There is a sense of ordinaryness in A View to a Kill that is its downfall. After fourteen official James Bond films, it seems that the series had run out of ideas. It's not surprising that it was Roger Moore's last perfomrance as 007, at 56 he looks old, and the series probably needed a new actor to give the series some novelty. John Glen seems like he's going through the paces, and that's a shame, because he had just come off of directing two of the most energetic films in the series Even Christopher Walken as the bad guy isn't as entertaining as he should be.
This one involves Walken as Max Zorin, who is trying to control the world's computer industry. Annoying computer geeks everywhere, he plans to destroy Silicon Valley, meaning that both Apple and Microsoft will be done, and the eternal debate will be made moot. Zorin has an adrogenous henchwoman played by Grace Jones, who doesn't sing the theme song (Duran Duran had a #1 hit with it). Can you guess which British secret agent gets assigned to the case?
Though it doesn't dive to the coma inducing boredom of Thunderball or the nauating stupidity of Moonraker, A View to a Kill never really takes off. It's not so much boring as it is uninteresting. Moore said that he had hesiations about returning to the part at his age, and he's right-his Bond doesn't age gracefully and wears a leather jacket like he's entering mid-life crisis. Although it has the best title, this is one of the worst films in the series.
A View to a Kill (1985)