Ryan McNeil
In some ways, this post feels eighteen months overdue. Back then, in the run-up to SKYFALL, every blogger and their sister was putting up post-after-post about James Bond, and acting like they’d loved him all along. It makes one wonder.
There are a lot of things that define 007 as a character – some tropes that came from Ian Fleming, and some that actors like Sean Connery and Roger Moore brought into the fold. We all know about his cocksure ways, his sexual prowess, his steely resolve, and his sarcastic wit. Many words have been written about those tropes, so I’ll spare you a few hundred more. For me, one of the most defining characteristics is on display in this image from GOLDFINGER…and it’s an image that doesn’t even include Mr. Bond himself.
What I always loved about James Bond is his ability to get under the skin of his opponent. To not just say something smartassed and annoying, but to actually instinctively know which buttons to push. It’s something you see in great athletes sometimes, an ability to trash talk and get in the head of their opponents. With that in mind, 007 was the Kevin Garnett of international espionage. It might take him an entire film to do it, but before the final credits roll and that iconic music blares out, he’d find a way to hit a nerve and make his enemy seethe. Take this moment from the 1964 classic.
Having quickly deduced that Auric Goldfinger must be gaming his opponent at the card table, Bond could very easily bust up the racket in any number of ways. When he ventures up into the hotel and gets irrefutable proof, he could again simply cut the cord on Goldfinger’s racket and leave him twisting in the wind. But no – our hero isn’t content to stop the crime, he wants to send a message while he does it. So he takes the mic from the sultry Jill Masterson and gets right to the point with a “Now hear this Goldfinger: Your luck has just changed”.
As the camera holds tight on Gert Fröbe’s face, giving us Bond’s point of view through the binoculars, we see it all:
Confusion, recalculation, annoyance, anger, frustration. Goldfinger is feeling them all at once, and by the looks of it, these are feelings this megalomaniac doesn’t feel all that often.
Someone has not only called “bullshit” on his game, but done it in a way that is about to cost him. The crazy thing is that this “bullshit” point of order has been made rather privately, with only Bond, Masterson, and Goldfinger knowing what has just happened. But for Goldfinger, that’s already three people too many. He’s seething – and we can can tell in those downturned corners of his mouth. What’s making him fume even more is that he has to wait to unleash his anger instead of going off right that instant. A snapped pencil will underline that fact just moments later.
That’s the talent of James Bond. Not to save the day, not to get the girl, but to do it all in a way that will truly piss his enemy off. It’s something he’d do time and again over fifty years, but perhaps never more iconically than in this moment.
Here’s three more from GOLDFINGER for the road…
This series of posts is inspired by the “Hit Me With Your Best Shot” series at The Film Experience. Do check out all of the awesome entires in their series so far
It’s a really interesting premise and on the money here but I don’t think it stacks up. You haven’t offered any examples of how Bond gets under the skin ofhis opponent in other films.
Does he wind up Raoul Silva (Javier Bardem) in this manner in Skyfall?
Or Blofeld (Telly Savalas) in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service?
Or Scaramanga (Christopher Lee)in The Man with the Golden Gun?
Generally he just has sex with the antagonists woman and kills a few henchmen which is enough to annoy them without having to engaging in any mind games.
He does initially challenge them, frequently to cards or some other proxy for combat, but even then that serves as an introduction or has another motive such as in Casino Royale (2006).
I like your premise and I’d like you to prove me wrong, I just don’t think you can.
When he doesn’t wind them up off the top, he tends to crawl under their skin with pure tenacity…like a blister on the foot that just won’t heal. Often – not always, admittedly, but often – that can give him just enough window to do something fast and save the day.
Back to my basketball analogy, that’s usually the point of the smack-talk between players: get the opponent off their game just long enough to do some irreparable damage.
I should have mentioned this in the larger post, since I feel like it’s part of his M-O: Be a cocky pest long enough, and the opponent will make an emotional lapse in calculation.
Elliot Carver in TOMORROW NEVER DIES
Max Zorin in A VIEW TO A KILL
Hugo Drax in MOONRAKER
I think where you’re on to something is the fact that Bond’s most formidable opponents – read also: ones that make for his better stories – don’t fall for this sort of annoyance.
“Why can’t you be a good boy and die?”
So Bond achieving success through being persistantly annoying is more of a failing of the script rather than a personality trait or a deliberate policy on Bond’s part yes/no?
I suspect (and I’d love to have the time to do the research) that more of Bond’s successes are achieved through trying to co-opt (exploit) the badguy’s mistress/girlfriend into an ally than by any other means.
As the plot of From Russia With Love explicitly states, Bond is Her Majesty’s biggest whore.
Definitely Live And Let Die. Thunderball. Tomorrow Never Dies?
My vote? Deliberate policy on Bond’s part.
His coercion of the female accomplice is another tool that comes in handy, though one would wonder why any villain would even keep a female accomplice around after seeing Bond pull his routine to one or two other villains.
The thing though? Whether Bond is being a burr in the saddle or a lothario in the boardroom, I get the feeling he gets a snide satisfaction at it. He’s certainly being used by Queen and Country, but more often than not he seems to be down with getting used.
Feel free to steal any of what we’ve discussed here and turn it into a post of your own. I have the hunch you could do great things with it.
Oh you flatterer •blush* Are you James Bond in disguise?
It’s a very kind offer but sadly I doubt that time will allow.
However I do love the idea the idea that Bond villians exist in a world where they are aware of each other…
INT. NIGHT.
GUSTAV GRAVES. ‘Hmm, this Bond fellow used his masculine wiles and relentless persistance to destroy Dr No, Blofeld, Max Zorin and Franz Sanchez. But hwere is my organisations greatest weakness? Hmm, I’m sorry Miss Frost, I’ll have to let you go..’
GUSTAV GRAVES SHOOTS MISS FROST.
MISS FROST. Aaaaaaaarghhhhh..
Goldfinger is in my top 10 list of the best Bond films ever. A true classic.
Top 10? Wowsers, the film makes my Top FIVE handily. For me it usually jockeys with FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE for the title of “Best Bond of All”.