Skyfall

[rhionnach]

Ever since I saw the first James Bond film on TV with Sean Connery in it I have hated James Bond. I took an immediate dislike to the character's slapping the massage woman on the bottom and shortly afterwards being responsible for the woman who was killed by being painted gold. Due to the hideous character's sexism I went through life avoiding Bond wherever possible although I had inexplicably managed to see Moonraker a couple of times.

Things took a downturn when I lived with a Bond fan who insisted on getting the films on DVD and making me watch them. It did nothing for my liking of the character. I still have all the DVDs up to Casino Royale but I refused to see Quantum of Solace/Silence (whatever, do I care?) when I had the choice of doing so.

So it comes as a bit of a surprise that I decided to see Skyfall, and even more surprising that I actually liked it! It doesn't change my views on the earlier Bond films but I can see that this one was different.

I don't care what Bond fans may say but the only way I can accept James Bond is that the name is a code name (just like M and Q) and is transferred to different individuals (just like M and Q). Either that, or James Bond is a Time Lord. (And there is some support for that in Timothy Dalton's appearence in Dr Who).

Comments

[wolfette]

I told you it was different - first Bond movie I've actually enjoyed rather than endured and gone "meh".

Passing The Title

[fiat-knox.livejournal.com]

It could well be that, in these fantasies, a well-placed, skilled, particularly competent military type - and here, Ian Fleming plays to the Old Etonian fantasy of such aristocratic types being la creme de la creme, in defiance of the chinless, jeering, yaroohing Bullingdon Club pig ignorant chavs which are the reality - comes to the attention of the top brass at MI5, who then assign him the title of "Commander James Bond" and the code designation of "007," supposedly the code designation of Dr John Dee in Elizabeth I's court if you believe Fortean Times, and send him out as a replacement to face the bad guys and run around wearing a tux while dodging bullets and big men with metal teeth.

Meanwhile, there are about fifty real operatives - the agents are the ones sitting at home sifting through the field reports and trying to make sense of it all - that just look like ordinary citizens, all just going about their cover jobs, while quietly and efficiently planting the bombs, hacking the bank accounts, taking down the bad guy's underworld contacts and generally doing their thing to undermine the bad guys' plans so that when James Bond's little firecracker goes up, all the rest of the SPECTRE nuclear installation hidden in the volcano follows suit.

Sometimes, you need a shill to make a noise and put on a bit of a wounded bird act to misdirect the bad guys, while the faceless, anonymous operatives, dressed as underlings and henchmen, do the real work behind the scenes.

Wouldn't you just love it if I wrote a James Bond story? :D

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

Condensed, that's very much the idea behind 1988's Without a Clue, which rolls with the supposition that Conan Doyle based Sherlock Holmes upon a physician of his acquaintance, and makes that physician Dr Watson himself, who must (sometimes literally) prop up a false-front actor “Holmes” whose job is merely to look good and deliver his lines without falling down.

There's also a strong taste of this idea in, of all things, The Hitchhiker's Guie to the Galaxy, where the President of the Galaxy is a flashy figurehead twit while the real decisions are made by someone who isn't aware that he's doing so, on the theory that “those who seek power are the very ones least fit to have it”.

[judith dumont (from livejournal.com)]

Can't stand James Bond - I had him inflicted on me every Xmas for years by my parents - however, on the recommendation of a fellow Bond-hater, I might give this one a try.

[autopope.livejournal.com]

I don't care what Bond fans may say but the only way I can accept James Bond is that the name is a code name (just like M and Q) and is transferred to different individuals (just like M and Q).

That's actually the premise of the 1960s Casino Royale (which features Basil Rathbone, Woody Allen, and Orson Welles, and takes the piss out of the original subject matter -- it's so bad it's sublime, like a for-real 1960s Austin Powers).

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

- Where was Basil Rathbone? [Of course I could research it, but if you happen to recall…]

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

It helps to read the books. Or one of them: Pick one. The movies don't do justice to the character… except when they're not trying; George Lazenby's depiction in On Her Majesty's Secret Service was dismissed at the time as “uncharacteristic” by critics who only knew the hamfest film versions… but in fact his portrayal of Bond as quiet, conflicted and competent, not a flashy womanizer, was much closer to what Ian Fleming wrote.

I actually agree with you to some extent: I have four Bond movies and I've only watched one - From Russia With Love, which I'd call one of the best of them. By the time Roger Moore rode it half to death there wasn't much left.

[luvlymish.livejournal.com]

I wonder whether you'd prefer the written stories to the films given that they are very different, and I find this latest incarnation of Bond closer to those.

[baron-waste.livejournal.com]

Yet actually, From Russia With Love turns out to be a remarkably accurate book-to-film: The biggest change I've found, believe it or not, is that Daniela Bianchi is blonde, where 'Tatiana Romanova' was brunette…

The subject is interesting, though you can see how it lends itself to parody. I'm half-convinced the real reason the 'Cold War' went on for so long is simply because it was FUN… though John LeCarré disagrees; he observed agents doing stupid, dangerous things out of simple boredom.