Gloria Hendry as Rosie Carver: a rookie CIA agent in San Monique.
Live and Let die (1973) is a James Bond movie based on the second novel in Ian Fleming's James Bond series of stories. The novel by the same name was published in 1954. This is Roger Moore’s first movie as 007.
"Live and Let Die" has one of the best James Bond theme songs, which was written by Paul and Linda McCartney which they also performed along with their band "Wings".
We first meet CIA agent Rosie Carver when James Bond (Roger Moore) is checking into his hotel room in the Caribbean nation of San Monique.
The island has a thriving tourist industry based around Voodoo performances. Some of these shows are for the tourists and others, in a more private location, are used to torture people to death.
Upon arrival Bond is informed that his ‘wife’ has arrived before him and has already checked in. (Bond’s wife was killed on their honeymoon in On Her Majesty's Secret Service -1969 ).
Going to his bungalow Bond finds women’s clothing in his closet, presumably those of his fake wife. He also finds a number of electronic listening devices in his room and disables them.
Bond then takes a bath and shaves as a poisonous snake is released in his room through a vent. Bond kills the snake by using a can of hairspray* as a flame thrower, using his cigar as the source of ignition.
*(Men’s hairspray was very common back in the 1970s.)
Bond then realizes that someone is coming through the door pointing a Smith & Wesson Model 19 Snub Nose revolver. Bond disarms the would-be assassin using his cigar burn to their gun hand, causing the weapon to drop to the floor, and then Karate flips them onto the bed. The gun person turns out to be Agent Rosie Carver.
Rosie is wearing a wig which has fallen off when she landed on the bed. (The wig was for production reasons. During the movie, the later scenes were shot first and Gloria Hendry sported a large afro. After the scenes were finished Gloria then went out and had her hair cut short. The wig was a workaround.)
After establishing Rosie’s credentials Bond allows her to go to the bathroom to freshen up. In the bathroom, she sees the dead viper and screams. “Oh, I never should have gotten into any of this…”
Rosie was already a bit upset as her partner on her last mission was killed.
Bond makes his move on the lovely Rosie Carver.
Bond, realizing that he has an attractive woman in his bedroom, immediately begins making a play for her. Rosie still upset about the snake and the loss of her first partner considers quitting.
Rosie Carver: I'm going to be completely useless to you.
James Bond: Well, I'm sure we'll be able to lick you into shape.
Rosie resists his charm and says that they will be sleeping in separate bedrooms tonight. But when Rosie goes into her bedroom she discovers a Voodoo top hat with a bloody white feather on the bed.
(Trivia: Putting a “hat on a bed” is a European superstition and is still believed to be very bad luck. This may date to the time when beds had bedbugs and or hats carried head lice.)
Rosie again panics and runs into Bond’s strong arms begging him now to leave her alone tonight. Bond is there to charm her, kissing her and reassuring her. They spend the night together and we can only assume what happened between them.
Tempted by 007's charm Rosie attempts to resist the inevitable.
The next morning as the waiter brings them their breakfast, (all the waiters turn out to be the villain Dr. Kananga’s henchmen.). Bond is sent a note with a Tarot card depicting the “Queen of Cups”.
Bond later goes to the High Priestess Tarot card shop next to his hotel and presumably finds out the meaning of the “Queen of Cups” which was paper clipped in the upside-down position on to a piece of paper.
(Also, apparently while in the Tarot card shop Bond buys 52 packs of Tarot cards of the same brand as the “Queen of Cups” card he was sent and takes the “Lovers” card out of each of deck making a complete deck of “Lovers” cards. In a very sad attempt of camp commercialism all the Tarot cards in the movie are all backed with a very stylized 007 logo.)
This stacked deck of “Lovers” Tarot cards will be a key factor of his seduction of Solitaire (Jane Seymour) later in the movie.
When we first meet Solitaire she is acting as Mr. Big’s personal fortune teller. Mr. Big is a New York gangster who appears to have some sort of an alliance with Dr. Kananga the ruler of San Monique.
She sits on a throne with wearing jewels, silk gowns, and tiaras. She is one of the most memorable women in all the Bond movies. Jane Seymour is beautiful and seemingly very vulnerable in her position as Solitaire. For she is constantly surrounded by crime and death and she is often threatened by Dr. Kananga with rape.
Bond met Solitaire earlier in the movie as she is working at her Tarot cards after Bond was captured by Mr. Big and taken to Mr. Big’s New York headquarters under a Harlem night club.
Bond was able to flirt briefly with Solitaire and was able to make strong of an impression on her.
Bond: My name's Bond. James Bond.
Solitaire: I know who you are, what you are, and why you've come. You've made a mistake. You will not succeed.
Bond: Rather a sweeping statement, considering we've never met.
Solitaire: The cards have followed you for me.
Solitaire's powers of prophecy with the Tarot cards are acute that Mr. Big depends on her for his day to day, moment by moment decisions.
Solitaire is able to tell Mr. Big’s robotic-armed henchman Tee Hee that Bond is armed just by looking at her Tarot cards.
Bond asks about the cards comparing Solitaire to the High Priestess card laying face up in front of her.
She challenges him to draw a card. He draws “The Fool” card.
Solitaire: I think you’ve found yourself.
A little while later after Bond has been sentenced to death, by Mr. Big. Solitaire lets Bond draw another card.
This time it’s “the Lovers” card.
Solitaire and Bond have a moment. Solitaire who is a loyal servant of Mr. Big and his alter ego Dr. Kananga (it turns out they are the same person in a latex disguise) realizes her and Bond’s destinies will cross again in the near future.
Bond was able to escape his execution.
It is revealed later in the film that Solitaire will only retain the power of prognostication as long as she remains a virgin. Bond having researched her powers makes an effective plan to wreck Mr. Big’s operation by deflowering his beautiful Tarot card reader.
The Queen of Cups card was a warning from Solitaire to Bond, for while he was able to disable all of Dr. Kananga’s listening devices Solitaire was able to see and feel all that went on between 007 and Miss Rosie Carver in their long passionate night together. Rosie is a double agent working for Dr. Kananga and is leading Bond to his death. However Solitaire saw in the cards earlier that Bond was to be her lover.
Rosie sees that 007 is ready for another round the morning after their first tryst.
Bond and Rosie travel to the port and rent a boat captained by Quarrel Jr. (Roy Stewart). Quarrel Jr. is the son of Bond’s contact in Dr. No also named Quarrel, who was killed. (The novel “Live and Let Die” (1954) was written before Dr. No (1957) and in the novels, Quarrel was a reoccurring character until his death.)
Bond doesn’t tell Rosie that Quarrel Jr. is in the ‘game’ and is now a bit cold to her, even after their night of passion, as he realizes now that she is most likely a double agent.
On the boat Bond poses as a sports fisherman as Rosie goes below to change into a bikini.
Old fashion Bond girl Madeline Smith as undercover agent Caruso Double E-33
(The producers of this Bond movie let their wives help cast the actresses in Live and Let Die. And so there is an absence of the voluptuous Bond women of the past such as Honor Blackman, Luciana Paluzzi, Jill St John, and Lana Wood. Madeline Smith appears all briefly at the beginning of Live and Let Die as the Italian agent Miss Caruso that Bond absconded with for a night’s amusement, with an added encore the following morning after M and Moneypenny leave.)
Gloria Hendry is beautifully fit and her bikini displays her in her peak physical condition as she hangs up her coat on a coat hook.
The coat hook turns to be a secret lever that opens a secret compartment with a high powered radio and some weapons. (Someone needs to tell Q-branch that coat hook is a really stupid place to hide a secret lever.)
Rosie takes one of the guns and points it at Quarrel Jr. who is standing behind Bond suspiciously holding a rope. Bond quickly lets Rosie know that the boat captain is on their side and is himself a secret agent.
While on the boat they pass a mansion on a distant hill. Bond asks Quarrel Jr. who the house belongs to.
Quarrel Jr.: That's the house of the Kananga woman. She's supposed to have the power of the Obeah. No one on the island dare go up there except him (Dr. Kananga).
Solitaire is seen sitting at her throne-like card table and reading her Tarot cards giving Dr. Kananga a play by play report of the near future via radio intercom.
Solitaire: He comes again, there will be violence.
Rosie and Bond disembark Bond has brought a picnic lunch. Solitaire in the meantime is being asked about the future by Dr. Kananga. She draws a card and a look of confused passion comes over her face.
It is “the Lovers” card, depicting the nude figures of a man and a woman their bodies intertwine by the coils of a giant snake. Solitaire doesn’t know how to answer, but Dr. Kananga presses the issue.
The cards show Solitaire her fate at the hands of 007.
Solitaire, still overcome by emotion and longing at the arrival of Bond, the man the cards have predicted to be her lover, the man who is destined to fulfill the aching void in her life and yet destroy her access to the power of the Obeah, is unable to find the words to speak and when Solitaire does finally answers Dr. Kananga’s question she lies and says the cards show “death”.
Dr. Kananga: It’s death then.
He then picks up the phone and calls his men.
Dr. Kananga: It is death. They're coming. Rosie knows what to do. Now, I want no bodies this time. No trace.
James and Rosie unite as allies one last time.
Meanwhile Bond and Rosie now have a car. She attempts to lead Bond into what appears to be an ambush. But seeing inconsistencies in her stories Bond declines to follow her directions any further and invites her to have some lunch while they decide what to do.
Rosie is a bit anxious, she is supposed to be following a deadly plan laid out by Dr. Kananga and she wants to get it over with. Bond is able to use his charm and Rosie relaxes.
Next to the car in the bushes unobserved by Bond and his femme Fatale is a Voodoo scarecrow. Dr. Kananga has a number of these ominous figures placed on different parts of the island.
Cut to Bond having just finished making love to Rosie, this is their second time after their tryst the night before. The play by play of their love-making is not depicted however the camera pans over to them having faded in on the highly symbolic image of a babbling brook.
Despite being on a mission to kill 007, Rosie seems to have really been swept up in the experience and sexual dexterity of such an accomplished and thorough lover and has let her guard down along with her panties.
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Bond questions Rosie about her sorted past.
Rosie: Oh, James! You don't know what finding you has meant to me.
But Bond having had his dalliance is back to business. He confronts Rosie about being a double agent. She tries to deny Bond’s charges.
Bond: You do know what the Queen of Cups means in an upside-down position?
Surprised she stares at him blankly seemingly that wasn't a position they had yet tried.
Bond: A deceitful, perverse woman, a liar, a cheat, and I'd like some answers now.
The Voodoo sentry watches over the lovers in their passion.
Rosie is shocked out of her complacency by Bond’s aggressive post-carnal pillow talk.
Rosie: You don't understand, sir. They'll kill me if I do.
Bond pulls his weapon on her (his Walter PPK).
Bond: And I'll kill you if you don't.
Rosie strokes his arm and his chest in a longing attempt to reignite the passion that they had a few moments before when they were locked at the hips.
Rosie: But you couldn't. You wouldn't. Not after what we've just done.
But Bond having had his tryst with this deadly lady, who would have killed him, is now ice cold.
Bond: I certainly wouldn't have killed you before.
She spits in his face.
Rosie suddenly realizes that her every move while making love to 007 was being watched by Dr. Kananga and his people.
Then looking up she sees one of Dr. Kananga’s Voodoo scarecrows has been overlooking their whole time. Unlike Bond, Rosie knows that these Voodoo sentries come equipped with mini-surveillance cameras and microphones.
Unlike the movie audience Dr. Kananga, his henchmen, and Solitaire were able to watch Bond and Rosie’s whole extended consensual coupling session. Starting with Bond’s seduction of Rosie. The surveillance system would have captured the passionate kissing, the fondling foreplay, the gentle unbuttoning of Rosie's shirt and the pulling off of her pants and then her undergarments and the final act of prolonged love itself. (007 knows what he’s doing when it comes to lovemaking).
It now seems that Bond was able to create such a sense of euphoria for Rosie Carver, that she was unable to see the ominous form of Dr. Kananga’s sentry watching over them.
But now in a panic, it all comes back to her. Bond is onto her deception and Dr. Kananga and his motley crew have been watching her being penetrated by outsider, rolling around in on the ground in passionate bliss moaning and groaning with a sworn enemy - in god knows how many positions.
Rosie looks at the Voodoo scarecrow in wide-eyed panic. Bond is not amused by what he believes to be her pretense of being afraid of Voodoo symbols.
Bond: It used to be a convincing act, Rosie. It's wearing a little thin now.
Rosie: It's not an act. It's...
Bond cocks his weapon menacingly pointing the automatic at her head.
Bond: Make your choice.
Rosie tries to run for her life but Dr. Kananga's deadly Voodoo sentries are everywhere.
Rosie panics and runs off almost completely dressed only Bond’s tank top.
Bond had the foresight to put on his pants and shoes before confronted Rosie after his final discharge of duties. He knew he wouldn't be able to point a gun at the double agent and get dressed at the same time so was ready for action when he began to turn the tables on Rosie.
Bond runs after her pulling on his shirt while brandishing his weapon.
Rosie runs passed another Voodoo scarecrow. This time we see that the sentry is equipped with twin video cameras in its eyes. The scarecrow’s mouth opens and a gun barrel equipped with a silencer appears and fires one deadly shot.
The beautiful Rosie Carver is killed.
Bond quickly realizes what has happened and stays out of range of the sentry’s weapon as he examines the late Rosie Carver from a distance, where she lays on the ground eyes open wearing only his tank top as a shroud.
Poor confused Rosie was caught up in a high stakes game that was way over her head. She could have been a decent agent. But Dr. Kananga clearly had some hold over her. Kananga used her and his goons disposed of her without a second thought.
Later we find out that it was Dr. Kananga’s henchmen Tee Hee that pulled the trigger on Rosie as they were concerned that she was about to give away too much about their operation to Bond, who had escaped death once again.
Back in the mansion, Dr. Kananga confronts Solitaire about the incident.
Solitaire as the High Priestess of Tarot
Dr. Kananga: You will explain what went wrong.
Solitaire, who is wrapped seemingly defensively in a jewel-encrusted peacock style coat, does her best to cover for the fact that she lied earlier.
Solitaire: I see the intervention of a woman.
Dr. Kananga sits at a table with his henchman Tee Hee standing behind him.
Tee Hee: The girl was about to confess. We had to kill her.
Dr. Kananga: The trap was set. Tee Hee was waiting and you saw death.
Thinking quickly Solitaire is able to deflect responsibility for the missed prognosis.
Solitaire: It must have been the girl's death. If you do not ask specific questions, I cannot be responsible for your misinterpretation of the answers.
Dr. Kananga is not pleased but Solitaire is safe for now. However, sadly we have to say good-bye to the beautiful Rosie Carver.
James Bond does end up deflowering Solitaire according to his plan. She askes for seconds after tasting the forbidden fruit for the first time.
Solitaire and Bond make love a number of times throughout the rest of the film. Solitaire has the honor of being the Bond girl that scores with 007 more than any other girl in the franchise.