Take a look at this scene from Doctor No.
What’s the most remarkable thing about this scene? The fact that Bond is obviously scared shitless.
How often have we seen him that way? In most Bond movies he’d be cool as a cucumber, disposing of the threat calmly and with a quip (or, if it’s the Daniel Craig Bond, with swift brutal efficiency and no quip – but no fear either).
But this scene was from the very first* Bond movie, before the films had drifted as far from the books as they eventually would. I’ve recently started reading through the original Bond books, and the James Bond of the novels is a far cry from the supercool superhuman of most of the movies (and almost as far a cry from the ice fury of the recent movies) – instead he’s a fallible, flawed, psychologically messed-up human being who pops pills, whimpers in his sleep, irritates people (I mean unintentionally), and doubts the morality of his missions. Oh yeah, and he looks like Hoagy Carmichael.
I wouldn’t mind seeing a Bond movie that was actually based on the books. But I’m not holding my breath.
* Movie trivia fact: okay, strictly speaking the first Bond film was a low-budget 1954 tv-movie of Casino Royale (unconnected with either the 1967 spoof or the 2006 reboot). But hardly anybody’s seen it (I have – they’re not missing anything).
I used to have a complete set of the original 13 Bond books (not 1st printings, unfortunately) and I agree. They are much more interesting than the movies. The books that were NOT written by Ian Fleming don’t even exist as far as I’m concerned
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Ah, but the 1950s TV version of “Casino Royale” DID have one saving grace — the wonderful Peter Lorre as the very first filmed Bond villain!
It was certainly a grace. Enough to be saving? Of that I’m less sure.
The one Bond film that actually has any meaning, or is about anything, is On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
Not only does Bond seem scared at times, but actually seems vulnerable too, in the scene where he’s being pursued in the small Swiss village, as Tracy skates up and saves him.
All of the other Bond films are to one degree or another meaningless, dull, morally repugnant (Bond threatens numerous women with beatings, including his beloved wife Tracy — and actually beats up Maud Adams in The Man With The Golden Gun) and absurd (not one scene in Die Another Day is believable).
Live and Let Die is a great book, but it’s also terribly racist, and the message of Goldfinger is that all a lesbian really needs is one good man to turn her around.
This reminds that all the talk of an _Atlas Shrugged_ movie does not excite me. Hollywood will probably butcher it.
Hoagie Carmichael? Wasn’t he the former African American political radical turned sandwich shop proprietor?
No, you’re thinking of Batman.
They made a big mistake to update and ‘modernise’ Bond. They should still make Bond movies, but they should all be set in the 1960s. Long live classic spy-fi !!