Michael G. Wilson's unheralded 007 milestone

http://hmssweblog.wordpress.com/2011/09/29/michael-g-wilsons-unheralded-007-milestone/

B23 will go a long way toward determining if he will be remembered positively or negatively by Bond historians. Right now his tenure is pretty much a push, IMO.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

B23 will go a long way toward determining if he will be remembered positively or negatively by Bond historians. Right now his tenure is pretty much a push, IMO.

I've been pondering this comment and I think it has merit. Interestingly, when another website wrote an item (linking to the HMSS Weblog post) it inserted the words "a fantastic record." The original post didn't use those words, it merely noted that Wilson's tenure has now exceeded his stepfather's.

Maybe this is a generational thing. In the '70s, while Bond fans continued to follow the series, they often discussed whether Cubby was following the right path or not. Thirty-five years later, a good many fans (based on anecdotal experience) don't want to hear *any* critiques of Eon and get really cranky on message boards when it pops up.

Napoleon Solo wrote:

Thirty-five years later, a good many fans (based on anecdotal experience) don't want to hear *any* critiques of Eon and get really cranky on message boards when it pops up.

Not on here they don't. Most of us pretty critical of EON present, and even EON past.

Sharky wrote:

Napoleon Solo wrote:

Thirty-five years later, a good many fans (based on anecdotal experience) don't want to hear *any* critiques of Eon and get really cranky on message boards when it pops up.

Not on here they don't. Most of us pretty critical of EON present, and even EON past.

Didn't mean to comment about (or imply I was talking about() Bond and Beyond. More my anecdotal experience on other sites.

The bigger the fan the more likely to get cranky once in a while.

For all the criticism tossed at Eon past or present the fact remains what they have done is perpetuate success and make this franchise live when many others have conked out and died, come and gone, got rebooted and ......err ok forget that one for now.

But reagrdless of the current state and the films artistic pretentions, it has to be said that Cubby and Harry had a much stepper hill to climb, with less safety equipment and fewer resources than Mr Wilson ever had to negotiate...he can stay a lot longer but hes unlikely ever to warrant the intimate connection Cubby or even Harry had with the franchise simply because they already did that work.

Standing on the shoulders of giants.

The apple fell pretty far from the tree.

Etc.

Erica Ambler wrote:

The apple fell pretty far from the tree.

Etc.

Mike needs to bite right the way through to the rotten core and put all of the essential pips back in place. I admire and thank him for his co-Cubby tenure, but of late.... Well, he still has time to put that right I hope. Is it just a coincidence that I've only really liked one Bond film since he stopped co-writing them...? More likely that Richard Maibaum was irreplaceable, possibly. Still, right now I see Wilson as a man I have some respect for, but just wish he'd step up a bit in public and give off a "Hey, I was here first" vibe a bit more. The films feel like they have a woman at the helm, and have done for some time now. That's not automatically a bad thing and nor is it me being sexist in any way, but the track record of the current team speaks for itself. Bond as a character is a masculine entity, thus I'd just like to get a bit more of a feeling that a man is actually taking some real charge up top.

Up top and down below.

Lazenby. wrote:

More likely that Richard Maibaum was irreplaceable, possibly.

Indeed. Maybe one day we'll accept that the James Bond most people recognize today had two creators not one: Ian Fleming and Richard Maibaum.

Napoleon Solo wrote:

Sharky wrote:

Napoleon Solo wrote:

Thirty-five years later, a good many fans (based on anecdotal experience) don't want to hear *any* critiques of Eon and get really cranky on message boards when it pops up.

Not on here they don't. Most of us pretty critical of EON present, and even EON past.

Didn't mean to comment about (or imply I was talking about() Bond and Beyond. More my anecdotal experience on other sites.

I didn't feel implications from what you said. Quite honestly, I *AM* cranky and I wear it as a badge of honor. But my crankiness has been the culmination of a perfect storm of certain events. For example:

#1 I'm older. In fact, I'm only 3 years behind Daniel Craig, which is kind of unsettling, because it means the next actor that plays Bond will be significantly younger than me, and will have been born well after I was born and was alive and aware of my surroundings. Knowing that I was alive and can remember things when Bond #7 is cast is kind of depressing.

#2 In the past few years I've been forced to reevaluate the Brosnan films (and not in a good way) and not because Daniel Craig is Bond. I still like Brosnan's films, but I think now, in 2011, I'm starting to see his performance much differently than I did 15 years ago, whereas 30 years onward I still believe Roger Moore was the best Bond. Brosnan's era is the only era or event in Bond history that has significantly changed in my mind, and the only event that has had to be downgraded. My impression of THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS has gone up over the years to the point where it is now the #1 film in the series, while my loathing of LTK has stayed constant, my indifference to Lazenby and OHMSS has stayed the same, and I pretty much view Connery as I always have: a good Bond, but belonging to the generation before me.

#3 I've had to re-evaluate the Brosnan films in light of some of the things Babs Broccoli has been trying to sneak into the series as of late, and has caused me to wonder whether hiring Dench was a stroke of genius, a politically correct move, or a bit of both. I have been so thoroughly disgusted with that lame PSA that Craig and Dench did, and that Barbara produced, for International Womyn's Day, that I've yet to forgive any of the key people in Bondage.

#4 To me, Daniel Craig right now is like the Mitt Romney of Bond actors: he's there. He looks the part (sort of) and I go to the movies because it has the name "007" on the poster, but it really hasn't FELT like Bond in a while. I'm just going through the motions right now with the series (I don't even own a copy of QUANTURD OF SOLACE, and it is unheard for me not to have owned a Bond movie on VHS, DVD or Blu-Ray on the day that the film came out; plus, I've gotten wise to the double-dipping practices of the studios and have opted not to necessarily buy a film on it's first home entertainment run).

#5 The world feels like it's going down to the crapper, especially the United States. The US is starting to resemble a third-world shame-hole and I need to vent more and more each day, and I"m probably taking it out on Bond a little bit, but I'm also weary of Babs Coltrane and company trying to "shade" the character of Bond a little bit instead of making him and MI6 the unquestionable good guys, as if there is a moral equivalency between the governments of the U.K and, say, Haiti or Bolivia. I'm a little weary of the direction Babs and Paul Hack-is have taken the series.

#6 The series is starting to feel like Debbie Downer is directing; of four Bond girls in Craig's era, two have been murdered, one has killed herself, and the other has blown 007 off. Whatever happened to the guy who was irresistible to women and who could save them? Now they seem to die from strangulation or suffocation and the ones who aren't murdered are irredeemable or lost souls who feel the need to psychoanalyze 007. Sometimes a person just wants the good guys to be good and the bad guys to be bad, without all the need for introspection.

#7 The Bond series feels like it is changing and there may not be a place for fans like me. Every year it feels like Bond or the series is being pressured to be something it's not: female M's, black Monepenny's, black Bond actors, etc...Does anyone ever feel like just making good, old-fashioned entertainment anymore instead of making social and political statements?

Excellent post, GS, and I particularly agree with points 5-7.

Our world is an increasingly frightening, chaotic, even apocalyptic place, and it would be nice if the Bond films could serve as one small anchor of sanity and stability in the mounting seas of irrationality that beseige us. Instead, Micolli have cast Bond adrift from his moorings and indeed, made him an abettor to the forces of destruction. (At least they did to some extent in QOS.)

B23 will tell the tale folks. Does Bond continue down the dismal path presaged in QOS, or does he pull back from the abyss and regain his true identity?

And that is why I said in another thread that, from a political standpoint, B23 will be the most important Bond film ever made.

Melodramatic? Perhaps. But I really don't think so.

[quote="Erica Ambler"]

Lazenby. wrote:

More likely that Richard Maibaum was irreplaceable, possibly.

Indeed. Maybe one day we'll accept that the James Bond most people recognize today had two creators not one: Ian Fleming and Richard Maibaum.
[/quote

I've felt that since reading the second version of JAMES BOND IN THE CINEMA and a STARLOG interview with Maibarum many years back, though I'd probably make it three, including the director Young. Everything else is either a successful or failed variation on a Maibaum approach or theme or largely unsuccessful.

[quote="trevanian"]

Erica Ambler wrote:

Lazenby. wrote:

More likely that Richard Maibaum was irreplaceable, possibly.

Indeed. Maybe one day we'll accept that the James Bond most people recognize today had two creators not one: Ian Fleming and Richard Maibaum.
[/quote

I've felt that since reading the second version of JAMES BOND IN THE CINEMA and a STARLOG interview with Maibarum many years back, though I'd probably make it three, including the director Young. Everything else is either a successful or failed variation on a Maibaum approach or theme or largely unsuccessful.

I certainly feel that way in terms of my own interest. I'm not interested in another Quantum of Solace. I almost feel as if the Bond film series is on probation as far as I'm concerned. I felt the same way during the 1997-2002 era of Bond continuation novels and short stories. I really didn't like the story set at the Playboy mansion. I felt if the next thing published was that bad, I was out of there. As it turned out, I thought the next novel was pretty decent so I stuck with it (though that novel, High Time to Kill, may have been the high point).

I've said it before, but will repeat here. Over the past decade, I think Eon has gotten very concerned about "respect" in the creative community rather than producing entertaining movies. They got a lot of good reviews for Casino Royale and wanted more. And we got...Quantum of Solace.

re: the PSA...I remember that long thread on CbN. There were some people, in all seriousness, claiming that Craig wasn't playing Bond in that commercial, despite the dialogue in the commercial and the press release concerning the commercial. If you attempted to bring up any objection, you were criticized.

Napoleon Solo wrote:

I certainly feel that way in terms of my own interest. I'm not interested in another Quantum of Solace. I almost feel as if the Bond film series is on probation as far as I'm concerned. I felt the same way during the 1997-2002 era of Bond continuation novels and short stories. I really didn't like the story set at the Playboy mansion. I felt if the next thing published was that bad, I was out of there. As it turned out, I thought the next novel was pretty decent so I stuck with it (though that novel, High Time to Kill, may have been the high point).

I guess I lost interest in Benson after MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DOOM, but in all fairness to him, I had sort of dropped out of reading Bond for a while, so it wasn't specifically him. I did like ZMT and TFOD, but I thought the short story MND was just awful. I think he was genuinely stunned at the reaction to MND and tried to play the short story off as a bit of intentional fluff, but I don't think it was originally intended to be that way, and the story certainly wasn't clever enough to support that idea. I'm going to give Benson a fresh look, though, as I am winding down the Benson era (should be finished with NEVER SEND FLOWERS today).

Quote :

I've said it before, but will repeat here. Over the past decade, I think Eon has gotten very concerned about "respect" in the creative community rather than producing entertaining movies. They got a lot of good reviews for Casino Royale and wanted more. And we got...Quantum of Solace.

Amen!!! May be one of the most insightful, on-point, dead-accurate comments I've read on any Bond forum in a long, long time. I really can't add anything to that.

Quote :

re: the PSA...I remember that long thread on CbN. There were some people, in all seriousness, claiming that Craig wasn't playing Bond in that commercial, despite the dialogue in the commercial and the press release concerning the commercial. If you attempted to bring up any objection, you were criticized.

And it wasn't like the objections were frivolous or baseless. There were some really well thought-out criticisms of the commercial being posted, but those people were often subject to withering attacks by mindless, politically correct drones who'd been taught in school to be very reactionary to any thought or action that was not absolutely supportive of women, women's rights, women's sexuality, etc....I think a lot of posters wanted to seem hip, tolerant, and "understanding" of women's causes to the point where they completely abandoned all manner of logic and reason and simply parroted a line of feminist talking points.

Does anybody remember the Sony HD promo that had Craig in tux (I believe he was dressed that way anyway) ... there was some stink over that too, with some folks claiming he wasn't playing Bond, just playing pitchman for Sony.

I remember objecting vehemently to it on the grounds that Bond, no matter how scarred and ugly, is not supposed to be a punching bag for virtual effects work, which is basically what the promo played like to me.

I'm not claiming that it messed with the character on the level of that in-dress PSA, but it was still a foot in both worlds approach that had its brain lost somewhere in outer space.

This is it:



That was just a little strange. You're right, it seems to imply that Bond is a good punching bag for computer effects. And someone at EON obviously gets a hard-on from seeing Craig dirty and bloody.

Coincidentally, I found this strange QoS-related Heineken ad:



What the hell?

Because drinking beer is much closer to Bond than drinking martinis, bourbon or pink champagne.

Louis Armstrong wrote:

This is it:



That was just a little strange. You're right, it seems to imply that Bond is a good punching bag for computer effects. And someone at EON obviously gets a hard-on from seeing Craig dirty and bloody.

Personally, I love that ad.

[quote="Gravity's Silhouette"]

Napoleon Solo wrote:

I

Quote :

I've said it before, but will repeat here. Over the past decade, I think Eon has gotten very concerned about "respect" in the creative community rather than producing entertaining movies. They got a lot of good reviews for Casino Royale and wanted more. And we got...Quantum of Solace.

Amen!!! May be one of the most insightful, on-point, dead-accurate comments I've read on any Bond forum in a long, long time. I really can't add anything to that.

Thanks. You may interested in this from October 2010:

http://hmssweblog.wordpress.com/2010/10/26/eons-drive-for-respect-and-how-it-affects-the-007-film-franchise/