Monday, September 22, 2008

No more 'Bond, James Bond'


From usatoday, Don't you love to hear the words "Bond, James Bond" in a James Bond movie? Well, you won't be hearing them in the new Quantum of Solace film, out in November. For the first time in his 22 screen outings, Britain's super cool secret agent will not utter the words of introduction that have been a tradition for 46 years. He also won't say another classic one-liner – "shaken not stirred" – when ordering his martini, according to director Marc Forster in The Independent.

"There was a 'Bond, James Bond' in the script," he said. "There are several places where we shot it as well, but it never worked as we hoped. I just felt we should cut it out," he says, and the producers as well as star Daniel Craig "agreed."

Graham Rye, who edits an online 007 Magazine says that Craig is much closer to author Ian Fleming's original vision for the character. "The Bond films had become tired and needed reinvigorating," he said. "Rather than going away from Fleming I think the producers have gone back to him." Rye added, "His announcing of himself had become a bit corny."
What do you say?

5 comments:

Landshark said...

Without having read any of Fleming's books, I agree.

AC said...

having read all fleming's bond stories, i agree.

Jordan said...

As I've pointed out elsewhere, the real innovation of Quantum of Solace is that it's a direct sequel to the last Bond movie. They've never done that before. Sure, Blofeld and SPECTRE came back, and Jaws reappeared (and delivered his sole line: "Well, here's to us"). But they've never done a sequel before.

Octopunk said...

Yeah, and having the balls to actually change stuff is why the new Bond is great. Though I still wish they had changed that weird title, Fleming's or not.

Jordan said...

Agreed, the title sucks. It's the kind of thing "The Architect" would say (from Matrix Reloaded) (obviously) in order to sound smart. Which is silly, because the smartest people on the planet all talk in straight lines and the simplest available words.

Something about "Bond...James Bond" always bothered me. I don't understand the underlying logic. Follow along with me:

"You are...?" (Villain and/or babe prompts Bond's introduction)

"Bond."

(Villain and/or babe: "This must be that MI-6 spy I've been hearing about, Commander Bond. Well, that certainly ups the ante, doesn't it? But somehow, I'm still not impressed.")

"...James Bond."

(Villain and/or babe: "Well, that's a completely different story! James Bond? Now I'm genuinely impressed, because [pick one:]

a) I thought it was his brother

b) I thought he would go by "Jim" or "Jimmy," or maybe a nickname like "Whipper" or "Tosh" (since he's a Brit from good schools)

c) I didn't think he'd reveal his first name, and, in so doing, make himself more vulnerable to...something

d) "Bond" is a nice name but "James" gives it so much more charisma and sex appeal that I just can't control myself (NOTE: this is coming from the babe, not the villian)

I mean....???? Can someone explain this? It's like "Shaken...not stirred." If I were the bartender and he ordered a vodka martini and then said "Shaken," I would think, "Okay, I'll just get out the old martini shaker here." Then Bond would say "...not stirred," and I would say, "Oh, I'm sorry, pal. Generally I do both, so it's a good thing you indicated that shaking your martini obviates the need to stir the martini." ("And furthermore, if you're so damn exacting, how about specifying a vodka? Because I'm giving you Popov.")

Malevolent

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