Happy Birthday, Ian Fleming

[filkertom]

In 1908.

What's your favorite Bond novel or movie? Mine, without question, is the film version of Goldfinger. Although I have a great love for the scene in Moonraker where, finding himself down a dark alley with Jaws (Richard Kiel), Roger Moore looks up with a cheeky, toothy grin, and then they get down to the deadly serious.

Bonus points if you ever had the misfortune to read the original novel of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

Comments

[zillafan.livejournal.com]

Ian Fleming's real life World War II exploits proved Fleming had quite an imagination (he masterminded many plots for Naval Intelligence!). I may have to have a Vodka Martini today!

My favorite Bond film has got to be Dr No. The first with the best Bond for my money: Sean Connery! Least sensible but also a fav is that guilty pleasure of mine Casino Royale. Love David Niven, Peter Sellers, Woody Allen, Ursula Andress and many more... all who were James Bond by the end of that film I might add!

Hmmmmm come to think of it those two films have more then just James Bond in common... I may actually be a Ursula Andress fan!

BTW The Redford Theatre Classic Film Series will be showing Goldfinger August 18 and 19!

[per_solo]

Favorite movie, for me, always comes back to the first I saw..."For Your Eyes Only"...Then the connery run all comes to mind.

Goldfinger and From Russia With Love top that list...and, were it not for the fact that FYEO intro'd me to bond, they'd be at the top..as it is, gotta love the one I started with. Trivia bit, it was the very first movie I recorded onto a VHS tape, from TBS, back in the day...when my sister and I had ONE VHS tape apiece to record shows onto. :-)

[filkerdave.livejournal.com]

Wait a minute. I liked the original novel of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and read it years and years before I saw the film (and still prefer it over the film by lightyears).

Mmm...movies. Either Dr. No or From Russia With Love, I think.

[ravenclaw-eric.livejournal.com]

I had the original novel read to me in school, not long after it came out. Our teacher read it to the whole class.

I was...annoyed...at the way they changed it around when Disney got its hands on it. What is it with Disney, anyway?

[drzarron.livejournal.com]

Just a point of order, CCBB was a MGM/United Artist production, produced by Albert "Cubby" Broccoli.

Disney had nothing to do with it.

[smallship1.livejournal.com]

I liked the original story of CCBB, too. Mind you, I haven't read it in about thirty years...

My favourite Bond film? Casino Royale. Yes, the one with Woody Allen in it. Yes, the one that makes no sense whatsoever. All the others I can absolutely take or leave, and usually the latter, these days. Sorry.

[drzarron.livejournal.com]

The Bond films hold a special place for me. My Dad and My Uncle had a standing outing for any Bond film.

Dr No is probably best over all film.

Goldfinger is the essential Bond film. If you one had to see one Bond film, Goldfinger is it.

I have a soft spot for "Live and Let Die" and especially "Spy Who Loved Me" most cause of the dates I was on seeing them.

I also like "Man With The Golden Gun".

Now, I've also ready several of the novels and pretty much hated them. Flemming was a good idea writer but that's about it.

[lapislaz.livejournal.com]

I'm going to confess something horrid here - as much as I adore Sean Connery (and his Scottish accent), my favorite Bond was George Lazeny - On Her Majesty's Secret Service is definitely my favorite.

I do like Live and Let Die and The Spy Who Loved Me, and I also liked Timothy Dalton in The Living Daylights just because it was so much fun to romp around Europe - also John Rhys Davies.

[naja-pallida.livejournal.com]

You're not alone, I liked Lazenby too, and On Her Majesty's Secret Service is probably my favorite Bond movie. With the two Timothy Dalton movies close behind... but then, maybe I enjoy the more realistic "human" side of Bond. :)

"This never happened to the other fella."

[jmthane.livejournal.com]

Love Moonraker, love Goldfinger more, but I must admit to truly enjoying On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

Never read Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, but I *do* have Ian Fleming's Thrilling Cities.

[suburbfabulous.livejournal.com]

Gelignite! Brekky!
I loved that book...

[rmeidaking.livejournal.com]

Hey, I liked the original Chitty Chitty Bang Bang! Of course, I was about ten at the time. It taught me what gelignite was, and I also had to figure out how to pronouce it. :-)

There are few novels in the world that have had less influence on the film version. All that survived was the flying car and the names of the children, IMO. And the flying car wasn't even like it was described in the book.

[drzarron.livejournal.com]

My favorite "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" trivia.. Lionel Jeffries, who plays the elder Mister Potts and Dick Van Dyke's father is one year YOUNGER than Van Dyke

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

ALthough it's not the best of the series, I admit to a sentimental fondness for Diamonds Are Forever, having seen it first of all the movies, in the theater. Likewise, From Russia, With Love, as far as the books go.

If I had to pick one DVD to watch, it would be Live and Let Die, with Casino Royale as a bonus pick (because it's sui generis among Bond flicks. I am NOT looking forward to the remake).

[faxpaladin.livejournal.com]

I grew up on Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker. (It's a pity I never really got into writing fanfic -- there's an idea I've had since I was a kid for a Bond spinoff with various secondary characters from the films being brought together by Willard Whyte from Diamonds Are Forever as a private counterterrorist force, centering on a reformed Jaws and his technician lady-love from Moonraker. I wavered between calling it The Whyte Knights and Jaws' 5.)

Goldfinger is the hands-down winner for the Connery era (I don't think any other in the entire series has matched that palpable hatred between Bond and Goldfinger). For Moore, I think Spy was the top of his game, though I have a soft spot for Moonraker and Octopussy. Dalton I didn't care for all that much. Brosnan it's harder to say, since for various reasons I haven't seen the last couple, but I rather liked Tomorrow Never Dies (also Brosnan was who I was rooting for to get the job when some NBC exec renewed "Remington Steele" for a measly few episodes basically out of spite, to keep Brosnan from the role, and Dalton got it instead).

[ericcoleman]

First of all, I do get the bonus points, although it has been a LONG time.

Movie ... From Russia With Love. Still the best spy movie of all time if for other reason than Lotte Lenya and Robert Shaw (the best Bond villian ever, he's terrifying)

[capt-video.livejournal.com]

"Goldfinger" is my all time favorite Bond... movie and book. I do have a soft spot for "For Your Eyes Only" (first Bond I saw in a theater), "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" (my favorite Bond line) and "Live and Let Die" (does anyone ELSE worry about what became of Solitaire?)

My parents saw a sneak preview of "Goldfinger" on their first date and had the devil's own time trying to make friends and relatives believe that there was a character called PUSSY in this movie. I've always said that if I had to be named after a character from that movie, I'm glad it was Jill Masters!

[ldwheeler.livejournal.com]

I can never, ever, ever pass up the film version of Goldfinger when it airs. And it airs pretty blessed often.

[vettecat.livejournal.com]

I kind of liked the CCBB book, actually...

[renquestor.livejournal.com]

Let's see...best movie...I'm gonna have to go with Dr. No, with From Russia With Love in a very, very close second. Bookwise, I think I like Casino Royale the best...Vesper's betrayal at the end was such a shock. And then the final lines of the book. "Yes I said was. The bitch is dead." That cold, ruthless persona got me hooked. I really enjoyed the novel From Russia With Love. I didn't particularly care for the Blofeld trilogy, but that's me. Now as to actors...overall Sean Connery has my vote. So smooth, suave, and able to kick your ass through a plate glass window if it's neccessary. For closest portrayal based on the literary Bond, I have to go with Timothy Dalton. His big problem was that the two movies that he did were really shitty on the script department.

Oddly enough, I have a special place in my heart for Man With the Golden Gun. With the exception of the main characters and Scaramanga being a crack shot, there is no similarity between teh book and the movie. Yet, surprisingly I enjoy both. I guess it's the fact that I'm a softy when it comes to Christopher Lee. I could watch that man act all day. He is the shit. The reason I enjoy the book so much is that I am a novel purist at heart. I frequently despise movies based on books. In fact, I often find the book adaptations of movies to be superior, for example, the novelization of Episode III, which rocked the hell out of the movie. It explainied quite a bit more and the fights were even better done...especially the duel with Dooko.

To finish up this post, which has rambled quite a bit as I'm tired, I'll leave you all with a line from Revenge of the Sith, by Matthew Stover. This line put Obi-Wan Kenobi into the pantheon of badasses that I worship

"I was trained in your Jedi arts by Lord Tyrannus himself," Grevious hissed.

"Ah, you must mean Count Dooku. What a curious coincidence. I trained the man who killed him."