I wasn’t permitted to see Dr. No and From Russia With Love when they were first released, but I guess I was thought to be old enough when Goldfinger came around, so I went to that one by myself (I don’t recall the rest of my family ever being interested in Bond) and it was a supreme discovery. I thrilled to everything about it. Love at first sight. That had been right near the end of the year, and that theater was going to run it all night for New Year’s Eve. What could be more blissful? I got my dad to drop me off there, probably not all that late in the evening, and I was glued to that screen for something like two and a half showings when I went out to be picked up at whatever the appointed time was. Subsequently, as I said the other day, that soundtrack LP was played to death.
Was it the very next year that Thunderball came out? I think so, and I believe it opened on Christmas Day. I was dropped off there that afternoon, the place was packed, and that was equally blissful for me even though it’s a slightly lesser film. But I was especially blown away by more of John Barry’s music, and that viewing also has a very special place in my memory.
At some point I caught up with the first two films, but I don’t remember where. I do recall seeing the later double feature of No and Russia with two friends in a seedy (or what seemed like one) theater in Times Square on a visit to NYC in my college years.
