Kingsley Amis | the m0vie blog

A View to a Bond Baddie: Francisco Scaramanga

Posted on October 11, 2012 by Darren

To celebrate James Bond’s 50th birthday on screen, we’re going to take a look at the character and his films. We’ve already reviewed all the classic movies, so we’ll be looking at his iconic baddies, and even at the character himself.

You see, Mr Bond, like every great artist, I want to create an indisputable masterpiece once in my lifetime. The death of 007 mano a mano, face to face, will be mine.

You mean stuffed and displayed over your rocky mantelpiece?

That’s an amusing idea, but I was thinking in terms of history. A duel between titans. My golden gun against your Walther PPK. Each of us with a 50-50 chance.

Six bullets to your one?

I only need one.

Scaramanga and Bond

Was there ever a better Bond villain wasted in a more terrible film? Okay, maybe Christopher Walken as Max Zorin comes close, but Christopher Lee as Francisco Scaramanga feels like the only potentially redemptive aspect of the tonally mismatched The Man With The Golden Gun, a movie about a duel to a death that involves a karate school, secret lairs, giant frickin’ lasers and a slide whistle. Scaramanga is easily the most compelling thing about the whole film, and that might explain the contempt that many people hold for it. After all, the eponymous assassin is missing for most of the middle section of the film.

The eyes of a killer…

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: bond, Christopher Lee, christopher walken, Curzon Street, Fleming, Francisco Scaramanga, Guy Hamilton, ian fleming, james bond, James Bond in film, KGB, Kingsley Amis, Man With The Golden Gun, Max Zorin, Roger Moore, Rosa Klebb, Scaramanga, White Elephant | 8 Comments »

A View to a Bond Baddie: Alec Trevelyan

Posted on October 9, 2012 by Darren

Alec Trevelyan stands out amongst Bond’s foes on the big screen because he’s really the first to be constructed explicitly to contrast with Bond. You could argue that many of the outings in the series are more preoccupied with the villain than with Bond himself, and GoldenEye stands out as one of the films most tightly focused on Bond himself. Alec Trevelyan, as such, exists as a more direct mirror to Bond than most of his foes. The bad guy even operates under the code name “Janus.” There are several implied reasons – his knack for treachery and betrayal, the scar on the side of his face. However, it also suggests that Bond and Trevelyan exist as two sides of the same coin.

Smart Alec?

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: Adolf Hitler's 50th birthday, alan rickman, Alec, Alec Trevelyan, anthony hopkins, arts, bond, daniel craig, GoldenEye, james bond, James Bond in film, Kingsley Amis, Movies, pierce brosnan, timothy dalton | 5 Comments »

A View to a Bond Baddie: Dr. Julius No

Posted on October 2, 2012 by Darren

In many ways, Dr. No feels like a rather strange first instalment for a franchise that has managed to persist from half a century. Many of the trademarks we associate with the series are absent. There’s no pre-credits sequence. No powerful theme song involving the title of the film. Even the music playing over that iconic gun barrel shot sounds weird. There are no gadgets and gizmos, save for a Geiger Counter. The movie’s iconic Bond girl, Honey Rider, only shows up past the mid-point of the film.

As such, it’s amazing that the Bond villain emerged almost fully formed, with Dr. No providing perhaps the archetypal James Bond baddie.