This is the 50th anniversary of the film franchise featuring British secret agent James Bond.
“Dr. No” created a sensation when it was released in 1962. “Skyfall,” released overseas in October and in the United States earlier this month, is already the highest-grossing Bond film ever, having earned nearly $800 million at the box office.
Some critics are calling “Skyfall” the best Bond movie ever. I haven’t seen it yet but I find it hard to believe that it can top “Goldfinger.”
“Skyfall” is the 23rd official movie, all produced by Eon Productions. There have also been two unofficial Bond films, made possible by copyright issues involving two novels.
The movies are based on 12 novels and two collections of short stories written by British journalist and novelist Ian Fleming between 1953 and 1964. Fleming based much of Bond’s character on himself and some of Bond’s adventures on Fleming’s activities with British Naval Intelligence during World War II.
The Bond books show Fleming’s prejudices, including political. Besides the Cold War, World War II is ever-present in the novels. Bond himself is a Royal Navy veteran, as are many of the villains he faces.
The Bond books provided a comforting fantasy for Fleming and others of his generation. They saw the British Empire falling apart in the aftermath of World War II. But in the Bond stories, Britain still plays a major role in a world now dominated by the Americans and Russians.
Fleming’s view of the United States becomes increasingly jaundiced in the books. Critics have pointed out that Bond often is called on to solve American problems, like nuclear blackmail of the U.S. in “Thunderball” and an attack on Fort Knox in “Goldfinger.”
Still, Fleming’s Bond novels remain ripping yarns, prejudices and all.
The movies are loosely adapted from the books. Many of the Bond films since the late 1970s have shared little with their source material other than the titles.
There were key differences in the books and movies from the start. The Cold War is in the background of many of the movies, of course, but Bond seldom directly opposes the Soviets. More often, villains try to pit the U.S. against the Soviet Union, hoping to trigger a nuclear war and take over what’s left of the world afterward.
The Bond movie villains are more outlandish than those in the books. Almost to a man, they love science-fiction gadgets and elaborate hideouts.
I first became aware of Bond during the constant television ads for “You Only Live Twice” in 1967. Of course, my parents wouldn’t take me to see it. Apparently, they had seen an earlier Bond film and didn’t consider his adventures to be suitable family entertainment.
On Sept. 17, 1972, “Goldfinger” became the first Bond movie to be shown on U.S. commercial TV. I went to the back of the house and watched it on my small black-and-white television, joining the then-record 49 percent of American TV viewers who saw it on ABC.
After that, I was a Bond fan. I have read most of the books over the years. And in 1973, I saw my first Bond movie in the theater, “Live and Let Die.”
My enthusiasm for the Bond film series started to wane in the late 1980s. I haven’t seen a Bond movie in the theater since 1999’s awful “The World is Not Enough.”
But I have seen them all — good and bad — on television or video. And I’m hoping to see “Skyfall” before its run in theaters ends.
• Contact Charles Corder at 581-7241 or ccorder@gwcommonwealth.com.
