--- title: "Never Say Never Again" year: 1983 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/never-say-never-again" fi1m_score: 64 critics_score: 65 critics_reviews: 7 published: "2026-09-18T11:49:08.211469+00:00" updated: "2026-09-18T11:49:08.496498+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Never Say Never Again (1983) Directed by Irvin Kershner · 2h 14m · MPA PG · Adventure, Action, Thriller **Fi1m score: 64** · Critics 65 from 7 reviews *In a sentence:* Connery came back, Brandauer came to play, and Michel Legrand seems to have turned up for a different film > Sean Connery returns to Bond twelve years on, greyer, drier and better company than the film around him. Klaus Maria Brandauer and Barbara Carrera give it two proper villains; a slack script, a wayward score and a great deal of seawater do their best to undo them. ## Synopsis James Bond (Sean Connery) fails a training exercise and is told by M (Edward Fox), a new chief with little time for the 00 section, to take a cure at a health clinic in the English countryside. There he notices a nurse, Fatima Blush (Barbara Carrera), and her patient, an American airman whose right eye has been surgically altered to pass a Presidential security check. Days later two nuclear warheads go missing from a test flight, and Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Max von Sydow) demands a ransom on behalf of SPECTRE. Bond is sent to the Bahamas, where the airman’s sister, Domino Petachi (Kim Basinger), lives aboard the yacht of a wealthy philanthropist, Maximilian Largo (Klaus Maria Brandauer), and where Felix Leiter (Bernie Casey) is already waiting. ## Review Sean Connery had said he would never play James Bond again, and the title is the film’s own joke about that. *Never Say Never Again* was made outside the official series, by the producer Jack Schwartzman, and it is a remake of [*Thunderball*](https://film.one/film/thunderball) (1965) with the names changed: SPECTRE steals two nuclear warheads, Blofeld demands a ransom, and Bond follows the trail to the Bahamas. Connery had not played the part since [*Diamonds Are Forever*](https://film.one/film/diamonds-are-forever) in 1971. He is the reason to watch, the film knows it, and most of the time it is content to stand back and let him. It starts well. Bond fails a training exercise, and M (Edward Fox), a prissy new broom who disapproves of the whole 00 section, packs him off to a health clinic to sweat out the toxins. Connery plays all of this with a raised eyebrow and a slower walk, an agent who has read his own file and finds it funny. Fox is good value as a man who would rather run a department than a spy; Alec McCowen’s Q grumbles about budgets in a workshop that looks like a garden shed; Pamela Salem’s Moneypenny gets one scene and makes it count. Rowan Atkinson turns up as a flustered Foreign Office man called Nigel Small-Fawcett, and we laughed, then wondered whether the film had meant us to. The villains are the film’s other asset. Klaus Maria Brandauer plays Maximilian Largo as a man who giggles when he is losing, a generous host who can stop being generous in the middle of a sentence, and the scenes where he and Connery circle each other over Domino are the best-written in the picture. Barbara Carrera’s Fatima Blush is his opposite, all appetite and no interior, dropping a snake into a moving car and changing her outfit for every murder. Charles Knode dresses her in black and white with a different hat each time, so you can find her in any crowd. Max von Sydow’s Blofeld strokes a cat and is barely in it. Kim Basinger, as Domino, is given a dance class and a brother and not much else. Douglas Slocombe, who had just shot [*Raiders of the Lost Ark*](https://film.one/film/raiders-of-the-lost-ark) (1981), lights Nassau and the Riviera the way brochures do, white walls and hard blue water, and it suits a film that behaves like an expensive holiday with occasional gunfire. Philip Harrison and Stephen B. Grimes give Largo a yacht of curves and cream leather and a North African villa built like a fortress. The trouble is what is laid over the pictures. Michel Legrand’s score is lounge jazz, brass and shaker, and it treats every chase as though the drinks trolley were due; a fight at the clinic against a hulking assassin is played to music that would suit a lift. Ian Crafford cuts that same fight so choppily that we lost track of who was holding the syringe, and the film runs 134 minutes, which is at least fifteen more than the plot can carry. Here is what we felt. For the first hour, and through most of the Bahamas, we were happy: Connery is relaxed and funny, Brandauer is alarming, and a duel played on an arcade machine that shocks whoever is losing is exactly the kind of daft thing this series does well. Then the film goes to sea, and then under it, and the last half hour is murk and bubbles and frogmen we could not tell apart. We were bored, and then annoyed, because a film that had been this good company had no business ending as a scuba lesson. Irvin Kershner, who had made [*The Empire Strikes Back*](https://film.one/film/the-empire-strikes-back) (1980), directs the people better than the action, which is the right way round for this cast and the wrong way round for a Bond film. Lorenzo Semple Jr.’s script, from the writer of *Flash Gordon* (1980), keeps winking at the material; some critics have read that as contempt, and we would call it fondness, though the plot goes slack all the same. Set beside [*Octopussy*](https://film.one/film/octopussy), released the same year with Roger Moore, this is the one with the better actors and the worse third act. Watch it at home, with company and something to drink, and give the last half hour your partial attention. Connery earns the rest. It carries a PG certificate and, for a film about stolen nuclear weapons, it is remarkably relaxed about the whole business. *Fi1m score 64, published 18 September 2026.* ## What the critics say Most critics give Never Say Never Again a moderately warm welcome, and nearly all of them locate the reason in the cast. Sean Connery’s return is the main event: the reviews find him more human than before, older and easier in the part, playing it with an irony they enjoy. Klaus Maria Brandauer’s Largo is singled out repeatedly as one of the better villains in the series, and the henchwoman Fatima Blush draws similar praise. Several critics also credit Irvin Kershner’s direction with more humour and character than these films usually manage. The reservations fall on the script. The story is a retread of Thunderball, and more than one reviewer finds it flabby and cutesy, with Domino a weak part. The spread is fairly wide: The AV Club sees a screenplay that treats its material with thinly veiled contempt, and Empire goes further, suggesting Connery was wise to have quit the first time. ### Reviews we read (7) - **Time Out**, CPea (75/100, inferred): The critic finds it comforting to return to the classic Bond atmosphere of gratuitous sex and violence. They single out the strong cast of villains and especially Sean Connery's welcome return in the lead role as the film's real highlight. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/never-say-never-again-1) - **RogerEbert.com**, Roger Ebert (70/100, inferred): The critic welcomes Connery's return as a more human Bond and highlights the emotional depth brought by Klaus Maria Brandauer's performance as the villain Largo. [Read](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/never-say-never-again-1983) - **The New York Times**, Janet Maslin (70/100, inferred): This is the better Bond film of the season, with noticeably more humor and character than usual, thanks to Kershner's direction and a marvelous villain in Largo. [Read](https://www.nytimes.com/1983/10/07/movies/sean-connery-is-seasoned-james-bond.html) - **Variety**, Variety Staff (70/100, inferred): The film benefits from strong casting, with Brandauer as one of the best Bond opponents, Carrera and Basinger in key roles, and Connery in fine form. [Read](https://variety.com/1982/film/reviews/never-say-never-again-1200425477/) - **The AV Club**, Noel Murray (C+): The critic finds it a flabby, cutesy Bond picture that derives most of its value from its cast, especially Connery's portrayal of an aging Bond. The screenplay is kitschy and treats the material with thinly veiled contempt, though the film remains too agreeable to dislike. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/never-say-never-again-1798205941) - **Empire**, William Thomas (40/100, inferred): The critic notes that Connery returns to the role with a pleasing sense of irony in this Thunderball retread involving SPECTRE and nuclear weapons. He concludes that Connery was perhaps wise to have quit the first time round. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/never-say-never-review/) - **Den of Geek**, Max Williams (70/100, inferred): The critic finds the film a pleasantly surprising, sly and witty semi-pastiche that holds its own with other Bond entries, praising Connery's energetic performance and standout villain Fatima Blush, while noting some narrative weaknesses and the weak Domino character. [Read](https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/never-say-never-again-an-unofficial-james-bond-007-movie/) ## Details - **Director:** Irvin Kershner - **Director:** Irvin Kershner - **Screenplay:** Lorenzo Semple Jr. - **Novel:** Ian Fleming - **Cinematography:** Douglas Slocombe - **Editor:** Ian Crafford - **Music:** Michel Legrand - **Production design:** Stephen B. Grimes, Philip Harrison - **Costume design:** Charles Knode - **Producer:** Jack Schwartzman - **Cast:** Sean Connery as James Bond; Klaus Maria Brandauer as Maximilian Largo; Max von Sydow as Ernst Stavro Blofeld; Barbara Carrera as Fatima Blush; Kim Basinger as Domino Petachi; Bernie Casey as Felix Leiter; Alec McCowen as Q 'Algy' Algernon; Edward Fox as M - **Runtime:** 2h 14m - **Certificate (MPA):** PG - **Release (the US):** 7 October 1983 - **Genres:** Adventure, Action, Thriller - **Budget:** $36 million - **Box office:** $160 million ## Where to watch in the US - Amazon Prime Video: rent $3.99, uhd - Apple TV: rent $3.99, hd - Amazon Prime Video: buy $14.99, uhd - Apple TV: buy $14.99, hd *Checked 2026-09-18.* Also available in: AR, AT, AU, BE, BR, CA, CL, CO, DE, ES, FR, GB, IN, IT, JP, MX, NL, NZ, PA, SE, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *Thunderball* (1965), Fi1m 66: The original, with the same plot, a younger Connery and clearer water — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/thunderball.md) - *Mephisto* (1981): Brandauer at full stretch, as an actor who sells himself to the Nazis - *The Ipcress File* (1965): Sixties spying with the glamour removed and the paperwork left in - *OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies* (2006): A French Bond pastiche that knows exactly how silly the genre is - *Skyfall* (2012), Fi1m 81: Another Bond told he is past it, and a better third act — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/skyfall.md) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/never-say-never-again