James Bond in the 21st Century: Why We Still Need 007
199
James Bond in the 21st Century: Why We Still Need 007
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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781935251583 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | BenBella Books, Inc. |
| Publication date: | 06/22/2009 |
| Sold by: | Penguin Random House Publisher Services |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 199 |
| File size: | 3 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
THE REAL JAMES BOND
RAYMOND BENSON
Can the Cinematic Bond Ever Be the Literary Bond?
JAMES BOND IS NOT a nice guy. He's often irritable and broods a great deal about his life and profession. Bond drinks too much, smokes too much, gambles too much, and treats women cold-heartedly and ruthlessly. He keeps to himself most of the time but overly indulges in the sensory pleasures that food, drink, tobacco, and sex give him because he knows that on any given day he may no longer be alive. Bond is good looking, but in a cold, cruel way, and he has a scar down his right cheek. He has no taste in art, music, theater, or film. Other than newspapers, whatever he reads is usually for his work — manuals on self-defense and the like — although he's been known to pick up an old Eric Ambler thriller for plane trips. He's painfully set in his ways, looks at the world with cynicism, has relatively no sense of humor, and can claim very few friends.
Not the image of James Bond you usually imagine? Unless you've read the original Ian Fleming novels then that's most likely the case, for this is a fairly accurate description of the character as depicted in the books.
It's no wonder that Ian Fleming found it very difficult for his literary creation to make the transition from the page to the silver screen. For nearly ten years, the author was concerned that James Bond might not become a film commodity at all.
The Long Road to the Big Film Deal
Ever since the first novel, Casino Royale, was published in the United Kingdom in 1953 (and in the United States in 1954), Fleming always envisioned a movie version of 007. Despite early sales of film rights and nibbles from Hollywood throughout the rest of that decade, however, the big movie deal eluded the author.
The first important early sale went to CBS television in 1954, shortly after the publication of the novel in America. The rights were sold to make a one-hour adaptation for the network's Climax!, a dramatic series of mystery and suspense adaptations taped live in the studio. Broadcast in October of that year, Casino Royale starred Barry Nelson as American "Jimmy" Bond, Peter Lorre as the villain Le Chiffre, and Linda Christian as the first Bond girl, Vesper Lynd. Needless to say, Nelson's television character had little to do with Fleming's literary creation other than he liked martinis and was an excellent card sharp. The teleplay, however, faithfully followed the novel's plot, albeit toned down for American audiences and the network censors.
Producer Gregory Ratoff bought the feature motion picture rights to Casino Royale in 1955 but did nothing with the property, sitting on it until his death in 1960. Ratoff's widow promptly sold the rights to Hollywood agent-turned-producer Charles K. Feldman, who also left the property undeveloped until late in the '60s, after the "official" film series produced by EON Productions had been underway for five years and was a runaway success. Casino Royale finally made it to the screen in 1967, but very little about it had much to do with Ian Fleming's original creation. Feldman, capitalizing on his 1965 "mod comedy" hit What's New, Pussycat? and fearing that he couldn't compete with the EON series, decided to make Casino Royale as a spoof of Bond and spy movies in general. The likes of Peter Sellers, David Niven, Woody Allen, Orson Welles, Ursula Andress, and Joanna Pettet starred in the picture, which critics and fans found to be a complete mess. It was neither funny nor coherent. It did, however, sport a lively and popular score by Burt Bacharach. But a Bond movie it wasn't.
A little later in 1955, Fleming sold the film rights to his third Bond novel, Moonraker, to the Rank Organization. Once again, the film company did nothing with the property, and Fleming eventually bought the rights back in 1959. The author was learning that the motion picture business was not an easy nut to crack.
Fleming toyed with other film possibilities during the '50s. During the summer of 1956 he was approached by NBC to develop a television series provisionally called Commander Jamaica. It was to be an adventure program filmed in the Caribbean, the author's stomping grounds and often a location for Bond stories, except that the main character was to be named James Gunn. Fleming wrote a treatment for the pilot but the project fell apart by the end of the year. Instead, Fleming used the basic plot of the treatment for his next 007 novel, Dr. No.
In early 1958 Fleming was approached once again by an American television network, this time CBS, to write thirty-two episodes for a James Bond television series. The author accepted the offer and worked on the first few outlines until this venture also fell by the wayside. Once again, Fleming retained some of the plot outlines and developed them into Bond short stories that were published in the 1960 anthology For Your Eyes Only.
Fleming's desire to bring James Bond to the screen was nearly squashed altogether when he entered into a partnership that would have disastrous results. The author's lifelong (and wealthy) friend Ivar Bryce had become a film producer. Bryce had formed Xanadu Productions with a young filmmaker named Kevin McClory. McClory was interested in making the first James Bond motion picture, but he was adamant that the film be based on an original screenplay and not one of Fleming's existing books. Thus, in the spring of 1959, Fleming, McClory, Bryce, and their friend Ernest Cuneo brainstormed about a possible plot in which two nuclear bombs are stolen by a criminal organization and used to collect ransom from the superpowers. Cuneo wrote a short outline which became the basis for James Bond of the Secret Service, the first original screenplay featuring 007. Fleming tried his hand at writing the first script and its subsequent revision but quickly realized that film writing was not his forte. McClory brought in a professional screenwriter, Jack Whittingham, to rewrite and polish the script. The project underwent a title change to Longitude 78 West, until Fleming made an executive decision and re-named it Thunderball. The story is notable for introducing the villainous organization SPECTRE and its leader, Ernst Stavro Blofeld.
Unfortunately, McClory's independent film produced by Bryce, The Boy and the Bridge, wasn't faring well. Fleming and Bryce apparently lost faith in the filmmaker. As McClory's efforts to interest a major studio in the project dragged into 1960, Fleming simply lost interest. Feeling that the movie project had died like all the others, he went on to write his next 007 novel and naïvely — and recklessly — incorporated the Thunderball plot. When the novel was published in 1961, Kevin McClory sued for plagiarism. In the 1963 court settlement, McClory gained ownership of the Thunderball film rights.
By that time, of course, the official series by EON Productions was in full swing. In late 1960, Canadian producer Harry Saltzman became interested in the Bond novels and in 1961 bought an option for all the existing titles (which excluded Casino Royale, since it had already been sold). Unbeknownst to him, London-based American producer Albert R. "Cubby" Broccoli also had become keen on producing a series of films based of Fleming's books but was stonewalled when he discovered that Saltzman had the option. The two men decided to join forces and produce the films together. They formed DANJAQ S.A., the holding company that governed the team's production company, EON. At first the producers picked Thunderball to be the first film but had to abandon the idea when the novel came under litigation. Dr. No became its replacement.
From Page to Screen — Changes and Innovations
While the search for an actor to play James Bond went forward, veteran Hollywood screenwriter Richard Maibaum adapted the novel to the screen (with the help of Johanna Harwood and Berkley Mather). From the onset, the producers felt that more humor needed to be injected into the stories. Broccoli and Saltzman wisely perceived that Fleming's brooding and cold misanthrope wouldn't play well to theater audiences of the early '60s. Hence, the cinematic Bond became a more sophisticated man-of-the-world with considerable knowledge in a variety of subjects. He also became a witty deliverer of sardonic quips as he dispatched adversaries and bedded voluptuous girlfriends. The decision was also made, especially beginning with the second film, From Russia with Love, to incorporate high-tech gadgetry into the series. The '60s was a decade in which electronics advancement skyrocketed, so it was only natural that an international secret agent should come equipped with all manner of outrageous — but possible — accoutrement. Fleming had experimented a little with spy hardware in the books, but not as extensively as the films eventually did. A trick attaché case is one thing; a hovercraft gondola in Venice is something else altogether.
The actor cast in the coveted role was Sean Connery, a relatively unknown Scot who had starred in a few forgettable pictures in the late '50s and very early '60s. What impressed the producers about him was his "animal magnetism." In truth, Connery was dissimilar to Fleming's literary character in many ways. Fleming's Bond was more of an upper-crust Etonian type (although Bond never finished his schooling at Eton), whereas Connery was decidedly Scot working class. Fleming had grave reservations. His idea of Bond was that of a young David Niven.
Enter Terence Young, the director of Dr. No. Young, a very sophisticated and adventurous man himself, took Connery under his wing and proceeded to educate the actor in the ways of being dapper, witty, and, above all, cool. Young escorted Connery around London, introducing him to the high life, the gambling parlors, the fancy restaurants, and the women. By the time shooting for Dr. No began in January 1962, Connery was ready. And Fleming was surprised and pleased to see what the filmmakers had done with his character. He was so impressed by Connery's portrayal that he indicated in subsequent novels that Bond was "half-Scottish," something to which he had never before alluded.
The first two Bond films, Dr. No (1962) and From Russia with Love (1963), were the only two that Ian Fleming saw. It was fortunate for him that these two pictures were more or less faithful in concept and storyline to his original novels. Sean Connery was not exactly the James Bond of the books, but he was nevertheless handsome, charismatic, and exciting. Much of the success of the early films can be attributed to Connery's instant star power, although it would be negligent not to mention that the pictures exhibited a wholly original style created by director Young, writer Maibaum, and editor Peter Hunt. Throw in the spectacular science fiction sets by production designer Ken Adam and the signature theme music composed by Monty Norman (and subsequent scores by John Barry) and the Bond films immediately became something very new in the action thriller genre. But when asked by reporters what he had thought of Dr. No after its premiere in London, Fleming implied that while it was a very good picture, anyone who had read the book would likely be disappointed.
Film historians might argue that it was the third Bond film, Goldfinger, released in 1964 shortly after Fleming's death, that became the blueprint for the continuing EON series. A new director, Guy Hamilton, injected even more humor into the proceedings. In Goldfinger, the tone slyly poked fun at itself, as if the filmmakers were winking at the audience. For example, Bond's first appearance involved emerging from water with a fake duck atop his scuba headpiece. When 007 pushed that red button ("Whatever you do, don't touch it!" warned Q) and the Aston-Martin's ejector seat sent the Korean guard flying, the audience couldn't help but scream with laughter. "This is all for fun, folks, so enjoy the ride," the filmmakers seemed to be saying. And it worked. Goldfinger was the first Bond film that really brought in the gold, so to speak. This was the picture that made James Bond and Sean Connery household names around the world. Suddenly, pop culture went secret agent–crazy. Bond imitations popped up everywhere — on television, in the cinemas, in comics, in books, and even in commercials. The mid-'60s displayed an onslaught of spy entertainment, from The Man from U.N.C.L.E., I Spy, Secret Agent, and Get Smart on television, to the Matt Helm and Derek Flint pictures in theaters. But it was James Bond who led the pack.
The End of the Classic Period
Aficionados agree that the Bond films of the '60s represented the "Classic" period of 007 onscreen. Even though Sean Connery announced his retirement from the role of 007 after the blockbusters Thunderball (1965) and You Only Live Twice (1967), there was to be one more entry in the series that fell within this Classic period.
In 1968 the producers held yet another talent search to re-cast the now world-renowned secret agent and came up with Australian George Lazenby, an unknown male model who had never acted before. He certainly looked the part and probably could have grown into the role if given the chance. It didn't hurt that Peter Hunt, the new director, wanted to film On Her Majesty's Secret Service as faithfully to Fleming's novel as he could, including the downbeat ending in which Bond's new wife is murdered within an hour of the wedding. The film, released in 1969, was not a success. Lazenby, who had more or less done a Sean Connery imitation, was let go, Hunt was dismissed, and Broccoli and Saltzman did everything they could to woo Connery back to the role one more time for 1971's Diamonds Are Forever. What is interesting to note is that today the hardcore James Bond fans regard On Her Majesty's Secret Service to be one of the best films in the series, if not the best. Lazenby's performance has been reevaluated, the picture itself is deemed the most accurate representation of a Fleming novel onscreen, and it is now considered one of the great, classic Bond films.
A New Decade and a New Type of Bond Film
Guy Hamilton returned to helm Connery's one-time return for Diamonds Are Forever, and this time the director imbued the film with more humor than ever before, sometimes dipping into slapstick. After the financial failure of On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the producers must have dictated that the new Bond film be more of an "entertaining romp" than a serious spy picture. Audiences apparently loved the result, for Diamonds Are Forever brought the grosses back on track. And Connery said goodbye once more.
English actor Roger Moore took over the role and slipped into this new style of Bond picture with ease. The movies themselves veered directly into what could be called "action comedies" rather than "action thrillers." Everything was played for laughs, even the eye-popping stunts and set pieces. Fleming's Bond character virtually disappeared, replaced by a pinball bouncing between the various action sequences that attempted to form some semblance of a plot. Roger Moore held court in this position for a total of seven movies over thirteen years. While he may have been suitable to play Bond by appearance and background alone, Roger Moore turned the character into a rather smarmy, eyebrow-raising international playboy who never seemed to get hurt.
Perhaps the filmmakers felt that Bond had already become a parody of himself by this time. Did audiences fail to take James Bond seriously anymore? Were laughs, big stunts, huge set pieces, and gadgets the only bankable elements of a 007 film in the '70s? Whatever the answers to these questions might be, there is no argument to the fact that Roger Moore's Bond films made even more money than those of the '60s.
One interesting development occurred in 1983 — during the Roger Moore era — and it involved none other than Sean Connery and the filmmaker who had originally collaborated with Ian Fleming on the Thunderball screenplay from the late '50s. After legally winning the film rights to the property in 1963, Kevin McClory made a deal with EON producers Broccoli and Saltzman to co-produce Thunderball as the fourth EON James Bond film (McClory received full producer credit). McClory retained the remake rights and he attempted to exercise them a few times during the '70s but EON's powerful lawyers threw obstacles in his way until 1982, when McClory joined forces with independent producer Jack Schwartzman. Together, they managed to convince a studio to remake Thunderball. Entitled Never Say Never Again, the picture was released as a rival film, by a rival production company, to compete with EON's then current picture, Octopussy. McClory and Schwartzman even had an ace up their sleeve — Connery — who agreed to play Bond again in the renegade movie. And while Never Say Never Again may have been a more faithful representation of the "early" Bond films and even Fleming's Thunderball novel, it lacked the glitz, glamour, and important trademark elements of the EON series such as the opening "gunbarrel" logo and familiar Bond theme music. Reception was mixed.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "James Bond in the 21st Century"
by .
Copyright © 2006 John Cox.
Excerpted by permission of BenBella Books, Inc..
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Table of Contents
The Real James Bond,
Can the Cinematic Bond Ever Be the Literary Bond? Raymond Benson,
The Sexual Subtext of 007 John Cox,
"Bland ... James Bland" Lee Pfeiffer,
The Spy Who Would Not Die Mark W. Tiedemann,
Interlude: Drink Like Bond,
The James Bond Debates,
What Is the Best Bond Movie? Bonding By the Numbers ... Ray Dempsey,
What Are the Best and Worst Gadgets from Q Branch? DON'T PRESS THAT BUTTON! JA Konrath,
Who Is the Sexiest Bond Girl? "My Name Is Coochie McPantsless, What's Yours?" Erin Dailey and Harry Elliott,
Who Is the Best Bond Villain? If I Were a Villain, But Then Again, No Steven Rubio,
Who Is the Best James Bond? Dalton's Gang Michael Marano,
Interlude: Eat Like Bond,
How to Make James Bond Your Bitch,
Chinks in the Armor Lawrence Watt-Evans,
Agent 007 Performance Review Natasha Giardina,
So You Want to Be an Evil Genius David Morefield,
"I knew Julius No. Julius No was a friend of mine. Osama, you are no Dr. No." Raelynn Hillhouse,
Interlude: Dress Like Bond,
James Bond in the 21st Century,
Why Do We Still Want to Be James Bond? Andrea Carlo Cappi,
Nobody Does It Better Louis Markos,
"An Englishman's Word Is His Bond" Adam Roberts,
Covalent Bonds Sarah Zettel,
James Bond: Now More Than Ever Bruce Bethke,
Acknowlegments,