Quiet Day, So I'm Wittering About James Bond

[poliphilo]

Bond works for the government. As an assassin. He's an establishment man- sexist, materialist, brutal.  No, I've never liked him.

I keep thinking I should maybe read one of the original books and then I think, no, I don't believe I can be bothered.

The films aren't nearly as good as we're supposed to think they are. Early Bond is to the thriller what the Carry On films are to comedy. Middle period Bond is vaudeville.  In the recent films he becomes a superhero.

I find his continued popularity faintly depressing.

Rush Limbaugh says it's inconceivable the character should be played by a black man. Oh, for fuck's sake, Bond is fiction. And he keeps being rebooted and updated. If it were incumbent on the film-makers to stay entirely true to Fleming's original conception Bond, who first appeared in 1953, would have to be played by a man in his nineties.

Besides, Idris Elba is just about the sexiest, most charismatic male actor around. He'd be perfect for the role.

If you like that kind of thing...

Comments

[artkouros.livejournal.com]

I do like that sort of thing. I listened to all the Bond books on audio - they are a delicious window into that era.

[halfmoon-mollie.livejournal.com]

Well, I read some of the original books. Anyone would think that all spies do is drive fast cars and have lots of sex. Brother and I went to see SkyFall, I hadn't seen a Bond film since Sir Sean Connery's last ones. eh.

Rush Limbaugh is an idiot.

Merry Christmas or...Holiday greetings anyway.

[resonant.livejournal.com]

I would be ok with a jane bond, too.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

I did read a lot of the original Bond books when I was in my teens. I enjoyed them at the time, but I suspect they were a product of their time. As to the film Bond, I've never like him until some of the recent incarnations. As to him being a superhero, he is up to a point, but I find him less so than the American versions such as Bourne.

[ooxc.livejournal.com]

The books were slightly amusing - I was 20-something when they began to appear in paperback. I've suffered a few of the films in other people's houses - not impressed,

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

There is a theory that Ian Flemming created James Bond as halfway between a wish-fulfillment fantasy of and a parody of the kinds of things they were doing in the OSS.

[(Anonymous)]

I've never gotten the thing about Bond, either. I love Sean Connery, but I have never seen more than 15 minutes of a Bond film.

[davesmusictank.livejournal.com]

Well as far as Bond is concerned i shall have mine shaken not stirred