When DR. NO came out, the publicity set off every alarm for my parents and I wasn't allowed to go see it. I can't remember if I went to FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE when it was new, so it's just possible that GOLDFINGER was my first Bond, and that impact was something I'll never forget. At that point I probably saw second-runs of the first two films, but everything about GOLDFINGER rang bells. I bought the LP, and wore it out in the first year.
According to the IMDb, GOLDFINGER was released nationally in January 1965. I don't remember when, or which theater I first saw it in, but on one of those New Year's Eves, the Gateway Theatre in Fort Lauderdale (my avatar on HTF) ran it all night, and I sat there through three showings of it, happier than the proverbial pig in the proverbial shit.
The next one, THUNDERBALL, to me, will always mean Christmas Day 1965, and one of my favorite Christmas memories. It had opened that week at one of the new theaters in town, and seeing it late in the afternoon on that day -- in a filled theater where I found other people I knew in attendance -- it was just as special to me as GOLDFINGER had been. THUNDERBALL has its critics, but to me it will always be magic.
YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE was equally thrilling, and I know I drove myself to that one three or four times with various friends along. Those were just thrilling movies then. I keep saying "thrilling", but there's no other word for it.
(I most definitely wasn't allowed go see that one, which opened at my tender age of 11 just after we'd moved down there.)
