List of James Bond henchmen in Moonraker

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This is a list of henchman from the 1979 James Bond film Moonraker, from the List of James Bond henchmen.

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[edit] Jaws

James Bond character
Jaws
Gender Male
Affiliation Assassin
Portrayed by Richard Kiel

Jaws is a fictional assassin in the James Bond films The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker (plus some later videogames). Jaws' nickname is due to his strong stainless steel teeth that could bite through virtually anything. The character was played by actor Richard Kiel. During filming, Kiel only wore the metal teeth for a few minutes at a time because they hurt his mouth.

[edit] Appearances

Jaws first appeared in the 1977 film The Spy Who Loved Me as a henchman to the villain, Karl Stromberg. He would later appear in the sequel Moonraker as a henchman to the villain Hugo Drax. However, in this second appearance, his character was changed from that of a ruthless and unstoppable killing machine to more of a comedy figure. He eventually turns against Drax and helps Bond to defeat him, and also gains a girlfriend. In Jaws' last onscreen appearance in Moonraker, he was last seen starting a new beginning with a new found love interest.

In addition to having steel teeth, Jaws was also 7 feet, 2 inches (2.18 m) tall and extremely strong, which forced Bond to be especially inventive while fighting him. In combat, Bond found himself caught in an unbreakable death grip by Jaws, who was about to fatally bite him; Bond only escaped by using a broken electric lamp to send an electric shock through the assassin's teeth to stun him. Jaws also has an uncanny ability to survive any misfortune seemingly unscathed and come back to challenge Bond again. In The Spy Who Loved Me, Jaws survives an Egyptian structure's collapse on top of him, being thrown from a rapidly-moving train, sitting in the passenger seat of a car which drives off a cliff (landing in a hut below, to the owner's dismay, though the height of the cliff is not established), a battle underwater with a shark and the destruction of Stromberg's lair. Most notably, in Moonraker he survives falling several thousand feet without a parachute — granted, he falls through a circus tent and lands in the trapeze net — a crash through a building on top of a runaway cable car, and falling off a waterfall. In the game Everything Or Nothing, Jaws is electrocuted and is inside a tanker that is knocked over the side of a bridge. In another instance during a fight on a large lift in which Jaws is equipped with a flamethrower, Bond shoots the flamethrower backpack which ignites Jaws. Bond then climbs into the cockpit of a plane and ejects his seat as the lift plummets to the ground. When Bond later lands on the remains at the bottom, Jaws is nowhere to be found, his body presumably blown to bits by the impact of the crash, or - simply suggesting that Bond has buried his enemy for the last time (though some point out that Jaws might have simply "flown the coop").

Jaws' principal videogame appearances are in the 1997 Nintendo 64 game GoldenEye 007 in which he is the leader of Hugo Drax Moonaker shuttle program in the Aztec complex, and the multi-platform 2004 game Everything or Nothing as a henchman to Nikolai Diavolo ("played" by Willem Dafoe). Both games use Richard Kiel's likeness. Jaws is an unlockable multiplayer character in the game Nightfire. He is the tallest character in the game. You can only see his teeth if you get close enough while fighting him, for the game is in first-person view.

[edit] Films compared with novelisations

Most of the background information on Jaws comes from Christopher Wood's novelisation of the film The Spy Who Loved Me; published as James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me to differentiate from Ian Fleming's novel. In Wood's version, Jaws's real name is Zbigniew Krycsiwiki and he was born in Kraków, Poland. Krycsiwiki was arrested by the secret police for his part in the "1972 bread riots". Whilst he was imprisoned the police "beat him with hollow steel clubs encased in thick leather" until they thought he was dead, leaving his jaw broken beyond repair. Krycsiwiki later escaped and stowed aboard one of Stromberg's vessels. Eventually he was caught, but instead of turning him in, Stromberg hired a prestigious doctor to create an artificial jaw. After 14 operations Krycsiwiki's jaw was restored using steel components that created two rows of terrifying razor-sharp teeth, although Jaws was left mute.

Since none of the above is actually mentioned in either movie, this is not necessarily considered canonical, and Wood contradicts his own continuity when one compares his scripts and his novelisations. In the novelisation of The Spy Who Loved Me Wood specifically states that Jaws is a mute. However, though Jaws remains mute in Wood's James Bond and Moonraker novelisation, he actually does speak at the end of the film. While it is possible Jaws might have somehow regained his voice between the two adventures, there is nothing on screen or in literary form to suggest how this might have occurred.

In the book, Jaws remains attached to the magnet that Bond dips into the tank, as opposed to the film where Bond releases Jaws from the magnet into the water.

Now both hands were tearing at the magnet, and Jaws twisted furiously like a fish on the hook. As Bond watched in fascinated horror, a relentless triangle streaked up behind the stricken giant. A huge gray force launched itself through the wild water, and two rows of white teeth closed around the threshing flesh. — Christopher Wood[1]

The initial script concluded with Jaws being killed by the shark, but after a rough test screening (where Lewis Gilbert's grandson was present), Jaws was so well liked that the scene was changed to have him survive.

[edit] Trivia

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • Unlike most henchmen and villains, Jaws appeared in two movies and survived both. In The Spy Who Loved Me, Jaws battled a shark and won, had an entire construction scaffold collapse on top of him, drove a car off a cliff into someone's roof, and fell off a moving train, had Stromberg's fortress explode with him in it, and swam several miles back to land. Furthermore, in Moonraker, Jaws survives a fall from an airplane without a parachute in the opening credits; later in the movie, he survives a high-speed crash of a tramway car in Rio de Janeiro and a fall from an Argentine-Brazilian waterfall (shot at Iguazu Falls). There is a throwaway line at the end of the movie about the American space shuttle rescuing a man and a woman in a fragment of space station, implying that Jaws survived yet again. After every accident, a signature move by Jaws is to get up, dust himself off, and walk away. In the videogame Everything or Nothing, Jaws is electrocuted several times, goes through another train accident, and loses control of an eighteen-wheeler and goes off a bridge. Near the end of the game, Bond sets him on fire in a falling elevator. Jaws does not appear again, but his body is in the elevator wreckage, so whether he survived or not is unclear.
Here's to us
Here's to us
  • While Jaws was in two James Bond movies, he actually only had one short line of dialogue. In Moonraker, towards the end of the film, he turns to his girlfriend Dolly (Blanche Ravalec) and says "Well, here's to us".
  • Although no character on the scale of Jaws appears in Fleming's books, a villain with steel teeth does appear in the original novel of The Spy Who Loved Me, though in the book he is a simple thug.
  • Richard Kiel played a very similar character -- complete with strange teeth -- in the 1976 comedy Silver Streak.
  • In the final credits sequence of the Inspector Gadget movie, Dr. Claw's assistant is shown attending a "Henchman's Anonymous" meetings. Richard Kiel is one of the participants (along with Oddjob and Nick Nack) and is billed in the credits as 'Famous Guy with Metal Teeth'.
  • During the filming of The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker, most of Jaws' scenes were filmed in 30-second shots, due to the fact that that's how long he could keep the metal teeth in his mouth.

[edit] Chang

James Bond character
Chang
Gender Male
Affiliation Sir Hugo Drax
Portrayed by Toshiro Suga

Chang is a fictional character in the James Bond film Moonraker. He is portrayed by Toshiro Suga.

Chang served as Drax's henchman and butler and was usually sent to deal with disloyal followers. When Bond was learning too much of his plans, Drax sent Chang to kill him. Chang initially attempts to kill Bond while he is in a centrifuge by setting its speed to extremely high levels. Chang later confronts Bond in a museum, where he uses Kendo skills against him. The fight continues into a clock tower, and Bond wins by throwing Chang through a glass window and into a grand piano, killing him. Because of this, Drax replaces Chang with Jaws.

His only line is "Mr. Drax say to telephone him", when luring Dr. Goodhead away from the centrifuge.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Wood, Christopher (1977). James Bond, The Spy Who Loved Me. Glidrose Publications. ISBN 0-446-84544-2. 
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