" All the ingredients of a Bond One-Liner except a fatality are present in those three words.
• Just Between You and Me: First Lampshaded and Averted, then played straight:
  • You think Blofeld is going to explain his plan, but...
    Bond: What do you intend to do with those diamonds?
    Blofeld: An excellent question. And one which will be hanging on the lips of the world quite soon. If I were to break the news to anyone, it would be to you first. You know that. But it's late, I'm tired, and there's so much left to do. Good night, Mr. Bond.
  • Later on, when Bond arrives at the oil rig base, Blofeld gives him the grand tour and explains his plans fully. Justified since the plan is to hold the world hostage with a Kill Sat for money—and he's already made his demands and threat known, and is only telling Bond what targets he might choose. Bond has already figured out how to stop it as well.
• Kaleidoscope Hair: When Bond first meets Tiffany at her apartment, he's perplexed to see her change from a blonde to a brunette to a redhead in quick order.
• Karma Houdini: Mr. Slumber, possibly, though it is feasible Blofeld had him killed offscreen just like all the other "links" in the pipeline.
• Killer Gorilla: In a circus sideshow, an African woman named "Zambora" transforms into a "ferocious 450-pound gorilla" (actually a man in a gorilla suit).
• Kill and Replace: Though not intended as such. Bond infiltrates the smuggling operation by posing as diamond smuggler Peter Franks, who has been arrested. However the real Franks escapes custody and turns up in Amsterdam, so Bond has to kill him. He swaps wallets with the man, then uses the man's corpse to smuggle the diamonds to America.
• Kill It with Fire: The final fate of Mr. Kidd (well, he probably drowned, but only because he was trying to put the fire out).
• Kill Sat: Willard Whyte supposedly put a satellite into orbit as part of his aerospace operations, only to discover it was actually Blofeld impersonating Whyte, who went on to use the satellite's ability to focus the sun's light into a coherent beam and thus fire a laser anywhere on Earth to attack important locations such as nuclear missile launch facilities or nuclear submarines.
• The Killer Becomes the Killed: Bond tries to dispose of Peter Franks. Bond kills him in a fight that mostly takes place inside an elevator, puts the diamonds in his body, and takes him to Slumber, Inc. in Los Angeles to be burned.
• Knockout Gas: While James Bond is in Willard Whyte's elevator, Blofeld renders him unconscious with knockout gas.
• Large Ham: Charles Gray as Blofeld is a smarmy, snarky, campy ham par excellence.
• Law of Inverse Recoil: Some mooks see Bond messing about with the crane, so Bond tells Tiffany to pick up a discarded submachine gun and shoot them. Fortunately a helicopter happens to blow up the mooks with a rocket, because when Tiffany fires the recoil knocks her off the platform.
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Bond's meeting with M seems to comment on Sean Connery's real-life absence between You Only Live Twice and this film.
  M: You've been on holiday, I understand. Relaxing, I hope.
  Bond: Hardly relaxing but... most satisfying.
• Lemming Cops: The Vegas cops not only crash into parked cars, walls, and each other as they pursue Bond, but they try to copy his Ramp Jump and Car Skiing with disastrous results.
• Lighter and Softer: Campier and more comedic than any prior Bond film.
• Lingerie Scene: For her entire first scene Tiffany wears only a lingerie. At the start of the scene, she is just wearing panties, but puts on a bra to make herself presentable for her meeting with whom she thinks is Franks (it's Bond impersonating him). Later she adds a short, completely transparent peignoir.
• Man on Fire: Bond sets Mr. Kidd ablaze by dousing him with high-proof liquor as he carries flaming shishkebabs as a weapon.
• Masquerading As the Unseen: Willard Whyte is infamously reclusive, which makes it easy for Blofeld to abduct him and take control of his business empire in his latest plot.
• Meaningful Name:
  • Tiffany got her name because her mother gave birth to her while shopping at Tiffany's jewelry store, apparently sparking her interest in diamonds.
  • Thumper's name is certainly appropriate, if not Bambi.
  • When Plenty O'Toole introduces herself to Bond.
    Plenty: Hi, I'm Plenty!
    Bond: (glancing down at her impressive bust) But of course you are.
  • Shady Tree and his Acorns is an act based on a Visual Innuendo.
• Me's a Crowd: Blofeld's army of doubles is a non sci-fi example.
• Milkman Conspiracy: Inverted. Willard Whyte's enterprises have been hijacked by Blofeld to engage in diamond smuggling and terrorism... all controlled from a hotel in Vegas.
• Mineral MacGuffin: The diamonds Blofeld needs for his Kill Sat's Frickin' Laser Beams.
• Minion Shipping: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd. Possibly Bambi and Thumper also, given their indifference to Bond's charms.
• Minor Crime Reveals Major Plot: Diamond smuggling -> Hold the world for ransom.
• Mistaken for Afterlife: Played for Laughs. Bond is knocked out and put into an incinerator in a coffin - when things are looking desperate the lid suddenly opens and Shady Tree, one of the diamond smuggling group, angrily curses him out. Bond smiles "Now, don't tell me - you're Saint Peter."
• Modesty Towel: A deleted scene had a soaking wet Plenty O'Toole returning to Bond wearing nothing but a white towel to protect her modesty.
• Money Song: Diamonds are forever/They are all I need to please me/They can stimulate and tease me...
• Mood Whiplash: The movie opens on a serene study in Japan before Bond tosses a SPECTRE minion through the paper walls.
• Moon-Landing Hoax: There is a brief unexplained scene during one of Bond's excursions into a (terrestrial) base where he stumbles onto a soundstage where a moon landing is being filmed. As the sequence goes by without any elaboration or plot-relevance, it's never really made clear why this is being done, though there are no-doubt sinister motives. It's the potential Ur-Example of the trope (America was still launching moon landings in real life when the movie was released), and in some circles the scene is considered to be the primary popular inspiration for the conspiracy theory.
  • During the Apollo era, NASA contractors had mockups of space hardware at their factories for purposes of testing of equipment and procedures and for training of astronauts. U.S. TV networks regularly featured these activities in their coverage of the program.
• Mouse Trap: In the pre-titles set-piece, James Bond has what appears to be a razor-sharp mouse-trap inside his jacket pocket.
• Mr. Smith: James Bond checks into a hotel as Mr Jones. Then again given that he was played by Sean Connery, maybe he was referring to another Jones.
• Ms. Fanservice: Tiffany Case (Jill St. John) and Plenty O'Toole (Lana Wood) are both gorgeous and their outfits don't hide it.
• Mugged for Disguise: During the opening sequence several doctors leave a building and another doctor enters. We then see a man lying behind some bushes wearing underclothes. After the other doctor gets inside he pulls off his mask and cap to reveal himself as Bond. Bond took out the doctor and stole his medical clothing so he could investigate inside.
• Murder by Cremation: Wint and Kidd attempt to do this to James Bond. It's one of the few Death Traps that he has to be rescued from.
• Murder by Mistake: Wint and Kidd arrive at Tiffany's house to kill her, as she's the next link in the pipeline. Instead, they find Plenty there and kill her, assuming she's Tiffany.
• Murderous Thighs: Whyte's bodyguard Bambi subjects Bond to hers.
• Naked Freak-Out: When an almost completely naked Plenty O'Toole is being given an unfriendly escort out, her screaming objection does not go unnoticed.
• Naked People Are Funny: Close enough. Plenty O'Toole is almost completely naked when she gets thrown out the window and lands in the pool, and before that with her arms folded protectively over her chest while she screamed in humiliated protest was clearly played for laughs.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  Tiffany: I did it, I switched the tape in the machine.
  Bond: You stupid twit, you put the real one back in!
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Shady Tree discovers just in time that the diamonds were fake and gets James Bond out of the retort Wint and Kidd had put him in. Bond takes the opportunity to casually stroll out of Slumber, Inc. during the inevitable questioning and later figures out that someone's bumping off the diamond smugglers when Tree gets shot later on.
  Shady Tree: (After the casket is out of the retort) You dirty double-crossing limey fink, those goddamn diamonds are phonies!
  James Bond: Now don't tell me... you're St. Peter?
  Shady Tree: Paste! Glass! Where's the real stuff, Franks?
  James Bond: Where's the real money?
  Morton Slumber: What do you mean?
  James Bond: You wouldn't burn up 50,000 real dollars, now would you?
  Shady Tree: One last break, Franks. Where are the real diamonds?
  James Bond: You get me the real money... [climbs out of the casket] and I'll bring you the real diamonds.
  Shady Tree: Where the hell do you think you're going?
  James Bond: I hear that the Hotel Tropicana's quite comfortable. My condolences, gentlemen!
  [Morton Slumber slams the now-empty casket shut as James Bond leaves.]
• No One Could Survive That!: Blofeld at the end. Indeed it was going to be revealed he survived, but then the rights issues reared their ugly head.
• Not Distracted by the Sexy: The "pervert's convention" of thugs who throw Plenty out the window are completely oblivious to the fact that she's a beautiful, shapely woman wearing nothing but flimsy see through pink panties and high heels.
• Obvious Stunt Double: In the scene where Willard Whyte's two female captors dive into the pool after Bond, Thumper is clearly not the same woman as the actress who was playing her earlier.
• Oh, Crap!: This is the look on Bond's face when, after being knocked out by Wint and Kidd, he wakes up to the sound of burners in a retort firing up and the sight of a casket lid directly over him. Cue the flames pouncing on said casket and Bond starting to push on the lid to no avail, wondering how he's going to get out of this one. Fortunately for him, he already has: he had passed counterfeit diamonds on to Shady Tree, and he figures out (and points out after Shady rescues him from a fiery end) that Shady had passed him $50,000 in funny money. Shady doesn't realize he himself had been double-crossed until he opens the urn and finds PASTE! GLASS!
• Only a Model: Willard Whyte has "Eureka!" Moment where Blofeld's base is when Bond points out a model of an offshore oil rig that isn't part of Whyte's business empire.
  Whyte: Baja? I don't have anything in Baja!
• Out-Gambitted: Shady Tree gets James Bond out of the retort with the intent to question him about where he hid the real diamonds. Neither he nor Morton Slumber counted on Bond having leverage against them to the tune of 50 grand (courtesy of Tiffany Case):
  Bond: You wouldn't burn up 50,000 real dollars, would you? [...] You bring me the real money, and I'll bring you the real diamonds.
• The Perfect Crime: Blofeld locking up and replacing Willard Whyte. The man was a known recluse who never appeared in public and only communicated with the outside world via telephone. As Bond pointed out, how does one detect and report the kidnapping of somebody who's already been missing for five years?
• Pet the Dog: Played With. After Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd kill Mrs. Whistler and dump her into the canal, Mr. Kidd takes some pictures out of rather morbid respect (she had wanted pictures of the canal for her students). Mr. Wint comments on it.
  Mr. Wint: How kind of you, Mr. Kidd. The children will be so thrilled.
• Pet Positive Identification: When James Bond is confronted with two apparently identical Blofelds (the real one and a surgically modified actor) he attempts to identify the correct Blofeld by kicking Blofeld's cat, who promptly leaps into one of the men's arms, thus telling Bond who to shoot. Then a second cat enters the room and jumps into the real Blofeld's arms.
• Pink Means Feminine: Plenty O'Toole wears bright pink panties with light blue/purple lace when stripped of her purple dress.
• Please Put Some Clothes On: Blofeld orders Tiffany Case to put something on over her bikini so his henchmen won't get distracted.
• Plot Armor: Even by the standards of a Bond movie, there's a lot of it. Bambie and Thumper only want to drown Bond using his feet. Multiple henchmen have the opportunity to kill Bond including Wint and Kidd have Bond knocked unconscious twice and are shown to be murderous with everyone they cross. Similarly, Blofeld has Bond where he wants him on two other occasions and has no reason to keep him alive.
• Post-Climax Confrontation: After defeating Blofeld's schemes, My Wint and Mr Kidd turn up for a "Bombe Surprise".
• Power Makes Your Hair Grow: Between the last movie and this one, Blofeld somehow usurped Willard Whyte's vast empire, and suddenly...
• Precision F-Strike: "You dirty double-crossing limey fink, those goddamn diamonds are phonies!"
• Preasskicking One Liner: Thumper tells Bond that they're going to have a ball, then knees him in the balls.
• Pre-Mortem One-Liner: Mister Wint and Mister Kidd come up with a few during their repeated attempts to kill James Bond.
  • The first time, when they try to burn him alive:
    Albert Wint: Very... moving.
    Charles Kidd: Heartwarming, Mr. Wint.
    [Wint and Kidd begin to leave Slumber, Inc. as the casket in which they had sealed James Bond inches closer to the retort.]
    Albert Wint: A glowing tribute, Mr. Kidd.
  • Coming across Bond a second time, after he had been gassed inside of an elevator:
    Albert Wint: If at first you don't succeed, Mr. Kidd...
    Charles Kidd: Try, try again, Mr. Wint.
    [They remove his unconscious corpus from the elevator and load him into a trunk before taking off to leave him for dead in an unfinished pipeline.]
  • For their third and final attempt, there is of course the unforgettable Bombe Surprise.
  • They also get one on Shady Tree, who they off more successfully.
    Shady Tree: Critics and material I don't need, I haven't changed my act in 40 years!
    Charles Kidd: (Shows Tree a water gun flower) Ah, but this one's surefire.
    Shady Tree: That's the oldest Godda—
    Albert Wint: And this one... will kill you. (Fires a "Bang!" Flag Gun at Tree)
    Shady Tree: [oblivious to their true intentions] Come on fellas, the popping gun and the squirting flower routine? You gotta be kidding me...
    [BANG! Mr. Wint fires a real bullet into Tree's brain, cutting him down almost instantly. Mr. Kidd proceeds to clean up the mess with the flower.]
• Punch-Clock Villain: Played Straight. Dr. Metz, the world's leading expert on light refraction, is working for Blofeld who he doesn't share Blofeld's goal of holding the world for ransom using a Kill Sat but was stupid enough to believe Blofeld wanted to get rid the world of nuclear weapons
• Punk in the Trunk: After being gassed unconscious, Bond is put into the trunk of a car by Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd and taken to a construction site to be disposed of.
• Punny Name: Tiffany Case.
• Ramming Always Works: Blofeld is about to escape in his bathysub which is being lowered into the ocean on a crane, and his satellite is moving into position to destroy Washington D.C. Bond solves both problems by seizing control of the crane and using Blofeld's sub as a wrecking ball to smash up the satellite control room.
• Ramp-rovisation: While in a chase with police cars in a parking lot, Bond uses an overturned car as an improvised ramp to jump his car to safety.
• Ready for Lovemaking: Bond knocks down the gangster who threw Plenty O'Toole out the window, but to his surprise the other two just grab their colleague and leave the room. Bond then enters the bedroom to find Tiffany lying on the bed in lingerie. Bond doesn't make a fuss about casually undressing to join her.
• Recycled Soundtrack: Several cues from You Only Live Twice get re-used in this film.
• Red Alert: At the U.S. missile base just before Blofeld's Kill Sat attacks.
• Red Right Hand: Looks like Blofeld's cat(s) has (have) heterochromia i.e. eyes of two different colours.
• Redemption Demotion: In the first half of the film, Tiffany is shown to be a seasoned pro, good at her criminal work, with enough authority to even have her own henchmen. Late in the film, she successfully (and cleverly) eludes a crowded auditorium loaded with CIA agents ready to arrest her. After she turns good, her brains go south, particularly over a mix-up with cassette tapes. This prompts both Bond and Blofeld to make snide remarks about what an "idiot" she is.
• Reluctant Fanservice Girl: Plenty O'Toole becomes this after losing her clothes and being caught by the "perverts convention".
• Reluctant Mad Scientist: Professor Dr. Metz, a "committed pacifist" who lends his expertise to Blofeld to create an orbiting death ray which will ensure world peace...right?
• Replaced with Replica:
  • This saves Bond's life when the diamonds he smuggles in are exposed as fakes, with Q bringing in the real diamonds.
  • When he goes to Blofeld's oil rig base, James Bond takes along a cassette tape of martial music in the hope of switching it with the computer tape Blofeld uses to control his Kill Sat. He successfully switches them, but while trying to help Bond, Tiffany Case switches them back. Luckily Bond has a Storming the Castle backup plan.
• Rescue Equipment Attack: When James Bond fights Peter Franks, it ends with Bond blasting Franks in the face with the elevator's emergency extinguisher before using the same extinguisher to knock Franks into falling to his death.
• Right-Hand Cat: For once used as a plot point.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Bond goes after Ernst Stavro Blofeld at the start of the film, presumably to avenge his wife's death from the ending of On Her Majesty's Secret Service. In this version, however, MI-6 apparently was willing to indulge Bond's vendetta, considering Blofeld is an extremely dangerous international terrorist who had threatened the entire world multiple times, only telling him to get back to business as usual once he's sure Blofeld's dead.
• Room Disservice: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd attempt to deliver some dangerous room service to James Bond and Tiffany Case on a cruise liner.
• Scary Scorpions: Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd assassinate Dr. Tynan with a scorpion.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Tiffany attempts to leave Bond following the chase at Willard Whyte's facility.
  Tiffany Case: Listen, you can drop me off at the next crossing. No offence, but when you start stealing moon machines from Willard Whyte, goodbye and good luck.
• Sex–Face Turn: Tiffany Case turns into a cooperative good girl after having sex with James Bond, though she has entirely pragmatic reasons for doing so.
• Sexophone: Heard when James Bond arrives in Las Vegas.
• Shameful Strip: Arguably happens to Plenty O'Toole after Bond takes her back to his hotel room, but the real shame came not so much from the act of Bond stripping Plenty down to her bare essentials but rather came from Plenty being caught after the fact.
• Shameless Fanservice Girl:
  • Plenty O'Toole starts out being one of these, but once she loses her clothes and is caught by thugs she very quickly becomes a Reluctant Fanservice Girl.
  • Tiffany Case lampshades this in her first scene, saying she doesn't bother to dress for the hired help.
• Shoot Out the Lock: A padlock on the door to Willard Whyte's room is shot off to free him, probably to demonstrate to the audience he really is being held prisoner in his Gilded Cage.
• Simple Score of Sadness: Used whenever we see Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd.
• Sissy Villain
  • The assassins Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd both act in an effeminate manner.
  • Blofeld got quite the upgrade in fabulousness, as well. He even got to dabble in Creepy Crossdressing.
• Slip into Something More Comfortable: Tiffany Case says this when James Bond first meets her (under an alias).
• Soft Water: Plenty O'Toole gets thrown out of a very high window but survives by landing in the hotel pool.
• Space Is Slow Motion: Bond nimbly dodges past a couple of trainee astronauts who are moving slowly for no other reason but this trope—never mind they're on Earth and others are shouting at them to stop Bond from stealing their Moon Rover.
• Sphere Factor: A small aircraft flies over Blofeld's oil rig and a large plastic dodecahedron is thrown out on parachutes. Is it a Big, Bulky Bomb meant to wipe out Blofeld and his satellite control center, so we can end the movie and go home? Turns out Bond is inside, and he proceeds to roll it over to the oil rig so he can have a chat with Blofeld. Bet you didn't know James Bond invented Zorbing!
• Spot the Imposter
  • Bond meets Blofeld and a Body Double. Not knowing which is which, he scares the cat and kills the person the cat runs to. It turns out the cat was a decoy too.
    Blofeld: Right idea, Mister Bond.
    Bond: But wrong pussy...
  • Bond must have told Tiffany about Blofeld's Right-Hand Cat, because it's what tips off Tiffany that Blofeld is walking out of the Whyte House Disguised in Drag, yet holding his Persian cat. If only she'd told Q, who was standing right next to her...
• Spy Speak: When Tiffany Case arrives at the circus to pick up the diamonds, the CIA agent alerts everyone:
  Agent: This is Quarterback. Operation Passover, commence. Quarterback to Tight End. Operation Passover, commence.
• Stab the Salad: While pretending to be a waiter, Mr. Wint raises an icepick-like device high in the air next to James Bond. He then strikes down but not to stab Bond: he drives it into the cork of a wine bottle, then uses it to extract the cork.
• Stealth Pun: Mr. Kidd's death: since he's burned to death by shish kebab flambés, he qualifies as a...(wait for it!)..."flaming homosexual."
• Storming the Castle: Armed helicopters vs. a heavily armed oil platform.
• Straight Gay: While Mr. Wint could be said to be vaguely swishy (though not really for the time), Mr. Kidd is so un-flamboyant, you'd never guess he's gay if not for the "For a lady" scene.
• Surgical Impersonation: Blofeld has two mooks undergo plastic surgery to make them look like him in order to distract James Bond.
• Surprise Inspection Ruse: James Bond sneaks into Willard Whyte's laboratory and meets Klaus Hergersheimer from G Section, who goes around checking people's radiation badges to see if they've absorbed too much radiation. Later Bond goes into the lab where the laser Kill Sat is being created and impersonates Hergersheimer, asking to check radiation badges while sneaking a look at the Kill Sat.
• Swiss-Cheese Security:
  • Around Willard Whyte's laboratory where the Kill Sat was constructed.
  • Averted when Bond boards the oilrig, and Blofeld orders him searched from top to bottom before being brought to him. They find a music tape he was planning to switch with the satellite control tape one sewn into the lining of his jacket. Then they ruin this by locking Bond in a storage room containing ropes and a hatch to the underside of the rig.
• Take That!: Guy Hamilton didn't like big American cars and took particular delight in trashing them in the film's numerous car chase scenes.
• Tap on the Head: Bond is knocked out after placing the diamonds in a compartment.
• Tempting Fate:
  • In the opening scene, a Cairo gambler tells the dealer, "Hit me." Bond obliges.
  • Felix says "a mouse with sneakers on" couldn't evade the surveillance he has on Tiffany. She does.
  • Bond assures Tiffany that he has a friend called Felix who can solve anything. Then a cop recognises him as the 'saboteur' who broke into Willard Whyte's laboratory.
    Tiffany: Relax! You've got a friend named Felix who can fix anything.
    Bond: Unfortunately, so can Willard Whyte.
  • That same cop says, "I've got you now!" when Bond drives down a narrow alley. Cue Car Skiing.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Inverted, some guy is threatening world governments with a satellite-mounted laser guided from fortified offshore oil rig, and all the US government responds with is utility/observer helicopters armed with rockets. Granted, bombers would have greatly shortened the climax of the movie. Plus Bond was being held captive there.
• Time Bomb: Used by Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd at the start and end of the movie. They have one in the courier case given to the diamond-smuggling helicopter, then activate one hidden in the "Bombe Surprise" (a bombe glacée ice cream dessert) in the dinner they serve to Bond and Tiffany.
• Toplessness from the Back: Tiffany Case's first appearance. Plenty O'Toole gets this herself once she loses her dress courtesy of Bond.
• Treasure Chest Cavity: Bond uses the dead body of diamond smuggler Peter Franks to smuggle diamonds through customs. Though they're not hidden in his chest...
• Trouser Space: Tiffany discovers this doesn't work if you're wearing a skimpy bikini. Blofeld quickly notices the blatantly obvious cassette tape she has shoved into the back of her bikini bottoms.
  Blofeld: Tiffany, my dear. You're showing a bit more cheek than usual.
• Two Rights Make a Wrong: Bond and Tiffany both have the idea of swapping the control tape for Blofeld's Kill Sat with a fake. Result: the real tape gets swapped right back into the machine.
• Uncertain Doom: Blofeld is last seen having his mini-submarine crashed into the oil rig's control room, after which the action climax ends abruptly. After this, Blofeld isn't even mentioned again, leaving it unclear whether he was supposed to be killed, captured, or if he somehow escaped.
• Unconventional Vehicle Chase: In order to escape Willard Whyte's facility near Las Vegas, Bond steals a prototype moon buggy and zooms off across the desert. He's followed by guards in cars and on motorized trikes; the latter being much more effective in the rough terrain.
• Unwitting Pawn: Blofeld kidnaps Willard Whyte and uses his industrial empire to build and launch a Kill Sat. Only one other person in Whyte's organization knows what's going on: the rest are kept ignorant.
• Use Their Own Weapon Against Them: Bonus points when Bond hoists Mr. Wint with his own petard by sticking it onto him and throwing him into the drink. He's blown sky-high before he hits the water. His boyfriend and partner-in-crime Mr. Kidd is the victim of a two-fer — not only was he burned alive when Tiffany Case splashed him with a claret as he approached Bond with flaming shish-kabobs, earlier in the film he had himself tried to burn Bond alive (with the assistance of Mr. Wint).
• Utopia Justifies the Means: Metz is conned into designing Blofeld's Kill Sat as a means of blackmailing the superpowers into complete nuclear disarmament.
• Vapor Wear: Plenty O'Toole didn't wear a bra 'til some Moral Guardians made them paint one on.
• Villain Ball: Given that Blofeld's only motives are to get rich and then wipe his record to be able to enjoy his fortune, he could have stopped right after stealing Whyte's identity: Whyte has all the money he could ever spend on himself, has no criminal record, and since nobody not working for Blofeld knows about the replacement, all he has to do to achieve his final goal is sit back and enjoy his stolen fortune.
• Villainous Rescue: Bond is only saved from being cremated because Shady Tree asks to take him out, as the diamonds were fake.
• Visual Pun:
  • When Bond meets Tiffany, she changes hair colour twice in his presence, like a trope about a trio of female characters...
  • From the opening credits: What's that between a woman's legs? Blofeld's "pussy", as Bond later calls it.
• Voice Changeling: Blofeld is able to impersonate Willard Wyte and run his business empire by remote control thanks to an electronic voicebox that can change his voice to sound like Whyte's. A smaller transistorized version is implanted in the neck of Blofeld's Body Doubles so they'll have his voice. After seeing this, Bond has Q jury-rig up a similar device to fool Blofeld into revealing the location of the real Willard Whyte, by posing as Burt Saxby. It's implied that Blofeld isn't quite fooled, as the real Saxby tries to kill Whyte shortly afterwards.
• Voodoo Shark: Bond tilts a car to get through a narrow alley, from which it exits tilted the other way. This was considered so obvious that a shot was inserted showing the car flipping around, despite this clearly being impossible.
• Waking Up Elsewhere:
  • After receiving a Tap on the Head, James Bond wakes up inside a coffin, just in time to foil Murder by Cremation.
  • After being rendered unconscious by sleep gas, he wakes up in an underground pipe and must face an electrified tunnel integrity checker.
• Water Torture: After Bambi and Thumper throw Bond into a pool and dive in after him, he turns the tables on them and holds their heads underwater until Thumper shows him where Willard Whyte is being held.
• Welcome to Hell: Bond to Blofeld after he apparently kills him. Yeah, not really.
• We Need a Distraction:
  • When Tiffany realises she's being followed she goes to see the "Killer Gorilla" act, ducking out the back while the feds are being mobbed by the fleeing audience.
  • Bond has Tiffany block off Dr. Metz's van and start an argument with the gas station attendant so he can duck into the back of the van.
  • Bond lets the Moon Rover drive off by itself so the trike riders will chase after it. Meanwhile, he jumps the lone rider who fell off his trike and is trying to restart it.
• "What Now?" Ending: While on a romantic cruise with Bond after their mutual adventure, Tiffany has a very serious question she wants to ask James, who gets a worried look. Turns out the question is: "James, how the hell do we get those diamonds down again?"
• Who Are You?
  Tiffany: Who. Are. You? You're not a cop and you're not Peter Franks!
  Bond: And you're not the type to turn the other cheek; now where's the stuff?
• Wholesome Crossdresser: Blofeld sure looks like a kindly old lady in that getup...
• Wicked Cultured: Blofeld loves his smokes and quips. And, just as in You Only Live Twice, he decorates his workspace with medieval religious art.
• Wiper Start: Bond does this twice. First, when he jumps into the moon rover, he doesn't know how to start it. Second, when he hops into the crane lowering Blofeld's escape sub, he doesn't know how to operate it and drops the sub into the water.
• World Tour: In the Action Prologue, Bond travels around the world (Japan, Egypt then unknown other locations) to vigorously interrogate various people in order to track Blofeld down.
• Would Hit a Girl:
  • Bond; or at least choke one, as he demonstrates during his search for Blofeld's whereabouts during pre-credits sequence. He also slaps Tiffany once to get answers out of her. He also nearly drowns the Bodyguard Babes of the man he is searching for till they tell him where he is. Considering his profession, not following this would've been a problem.
  • The villains who are after Bond had no compunctions about hurting and killing any women who get in the way.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Bond suspects an elevator he was forced into to have a trapdoor, so he backs right up against the wall. Unfortunately he's gassed instead. ^note However, doing so in The Spy Who Loved Me would turn out to be the correct thing to do
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: After Blofeld gets enough diamonds to create his Laser Kill Sat, he sends his assassins Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd to execute the members of his diamond smuggling ring.

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