Licence To Kill Ultimate Edition

Continuing with the intention of keeping Bond grounded in the real world, "Licence To Kill" saw a break from the spy format as Timothy Dalton's Bond sets off on a personal quest for revenge.

It's a gritty, violent tale, and the only Bond movie to be rated a 15. The background of CIA incursion into the Central American drug trade is torn straight from the headlines, and some of the execution-style killings are genuinely chilling.

David Hedison returns as Felix Leiter, the only actor to play the character twice; however a vicious attack by drug lord Franz Sanchez puts him out of the picture early on. Sanchez, chillingly played by Robert Davi, is perhaps the scariest Bond villain ever, a thinly veiled version of Manuel Noriega far removed from the implausible madmen of previous films.

With MI6 unwilling to sanction Bond's actions, he has to go it alone; but his old friends won't abandon him, and Desmond Llewellyn returns to the field as the increasingly ancient Q. Carey Lowell too is a believable Bond girl as Pam Bouvier.

There's some cool action, such as an epic chase in an 18 wheel truck which does unbelievable stunts, and Dalton is simply superb as Bond, smouldering with barely-suppressed rage at the fate of his friend. His face-offs with Davi's sadistic Sanchez are highlights of the movie, and never before has the viewer been so keen for Bond to kill the baddie.

Sadly, this was to be Dalton's last movie as Bond; "Licence To Kill" is a fittingly serious finale.