I have, by now, got rather fond of Mr. James Bond. I like most of the things about him, with the exception of his rather deplorable taste in firearms. In particular, I dislike a man who comes into contact with all sorts of formidable people using a .25 Beretta. This sort of gun is really a lady's gun, and not a really nice lady at that. If Mr. Bond has to use a light gun he would be better off with a .22 rim fire; the lead bullet would cause more shocking effect than the jacketed type of the .25. -
The letter that changed James Bond's gun, and gave his armourer a name.
posted by Artw
on Jun 2, 2011 -
102 comments
RIP John Barry, composer of the soundtracks of 11 James Bond films and many others including
Midnight Cowboy. He won Oscars for
Born Free (for best song and best score),
The Lion in Winter,
Out of Africa and
Dances With Wolves.
[more inside]
posted by fearfulsymmetry
on Jan 31, 2011 -
65 comments
After the fiasco of their premier episode - a lavish live production of Raymond Chandler's
The Long Goodbye during which a corpse unwittingly got up and walked off stage on camera - CBS's
Climax! Mystery Theater was looking to adapt something less high-profile. Say, the debut spy thriller by a struggling British journalist willing to let the rights go for $1000. The result: 1954's "
Casino Royale",
starring Barry Nelson as Jimmy "Card Sense" Bond of American intelligence, Michael Pate as his British counterpart Clarence Leiter, and
Peter Lorre as the first-ever Bond villain. Now on
Youtube 2 3 4 5 6
posted by ormondsacker
on Apr 20, 2010 -
19 comments
Spy music! Whether it's
Lalo Schifrin's theme for
Mission Impossible, or
Jerry Goldsmith's theme for
Man from U.N.C.L.E., or the greatest of them all,
John Barry's iconic
James Bond theme, you know it when you hear it. Now, for my money, the best spy music in
recent years wasn't from a spy movie at all, but an animated superhero film: the action-packed
theme and soundtrack for
The Incredibles, in which the very talented
Michael Giacchino was clearly (and brilliantly)
channeling John Barry. And of course, you'll all want to head over
here and see what your fellow MeFiers have lately been doing with the genre.
[note: see hoverovers for link descriptions] [more inside]
posted by flapjax at midnite
on Aug 1, 2008 -
54 comments
The Real-Life Vesper Lynde. Known to history as Christine Granville, Krystyna Skarbek was first Polish nobility and later Churchill's favorite spy. Undaunted by weather, Christine skied over the
Tatras from Hungary to Poland to gather intelligence and participated in the liberation of France. She was awarded the
Croix de Guerre, but found herself ill-suited to normal employment, and worked as a saleswoman at Harrods and as a telephonist before becoming an oceanliner stewardess. Along the way, Christine met
Ian Fleming, who may have
based his first "Bond Girl" on the intrepid spy. Want to know more? Read her recently republished
biography or
order her file from the Briish National Archives.
posted by Medieval Maven
on Aug 6, 2006 -
6 comments
Miss, Miss! Little Jimmy Bond peeked at my intelligence report! "The UK's latest move in the fight against terrorism is a secret project to bring together intelligence data from the UK's security agencies, say reports." Because normally, it's far more sensible to have all the different agencies hoarding their own information and not letting anyone else see it... But seriously: first steps to a UK TIA? Knowing the inefficiences, bureaucratic in-fighting, and awful data mess that these agencies routinely engage in, I doubt it.
posted by humuhumu
on May 29, 2003 -
3 comments
The film - starring Pierce Brosnan and Halle Berry - "clearly proves" the US is "the root cause of all disasters and misfortune of the Korean nation" and is "an empire of evil", according to the Secretariat of the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland.
I can't get enough of these people.
posted by Pretty_Generic
on Dec 14, 2002 -
24 comments
The Art of James Bond captures the aesthetic of a character Martin Amis called "lonely, melancholic, in some way ravaged... dark and brooding in expression, of a cold or cynical veneer, and above all enigmatic, in possession of a sinister secret." Of course,
the movies are a different story.
posted by Hildago
on Oct 5, 2002 -
11 comments
James Bond vs. Austin Powers ...and now for something completely trivial: MGM and Danjaq, the British company that controls the Bond film license, have obtained a cease-and-desist order against New Line Cinema that prohibits New Line from calling the latest installment of Mike Myers' shagadelic spy series
Austin Powers in Goldmember. Apparently, the 007 folks weren't too keen on the double entendre of
Goldmember--a takeoff on the 1964 Bond classic,
Goldfinger--and released the legal hounds to force the name change.
That's not very sporting of them, is it?
posted by verdezza
on Jan 26, 2002 -
25 comments
