Funny / GoldenEye

Funny moments in GoldenEye. For moments from the 1997 GoldenEye game for the Nintendo 64, go here.

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"Well, at least he died happy."

• Bond dropping in on the guard in the toilets: "Beg your pardon. Forgot to knock." [punches the guard out cold]
• Alec Trevelyan killing a scientist in the facility can be this to people who have played the game since killing scientists and civilians is against the mission briefings.
  "Mission Failure: Unacceptable non-military casualties!"
• Moments after "shooting" Alec in the head, Ourumov repeats his order for Bond to surrender, as if he expects Bond to give up moments after Ouromov demonstrated he had no intention of sparing them.
• It's right after a dark moment, but the cart full of Exploding Barrels Bond uses as a shield during his escape from the chemical weapons facility has a squeaky wheel that really lets the air out of the tension in the scene. The fact that it moves really slowly doesn't help much.
• How Bond handles his psychiatric evaluation per M's orders: seduce the psychiatrist Caroline and take her on a road trip, and during it, race Xenia Onatopp down windy roads.
  Caroline: (nervously watching Bond race across a mountainside road) I enjoy a spirited ride as much as the next girl, but...
  (Xenia Onatopp revs up in her car right next to theirs)
  Caroline: Who's that?
  Bond: (smirking) The next girl!
• Right before GoldenEye is first set off over Severnaya, Bond and an associate at MI6 go over the location of the missing stealth Eurocopter Tiger in Russia with M. Bond asks if the satellite footage being used is live.
  M: Unlike the American government, we prefer not to get our bad news from CNN.
• Bond visits Q Branch:
  • Bond finds Q sitting in a wheelchair with a cast over his left leg.
    Bond: Morning, Q. Sorry about the leg. Skiing?
    (Q fires off a missile hidden in the cast)
    Q: (giddy) Hunting!
  • Bond's new car has stinger missiles housed behind the headlights, to which Bond muses, "Just the thing to unwind after a long day at the office."
    Q: Need I remind you, 007, that you have a licence to kill, not to break the traffic laws. ^note  The French dub has Q admonish him with "not to drive the wrong way on the highway."
  • Q shows off the exploding pen grenade:
    Q: Three clicks (clicks the pen thrice) arms the four second fuse, another three (does so) disarms it.
    Bond: (takes the pen and clicks it three times at a slower rate than required to arm it) ...how long did you say the fuse was?
    Q: (snatches the pen) Oh, grow up, 007!
  • And then he demonstrates it:
    Q: Don't say it...
    Bond: The writing's on the wall?
    Q: (laughing) Along with the rest of him!
  • Desmond Llewelyn had some difficulties with getting the clicks right during filming; apparently, the phrase "Des, you've blown us up again!" was used repeatedly, in good humour. If you're watching and listening closely, you'll notice that the "Disarm" clicks are sometimes dubbed on while the pen is off-screen.
  • A couple of Funny Background Events during the visit:
    • While 007 and Q are discussing the zipwire coiled in a belt buckle, an assistant enters a phone booth and starts to make a call only to be shoved against the side by an airbag once he picks up the phone. The box is later wheeled off, with the assistant still trapped inside.
    • After the exploding pen demonstration the camera has Q and Bond talking while another assistant is seen in the background between them talking on the phone while leaning back in an office chair — which suddenly launches her offscreen via compressed air with a crash.
  • At the end when Q's asking Bond (again) not to break all of his toys, he notices Bond inspecting a large sandwich:
    Q: Don't touch that!
    [Bond backs away as if it bites]
    Q: That's my lunch!
• The perplexed look on Ourumov's face after Xenia has way too much fun killing the staff of Severnaya, which seems to say, "Girl, you really should see a therapist right now."
• When Bond find's the Canadian admiral's body with a giant grin on his face stuffed into the closet. It's as if to tell us that if you had a choice of you wanted to be killed, you should choose to have Xenia Onatopp crush you between her thighs...even though he was crying in pain when we last saw him.
• Similarly, Bond's sauna encounter with Xenia strikes a good balance between sex, action, humour, and slight hints of Nightmare Fuel; for all that it is a pretty solid fight - with Xenia shrugging off Bond's attempts at escape - and that it is both sexy and slightly nightmarish because of Xenia's killing method, there is something funny about elements of it, including Bond's eventual method of escape... And the fact that Pierce Brosnan's 'painface' is on full display when he's at Xenia's mercy.
  • And then there's the poor fool who (apparently) misunderstands the situation and charges at Bond, only to get a face full of bucket.
  • Perhaps funniest is the commentary track on the fight; director Martin Campbell thoughtfully remarks on the set and the use of doubles, but as Xenia snatches Bond up to crush him on the bench jovially states he knows people who've paid money to have it done rather like that; even more hilariously, this is Truth in Television as there are a number of reenactments and homages to Xenia starring fetish models and the like, paid for by fans from that community.
• Jack Wade and his love of stiff-assed Brits.
  • When they first meet, Wade flubs the Spy Speak verification code. Bond draws a gun on him and demands to see the Embarrassing Tattoo that he was told Wade would have. When he does...
    Bond: Muffy?
    Wade: ...third wife.
  • Wade's skill in automotive repair
    Wade: Wanna hand me that hammer, there, Jimbo... (Bond reaches for a ballpene hammer) No, the bigger one, the sledge.
• "STAND BY YOUR MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!"
  • "Who's strangling the cat?"
  • When Bond is informed that the cat-strangler in question happens to be the mistress of the man currently pointing a gun in his general direction. Specifically, Valentin Zukovsky informs him of this by shooting between Bond's legs, causing the cushion Bond's sitting on to explode feathers all over the place.
    Valentin: [Threatening] That is Irina. My mistress.
    Bond: [Trying to school his face appropriately] Very... talented girl.
    • And then when Valentin dismisses her:
      Valentin: IRINA! TAKE A HIKE!
      Irina: (flips him off before storming off)
  • Gets even better when you consider that Minnie Driver, who plays Irina, can actually sing.
  • The ensuing reaction when Bond asks Valentin (the man he shot in the leg) to do him a favor:
    Valentin: My knee....aches every single day. Twice as bad when it is cold. Do you have any idea how long the winter lasts in this country? Tell him, Dmitri.
    Dmitri: Well, it depends—
    Valentin: SILENCE!
  • Valentin finds Bond's whole persona hilarious:
    James Bond. Charming, sophisticated secret agent. "Shaken, but not stirred." Ha ha!
  • Mind you, Bond gets his own digs in at the somewhat-stout Valentin's expense:
    For an ex-KGB agent you surprise me, Valentin. I'm sure someone of your stature must have realised that the skill was not to hit your knee but, uh... miss the rest of you.
• Bond waking up in a daze from a tranq dart to Natalya screaming at the top of her lungs at him to get them out of a helicopter that's about to blow. By the way, this is the first time they meet in the entire movie. No time to make a good first impression when you're half a minute from death.
• Bond's response to Mishkin's overly cordial interrogation:
  Bond: What, no small-talk? No chit-chat? That's the trouble with the world today. No one takes the time to do a really sinister interrogation anymore. It's a lost art.
• During the interrogation scene, Bond and Mishkin are going back and forth, exchanging accusations and insults, when a frustrated Natalya tells them to stop.
  "Oh stop it, both of you! Stop it! You're like boys with toys!"
• Bond removing his belt preparing the piton within during the shootout in the archives. Bond finds himself on the receiving end of a bewildered look from Natalya.
  James Bond: Trust me.
• General Ourumov, drinking quite frequently from his flask, during the tank chase. Especially "Use the bumper! That's what it's for!"
  • The look on his face at the start of the chase when Bond smashes through a wall with the tank is priceless. Hell, that whole chase has a lot of funny moments, simply because of the sheer audacity of the whole thing. And, well, PROPERTY DAMAGE!
• Bond in tank = 1; truck with cans of Perrier = 0. A statue (a soldier on horseback) doesn't come out of it too well, either.
  • Does Bond just destroy the statue? Oh no, the statue ends up riding on top of the tank. It's then used to get some St. Petersberg PD cars off his back when it falls off right in front of them.
  • Not to mention the moment when Bond stops just for a second to straighten his tie...
• Natalya asks Bond if he destroys every vehicle he gets into. Not a silly question since at that point she's witnessed the destruction of a military helicopter, a tank, and a heavily armoured train.
  Bond: Standard operating procedure. Boys with toys.
  Natalya: Maybe I should take care of transportation for our trip to Cuba.
  Bond: Uh uh... [Double Take] Our trip?
  • And then after they almost get landed on by a plane:
    Natalya: What is it with you and moving vehicles?
• Natalya asks Bond if he meant it when he told Alec to kill her, and that she meant nothing to him.
  Bond: Yes. Basic rule. Always call their bluff. [starts laughing, Natalya whacks him with a pillow]
• After Xenia's death: "She always did enjoy a good squeeze."
• Boris messing with Trevelyan as they prepare to activate the Goldeneye satellite.
  Alec Trevelyan: Prepare the dish.
  Boris: No! It's too early. I am not ready!
  Alec Trevelyan: [in a threatening tone] Do it.
  [Boris gives an "okay, fine", look]
• Natalya utterly beating the shit out of Boris in the control room. Even Trevelyan smirks.
• Boris' reaction when Bond calls Trevelyan a common thief.
• This exchange, referencing when Natalya was held at gunpoint on the train:
  [Alec threatens James with a gun after it's discovered Natalya had reprogrammed the Goldeneye satellite.]
  Natalya: Go ahead. Shoot him. He means nothing to me.
  James: [Gives an expression that screams "Well, I deserved that one..."]
• Boris's Villainous Breakdown at the end, from his Oh, Crap! reaction to the antenna malfunction to shaking the computer and screaming "SPEAK TO ME!"
  • Plus, computer users will realize that he's attacking the monitor, not the computer system.
• Boris's "YES! I AM INVINCIBLE!" as he finds out he has survived the destruction of the base... followed by tanks of liquid nitrogen exploding above him and freezing him.
• It's the end of the movie, the day is saved, the villain defeated, and Bond and Natalya are about to have some well-deserved Glad-to-Be-Alive Sex... until they're interrupted by Jack Wade and a truly ridiculous number of Marines that would've been awfully useful about fifteen minutes ago.
  • Then after Wade suggest that they'd like to finish debriefing each other at Guantanamo:
    Bond: You ready?
    Natalya: I'm not going on a helicopter with you! No plane! No train! (Bond picks her up and she starts giggling) Nothing that moves!
    Bond: Darling, what could possibly go wrong, okay?
    ——