From Novel to Film pt. 22: Children of Men

THE NOVEL

"We are outraged and demoralized less by the impending end of our species, less even by our inability to prevent it, than by our failure to discover the cause. Western science and Western medicine haven't prepared us for the magnitude and humiliation of this ultimate failure. (...) Western science has been our god. (...) It has been my god too, even if its achievements are incomprehensible to me, and I share the disillusionment of those whose god has died."

Theo Faron is a historian who lives alone. He's divorced, his wife having left him for someone else, a few years after Theo backed over their daughter in the driveway with their car and killed her. Unintentionally, but nonetheless.

Theo of the film is younger, not a historian, and did not run over his daughter (who is changed to a son who dies from the flu.)

His former mentor, Jasper, lives in seclusion with his invalid wife, and his brother Xan is Warden of England. Xan and his fellow Council members rule rather aloofly, which isn't a concern of Theo's until he is contacted by a former student, Julian, who asks him to go to the Council and deliver a list of demands from the would-be partisan group, The Five Fishes, she and four others have formed. 

Jasper of the film is changed to a rowdy marijuana grower.

Xan is changed to Nigel, a government minister, and he is confined to a single scene. While we're here, I wonder what Roger Waters thinks of this shot.

And - most changed of all - the ex-wife becomes Julian in the film, who is the leader of an already-active partisan group.

These demands are a) a return to unrestricted immigration, b) an end to the Quietus: 

this is the state-sponsored assisted-suicide program.

c) a shutdown of the brutal (and sealed-from-public-scrutiny) Isle of Man penal colony, and d) a shutdown of the state-sponsored pornography shops. Theo is disturbed by some of what the group tells him, particularly about the elderly being forced into Quietus rather than volunteering for it, so he visits a seaside town to observe a Quietus ritual firsthand. When he recognizes Jasper's wife, Helen, trying to escape the Quietus ship, he tries to help her and is knocked unconscious. After this, he agrees to visit Xan and plead on the group's behalf.

He is conflicted about this for many reasons. First and foremost, he doubts it will do any good. Second, when we meet Theo, he's a character who has largely surrendered. Along with most of humanity. He is suspended between the sublimation practiced by many of his countrymen (elaborate birthday and baptism rituals for pets, dollmaking, All Is Love cults and a Church of England that has "moved from the theology of sin and redemption to a less uncompromising doctrine: corporate social responsibility coupled with a sentimental humanism", and the lawlessness of "the Omegas," the generation born in 1995/1996) and the outright denial of most everyone else, who are content to keep their gardens tidy and keep up appearances so long as the electricity stays on and the streets are kept safe. 

Theo is blasé about the real suffering the Five Fishes describe - are things really so bad? Even if they are, is it realistic to expect to win hearts and minds given the impending end-of-everything? Also, his training as a historian allows him to see non-altruistic historical parallels within the group, particularly in their leader, Rolf, whom Theo suspects, accurately, as simply wanting to take Xan's place as unchallenged supreme leader of England.

The movie significantly ratchets up the police-state/ world pandemonium aspect.

Theo's arc is one from cynical inaction and (an understandable) lack of forward momentum ("even when he killed his daughter, he was moving backwards," says one Council member. Ouch.) to engaging with the present, sluggishly at first, and seizing the future. Making him a historian ("someone who interprets the past to understand the present and confront the future - the least rewarding discipline for a dying species") serves this well.  

What I felt was envy and regret, not for something lost but for something never achieved. 

He is the embodiment of the civilizational malaise that has come fully out of the shadows in humanity's eleventh hour. What spurs him from this observer role is the reveal that Julian is pregnant. Rolf thinks he is the father and plans to leverage his world-saving sperm into becoming the new Warden. Theo thinks Rolf is rather foolish, but the miracle of a pregnant girl in a barren world - and the affection and protectiveness it stirs in him - weds him to their cause. He agrees to help them get to Wales, where they will hide out, have the baby, and then make their demands of Xan's Council. 

Quite a few changes in the film:

Julian is, as aforementioned, the name of his ex-wife, not the pregnant girl, Kee:

an invention of the film, played by Clare-Hope Ashitey.

Miriam (Kee's midwife and protector) is an important character in both book and film, though film-Miriam is more a composite of many characters from the book.

And there is no Rolf, though Luke, the group's leader in the film (Chiwetel Ejiofor) also wants to harness the miracle for the increase of his own power. Chiwetel is always good - no exception here.

As predicted, Xan and the Council reject all the demands as insensible and warn Theo of aiding any state-subversives. After commandeering food and a vehicle from an elderly couple watching Neighbours - a detail I loved - Theo and Miriam spirit spirit Julian to the estate where Theo and Xan spent summers together as children. There, Julian gives birth to her baby.

Xan and the authorities arrive, and he goes in alone to talk to Theo. They get into a standoff at gunpoint, and when the baby's sudden cry startles and distracts Xan, Theo shoots him. He takes the Coronation Ring of England from his cousin's finger and slips it onto his own before revealing the baby to the other Council members. Theo puts the sign of the cross on the baby's forehead. The end.

Fantastic book. I don't think the Xan/Theo stand-off makes a great deal of sense, nor is it exactly clear why we're led to believe people would follow Theo simply for having the Coronation Ring on his finger. But it's also an ambiguous ending, perhaps suggesting that that miracle aside, Theo, changed or not, can only become only a kinder, gentler dictator. Is it an ironic gesture or an act of reclamation? The human comedy, after a brief intermission, perpetuates itself?

Pessimistic? Perhaps. But it's not really written that way. First off, it's much more explicitly religious than the film. Not in a preachy way, just that Theo's fall-from-faith is explored more, and the prose (which is quite beautiful - I'm highly motivated to read P.D. James' other work, which while I understand to be quite different, likely is still just as eloquently written) is definitely concerned with how faith and the supernatural might play out in a world where both the religion and science of procreation are so bewildered.  

"'I don't think (God) bargains.'

'Oh yes He does. I may not be religious, but I know my Bible. My mother saw to that. He bargains all right. But He's supposed to be just. If He wants belief, He'd better provide some evidence.'

'That He exists?'

'That He cares.'"

THE FILM

Where to start? What a fantastic film, easily one of the best the 21st century has produced thus far. Alfonso Cuarón has proven to be an ambitious director, and the long tracking shots (excellently augmented by CGI that never overwhelms) are as good as any out there. Not to mention the sets - the London and England of tomorrow look suitably familiar-yet-alien, majestic-yet-foreboding.

Cuarón grounds the fantastic premise with great little moments, too, such as the dreadlock-guy's bungled wrath, Theo's difficulty finding shoes that fit him once he and Kee begin their run, or the ongoing tease of Kee's baby's name (tied up so beautifully in her last moments with Theo.) While bleak and violent in spots it's a transcendent work: epic with a personal touch, moving without surrendering to cliches, and big-production-impressive without seeming ostentatious.

And the performances are stellar. First off, Clive Owen as Theo.

Brilliant performance. His best? Some say Croupier. I say this. On one hand, he's an Everyman-reluctant-world-savior; on the other, he's a self-medicating, broken mess.

His journey from anguish to redemption is brought home especially well at the end, where his face and whole body slowly unclench as Kee reveals what her baby's name is.

Throughout the film we see Theo smile and laugh quite a bit, but it's always with a remote sadness and detachment, never quite reaching the eyes. Compare those smiles to his face here in the boat, not necessarily this screencap but next time you see it.

Jasper's role is significantly expanded, and Michael Caine makes the character his own. The Jasper of the film and novel are wholly different.

Caine says he based his stoned-mannerisms on how John Lennon used to act when he was stoned. I have no way of knowing if that is accurate or not, obviously - just passing it along.

As a tangible presence of a sort of stubborn (if chemically induced) and zany optimism of humanity, irreverent in the face of disaster, defiant in the face of fascism, Caine is pretty much pitch-perfect. Theo clearly loves him, but the death of his son has rendered him too emotionally inert to be swept up in his energy. (It probably would have been one-bleak-bridge-too-far to retain Theo's infanticide from the book.)

I mentioned Chiwetel and Clare-Hope, above - they essentially play characters invented for the film, but both rise to the occasion well. There's no slack in the line - this is a great cast doing great work on the set-to-end-all-sets.

The Omegas of the novel are nowhere to be seen, but they aren't really missed.

Their symbolic "preciousness" and alienation are encapsulated quite well in the scene where Theo visits Nigel. (And yes, that's Chuck Bass.)

The ending is changed significantly. No Theo's taking the Coronation Ring for his own, no sign of the cross, no Xan. Theo and Kee go into Bexhill - the Isle of Man from the novel augmented considerably - where she gives birth, then there's a massive shootout set piece between the authorities and Luke's insurrectionist army. (If Cuarón wasn't chanelling Kubrick here, then it's the happiest accident in cinema history.) 

In one of the film's most memorable sequences, the sound of Kee's baby crying cuts through the air and brings all action to a halt.

The whole escape plan hinges on being picked up by the Tomorrow, a boat from The Human Foundation, a seed-vault of personalities sequestered on an Atlantic island.

I wonder how the film would come across without the shot above? Just Kee in the boat, and fade to black, draw your own conclusions? More like the novel, perhaps, but I'm glad they didn't elect to find out. As it is, it ends with John Lennon's "Freda People" over the end credits. (A song that usually ended up on mix tapes I made for anyone 1994-1998. Another? "In the Court of the Crimson King," also in the film, when Theo is driven to see his brother. Guess Alfonso Cuarón and I would do okay on a road trip.)
 
The film (timely for 2015) casts a withering eye on immigration paranoia, even within the heightened tension of the barren future. This is amplified from the book, but it's there, too:

"People became tired of invading hordes, from countries with just as many natural advantages as this, who had allowed themselves to be misgoverned for decades through their own cowardice, indolence, and stupidity, and who expected to take over and exploit the benefits which had been won over centuries by intelligence, industry and courage, while incidentally perverting and destroying the civilization of which they were so anxious to become part." 

You hear plenty of variations of that in 2015.

Final Verdict: As a novel: solid A. As a film: A+, maybe A++. As an adaptation: quite a fascinating mix of subtext from the book, intelligently transcribed to the screen. It's a great example of how a reboot / reinterpretation can both illuminate why and how the original was great and also create something new and original.

Ian Fleming's James Bond: The Short Stories

RANKING the ORIGINAL BOND 

SHORT STORIES by IAN FLEMING

I didn't know what to make of these the first time I read them. My mistake was perhaps to read them with the same set of analytical tools I was taught as an undergrad on stuff like Updike's "A-and-P" or Mailer's "The Language of Men." (Two pretty much perfectly-structured short stories.) Those tools don't work so well with something like "Risico." But stories are written for all sorts of audiences and with all sorts of aims, of course - no one is suggesting there's a one-size-fits-all approach to them. The only thing you can do is establish the context as best you can and see how and where they fit into that. True for stories, true for life, I say.

The questions I asked of the following were: Is it a situation that is exciting to see Bond sort out? If it isn't, is its lack of traditional Bond excitement all the more interesting for its absence? Are the characters we meet fleshed-out, and do they interact with Bond in a more than perfunctory way? Finally, do we learn anything about Bond that we don't already know from the novels? I assigned points for those and ranked accordingly, like I like to do.

And here we go - presented least-to-most favorite:

9. "The Property of a Lady" (1963)

Takes place between "The Living Daylights" and Chapters 1–5 of On Her Majesty's Secret Service. (For those who care, I used John Griswold's chronology, not Henry Chancellor's.)

Bond is called into M's office for a brief history of The House of Fabergé from Dr. Fanshawe, adviser to the C.I.D. and H.M. Customs on antique jewelry. (Bond notes he's dressed "rather foppishly in the neo-Edwardian fashion.") He's given this information because Maria Freudenstein - a known KGB agent working for MI6 in a department created specially for her so they can feed false info back to the Soviets - is about to receive her big pay-off for years of dedicated work. She was sent one of Fabergé's greatest works - the Emerald Sphere - with a drummed-up story of it being a family heirloom. She agrees to sell it at auction. M and Bond both agree that this sale will almost certainly be attended by the KGB's head man in London - presently unknown to them - who will try to drum up the price to increase the size of Ms. Freudenstein's "pension." 

Bond is dispatched to the auction to spot him, whereupon he will be rounded up and deported and the Russians' London-based spying seriously disrupted.

Not all of Bond's adventures need involve exotic ladies or locales - though Sotheby's is certainly something to behold. I quite liked it, even if we're starting off in the last spot. As a general rule, if your story involves "Soviet secret agents in the West," I'll be on board. I grew up two hundred klicks from the Iron Curtain and never got over it. 

8. "For Your Eyes Only" (1960)

Takes place between "From a View to a Kill" and Thunderball.

"You can get far in North America with laconic grunts. Huh, hun, and hi! in their various incarnations, together with sure, guess so, that so? and nuts! will meet almost any contingency."

True in 1960, true in 2015. 

Adapted for The Daily Express, Sep - Dec 1961.

When two gunmen murder two of M's oldest friends, the Havelocks, on behest of an ex-Nazi named Von Hammerstein, Bond volunteers himself for the mission to take him out. With some unofficial help from the Canadian secret service, Bond tracks them to a residence in Vermont, where he stalks them from the nearby hills with a sniper rifle. He runs into Judy Havelock, who is there on a mission of vengeance herself, but armed only with a bow and arrow. He berates her for being a damn fool and tells her assassination is "man's work," before reluctantly agreeing to team up and complete the mission.

That "man's work" business might understandably piss the female assassins of the world right off, particularly when Judy agrees with Bond after all the killing's been done. (You can almost see the rage-memes and hashtags.) But context, people: every other sentence of the story is about Bond's distaste for the work. This isn't to excuse the sexist perspective - you want to explore Bond's sexism, there's an awful lot to work with. But at least read this story correctly: Fleming is not having Judy validate said perspective; she's expressing the humanity Bond suppresses.

Speaking of that inner monologue, we eavesdrop further on Bond's meandering thoughts as he painstakingly awaits nightfall so he can move into position.

"Was this a hill or a mountain? At what height does a hill become a mountain? Why don't they manufacture something out of the silver bark of birch trees? It looks so useful and valuable. The best things in America are chipmunks, and oyster stew. In the evening, darkness doesn't really fall, it rises. When you sit on top of a mountain and watch the sun go down behind the mountain opposite, the darkness rises up to you out of the valley. Will the birds one day lose their fear of man? It must be centuries since man has killed a small bird for food in these woods, yet they are still afraid. Who was this Ethan Allen who commanded the Green Mountain Boys of Vermont? Now in American motels they advertise Ethan Allen furniture as an attraction. Why? Did he make furniture? Army boots should have rubber soles like these."

The New York / Vermont border region where the story takes place.

7. "007 in New York" (1963)

Takes place between Chapters 1–5 of On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Chapters 10–15 of The Spy Who Loved Me.

 

"But New York did not have everything. One can hardly credit the deficiency, but there is no Reptile House at the Central Park Zoo." 

The story-behind-the-story for this, as summed up by Fleming: "I am well aware these grim feelings I’ve expressed for New York * may shock or depress some of my readers. In fact, I would be disappointed if this were not the case. In deference to these readers, I here submit the record of another visitor to the city, a friend of mine with the dull name of James Bond, whose tastes and responses are not always my own and whose recent minor adventure in New York (his profession is a rather odd one) may prove more cheerful in the reading."

* He refers to his less-than-flattering account of New York City for Thrilling Cities. 

"007 in New York" is simply an account of Bond's taxi ride from the airport to his hotel. He's been dispatched to New York to tell a former Secret Service agent that her boyfriend works for the KGB. He anticipates no difficulties. He muses on Americans and his forthcoming rendezvous with a girl named Solange.

"Were the Americans becoming too hygienic in general - too bug-conscious? Every time Bond made love to Solange, at a time when they should be relaxing in each other's arms, she would retire to the bathroom for a long quarter of an hour and there was a lengthy period after that when he couldn't kiss her because she had gargled with TCP. And the pills she took as if she had a cold! Enough to combat double pneumonia. But James Bond smiled at the thought of her and wondered what they would do together that evening. Again."

I love these mind-of-Bond moments. The paragraph that informs the very end of the story - the "New York did not have everything" bit, above - also tells you a bit more about our old pal Felix: 

"New York had everything. He had heard, though he had never succeeded in tracing them, that one could see blue films with sound and color and that one's sex life was never the same thereafter. That would be an experience to share with Solange! And that bar, again still undiscovered, which Felix Leiter had told him was the rendezvous for sadists and masochists of both sexes. If you were a sadist, you wore the gloves under the left shoulder strap. For the masochists, it was the right. As with the transvestite places in Paris and Berlin, it would be fun to go and have a look. 

I suppose as a CIA and Pinkerton's man, it's his job to know these things. Of course. I also love the bit about the blue films "with sound and color." One wonders how Fleming's Bond (or Fleming himself) would characterize the internet porn age.

In the end, of course, they would probably just go to The Embers or to hear Solange's favorite jazz and then home for more love and TCP." 

6. "Risico" (1960)

Takes place between Goldfinger and "Quantum of Silence." 

Bond meets with Kristatos, a CIA informant, about stopping the Soviet-funded flow of heroin into the UK. Kristatos agrees to help if Bond will take out Colombo, whom, he swears, is the man in charge of the heroin smuggling. Colombo gets wind of this and kidnaps Bond to tell him the truth: it is Kristatos who is smuggling the heroin, not himself. He is a man of honor. Bond believes him and joins Colombo and his men to attack Kristatos.

Published as "The Double Take" in The Daily Express, April 1960.

This and "For Your Eyes Only" were mashed together to form much of the plot for the For Your Eyes Only film.

Chaim Topol brings Colombo to life memorably.

Just a great little story. Not much to it. I loved this:

"M had certain bees in his bonnet. There were queen bees, like the misuse of the Service, and the search for true as distinct from wishful intelligence, and there were worker bees. These included idiosyncrasies as not employing men with beards, or those were completely bilingual, instantly dismissing men who tried to bring pressure to bear on him through family relationships with members of the Cabinet, mistrusting men and women who were too "dressy," and those who called him 'sir' off-duty; and having an exaggerated faith in Scotsmen."

Bond makes several fun observations of M in the novels, but this one is the most eccentric.

5. "From a View to a Kill" (1959)

 Takes place between "The Hildebrand Rarity" and "For Your Eyes Only."

"One cannot drink seriously in French cafes. Out of doors on a pavement in the sun is no place for vodka or whiskey or gin. A bottle of indifferent champagne is a bad foundation for the night. Pernod is possible, but it should be drunk in company, and anyway, Bond had never liked the stuff because its licorice taste reminded him of his childhood. No, in cafes you have to drink the least offensive of the musical comedy drinks that go with them, and Bond always had the same thing - an Americano - and for the soda he always stipulated Perrier, for in his opinion expensive soda water was the cheapest way to improve a poor drink." 

Published as "James Bond and the Murder Before Breakfast" in The Daily Express, September 1959.

Intriguing bit about the licorice and Bond's childhood. Outside of the details in the obituary at the end of You Only Live Twice, the only information we get on Bond's childhood as Fleming imagined it are via little remarks like this. We also learn he lost his virginity on his
"first, ignorant visit to Paris" when he was 16.

Here's a familiar enough plot (Bond is liaised to SHAPE to help solve the murder of one of its dispatch motorcycle riders) that like "For Your Eyes Only" is made more interesting by all that's going on in Bond's mind. Whether it's his early imaginings of the kind of day and night he intends to have in Paris or his thoughts on NATO, Fleming does a great job with these meandering idle moments of Bond.

Extra points for Mary Ann Russell, who likes Paris but not getting her ass pinched constantly, often so hard they leave her backside bruised. (Ah, Paris, ville d'amour!) She's a cool character all around. I pictured her being played by Cate Blanchett. I'm sure she and James enjoyed a nice motorcycle tour of France after the story ended. I hope he didn't just take her up to Vesper Lynd's grave for some awkward drunken sobbing.

4. The Hildebrand Rarity (1960)

Takes place between "Quantum of Solace" and "From a View to a Kill."

Bond is relaxing in the Seychelles after finishing a security check for the British Navy. His friend, the excellently-named Fidele Barbey, recruits him for a job he's been hired to do for a sadistic American gazillionaire, Milton Krest, who, Bond thinks to himself, "thinks of himself like a Hemingway character." * Krest has employed the Rockefeller/Morgan (J.P., not Sir Henry) method of pouring his gazillions into a non-profit foundation to avoid the prying eyes of the taxman. Krest's foundation tracks down rare fish for the Smithsonian, which is what brings him to the Seychelles. 

* Has anyone ever done a side-by-side comparison of Hemingway and Fleming's writing? If only for the methodical accounting of boozing, it'd be fascinating.

Bond and Barbey join Krest aboard his yacht to search for a rare member of the squirrel-fish family. Bond forms a platonic attachment to Krest's wife Liz, whose marriage to Milton is glitz and glamour on the surface but abusive in private quarters. Bond learns Krest whips her with a stingray tail, an ancient but outlawed marital tradition in the South Pacific. After a night of watching his host drunkenly harangue everyone in earshot, Bond finds him murdered with the rare fish stuffed in his mouth. Thinking that he got exactly what he deserved, Bond throws the body over the side without hesitation.

This is quite a good story. Earlier I mentioned that the type of short-story-deconstruction one learns as an English major doesn't always work with these Fleming stories, but this one is an exception. (As is "Octopussy.") There's a lot going on under the surface of this one about marriage, morality, and predation.  

‘The Corrector and The Collector – A Cabinet of Curiosities.’ © 2015 Gerald Wadsworth. (As nicked from here.)

And as mentioned here: "Elizabeth is beautiful, but there's not the usual sexual tension between her and Bond. I mean there is tension there, but it comes from knowing how Bond usually interacts with beautiful women and from knowing that Milton Krest is a dangerous man to offend. (...) Her nervousness and unsuccessfully concealed desperation touch Bond and turn him into a listening ear for her. He becomes an oasis of comfort and normality in the life of fear that she's leading, which is a really odd role for him to take. But he wears it well."

Very true. This isn't even undermined by the implication at story's end that he and Liz are poised to take things to the next level; it just seems like a natural progression from all that followed.

3. Quantum of Solace (1959)

Takes place between "Risico" and "The Hildebrand Rarity."

 

"When the other person not only makes you feel insecure but actually seems to want to destroy you, it's obviously the end. The Quantum of Solace stands at zero."

Bond attends a dinner party at the Governor's house after completing a mission in the Bahamas. Both men have run out of things to say to one another, and after Bond makes an offhand remark about how he'd like to marry a stewardess, the Governor tells him the tragic story of Philip and Rhoda Masters. 

I'll say no more. That's really all there is to the plot - Bond simply listens to the Governor tell the story, and then they shake hands and part ways - but the details of the story are exceptionally well-chosen. To quote Michael May again: "it as an homage to W Somerset Maugham, one of Fleming's favorite authors. According to the British Empire website, Maugham enjoyed writing about 'the remote locations of the quietly magnificent yet decaying British Empire' and the people who worked and lived there. He was a master at juxtaposing 'realistic depictions of the boredom and drudgery' of plantation life or civil service with 'the desire and trappings of what [British citizens who lived in those places] would regard as civilization.'"

I normally have trouble suspending my disbelief for stories where one character tells another character a long story without interruption. I didn't mind here, though - I think the deciding factor is whether or not the characters involved are British or pre-twentieth century. I'm not sure why this is the case, but looking over the stories where I mind the trope vs. the ones I don't, that seems to be the deciding factor. 

2. The Living Daylights (1962) 

Takes place between "Octopussy" and "The Property of a Lady"

"Look, my friend," said Bond wearily, "I've got to commit a murder tonight. Not you. Me. So be a good chap and stuff it, would you? You can tell Tanqueray anything you like when it's over. Think I like this job? Having a Double-O number and so on? I'd be quite happy for you to get me sacked." Bond drank down his whiskey, reached for his thriller *, now arriving at an appalling climax, and threw himself on the bed. 

* That thriller is called Verderbt, Verdammt, Verraten - "the prefix ver signifed that the girl had not only been ruined, damned, and betrayed, but that she had suffered these misfortunes most thoroughly."

Bond is dispatched to a hotel overlooking the border between East and West Berlin. He's there to take out his Soviet counterpart, who, M tells him, is there to assassinate a British agent escaping the East after many years in the cold. Bond must assassinate the assassin so the agent can return safely. While he waits for the pivotal moment, he spends his time reading the aforementioned thriller, drinking whiskey, arguing with the stuffy staff officer assigned to the same room, and fantasizing about the cellist he sees through his rifle scope going in and out of the Haus die Ministerien. 

Adapted (with a few twists) for the first Dalton movie.

Another gem that effectively walks the line between typical Bond adventure and booze-soaked deconstruction of Bond as a character. The attachment he forms to the cello player (thinking "something almost indecent in the idea of that bulbous, ungainly instrument between her splayed thighs") is subverted brilliantly by the ending. 

I'm not sure anyone would really notice the minute adjustment Bond makes to his shot, but of course his doing so makes all the difference in the world. "Scared the living daylights out of her. In my book that's enough."

1. Octopussy (1965)

Takes place between Thunderball and "The Living Daylights."

If any of these short tales of Bond belonged in something like the Norton Anthology of Short Fiction, it would be this one. In addition to being a fascinating sideways-glance at the Bondverse (as something like The Spy Who Loved Me is) it's probably Fleming's best-realized exploration of his favorite themes: accidie, karma, Best-laid-plans? Meet-James-Bond, and predatory creatures. Not to mention three of his great interests: gold-smuggling, the underwater world, and physical pain. 

Major Dexter Smythe, retired, is in bad shape: 

"Fifty-four, slightly bald and his belly sagged in the Jantzen trunks. And he had two coronary thromboses. But, in his well-chosen clothes, his varicose veins out of sight and his stomach flattened by a discreet support belt behind an immaculate cummerbund, he was still a fine figure of a man at a cocktail party or dinner on the North Shore, and it was a mystery to his friends and neighbors why, in defiance of the two ounces of whiskey and ten cigarettes a day to which his doctor had rationed him, he persisted in smoking like a chimney and going to bed drunk, if amiably drunk, every night." 

(Some have speculated that this is Fleming-in-disguise. I refer to you this excellent Literary007 post pointing out the pros and cons of this approach.)

Smythe spends his days drinking and looking for a scorpion fish to feed to an octopus he is quite fond of. He (and a colleague at the university, whose intellectual interest in the subject he appropriates for his own) are curious to see if the octopus can withstand the fish's highly concentrated poison. Smythe has taken to feeding the octopus daily in order to get it accustomed to him. 

He is visited by a man who says he's there on Miscellaneous Objects Bureau, his wartime outfit, business. The man asks Smythe if he ever knew a man named Oberhauser and observes him closely as he lies through his teeth. A feeling of dread envelops him, as he realizes this man is there to finally bring him to justice for the crime he committed in the last days of World War 2: the cold-blooded murder of an Austrian ski instructor and theft of several bars of Reichsgold. Eventually, Smythe confesses to everything. The man says that Smythe's story is more or less how he figured it. Smythe asks how on earth the man ever got on the case to begin with.

James Bond looked Major Smythe squarely in the eyes: "Oberhauser was a friend of mine. He taught me to ski before the war, when I was in my teens. He was something of a father to me at a time when I happened to need one."

Bond mentions to Smythe that it'll take about a week for the authorities to catch up to him and leaves the "or you could kill yourself before they get here" dangling unspoken in the air. As Smythe processes what has happened, he goes back to the reef and has one final (and very symbolic) encounter with Octopussy.

I love everything about this story. I really am surprised no one called my attention to it before I got to it myself. It's possible it's known only to hardcore Bond fans. If so, that is a real shame. It preserves in short-story-amber its themes as well as just about any other short story I can think of. And Bond's working out the decades-old crime from a body in the Alps all the way to Smythe's drawing room in Jamaica - and his steady, controlled vengeance - is a great moment for the character. 

~

James Bond will return in... From Novel to Film: On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

Ian Fleming's James Bond: The Novels

RANKING the ORIGINAL BOND 

NOVELS by IAN FLEMING

A few months back I looked over at the Bond books sitting unread on my shelves and figured it was high time I made my way through them. I didn't intend to blog about them, but that's sometimes how these things go. 

When I got to the end, I decided to make a spreadsheet with the following categories, 005 pts for each. (I considered using a 007-based rating system as a tribute to You-Only-Blog-Twice's rating system, but it was easier for me to work with zero-to-five.)

- Plot and Writing: As so many have already identified both the recurring themes (the thrill of motorcars, the end of Empire, contempt for Americans and the French, the detailed asides about marriage, the drinking, the smoking, the birds, fish, and scorpions, etc.) and structure (M gives Bond an assignment, Bond meets Villain, Bond meets Woman, Bond takes Woman, Villain Captures Bond, Villain Tortures Bond, Bond beats Villain, Bond convalesces, usually with Woman, Bond loses Woman) and as these examinations reverberate through practically all of the various sites that look at Ian Fleming's Bond, I assigned points for this section not based on any of that but just on the degree of enjoyment I got from reading them.

- Allies: Bond is always helped by the local Station folk of wherever he's adventuring or his foreign government counterparts. The one who appears the most is Felix Leiter, Bond's eager-to-please, competent-but-inferior (naturally) CIA/ Pinkerton's pal. I assigned points based on whether or not these helper-characters did much for the story besides help get Bond from A to B. 

- The Ladies: I don't care to determine which women of Fleming's Bondverse pass the Bechdel Test, nor which ones best encapsulate the fantasy girl ideal - or that even subvert that ideal - for a man of Fleming's generation. I assigned points here much as I did with the Allies section: which ones works for the specific story being told the best rather than just fulfill a role.

- Ditto for The Villains. And finally:

- Is It Like the Movie? Not a category I assigned points for, but I know of at least a couple of readers who might appreciate this.

I spent a good amount of time trying to figure out which covers of the many editions to showcase, and whether or not to quote any of the in-depth-reviews out there.

When I was growing up and they were on my older brother's shelves, they looked like this.

I decided to use the covers from the Signet US paperbacks (the ones I currently own) and the UK Penguin centenary editions with covers by Michael Gillette. (The artists for the Signet editions are unknown to me. I'm sure the information exists out there, though- probably here.) 

I'm not saying these editions are the best-looking of the lot; the Bond books have gone through so many editions worldwide that to choose the best would be a post of its own requiring much consideration. A post I'd love to read, certainly, maybe even write, but beyond our scope today.

As for which of the "in-depth reviews out there" to include, I decided to link only to the appropriate Literary007 post. Great site. You can access them by clicking on the year-of-publication beneath the covers below.

One last thing: I didn't include The Spy Who Loved Me. Not because I think it's a bad book - I actually quite like it. I didn't know what to make of it at first, but it grew on me. Bond, however, is basically a supporting character in that one, and I couldn't figure out how to properly represent it within the categories described. I was amused to discover that this was first published in the United States (serialized in Stag magazine) under the name Motel Nymph. Nice.

Ready? Let's have it.

11.

(1965 - there doesn't seem to be a Literary 007 review for the book, so here's a link to Christopher Lee's reflections on its author.)

The prominent third nipple over the heart made an obvious target! Bond walked thoughtfully down to the beautiful crescent of white sand fringed with gently clashing palm trees.

That exclamation point after the third nipple sentence greatly entertains me. The mind of Bond.

Plot and Writing (003.5) - The last of Fleming's Bonds to appear, and the first one I read. Not sure why I started with this one, except that I've always loved the movie.

Bond returns from Russia, where he's spent a year being brainwashed after the events of You Only Live Twice, to assassinate M. He fails, and the brainwashing is reversed. To get him back on his feet, M sends him to Jamaica to take out Francisco "Pistols" Scaramanga, a Cuban assassin believed to have killed several British agents. Bond infiltrates his organization  in his usual fashion.

This is a half-finished affair. Fleming's health was failing during the writing of the first draft, and he was unable to revise it before his death a few months later. It's still a fun enough little story, with enough touches of the Bond aesthetic to keep the reader interested.

Allies (003.25) Felix Leiter, posing as an electrical engineer at the hotel. Not one of his more essential roles, but not the worst.

Ladies (002.75) - Mary Goodnight - Bond's former secretary - and Tiffy, the proprietor of the Dreamland Cafe. Goodnight is a more endearing character in the novels than she is in the film version of TMWTGG, but that still doesn't quite catapult Bond's former secretary into iconic Bond Girl status. (If it does, then Loelia Ponsonby is a step ahead of her.) Outside of driving Bond around and all-signs-point-to-banging at novel's end, she doesn't have much to do. Tiffy is interesting enough, but she only appears in one scene.

Villains (003.5) - Scaramanga isn't much of a Bond villain, it must be said. I do love the fact that he has his own private train - I picture him in happier times, riding the rails by himself in his engineer's cap and muttering to himself - and his final confrontation with Bond in the swamp is well-done. He exudes an appropriate amount of competence and menace.

Is It Like the Movie? Not at all. Scaramanga's sexual warm-ups before his assassinations inform the lyrics to the theme song, though. Total: 13 pts

10.

(1954)

"Mister Bond, I suffer from what the early Christians called 'accidie,' the deadly lethargy that envelops those who are sated, those who have no more worlds to conquer. (...) If I see you again, you will die in a manner as ingenious and appropriate as I can devise."

I took some liberties with this quote from Mr. Big. Call it a mash-up. That goes for most of these excerpts.

Plot and Writing (003) - Bond is sent to Harlem to investigate Mr. Big (Buonaparte Ignacio Gallia) who is suspected of selling 17th-century gold coins from the lost treasure of Sir Henry Morgan to finance SMERSH (Смерть шпионам!) operations in the United States. He teams up with Felix, who loses an arm and a leg for his troubles, and follows Mr. Big to Jamaica to complete his mission.

This one is well-regarded by Bond aficionados, but I had trouble getting past the racial politics of the prose. Unremarkable for its era, and Fleming does takes pains to individuate several characters. And for a non-Yank, his almost-journalistic impressions of Harlem, highways, and Florida are fantastic. But it's still rather relentless in treating Bond, Felix, and Solitaire as real characters and everyone else as part of a shiftless mass. This kept me at a distance, reading it in 2015. I don't think it's cause for a class action suit or anything, and I'm not sure why I found it only too alienating here and not elsewhere, where it's equally prevalent, but there it is.

Allies (003) - Poor Felix. This is the first appearance of Strangways, Head of Station in Jamaica, and Quarrel, Bond's Jamaican sidekick. Fleming described their relationship as "that of a Scots laird with his head stalker; authority was unspoken and there was no room for servility." Others have described it differently. He seems to me a Jamaican of his era brought to life through Bond's/ Fleming's eyes very vividly. And that's all he has to be.

Ladies (003) - Simone Latrelle, the descendant of French Haitians and a clairvoyant so disinterested in men that her nickname is "Solitaire." (Guess who re-awakens her interest in men?) She's okay, but she's more of a Gothic trope (the sort normally played by Barbara Steele) than a Bond girl. Not that Gothic tropes can't be Bond girls, of course. The film's Solitaire is much better.

Villains (004) - Mr. Big is pretty cool. The SMERSH-trained black American gangster is a bit too close to the idea that the Civil Rights movement in the United States was just a communist front. But hey, what wasn't a front communist-or-otherwise in the Cold War amirite? Death to Spies. That aside, he's written pretty well, and his whole set-up makes a lot more sense in the book than in the film. Speaking of:

Is It Like the Movie? Somewhat. The film adds quite a bit. A portion of Leiter's fate (and the "He disagreed with something that ate him" line) is appropriated later for License to Kill. Total: 13.5 pts

9.

(1956)

"There's nothing so extraordinary about American gangsters," said Bond. "Mostly a lot of Italian bums with monogrammed shirts who spend the day eating spaghetti and meatballs and squirting scent all over themselves."

Plot and Writing (004.25) - M tasks Bond with infiltrating a smuggling ring transporting diamonds from mines in Sierra Leone to the United States. Bond must infiltrate the smugglers' pipeline and smash it to pieces. This takes him to NYC and Las Vegas to do battle with the Spangled Mob, across the Atlantic on the RMS Queen Elizabeth, and to Sierra Leone, and to Sierra Leone to shoot the last American usurper on Crown Colony soil.

Bond's end-pages wrap-up of Tiffany Case ("It reads better than it lives") seems to me an apt description of the plot, too. Nothing all too remarkable in the summary provided above, but it's very enjoyable. This novel is, in many ways, where the British Empire ended up; interesting lens for the events within.

Allies (003) - Not my favorite Felix moments. The way he shows up and moves things along in NYC were somewhat lazy. Not a dealbreaker or anything, though it does make me wonder if Bond ever return these sorts of favors. Ronnie Valance (head of MI5 and Bond's buddy from Moonraker and elsewhere) is namechecked. 

Ladies (004) - Tiffany Case, the smuggler, tough but lonely. I bought her and Bond's relationship, both the falling into and falling out of it. Nothing against Jill St. John, but Tiffany is a better character in the book. (And there's no Plenty O'Toole to be found.)

Villains (003.5) - The Spangs are just gangsters. Nothing special, though they're sketched out pretty well. (Also, like Scaramanga, Serrafimo Spang has his own private train.) Wint and Kidd, "the homosexual killers," are a tad underdeveloped. As Bond mulls them over, there is ample speculation about how allowing women to vote turns folks homo or homicidal. He wonders the same in Goldfinger re: Pussy Galore and Tilly. Bond's got a lot of crazy ideas. 

Is It Like the Movie? Outside of retaining some of the same names and locales, not at all. Total: 14.75 pts

8.

(1959)

"Mr. Bond, they have a saying in Chicago: 'Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action.' I propose to wring the truth out of you." Goldfinger's eyes slid slowly past Bond's head. "Oddjob. The Pressure Room."

I'm almost positive no one in the history of Chicago has ever used the word 'happenstance,' though it is a word that is fun to say aloud in a Chicago accent. Try it and see. Great quote either way.

Plot and Writing (004.25) - Bond runs into Junius Du Pont, with whom he gambled back in Casino Royale. DuPont is playing Canasta with a mystery-man named Auric Goldfinger, whom he suspects of cheating him. Bond confirms this and after blackmailing Goldfinger into repaying DuPont's lost money, spirits away his secretary Jill Masterton.

Upon return to London, M sends him after Goldfinger, who is believed to be smuggling gold out of the country. After a memorable round of golf and an invitation back to Goldfinger's for dinner, Bond trails him across France to Switzerland, where he runs into Tilly Masterton, who is there to avenge the death of her sister. After capture and a torturous interview, they're hired as Goldfinger's personal valets (!) and have a front row seat for Operation Grand Slam, Goldfinger's mega-crime plan to steal the US gold reserves from Fort Knox.

The plot hinges on some ludicrous developments, and the writing is very Golden Age comic-booky in spots. But who cares? Tremendous fun from start to finish. 

Allies (003) - Tilly isn't much of one. She almost immediately abandons Bond (and her sister's vengeance) for Pussy Galore. But hey, Bond's the one got her sister killed, so all's fair, I suppose. Felix appears with his usual improbable gusto. I wondered when reading whether he took greater satisfaction in saving his country's gold supply or being able to once again come through in the clutch for his old pal Bond.

Ladies (003) - The name Pussy Galore is iconic, but she manages to stand out as ridiculous even while surrounded by so many other over-the-top personalities. The idea of an all-lesbian crime gang named The Cement Mixers is wonderfully dirty, though. Much is made of Bond's "delesbianizing" her, and while I understand this, it seems Pussy is the type of girl who pursues whatever catches her fancy, male or female, legal or illegal.

Villains (004.5) Goldfinger is often mentioned as the high water mark of the bombastic Bond villain. I can't argue with that, even though he's not my personal favorite. He not only wants to bring the world to its knees by cornering the market on gold, he wants to be a Picasso of crime. And he delivers many speeches suitable to those ambitions. 

The real-life Goldfinger (Erno, a Hungarian architect immigrant to the UK) threatened to sue Fleming over the use of his name. Fleming said he would be happy to add an erratum slip to the book changing the character's name to "Goldprick." They settled out of court, and Fleming sent the real-life Goldfinger six free copies of the book.

Is It Like the Film? - Very much so, although Goldfinger's scheme is changed from stealing the gold to blowing it up. And the circular saw of the novel is changed to the laser beam of the film. The famous "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to die" is an invention of the script. Total: 15.25 pts

7.

(1958)

Bond stood and waited for his unspeakable end. He looked into the blue jaws of death and saw the glowing red filament of the firer deep inside the big tube. Soon he, too, would flame like a torch.

Plot and Writing (004.5) - M sends Bond to Jamaica to investigate the disappearance of Strangways. Upon learning that Strangways had been investigating the activity of Dr. Julius No - the reclusive owner of a guano mine on the Crab Key part of the island - prior to his disappearance, he enlists Quarrel's help to infiltrate the facility. It turns out Dr. No's real business is to sabotage missile tests at nearby Cape Canaveral. Bond must negotiate an obstacle course of death, poisonous spiders, and a giant squid before he can kill the good Doctor by burying him in a mound of spoonbill excrement.

It's possible I'm overvaluing Dr. No, but everything from the dinner-with-Dr.-No scene to the end I found absolutely riveting, particularly the out-of-the-frying-pan-into-the-fire giant squid business. And as Bond is often contrasted against St. George, it was fun to see him fight a literal (so to speak) dragon. Speaking of:

Allies (003.5) - Adios, Quarrel.

Ladies (004.5) - It was difficult for me to imagine anyone other than Ursula Andress as Honey Ryder, but going into these books, I knew that unless the text explicitly described one of the Bond Girls differently, that was going to be unavoidable for me. Here it makes little difference - she's more or less the same from page to screen.

Villains (003.75) - Dr. No, lord of spoonbill shit, is a tad too Fu Manchu and given to even more grandiose speeches than Goldfinger. But all the monologues are interesting, to say the least, and he's got an underwater lair, an  army of "chigroes" i.e. black Chinese-Jamaicans, and a flamethrowing-tank done up like a dragon. That's how you super-villain, folks. 

Is It Like the Film? - Only a very few changes: the centipede that threatens Bond in his hotel room is changed to a tarantula, presumably because tarantulas read better on-screen, and the film adds a few more girls. And plays down the whole "chigro" thing. Total: 16.25 pts

6.

(1961)

Always he had seen the essential step ahead that would have been hidden from the lesser man. He was a man of the world, a great womanizer, a high liver, with the entree to cafe society on four continents and the last survivor, conveniently enough, of a once famous Roman family whose fortune, so he said, he had inherited. He was the perfect man for SPECTRE, and the perfect man, rich Nassau playboy and all, to be Supreme Commander of Plan Omega.

Plot and Writing (004.25) - M tells Bond he's smoking and drinking too much and sends him for a rest cure at a spa. While there he tousles with an associate of a new criminal organization, SPECTRE (SPecial Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion.) Upon his return, he learns SPECTRE has hijacked two nuclear bombs and plans to detonate them unless the governments of the western world cough up £100,000,000. M sends Bond to the Bahamas, where he quickly gets on the scent of Emilio Largo (SPECTRE Number One), allegedly visiting the islands as a treasure hunter. Bond, Felix, and the crew of the US submarine Manta race to intercept Largo and his boat the Disco Volante before zero hour of Plan Omega. 

Though Fleming wrote this one off as "immensely dull," I couldn't disagree more. I missed this one when I wasn't reading it.

Allies (004.25) - Is this Felix Leiter's best turn? It might be, although he of course over-commits himself in the final assault. This enables him to dramatically wave off Bond's offer of assistance, though: the shabby nobility of living within Bond's shadow. Beside Felix, Bond becomes fast friends with the captain of the Manta submarine, and the final battle is a rarity in the Bond novels, befitting the stakes: a team effort. 

Ladies (004) - Dominetta "Domino" Vitali, Largo's mistress and the sister of the pilot that SPECTRE hired to hijack the bombs and then murdered. She's similar to Tiffany Case in many ways.

Villains (005) - Intro SPECTRE. And from first to last (the unfortunate Count Lippe, Blofeld running his meeting, and Largo for the rest of the book) they live up to whatever idea you have of the organization.

Is It Like the Film? - Very similar, yeah. Well, no jet-pack sequence in the book, but otherwise. Total: 17.5 pts

5.

(1964)

"I suppose you know you're both mad as hatters."

"So was Frederick the Great, so was Nietzsche, so was Van Gogh. We are in good, in illustrious company, Mister Bond. On the other hand, where are you? You are a common thug, a blunt instrument wielded by dolts in high places. Having done what you are told to do, out of some mistaken idea of duty or patriotism, you satisfy your brutish instincts with alcohol, nicotine, and sex while waiting to be dispatched on the next misbegotten folly. Try and summon such wits as you possess and see (yourself) in a realistic light and in the higher realm of my own thinking."

Plot and Writing (005) - Bond is dispatched to Japan to petition the Japanese Secret Service, run by Tiger Tanaka, for use of their intelligence pipeline into China and the Soviet Union. Tiger agrees - if Bond assassinates the lord of the Castle of Death, a gaijin whose carefully-guarded estate houses a foremost collection of poisonous plants and has become a lightning rod for Japanese seeking to kill themselves. Upon showing Bond a photograph of the Lord of Death, Bond recognizes the man as none other than Ernst Blofeld. He infiltrates the castle, Blofeld puts on a full suit of samurai armor, and the two duel. In the aftermath, Bond sustains a head injury and loses all memory of his former life. The novel ends with Bond's heading off to the Soviet Union on a hunch he might discover himself there, and an obituary written by Mary Goodnight which for the first time reveals details of Bond's childhood.

I really love this one. The leaps it took, and the way it ended greatly entertained me. The setting also allows for an interesting window on post-WW2 Japan. And all the stuff at the castle is great fun.

Allies (004.5) - Tiger Tanaka and the Aussie intelligence officer (Dikko) are both cut from similar cloth as Bond's previous allies, but they're both standouts. Fleming uses Tiger as a mouthpiece for his own increasingly bitter take on postwar Britain and the U.S., which sometimes strains credibility. But not by much. He is also aided by the Suzuki family before and after his mission.

Ladies (003.5) - Kissy Suzuki is a rather mild Bond Girl, but she's effectively characterized in the short time allotted to her.

Villains (004.5) - Arguably the least of Blofeld's appearances, despite the samurai armor. Though, I love his cover as some mad collector of botanical specimens. ("The Shatterhands." Nice.) And basically everything about the scenes in which he and Irma Bunt appear. I was surprised to see Bond succeed in actually killing him.

Is It Like the Film? - Not at all, though elements of it seem to have been resurrected for the film version of The Man with the Golden Gun. Total: 17.5 pts

4.

(1955)

"Your majesty, men and women of England," the voice was a velvet snarl. "I am about to change the course  of England's history. In a few minutes' time the lives of all of you will be altered, in some cases, ahem, drastically, by the, er, impact of the Moonraker. I am very proud and pleased that fate has singled me out, from amongst all my fellow countrymen, to fire this great arrow of vengeance into the skies and thus to proclaim for all time, and for all the world to witness, the might of my fatherland. I hope that this occasion will forever be a warning that the fate of my country's enemies will be written in dust, in ashes, in tears, and in blood. I sincerely hope that those of you who are able will repeat my words to your children, if you have any, tonight."

Though the reader (and Bond) is well aware that Drax is a villain at the time he speaks these words, the audience hearing them (over the radio, prior to Moonraker's launch) is not. Nice effect.

Plot and Writing (004.5) - England is in love with Hugo Drax, an industrialist and rocket scientist who has offered to build for the Queen and people of England a rocket capable of hitting any of the capitols of Europe. M is suspicious, though, as Drax cheats at cards at his club (Blades). After Bond (aided by heroic amounts of champagne and Benzedrine, and a deck of stacked cards) turns the tables on him at the club, Drax retreats to his test site near the celebrated Cliffs of Dover. Bond follows and slowly uncovers the mystery - Drax and his team of rocket scientists are actually ex-Nazis who plan to fire the rocket at the heart of London. 

Allies (004) / Ladies (004.25) - Gala Brand doubles as both ally and Bond Girl in this one. She polarizes people, apparently, but I like her. The twist at the end that she's engaged and not going to sleep with Bond after all was good. Besides Gala, Bond is aided by Ronnie Valance at MI5.

Villains (005) - I absolutely love Drax and his Nazi rocket scientists. What a trip.

Is It Like the Film? - Unfortunately, it can't be. The plot very much hinges on being only ten years away from the end of WW2, and prior to the development of ICBMs. But it made me love the film even more for the wild direction EON took things in 1979. I didn't think that was actually possible; I assumed I was at Peak Moonraker. Total: 17.75 pts

3.

(1963)

"The World Is Not Enough."

Plot and Writing (005) - Forgive me, but I'll be covering this one for my From Novel to Film series, so I'll save discussion of the plot until then. Suffice it to say, I loved it.

Allies (004) - Marc-Ange Draco, a higher-up of Unione Corse, is a tad derivative of Darko Kerim from From Russia with Love, or Colombo in the short story "Risico." Perfect as a father-in-law to Bond.

Ladies (004.75) - Contessa Teresa "Tracy" di Vincezo, the brief Mrs. Bond, is very memorable. But, it was impossible for me to picture anyone but Diana Rigg. And there's the one chick Bond hooks up with at Piz Gloria, whom I personally pictured looking like Patty Boyd.

Villains (004.5) - Ah, Blofeld. I'm sorry, I mean Comte Balthazar de Bleuville.

Is It Like the Film? - I'll have the answer up within a few weeks. Total: 18.25 pts

2.

(1957)

"The great trains are going out all over Europe, one by one, but still, three times a week, the Orient Express thunders superbly over the 1,400 miles of glittering steel track between Istanbul and Paris. Under the arc-lights, the long-chassied German locomotive panted quietly with the labored breath of a dragon dying of asthma. Each heavy breath seemed certain to be the last. Then came another."

Plot and Writing (005) - Fed up with Bond's disruption of their plans, SMERSH comes up with a plan to rid themselves of him and greatly embarrass the British Secret Service in the process. They send two of their agents into the West to spring the trap: Tatiana Romanova, whose cover is that she's fallen in love with Bond and wants to deliver unto England a Russian coding device ("Spektor," coincidentally enough), and Red Grant, a defected British sociopath who's promised the Order of Lenin if he kills 007.

Bond doesn't even appear in this book for a hundred pages or so, which allows for a fascinating glimpse into the world of SMERSH and a slow burn until he makes his appearance. And the sequences on the train are so perfectly paced. 

Allies (004.5) - Darko Kerim, head of Istanbul station, is a great and memorable character. Fleming indulges in a little Orientalism with him, particularly with certain aspects of his origin story, but a) Fleming? Orientalism? Surely not. and b) while I prefer the way the character is handled in the film, I formed the same attachment to him that Bond did.

Ladies (004) - The weak part of the book for me - her story (and conversion) is somewhat hard to swallow. Tatiana Romanova is a badass name, though.

Villains (005) - Some of the best here, from Kronsteen, the competitive chess player, to Red Grant, the British turncoat, to Rosa Klebb, the hatchet-faced lady with the poisonous-spiked shoe.

Is It Like the Film? - Very similar, yes. The Mouth of Marilyn Monroe becomes the mouth of Anita Ekberg in a billboard for Call Me Bwana. Total: 18.5 pts And finally:

1.

(1953)

"The bitch is dead now."

Plot and Writing (005) - M assigns Bond to play in a high-stakes baccarat game against Le Chiffre, the paymaster for a SMERSH-controlled trade union in France, whose funds he appropriated and must replace by winning big at the Royale-les-Eaux casino. M also sends along Vesper Lynd, personal assistant to the head of Station S (the Soviet Union). Bond beats Le Chiffre, who proceeds to kidnap him and Vesper. He tortures them both, but he is killed by SMERSH agents who arrive to clean up the scene. They brand Bond's hand with a "SH" for spy ('shpionam.') In the weeks that follow, Bond falls in love with Vesper, but when a mysterious man is seen tailing them, she grows cold. She commits suicide, and Bond learns that she was an (unwilling) double agent. He hardens his heart and commits himself to disrupting SMERSH wherever and whenever he can. 

The first of the Bond books is also the most dispensable in learning why Bond is the way he is. It's a great read and has within its pages all of the essential elements of the character.

Allies (004.5) - Felix's late-innings cash infusion to Bond, "compliments of the USA," is a fun moment. I also liked Rene Mathis, the French agent assigned to assist Bond.

Ladies (005) - Vesper Lynd is the other most important dead lady in Bond's life. Perhaps even more important than Tracy, actually - she's certainly referenced more, though that may simply be a question of timing. (Those references are: in Goldfinger, a drugged Bond wonders how he's going to introduce Tilly to Vesper in the afterlife; in Diamonds Are Forever, Bond tells Tiffany the song "La Vie en Rose," associated with Vesper in Casino Royale, brings up uncomfortable memories for him; and in On Her Majesty's Secret Service, it's revealed Bond makes a yearly pilgrimage to Vesper's grave.)

Villains (004.25) - Le Chiffre is probably better in the film. SMERSH is of course mysterious and deadly; they always are.

Is It Like the Film? - Very similar (to the Daniel Craig film, I mean, not the 60s farce with Peter Sellers, nor the Climax! version, which I've never seen), tho the film adds elements that allows the production to move to Africa and the Caribbean. Total:  18.75 pts

How about you?

~

James Bond will return in An Overview of John Gardner's Bond -

as soon as I get a chance to read them, that is. (These are the German editions - I recall seeing at least one or two of these at the Neu-Isenburg Zentrum, growing up.)

and Ian Fleming's James Bond: The Short Stories - coming up next. I'll likely cover all the other books sooner or later, as well. (Probably later.)