The Art of Giving A Good Screen Kiss (Off?)

... well, that would work as a goodbye 

--- but it implies too many happy returns! 

Maybe a better, more effective way to KISS OFF
(as in ''kiss them goodbye'' figuratively, as you push them off of you!)
is the way Dame Diana Rigg famously went about it,
prior to all of her scenes with one-time James Bond
George Lazenby, in 1969's
On Her Majesty's Secret Service - 
she ate garlic!

But even when there is no garlic involved... 

An onscreen kiss is a technical, cold thing, verily --- 

no room for anything else there! 

It is the same thing onstage...! 

Or on LIVE TELEVISION... 

Now a KISS OFF can also be... all this:

... ultimately, 

it is all make-believe! 

As Sam sang it: 

''you must remember this; 

a kiss is just a kiss!''

"This Never Happened To The Other Feller" - best sly line delivery of all time!

I admit it:
It took me a long, long time to discover that ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE was the greatest James Bond film ever made (in great part due to the absence of either Sean Connery or Roger Moore - but also because of the simply stupendous title sequence by master Maurice Binder (the best such sequence ever made), the awesome action sequences, their realism, the stunning soundtrack by John Barry, the masterful directorial debut of one Peter Hunt, the better use of the locales chosen to shoot in, the flair and panache that dastardingly captures the true essence of the Ian Fleming beast throughout this film and, of course, the casting of Diana Rigg as the first and only Mrs. Bond!)
It took me quite long to give the film a chance, alas; prior to 1980, I had considered this to be a film "that didn't count" - it wasn't "the real Bond", just an impostor! The real Bond was, to me, The Saint! Roger Moore - in other words, Lord Brett Sinclair, Simon Templar and James Bond were all one and the same to me! Sean Connery was himself a mere replacement in my mind - so what did George Lazenby hope to be rated as, when young filmgoers such as me had this kind of "backwards logical thinking" going - eh?

The pleasant surprise that "OHMSS" is born in the luminous year of 1969 was a factor, I cannot deny it (plus, one of the locations it was shot in was Portugal - wow!) - but the film itself, in my more mature eyes, proved to be far superior on all technical levels that matter - once I finally gave it a chance, sat down and saw it, in 1980!
I was stunned - this was waaaaaaaaay better than any Connery conk out on celluloid or any Moore merriment caught on film...! (And please spare me any Dalton or Brosnan talk - and that other guy now...! The preceding was a little *clin d'oeil* to the pre-credits in-joke Lazenby so cleverly delivers in this one...! ;)
THIS, my friends, is the true James Bond!



And DIANA RIGG is the ultimate Bond Girl - no question about it!
Most fully-capable critics will agree with me on that too!


.

Many kudos and thanks to the Propellerheads for ressuscitating that unforgettable and unmistakenably unique theme music concocted for Bond exclusively for this film
(the finer music, the meticulous approach to every detail, both in scriptwriting, cinematography and plain plausibility - it was all attributable to the casting of a neophyte 007 in this one! It was the nicest side-effect of all, in the end: in over-compensating for their apparent weakness -their leading man- the 007 team made this the best Bond film of all! More stills from it can be seen here.)