X out of 10

The world is made of two kinds of people: those who love Bond movies and those who loathe them. I consider myself part of the former camp, especially when it comes to the classic films starring Sean Connery. The fourth and final set in the James Bond Ultimate Edition collection combines two of these classics (Dr. No and You Only Live Twice) with one of the better Pierce Brosnan films (Tomorrow Never Dies), a middling Roger Moore film (Octopussy) and the so-remarkably-bad-you-can’t-help-but-love-it Moonraker (also starring Moore).

All five movies, including the relatively recent Brosnan adventure, have been remastered frame-by-frame from the original film, and the result is incredible—even 1962’s Dr. No looks unbelievably recent. Audio enthusiasts will also be pleased to know that the soundtracks of all five films have been restored and remixed in 5.1-channel DTS surround sound.

For all that goodness, however, this collection has a big fault: the Special Features discs—each movie in the set includes one—are mostly useless. They consist mainly of dry, boring documentaries, storyboards, and other features that really aren’t very special, and are definitely not worth their own separate discs. The resources put into making these discs would have been better used to further perfect the audio and video quality of the features themselves.

X = 7.8

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