What's so great about Thunderball?

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A lot of Bond fans consider it to be one of the best Bond movies, or one of the better ones, and I want to get on board with them and see what they are seeing, but I find the movie to be kind of boring compared to other entries. The pacing just feels more slow and drawn out compared to other entries.

I also find the villains and henchman to be incredibly bland in this one, with the acception of the main hench woman. She's good and has a good presence, but they don't give her as much good stuff to do as they could.

The main Bond girl though is also really flat. She is totally hot and very goodlooking, probably one of the best looking in the series. But she is kind of light in character it seems.

In fact, Bond has even more chemistry with the opening Bond woman, at the clinic, compared to her. But what do you think? Am I missing something, since it's a well liked entry?

IIRC, "Thunderball" was the one which had the major issues with the BBFC and other film censorship organs of the day, and many compromises were made along with some jarring cuts, the contents of which unfortunately were lost to this day, a real pity. it made what should have been a truly adult picture into something more akin to a kiddie pic, all just to get that bloody commercial A rating.

Oh really? I thought Thunderball was safer than the 2 predecessors though, since for example, Bond doesn't have a cold kill, like he did in Dr. No, or he didn't have the implied threesome like in From Russia with Love.

Wouldn't Thunderball, be safer than it's predecessors for it's time therefore?

Oh okay, but was it any worse than usual compared to deleted sections from other Bond films from the time?

(clicky)it was the first bond film to run up against the then-hard limits of the A rating.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/r380kcfy9 ... erball.pdf
above link is a detailed list of specific cuts made to the movie which, IMHO, butchered it.

The school I attended in the late 1960s-mid 1970s had a 'Film Club', which screened various popular releases on Friday evenings every fortnight or so. The first film I ever saw as a member was Thunderball, and I recall feeling a great sense of anticipation as a 12-year-old prior to watching it, as I was aware of its fairly controversial reputation. I wasn't really knocked out by it at all though and had the impression that it was pretty 'meh', rather than anything more striking.

i still remember the jarring cuts made to the two scenes which referred to the 8mm voyeur film made of bond and some bond girl.

Hmmmm.....maybe I need to dig out a copy of this, if I still have one, and check it out again.