YMMV / Octopussy

• Applicability: The movie opens with Bond on a mission in unnamed Latin American country. The military seen is fairly generic and the most common assumption, based on what we can see, is that he's in Cuba^note  there's a senior officer with a beard puffing on a big cigar, and Bond says he'll see Bianca in Miami. However, given that The Falklands War took place the previous year, it could be argued that we're actually looking at what Bond got up to in Argentina during that conflict, and operations in Cuba would be more of a CIA thing.
• Awesome Music: Goes without saying in a Bond movie, but "All Time High" by Rita Coolidge is a classic song that holds its own, with lyrics by Tim Rice.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Both of the main villains. About half of the fanbase consider Orlov to be an entertaining Large Ham who brings some much-needed life to one of the most average entries in the series, while considering Kamal Khan to be an entirely forgettable Generic Doomsday Villain. The other half think that Orlov comes across far too cartoonish to take seriously, while Khan's more grounded personality and performance make him a more threatening villain.
  • Octopussy herself. Some fans think she's a great character, mainly because of Maud Adams' charm and her chemistry with Roger Moore (it helps that their age difference is smaller compared to Carole Bouquet in For Your Eyes Only or Tanya Roberts in A View to a Kill). Others find her an uninteresting, one-dimensional character, who is relegated to the role of Damsel in Distress in the third act.
• Broken Base: Bond dressing up as a clown during the first climax. Depending on who you ask it's either too silly (even for a Bond film from the Roger Moore era) or it's an acceptable, some daresay even clever, way of showing just how desperate Bond is as he races to avert tragedy.
• Cult Classic: Though its overall reputation tends to be mixed, there is a loud and vocal fanbase for this film that ranks it as one of Moore's best, particularly those that love the Bathos of the Cold War drama mixed with some of the series' all-time silliest visual moments.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Octopussy's loyal Action Girl and Femme Fatale assistant Magda, played by Kristina Wayborn, isn't as iconic as Octopussy herself, but she's by no means forgettable.
  • Badass Driver and Nice Guy Vijay ranks pretty high among Bond's single film male allies.
  • Hero of Another Story 009. The number has been reused for 00 agents in two subsequent movies.
• Harsher in Hindsight: The idea of a renegade Russian planning to start a war and stomp all over Europe seems eerily prophetic of all the trouble Vladimir Putin would cause, particularly the War in Ukraine.
• He Really Can Act: The scene where Bond confronts Orlov is one of Roger Moore's best moments as Bond and proof that he could play the part seriously if the occasion called for it. His being able to sell a serious warning about a nuclear bomb while dressed as a clown is also quite a good showing.
• Mexicans Love Speedy Gonzales: Despite the film's embrace of many Mystical India tropes, the film is considered a series highlight in India, and is a factor in Roger Moore's own popularity in the country.
• Moral Event Horizon: Kamal Khan and General Orlov cross it with their plan: to bomb a US Air Force base in Germany in order to trick the nations of Europe into instituting universal disarmament so that Russia can invade. While there's a circus going on. With civilians and children on the base. And General Orlov doesn't give a crap as long as the USSR retains its advantage.
• Narm:
  • Bond dressing up as a clown (though see Broken Base), a crocodile, and a gorilla.
  • During Kamal Khan's literal manhunt, Bond — the one who's being hunted — swings through the trees, complete with Tarzan yell.
  • The scene where Octopussy's circus attacks the villain's stronghold, fighting armed guards with circus tricks and acrobatics in brightly coloured spandex.
  • When the guard alerts the others to Bond breaking into the base and caps off his description with " and he's wearing a red shirt!" as if this is the most heinous offense of all.
• Narm Charm: The infamous scene where Bond is dressed as a clown is extremely tense and suspenseful, what with nobody taking him seriously while he's desperately trying to warn the generals of the nuclear bomb that's about to go off. "Let me go, damnit! There's a bomb in there!" What really seals the deal is that when the bomb is revealed there are only 14 seconds left, and we actually see the bomb's counter hit 0. Bond disarms it at literally the last split-second.
• Never Live It Down: Nobody will ever forget that this is the film where Roger Moore's James Bond dresses up as a clown, even if it makes sense in the context of the scene.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • Schatzi is played by Brenda Cowling, who would later be best known for playing Mrs. Lipton in You Rang, M'Lord?.
  • An Octopussy Girl is played by Carole Ashby, who would later be best known for playing Louise in 'Allo 'Allo!.
• Signature Scene: Whether you like it or not, Bond dressed as a clown desperately trying to stop a nuclear bomb from exploding in a circus full of children.
• So Okay, It's Average: Generally has a reputation as the most typical Bond movie, being seen as competent and entertaining, yet formulaic. While there aren't that many glaring flaws or divisive elements when compared to some of the more controversial instalments, nor does Octopussy offer much that hasn't been done better elsewhere in the series.
• Special Effects Failure:
  • In the intro, as the plane flies through the building, you can see a white pole holding it up at least once. No freeze-framing required if you know when to look. It was much too dangerous to have the plane really flying through a building with people inside, and too expensive to paint out the pole. It's also a bit awesome to realize that they took a real jet plane through a building even if it wasn't flying.
  • The bit where 007 inadvertantly walks into a spiders web really isn't convincing, as the spiders are clearly rubber (and he even swipes a red kneed tarantula off his elbow with much ease).
  • At one point, one of Kamal's henchmen gets speared on a bed of nails. Problem: The scene in question is a whacking great close-up, and the rubber nails visibly bend under his weight.
  • A careful eye can clearly see Kamal's plane already coming apart a second before it actually erupts into flames.
  • When Bond drives into the airbase with the police hot on his heels, he drives into the chain at the entrance, ripping off a large chunk of a concrete pillar. One can clearly make out the lines of the prop where it was meant to break off.
  • During the fight on top of the train, the sword Gobinda is using visibly bends at a couple points (most prominently when he gets shoulder rolled off of Bond).
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Octopussy was built up to be quite a formidable woman with her own empire, but the few times she engages in the action she gets beaten rather easily. Kind of a shame considering that actress Maud Adams actually did have good chemistry with Roger Moore. It's also especially bad when you remember that Octopussy comes right after the franchise delivered one of its best Bond Girls, Melina Havelock.
  • The movie doesn't get as much mileage from Gobinda or the henchman with the chainsaw-yoyo as it could.
• Tough Act to Follow: As with Moonraker before it, Octopussy has the distinction of having to follow a much more popular film. While Octopussy is often better-regarded than Moonraker, it still tends to be seen as inferior when compared to For Your Eyes Only. That being said, the chemistry between Roger Moore and Maud Adams is generally held in higher regard than the ones he had (or lack thereof) with either Lois Chiles or Carole Bouquet. Although some fans do feel that this film might've made a better finale for Moore than A View to a Kill, where he was simply too old to plausibly play Bond, anymore.
• Uncertain Audience: On the one hand, the film clearly tries to continue the more serious and realistic atmosphere of For Your Eyes Only, with Bond in a Cold War plot and with violent death scenes. But at the same time, the film tries to return to the silly humour of Roger Moore's early films, with a plot that also involves an island inhabited only by warrior women in India, and scenes with Bond dressed in a gorilla costume. The fact that the movie's climax shows Bond dressed as a clown trying to prevent the detonation of a nuclear bomb in a circus full of children perfectly sums up the confusing tone of this movie.
• Unintentional Period Piece: The mere fact that the plot mentions West Germany and East Germany already makes the film that. Also, the Soviet prime minister Leonid Brezhnev administers the Soviet briefing in the first half of the film. However, in real life, Brezhnev had died during production in 1982, making Octopussy one of the last depictions of him. Since he was succeeded by KGB chairman Yuri Andropov in real life, General Gogol would've succeeded him within the film series.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: 009 getting a thrown knife in the back and slowly expiring. Bond later does this to one of the two knife-throwing brothers responsible. General Orlov is shot in the lungs and slowly expires, Vijay is cut open by a bladed yo-yo, a mook is impaled on a bed of nails, another mook is suffocated by a blue-ringed octopus, and the bladed yo-yo using mook is devoured by crocodiles. Finally, Gobinda falls to his death from an aeroplane.

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