Sunday, October 21, 2012

Smokin' James Bond.

In a few days the latest Bond film will fall from the sky; it's called,' Skyfall'.

The build up to the latest lavish extravaganza has been completely over the top.It seems that in the U K you can't escape from this James Bond frenzy.Almost everyday some newspaper will have a picture of Daniel Craig and  yet another interview with him, or if not with him, the new Bond girl.Heck, they started this long advertising campaign with the Olympic Games when Craig was seen with the Queen of England, of all people.How on earth did they persuade her I wonder; perhaps she was told that it would be good for her image.

There have been details of Bond's habits; what he likes to eat and drink, but no mention of smoking.
Previous Bond actors have been wheeled out to all say, what a great actor the new Bond one is.

In fact I don't recall a film that was ever plugged so hard as this one.  Maybe Jurrasic Park comes a close second.

The last few films have more or less been propoganda for Her Majesty's Government. with the message,"Isn't Britain great and look how brave and wonderful our special forces are. "
The film though, like the previous ones is promoting violence.As Daniel Craig said," I can be seen killing people, but I can't be seen smoking." Craig wanted to be true to Fleming's creation,and was , it was reported, furious that any smoking scenes were cut out in previous films

While the powers that be have promoted this particular movie so much is a bit of a mystery. I suspect that that there is a message in it we are all meant to hear..Possibly it's loaded with sublimals that are meant to get us to act in a certain way.

Films are the perfect medium to influence large numbers of people.You sit still for about two hours in a darkened room staring at a huge screen, surrounded by like- minded people.Your senses are then bombarded with often startling, dramatic pictures and very loud noises.Whole generations have been brainwashed in this way.

I read all the Bond books in my teens, and I think Ian Fleming is a good writer of popular fiction.The Bond in the books, to sound trite, is nothing like the Bond on the screen.. To my mind, the only actor who came near to the book Bond. was Sean Connery.; Timothy Dalton, a close second.Roger Moore bore no resemblance to Bond at all, and Brosnan came across as very vain and arrogant, which 007 was not.I remember the late Richard Harris when describing Moore playing Bond, said;" He's more like 3 and a half than a 007".

Ian Fleming,the creator of this long lasting character,  in private described his creation as ,"A cardboard policeman", and told, I believe, his friend Noel Coward, that to make him more human he made sure that he had some memorable idiosyncracies and habits.

Bond was fond of good cuisine, strong drink and strong cigarettes.Fleming went into great detail about
his hero's habits, describing with relish any meal he ate, any drink he had and the type of cigarette he smoked.

According to Wikepedia 70 meals were described in the Bond series.They were described in great detail., as was his drinking.

Here is an example in Casino Royale: his drink consists of 3 measures of Gordon's, one of Vodka and half a measure of Kiba Lillet, shaken until it's ice cold with a large slice of thin lemon.I love the attention to the smallest detail with the mention of a large slice,not just of lemon, but thin lemon. I'm surprised he didn't insist that the lemon had to be from some remote area of Greece.

.I.He certainly drank a hell of a lot in the books. In, On Her Majesty's Secret Service he got through 46 alcoholic drinks.He rarely drank beer, but if he did it was often German.One wonders why in the latest film,'Skyfall' he will be seen drinking a normal, everyday, popular beer.Almost every advert I have seen for the film shows him drinking this beer.
.Heinneken gave the film a wallop of money for this perfect advert.

While the British governement has been moaning about the youth drinking too much beer, promoting this beverage in the film is O.K.Money really does talk,doesn't it ?

The other habit of Bond's was his smoking.Fleming was a heavy smoker getting through up to 80 a day, whereas his alter-ego smoked about 60 a day.His cigarettes were made by Morland of Grosvenor Street who mixed Balkan and Turkish tobaccos that had a high nicotine content.Each cigarette had three gold bands on the filter.He carried his cigarette case in a wide gunmetal cigarette case and had a Ronson lighter.
Once again, notice the attention to detail given to this ; smoking was a part of James Bond.

When he smokes, he doesn't simply inhale, but the whole process is usually described to show how much James is enjoying it.When he runs out of his handmade brand  when abroad, he doesn't like other characters in other books, buy a packet of cigarettes, but spend ages wondering what packet to buy.I remember when he was in Greece, in one of the books he praised the Greek Karelia brand.In another book he devotes half a chapter to the origins of the sailor on the John Player Cigarettes, and was surprisingly romantic in tone about this.
As I said smoking played a large part in his life.

In the last few films though, Bond is never seen smoking and I bet he won't be smoking in the new one.When Roger Moore was Bond he actually only smoked cigars and the fictional Bond would never do this as his creator hated them.

The' real' James Bond,007 was a heavy drinker and a heavy smoker, but the film Bond is nothing like the 'real'one in this respect. It was part of his appeal, the fact he didn't care how much he smoked or consumed alcohol.I think a lot of people envied this devil may care trait he had. Without it he is not the same man.

It's like someone acting as Churchill, but never smoking a cigar, or an actor playing a non pipe-smoking Harold Wilson

Can you imagine Sherlock Holmes without that pipe stuck in his mouth ?.






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