Every James Bond Movie Pre-Credits Scene Ranked Worst To Best
Which Bond film started the best?
Throughout the Bond franchise's run, nearly every single instalment has had a pre-credits scene before the opening title sequence and this has become one of the most interesting parts of the Bond formula, especially since the various pre-credits scenes are all so different.
Many of them kick the film off with an explosive action sequence, while plenty of others are more artistic and unpredictable. Quite a few of them set up the story of the film while others are unrelated to the rest of the film's action and are like Bond short films in their own right.
They do vary a hell of a lot, not just in content but in quality too. There are plenty of great openings in the franchise, but there are also some more mediocre ones and a few of them are downright awful. More are good than bad though, so that's something.
Additionally, many of the decent ones come from some of the franchise's lower-tier entries while some of the franchise's best films have weak openings, so the Bond pre-credit scene is a truly fascinating trope. But how do they stack up?
Which is the best, which is the worst? It's time to find out...
24. A View To A Kill - Bond Escapes Some Soviets In Siberia
The pre-titles scene of the fourteenth James Bond flick is arguably the worst Bond opening ever, and it's a cocktail of dire elements with one hell of a nasty aftertaste.
It's a very lazy start to the film that revolves around a dreary, uber-generic action sequence that we've seen so many times before, and the distracting way in which Roger Moore is clearly almost sixty at this point makes it even harder to get into.
And the worst part? It features a strong contender for the worst James Bond scene of all time. While Bond is snowboarding along, he takes out a bad guy and suddenly, the soundtrack changes from John Barry's score to... a cover of 'California Girls' by The Beach Boys. Err... what?!
This horrendous gag turns the cringe factor up to eleven and it is absolutely painful to watch. Seriously, what were they thinking? Finally, the scene ends with Bond getting into a submarine disguised as an iceberg and making out with a woman young enough to be his daughter (Mary Stavin), so this is a sequence that'll piss you off from beginning to end.
The only saving graces here are the solid cinematography and music (aside from the aforementioned needle drop, of course!); other than that, it's a fittingly terrible start to a terrible movie.