It’s October 5, 2022. Happy 60th
anniversary, James Bond!
That’s what I
would say if I was enthusiastic to celebrate this anniversary. Unfortunately,
I’m not. One year ago, the worst spectacle ever to be associated with this
great and glorious character was about to be screened in US theatres.
Misleadingly titled No Time To Die,
the film not only pushed Daniel Craig’s Bond to commit suicide in the bombastic
climax but also made him lose every battle in every war: he takes every action
after being outsmarted by the two villains; rarely acts like a spy, deciding
just to break up and leave to an unplanned Jamaican vacation, ignoring the red
flag that the man he put in prison could have a connection to his girl, and
even bows down with a pathetic “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I apologize, I apologize,
I’ll do whatever you want” to the main villain, the needle-thin Lyutsifer Safin
played by Rami Malek. Let’s not forget Safin pathetically ambushes and shoots him
four times in the back, turning the legendary 007 into a rookie first-person
shooter player who had just tried Call of
Duty for the first time in his life. Before that, he rejects Ana De Armas’
advances and barely touches a girl in the whole film, which is another death –
the death of a well-known characteristic of his personality which is his
frequent womanizing.
Using the
#60yearsofBond hashtag, today we are celebrating a funeral and the fact that it
all ended in a film that would make General G and the whole of SMERSH proud.
And we are ordered to get past behind it, pretend nothing happened, and trust
in that April Fools’ Day joke at the end of the movie reading “James Bond Will
Return”. Apparently, people are way too reassured by that end credits line that
was once a promise and it now feels like a mockery to those who have grown to
admire and respect the character.
 |
You would say
that I’m just complaining and not offering a solution. Is there a solution? Can
James Bond return after his death? Can we still depend on this man in this new
world of new threats and new enemies?
A well-known
Bond fan, someone I respect a lot and I have been following his work since my
childhood, proposed that the character should return to the 1960s, his glory
period, and from Bond 26 on every film should be a period-piece because in that
way today’s society wouldn’t complain of 007’s “uncomfortable” attitudes. His
intentions are noble, but I beg to differ. I think James Bond is a man for all
seasons that always imposed his place in every era: the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and
so on. GoldenEye, my favorite film of
all time, is the perfect example of this: we have a new world, a world that
clearly has no place for Bond in terms of ethics and ambitions. In a world
where technology replaces the man in the field, women have more prominence, and
the utility of a Cold Warrior began to wane… but Bond still saved the world and
despite his “questionable” attitudes, the world depends on him and he doesn’t
have to change a thing. Okay, maybe leave the cigarettes for a change, but not
much more. The formula, with small tweaks, can work every time and in every era
and will still achieve a huge number of followers. As much as Bond offends
them, will they stop watching the films? Certainly not.
Leaving that
aside, where’s the guarantee that setting future Bond films in the 60s will
avoid the woke radar and have these people enjoy it and ignore whatever they
find unsuitable? Don’t forget, the social justice warriors don’t judge the
films only after 2013, they question “offensive” scenes of Dr No, Goldfinger and Thunderball knowing very well that those
films were made when the world had different values. And they come over and
over again with the same arguments. So, I bet that “Bond 26 will be set in the
60s” might be a way to attract the Sean Connery nostalgics, but in the end, we
will get Bond films in a retelling of the 60s adapted to today’s moral
viewpoints: things like making Bond black, Moneypenny a field agent, Tanner a
queer secretary, a “multicultural” England. In the end, we had a film of the
2020s with a 1960s makeover. Check out this year’s version of The Ipcress File to have this pseudo-60s
feeling that could be applied to 007 and you’ll get my points.
Then again, which is the only way to give a dignified return to James Bond?
If the series
was rebooted, I’d say the first step is to deboot it. Return to where it was
left in 2002, heal the damage caused by No
Time To Die with a film that will remind us what Bond is and why we enjoy
his films. I don’t think we should simply ignore what happened. The Cary Joji
Fukunaga film is a cavity in a molar that can’t just be covered, it has to be
healed for benefit of the franchise. Considering that a brand of the Heracles
nanobot-based virus is still killing everyone with the Blofeld DNA around the
world and Bond’s suicide, contrary to the official version, didn’t solve
anything… this brand of Heracles could be something the villain is threatening
the world with.
Gareth Mallory
is arrested for ordering the development of a mass destruction weapon. The
Defense Minister appoints Sir Miles Messervy (who else but Anthony Hopkins to
play him) as head of the 00 Section again. He is informed that between 2006 and
2021 there was a political takeover of the British Secret Service that led to
the demotion of all active personnel and recruits were assigned with cover
identities. One of them was given the new “James Bond 007”, who committed
suicide after being infected with a variant of Heracles. Messervy brings back
to active duty none other than the real James Bond, now exiled in Nassau…
Yes, Pierce Brosnan. And no, I don’t oppose a 70-year-old Bond if it means debooting the franchise and restoring it to where it belongs. Liam Neeson still does action movies at this age, so we can argue that the 70s are the new 50s. Both Roger Moore and Sean Connery played Bond well into their 50s. And if Never Say Never Again made some fun of 007’s “advanced” age, why not make the opposite with Brosnan’s return? Make him scuba dive, being incredibly fit and strong for his age: still desired by women in their 40s, impeccably looking in his tux. This is the same Bond from GoldenEye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day. Removed from the job by political influences in 2005 mimicking real-life facts about Brosnan’s exclusion from the role, and now brought again when the world is in danger.
The new Bond
–correction, the genuine Bond – will be as womanizing, courageous and debonair
as we last saw him. Sleeps with the heroine and the villainess, enjoys a bottle
of Bollinger like a connoisseur instead of a drunken guy in the nearest dark
alley, is respectful and obedient to M, gets assigned a mission instead of
going rogue, defeats the mastermind and brings hope back to the world. He
survives, naturally. And the franchise survives as well, leaving the “James
Bond” from No Time To Die in the only
place he belongs: next to Sir James Bond, Evelyn Tremble, Dr Noah and the whole
lot from the 1967 satirical version of Casino
Royale.
I can’t
personally see another way to restore the myth of James Bond back to his early
days of glory with this single deboot film so we can move on with another
British, straight, white male actor in the role in original stories set in the
current times. There is no way to avoid the complaints of a sensitive society
so there’ll be a huge deal of protest for Bond antics in today’s world, but
honestly, why should we care? The Bond films or books weren’t made for them, so
they have every right to dislike them and surely Netflix can offer plenty of
alternatives to satisfy their interest. Speaking of sensitivity, it surprises
me nobody is offended by the fact that Craig-Bond preferred to die instead of
assuming his parental duties and taking care of his daughter. Or the fact that
right after two years where people died of a virus transmitted by touch, “James
Bond” commits suicide after contracting a similar type of virus – a hopeless
message that the world didn’t need in 2021, let alone coming from a name
associated to saving the world from a madman who wanted to exterminate the
human race with poisonous gas or another madman who plotted to drop an atomic
bomb in the United States or Great Britain.
Since we are
all so adamant about returning to Ian Fleming, and the producers themselves
always insist that they turn back to Fleming whenever they get lost, why not
understand him better when he said “I don’t write for a suffering humanity”? I
think that makes it very clear that he would have shrugged at the sole thought
of No Time To Die as the film is
overloaded with people who suffer – and Bond’s demise is even caused by someone
else’s suffering, as the villain has nothing personal against him. His apparent
vendetta is against Mr White’s family, and Bond becomes a target only for being
attached to the woman he is obsessed with!
Speaking of
Fleming, an ending of No Time To Die
that would have garnered all my applause would have been to have Bond living in
Jamaica after recovering from his wounds or Heracles and an envoy of the
Minister of Defense handing him a Colt weapon with the words FOR SPECIAL
SERVICES engraved, which would serve as a homage to John Gardner as well. Since
I doubt this idea never entered the minds of the ones who wasted five years in
delivering that lacklustre and insulting production, I would propose this
moment to conclude a deboot film with Brosnan.
That said, on
this 60th anniversary, I thank EON for 40 years of James Bond films.
