Word: bonding
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...four actors playing 007 -- since Dr. No opened to no special acclaim. But the spy created by Novelist Ian Fleming is still in business: saving the world from megalomaniac crime masters, heartless femmes fatales and indifferently prepared vodka martinis. It's a big business too. The first 14 Bond films presented by Albert R. ("Cubby") Broccoli have earned something like $2 billion around the world. (Broccoli did not produce the 1967 parody Casino Royale or Connery's free-lance return to the role in 1983's Never Say Never Again.) Now, on the series' silver anniversary, Broccoli offers...
...world disturbed by cold war ultimatums and distracted by Camelot dazzle, Bond gave the traditional action hero modern attitudes and equipment. He brought a killer's lightning instincts to Sherlock Holmes, a suave caress to crude Mike Hammer, the microchip age to Dick Tracy's gadgets. His films were comic strips with grown-up cynicism, Hitchcock thrillers without the artistic risks. He was an existential hired gun with an aristocrat's tastes -- just right for a time when class was a matter of brand names and insouciant gestures. "My dear girl," Bond tells a new conquest, "there are some things...
...Bond films made celebrities of his enemies (Oddjob, Rosa Klebb, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Jaws), so they incited schoolboy giggles with the names of his women. Pussy Galore and Octopussy! Kissy Suzuki and Plenty O'Toole! Mary Goodnight and Holly Goodhead! They were as indispensable and interchangeable as 007's other accessories, the Walther PPK and the Aston Martin. Pussy Galore might be a judo expert who could toss Bond like a crepe, but he would merely toss back a wolfish double entendre: "We must have a few fast falls together some time." In its Connery years, Bond comprised equal parts...
...nation that had seen its empire shrink in rancor, and its secret service embarrassed by the Burgess-Maclean and Profumo scandals, the notion of a British agent saving the free world was a tonic made in Fantasyland. The Beatles might have made Britain swinging for the young, but Bond was a travel-poster boy for the earmuff brigade. The Bond films even put a few theme songs (including Paul McCartney's Live and Let Die) on the pop charts. But their signal influence was closer to home. In the '60s, Bond spawned a whole genre of superspy imitators: Matt Helm...
...surprise there: John Stears, the effects wizard of Star Wars, supervised the visual tricks on six early Bonds. He was one of many craftsmen who kept returning to the series: Screenwriter Richard Maibaum (twelve of the 15 films), Composer John Barry (twelve), Production Designer Ken Adam (seven), Main Credits Designer Maurice Binder (13). Bond's office colleagues -- M, Q and Moneypenny -- have appeared in every episode. John Glen, who has helmed the past four films, is just the fifth director in the series. The Bond team hit its early peak with Goldfinger in 1964 and followed up with some snazzy...