The James Bond Bedside Companion (53 page)

The films also differ from the novels in plot details. The early movies tend to follow Fleming's original storylines for the most part; but the fifth film,
You Only
Live Twice, is nothing like the novel. Written by Roald Dahl, it is virtually a remake of
Dr. No
on a much grander scale.
The Spy Who Loved Me
is easily discernible as a remake of
You Only Live Twice;
and all of the films since
Goldfinger
contain sequences that rehash scenes from earlier efforts.

Roger Moore with co-producer Harry Saltzman on the set of
Live and Let Die
in New Orleans. (UPI Photo.)

Two films have screenplays that are fairly close to the Fleming originals:
From Russia With Love
and
On Her Majesty's Secret Service (OHMSS).
Not surprisingly, these are two of the best films in the series.
OHMSS
adheres almost perfectly to the novel, even daring to include the tragic ending—Bond's new bride is shot to death by archenemy Blofeld. As mentioned before, this is the only film that was not a runaway success. But
From Russia With Love,
the second film in the series, was very successful. Only a couple of departures from the original plot were made, i.e., changing the criminal organization from SMERSH to SPECTRE, and adding the Blofeld character.

Maibaum collaborated on ten of the thirteen Bond films (he wrote
OHMSS
alone). His cowriters included Berkley Mather, Johanna Harwood, Paul Dehn, John Hopkins, Tom Mankiewicz, Christopher Wood, George MacDonald Fraser, and Michael G. Wilson. This impressive track record can only indicate that Maibaum's work is an important element in the successful Bond formula.

THE DIRECTORS

D
eparting from the modem tradition of
auteurism
,
which emphasizes directorial control of all creative aspects of a film, the producers of the 007 series have forced their directors to work within strict artistic boundaries. But certain stylistic differences can be discerned among the chief directors of the Bonds, and play a subtle yet important part in the success or failure of the films.

Terence Young directed three of the best Bond films:
Dr. No
,
From Russia With Love
,
and
Thunderball.
Born in 1915, Young has had a fairly active career, having directed a number of films including
Corridor of Mirrors
(1948),
The Red Beret
and
Zarak
(1953 and 1956, respectively, both for producer Albert R. Broccoli), and
Too Hot to Handle (
1960). Since making the Bond films he achieved acclaim for directing
Wait Until Dark (
1967), and has gone on to direct other films such as
Red
Sun
(1971).

Terence Young, the man who directed
Dr. No, From Russia With Love
, and
Thunderball
. (Photo by Richard Schenkman.)

Young's directorial style is the most realistic of all
the Bond helmsmen. He maintains a stricter balance between seriousness and humor than others have; thus his films manage to avoid silliness. By the same token, his films move slower in contrast with most of the others and dynamic levels are kept more in the midrange. This helps as well as hinders the effectiveness of his efforts.
Thunderball
is the weakest of the three films in terms of excitement and suspense; but it is impressive visually. Violence is more pervasive in Young's films than in the others: there is the cold-blooded murder of Professor Dent and the breaking of the flash bulb on Quarrel's cheek in
Dr. No
; the gypsy girl fight and the brutal battle between Bond and Red Grant in
From Russia With Love
; and the murder of Domino's brother and the execution of Largo's henchman by throwing him to the sharks in
Thunderball
. All of these violent acts are presented with a high degree of realism—more blood, genuine fright on the part of the victims, and a cold point of view toward the act. Young also tends to pull strong performances from his actoss—
From Russia With Love
features perhaps the best ensemble acting of all the Bond films.

Guy Hamilton, director of
Goldfinger
,
Diamonds Are Forever
,
Live and Let Die
, and
The Man With the Golden Gun
, was born in 1922 and was once an as sistant to veteran director Carol Reed. Among his film credits are An Inspector Calls (1954),
The Man in the Middle
(1964),
Funeral in Berlin
(1965), and
The Battle of Britain
(1969). Hamilton's style incorporates quick editing, a faster pace, and a much more humorous approach to the material. This new style works extremely well in
Goldfinger
, works for the most part in
Diamonds Are Forever
, but backfires in his two later films. Hamilton's direction of
Goldfinger
was inspired and fresh, and ranks as the most trend-setting directorial job of all the films.

Lewis Gilbert, the director of
You Only Live Twice
,
The Spy Who Loved Me
, and
Moonraker
, was born in 1920 and has had a career as both a writer and director. His directorial efforts include
Albert RN
(1953), The Good Die Young (1954),
Reach for the Sky
(1956),
Sink the Bismarck
(1960), and
Alfie
(1966). He was nominated for an Academy Award for his direction of the last film. The most obvious stylistic element common to all three Gilbert-directed Bond films is that all are big productions. These films are the most expensive of the series (
Moonraker
holds the record with a budget of $30,000,000); and all, unfortunately, are basically variations of the same film.
You Only Live Twice
goes as far as the producers possibly can in terms of lavish sets, exotic locations, and far-out gadgets. The other two films repeat all this—only locations and hardware have been changed. Gilbert also uses a faster cutting style than Hamilton or Young. Gilbert's films move from one set-piece to another so rapidly that the audience barely has time to comprehend the change of locale. As a result, these three films suffer from overkill to the point that James Bond as a character scarcely exists. He is like a pinball in these films, bouncing around from place to place, getting in and out of predicaments—the action is so unrealistic that the films could be labelled science fiction comedy-fantasies.
Moonraker
in particular suffers from this flaw: it is so unrealistic as to be absurd—but this may be due more to the screenplay than the direction.

The other two directors, Peter Hunt (
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
) and John Glen (
For Your Eyes Only
and
Octopussy
), made impressive directorial debuts with their Bond films. Both men were Bond film veterans—Hunt was the editor and second unit director for previous Bond films, as was Glen. Their work will be discussed with their respective films.

ACTORS AND CHARACTERS

W
hen the producers received the go-ahead from United
Artists to make the first Bond film, the big question was: Who was going to play James Bond? Many names were tossed around, including David Niven (who would play Sir James Bond in the 007 spoof,
Casino Royale
),
Richard Burton, and, believe it or not, James Stewart. But because
Dr. No
had a relatively small budget, Broccoli and Saltzman were forced to go with an unknown. After many interviews and auditions, the producers came up with a handful of names. Reportedly, second on the list was Roger Moore. First on the list, as we have seen already, was Sean Connery.

Born in Edinburgh in 1930, Thomas Sean Connery was the son of a truck driver. He held many jobs, including newspaper boy, milkman, coffin polisher, cement mixer, and merchant seaman. He landed a chorus part in the British production of
South Pacific,
which led him to films. Before making
Dr. No,
Connery starred
in four forgettable films:
Another Time, Another Place
(1958), Walt Disney's
Darby O'Gill and the Little People
(1959),
Tarzan's Greatest Adventure
(1959), and
Frightened
City
(1960). It was the role of James Bond that made Sean Connery a star. By the mid-sixties he was the number one box-office draw the world over, and it wasn't because of his non-Bond films such as Hitchcock's
Mamie
or Sidney Lumet's
The Hill.
Connery became so identified with the character of James Bond that it was hard for audiences to accept anyone else in the part. The ad campaign for
You Only Live Twice
read: "Sean Connery Is James Bond in Ian Fleming's
You
Only
Live
Twice."
Inevitably, this alter-ego complex became too much for Connery, and he tried more than once to leave the Bond series. His boredom with the role is quite evident in
You Only Live Twice
,
after which he quit, but he was persuaded to return once more four years later in
Diamonds Are Forever
.

George Lazenby, who replaced Connery in
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
,
was an unknown Australian model. He had worked in TV commercials, but had no previous film acting experience. Lazenby had been a car salesman before switching to modeling. He was certainly handsome and dapper, but these modeling qualities did not create a plausible James Bond; audiences and critics alike gave him the unanimous thumbs down. In retrospect, Lazenby's performance is quite sincere, and he probably could have grown into the role with subsequent films. Lazenby has gone on to make other movies, such as Peter Bogdanovich's
Saint Jack.

Connery was enticed to play Bond again in
Diamonds Are Forever
,
having been lured back by the
very lucrative deal with United Artists recounted earlier. After
Diamonds Are Forever
, Connery insisted that he would never play Bond again, so the producers had to search for a new leading man once more. (Fortunately for Connery's fans, the actor played Bond once again in the non-Eon Productions film,
Never Say Never Again
, released in 1983.) Broccoli and Saltzman settled on their original second choice, Roger Moore.