[HN Gopher] James Bond Unmasked (1968)
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James Bond Unmasked (1968)
Author : uniqueid
Score : 40 points
Date : 2021-05-30 17:59 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.commentarymagazine.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.commentarymagazine.com)
| akomtu wrote:
| I've been thinking just days ago that ending the Bond franchise
| will be the number 1 target of the woke crowd (or whoever steers
| them). The reason is obvious: Bond is the pinnacle of "whiteness"
| - the character is all about excellence and superiority, all
| attributed to a white dude (this brazen heresy is making me feel
| a bit uneasy). And since the censors can't make their own PC
| movie that would outcompete Bond, they'll have to cancel it.
| halfmatthalfcat wrote:
| Idris Elba is heavily favored on the internet as the next Bond.
| It's on MGM (now Amazon) to push a more contemporary and
| progressive Bond. This isn't dismissing the past "white" and
| stereotypical alpha male persona of Bond, but there's plenty of
| room to move forward and bring Bond into the 21st century.
| setpatchaddress wrote:
| You really need to stop watching Fox News. It is poisoning your
| brain. No one other than Twitter grifters thinks the way you
| seem to think they do.
|
| - A Bond of color is probably an inevitability.
|
| - Bond is usually incredibly incompetent and succeeds in spite
| of himself through sheer luck.
| asguy wrote:
| > You really need to stop watching Fox News. It is poisoning
| your brain.
|
| What's the point of typing this out? When you write things
| like this do you think you're going to convince anyone to
| change positions? Is it just to gain internet points? Imagine
| this as a response to your comment:
|
| > You really need to stop watching MSNBC. It is poisoning
| your brain.
|
| It's like playing tennis.
|
| I'm replying because this type of stuff is so tiresome. It's
| hard enough to avoid on the rest of the Internet; please
| don't bring it to HN.
| curtainsforus wrote:
| You agree with fox news on half of your points?
| [deleted]
| leephillips wrote:
| This is a rather odd and fatally incomplete essay. Its final
| suggestions, verging on explicit charges, of antisemitism against
| Fleming seem like guilt-by-association.
|
| The criticism of the writing in the novels is not totally unfair.
| Although the worst of it is barely readable, at his best Fleming
| could spin a scene or passage with resounding skill. But his most
| interesting work is in his short stories, which Richler doesn't
| mention. If you think you have the measure of Fleming, read the
| story "The Hildebrand Rarity", which rises to the level of
| literature, and takes Bond to psychological places that may
| surprise you. Also, in stories like "007 in New York", Fleming
| shows real wit and something like self-deprecation toward his own
| output, or at least the ability to have fun with it.
|
| Finally, although Richler runs on quite a bit into anecdotes
| about Fleming's promotion of the Bond books and their commercial
| fortunes, he doesn't mention what caused the sharp turning point
| in their popularity, which was a comment by JFK.
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| It's a revealing bit of contemporary criticism, but it comes
| across as a bit naive, as if the author somehow expected
| something different from an author of popular spy fiction and
| was disappointed. He's not wrong, he just misses the point. Of
| _course_ Bond is a head case whose psychological foibles are a
| reflection of his creator, or at least of his era. A woke Bond
| would be about as interesting (and about as profitable) as a
| woke Batman.
|
| And as for Fleming's predilection for writing about card games
| and golf games: if you can make those interesting -- and he
| could, and did -- you're certainly entitled to be listed among
| the ranks of Real Writers. That's when I realized it was time
| to take Stephen King seriously -- not when he wrote interesting
| stories about vampires or demons or aliens, but when he wrote
| interesting stories about _baseball._
|
| Edit: on finishing the essay, I'm being too generous to the
| author here. His rambling about an anti-Semitic subtext in
| Fleming's books has no justification, and he knows it, which is
| why he starts rambling about anti-Semitic subtexts in other
| authors' works.
| woodruffw wrote:
| > It's a revealing bit of contemporary criticism, but it
| comes across as a bit naive, as if the author somehow
| expected something different from an author of popular spy
| fiction and was disappointed.
|
| Well, John le Carre had already published at least 4 popular
| spy novels by the time (1968) this critique of Fleming was
| published.
|
| I, for one, think it's fair to expect something different
| when other contemporaneous authors were doing something
| different.
| B1FF_PSUVM wrote:
| > John le Carre had already published at least 4 popular
| spy novels
|
| By the time I read my tenth or twelfth le Carre, I was
| ready to contest the point that they were different novels.
| It all seemed to boil down to "It's a mistake, we don't
| know what we are doing, woe is us" in different locales.
| woodruffw wrote:
| That's been my experience of them as well :-)
|
| They're certainly a different subgenre, but I think the
| larger point stands: it's possible to be a British author
| of spy novels in the 20th century without sublimating
| your fear of British decline through one-dimensional,
| reactionary characterization.
| whakim wrote:
| I didn't read the author's charge of antisemitism as strictly
| guilt by association. I think Richler's argument is that the
| fixation on shadowy global plots threatening "good old England"
| both fits into a pattern of 20th century antisemitism (Russia,
| Germany) and provides a kind of "dog whistle" appeal to the old
| (antisemitic, xenophobic) aristocracy.
| leephillips wrote:
| I agree, but that's what I meant. Toward the end he comes
| right out and practically calls the books antisemitic, but
| his evidence is that they contain plot elements that
| _resemble_ other, truly antisemitic fantasies, such as global
| plots to take over the world.
| whakim wrote:
| But knowingly echoing antisemitic tropes _is_ antisemitism
| - that 's why I used the phrase "dog whistle."
| jasonwatkinspdx wrote:
| I think one of the sad things about Idris Ilba not getting to
| be Bond is, in the hands of a nuanced writing team, they
| really could have used the character to dig into some of the
| stuff the aristocracy still has not fully self reflected
| over.
| curtainsforus wrote:
| Why do you think the aristocracy cares about Bond films?
| Bond films are trash for proles. Any attacks in an Elba-
| bond would only cause damage to the proles. That being the
| reason the aristocracy can, and will when prompted, say "oh
| yes, it's a stunning and brave work of art"- because it's
| like chemo, or antibiotics- a mild poison that damages the
| scum far more than you.
|
| The scum likes bond films; when bond films say "England is
| racist", the scum sours and turns on itself. The human
| aristocrat breathes a sigh of relief and goes back inside.
| karaterobot wrote:
| Fifty years on, the article reads to me like one writer was angry
| at another writer's outsized success, and went really hard at
| them in the cattiest possible way.
| darthrupert wrote:
| I can recommend the podcast Kill James Bond! (featuring at least
| Philosophy Tube's Abigail Thorne) if you're at all perplexed why
| this monster and the mostly very mediocre movies are so
| glorified.
| blowski wrote:
| Is there any great mystery to their popularity? Surely it's the
| same reason other franchises are popular - good promotion from
| the studio, a loyal fanbase that loves the familiar characters,
| and a wider audience that loves a brainless action-flick with
| attractive actors.
| akomtu wrote:
| I'd make a guess that it's the non trivial plot, outstanding
| performance and top notch actors that make Bond such a
| successful franchise.
| watwut wrote:
| Wut? The plots are fairly trivial and predictable. Bond
| movies are schematic movies with completely average
| performances.
| jasonwatkinspdx wrote:
| I like Craig's version but agree with you in general. I
| like the old movies for nostalgia reasons but they are not
| exactly high quality cinema. That's ok. They can just be
| fun, but I think it's a little silly to hold them up as
| more than they are just because they had some cultural
| cache half a century ago.
|
| Brosnon is a fine actor, but I never liked his version. It
| was like watching a prep school dweeb act like he's a macho
| badass. Just never came across as particularly believable
| or compelling.
|
| I hope moving forward the franchise continues the trend of
| getting into some more serious/substantial character
| development and conflicts. The Craig versions were mostly
| better on this point, but they could go so much further.
| beaconstudios wrote:
| Bond films are glorified for something that snobby elitist
| critics have disdain for; they're fun.
|
| Not a big fan of the Daniel Craig bond films though, they've
| joined the 20xx trend of everything having to be dark and
| gritty.
| FearlessNebula wrote:
| This franchise has too much childhood nostalgia for me to ever
| "cancel" it. It's gonna be the blue pill for me.
|
| That being said, it's interesting and humble to see my internal
| biases. My gut instinct to all of these critical comments of the
| Bond movies was "these idiots are wrong". I had to consciously
| tell myself "they probably have a lot of valid points but in
| favor of protecting childhood memories I'm not going to look into
| this".
| howmayiannoyyou wrote:
| Anyone interested in Bond's author, Ian Fleming might find
| interesting Fleming's activities in Washington DC during WWII. An
| account this NPR feature:
| https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=242536...
| follows below.
|
| As England was fighting for its life against the Nazis, the
| British government sent its most charming spies -- including
| Roald Dahl, Ian Fleming, Noel Coward and David Ogilvy -- to
| America to blackmail, bully and cajol the U.S. into the war
| effort.
| [deleted]
| jmkni wrote:
| Fascinating, I just wish the NPR audio was much longer (like
| hours longer)!
|
| It felt like the intro to a podcast series (except without the
| podcast series).
| dredmorbius wrote:
| Protip: author interviews on broadcast media are almost
| always part of a publicity tour for a book.
|
| Here, the guest, Jennet Conant and her book _The Irregulars_.
|
| A YouTube search for longer-duration videos should provide a
| few talks based on the book. Or you could read the book
| itself ;-)
|
| https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=JENNET+CONANT+i.
| ..
|
| Here's a 50-minute talk:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w-iPz6brO0
|
| You can also try podcast search (in your podcast app or
| online). A starting point: https://www.listennotes.com/search
| /?q=JENNET%20CONANT%20irre...
|
| And another: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWtDq5rWmmc
|
| (I've listened to only a minute or so, it's highly likely the
| talks are near-identical.)
|
| The book: https://www.worldcat.org/title/irregulars-roald-
| dahl-and-the...
| ghaff wrote:
| I've found that about 30 minute interviews work about right
| for me. When I'm recording them, I may go as short as about
| 15 and as long as about 45. But 20-30 always feels like the
| sweet spot.
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