Culture Shock 06.16.11: Let us now praise George Lazenby

Let us now praise a sort of famous man.

Of all the actors who have played James Bond on the big screen, one always gets short shrift.

No, I'm not including the various "James Bonds" of the farcical 1966 version of "Casino Royale." That would force me into a completely unnecessary digression about Woody Allen's turn as Jimmy Bond.

I'm talking about George Lazenby.

His tenure as 007 was brief, and his performance in that one Bond film is generally regarded as wooden, but of all the actors who every slid behind the wheel of 007's tricked-out Aston Martin, Lazenby is the toughest.

In his prime, he could probably take on Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig simultaneously. (I'm not sure about Timothy Dalton, though. Dalton has gotten really good at going full psycho in his most recent performances. I wouldn't put anything past him.)

You see, Lazenby actually has black belts in multiple martial arts and was friends with Bruce Lee. In a fight, he could probably hurt you.

When Connery, the man regarded by most 007 aficionados as the best Bond, retired from the super-spy franchise — temporarily, as it turned out — Lazenby became his unlikely successor. Not easy shoes to fill, especially if you are a model-turned-actor in his first movie role, which the Australian-born Lazenby was.

Despite Lazenby's bad rep, most of those same Bond aficionados will admit Lazenby's sole outing as 007, "On Her Majesty's Secret Service," is one of the strongest entries in the series. It features arguably the best Bond girl in Diana Rigg ("The Avengers") and Telly Savalas as arguably the best Blofeld.

If he'd stuck around, Lazenby could have grown into the role and become one of the best Bonds ever. Instead, he took probably the worst career advice ever and hung up his Walther PPK after just the one film.

After that, acting jobs became hard to find, and Lazenby returned to the Far East to make movies in Hong Kong and Australia, but not before a detour to Italy to make the 1972 thriller "Who Saw Her Die?" in which he plays a father searching for his daughter's killer and displays some acting chops absent from his Bond performance.

Back in Australia, Lanzenby appeared as the villain in 1975's "The Man from Hong Kong," the first feature film by Anglo-Australian director — and Quentin Tarantino favorite — Brian Trenchard-Smith ("BMX Bandits").

This is the movie that most sets Lazenby apart from other Bonds.

Not only does Lazenby do his own fight scenes, which include letting the hero, played by Yu Wang of "Master of the Flying Guillotine," beat him up, he also does his own stunts.

That includes being set on fire.

Unfortunately, "The Man from Hong Kong" isn't currently available in the U.S., but the Lazenby/ Yu Wang fight scene and the story behind it is one of the highlights of the recent documentary "Not Quite Hollywood," which chronicles the wild and dangerous world of 1970s and '80s Australia cinema.

How dangerous? Well, Lazenby ended up burning his arm doing that stunt. And, according to some accounts, he might have punched Trenchard-Smith afterward. (For the record, Lazenby says he doesn't remember punching his director, but if he did, he's sorry.) Actually, anyone who survived to talk about making movies in Australia in the '70s is probably a pretty tough guy. Trenchard-Smith had to set himself on fire before Lazenby would do it.

So, I'm not saying George Lazenby is the best James Bond. But I am saying he's definitely the 007 I'd want with me in a fight. And that deserves respect.

Culture Shock 09.10.09: Stuntman meets rock band, band does magic tricks, things go boom

You can't get better truth in labeling than "Stunt Rock."

An Australian stuntman comes to Los Angeles and meets a rock band. Lots of stunts and rock ensue. And yes, things blow up.

In a way, "Stunt Rock" seems like the perfect summer blockbuster, except unlike "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" and "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra," "Stunt Rock" doesn't annoy you with a plot.

But "Stunt Rock" is about as far from a blockbuster as you can get. When it originally opened in 1978, you were lucky if you could catch it playing at the local drive-in or at one of the seedy 24-hour theaters that then lined New York City's infamous 42nd Street.

Since then, however, "Stunt Rock" has gained a cult following, fueled by the film's death-defying stunts and cheesy '70s metal soundtrack, which ranges from entertainingly addictive (the title song, "Stuntrocker") to addictively awful.

The man behind "Stunt Rock" is rogue Australian filmmaker Brian Trenchard-Smith, who came up with the idea while in the shower. Trenchard-Smith also directed "The Man from Hong Kong," featuring temperamental Hong Kong star Yu Wang and George Lazenby, otherwise known as the James Bond whom time forgot ("On Her Majesty's Secret Service"). Unsurprisingly, Trenchard-Smith is a favorite of exploitation auteur Quentin Tarantino.

A DVD release of "Stunt Rock" was long overdue, and fortunately Code Red DVD has obliged with an extras-packed, two-disc edition that gives this film the sort of love and respect usually reserved for Hollywood blockbusters.

"Stunt Rock" is seat-of-your-pants filmmaking. In order to obtain financing, Trenchard-Smith had to appease his Dutch backers by casting rising Dutch actress Monique van de Ven, who made her film debut in 1973 opposite Rutger Hauer ("Blade Runner") in one of Paul Verhoeven's early films, "Turkish Delight." Needless to say, it's obvious that English isn't her first language.

Then, when he couldn't get known musicians, Trenchard-Smith had to find a band within five days or else his backers would shut the film down.

As Trenchard-Smith recalls, Sorcery is the type of band you find within five days. Yet despite being unknown and, frankly, not particularly good, Sorcery was perfect for "Stunt Rock." Sorcery's theatrical stage show included two magicians, one dressed in an outlandish wizard costume, who performed during the songs. The magicians' pyrotechnics, fire tricks and escape artistry couldn't have been a better fit.

But the real star of the film is Australian stuntman Grant Page, who set himself on fire and jumped backward off a cliff in "Mad Dog Morgan" starring Dennis Hopper, played an assassin in "The Man from Hong Kong" and later served as stunt coordinator and Mel Gibson's stunt double in "Mad Max."

Yes, he's the unknown stuntman who makes Gibson look so fine.

Page climbs buildings, sets himself on fire, bursts through windshields, rides on top of speeding cars and catapults himself across a bay on the Australian coast. He can even act a little — well enough, at least, not to embarrass himself, which can't be said of the rest of the cast.

The plot is virtually nonexistent, which is a plus, actually, and what little there is exists merely to link the stunts and concert footage. The dialogue is terrible. The acting is worse. And the music is what it is. But the stunts are fun to watch and a pleasant reminder of what filmmaking was like before computers took the danger out of it.

As a whole, "Stunt Rock" is — often despite itself — an entertaining artifact of an era when men of questionable sanity, armed with more imagination than money, gave teenagers something to watch at the drive-in when they needed a breather from making out.