Monday, December 8, 2014

What have they done to you, Bond?

I vaguely remember a snippet from PG Wodehouse' "Our man in America" pieces. It goes something like this (NOT verbatim quoting since my memory is pretty poor. Yes! Yes! THAT is not my only flaw, thanks for reminding)

There has been a huge renaissance in Western movies. In the movies of the past, when the outlaw rode into town, the Sheriff used to meet him on the street in a duel and shoot him to doll-rags. Nowadays, he calls him in, psycho-analyses him, and finds that Bill holds up stages and shoots up the Malemute Saloon on Sundays because someone deprived him of his all-day sucker at the age of six. After which, Bill sells the movie rights to his life-story for a huge sum and retires to California. The movies, in the past, had the Army commandant fight battles with the Indians and kill them to the last man. Now, he calls them for a palaver ("Is all this scalping really necessary?"), after which they toddle off, go into the hay, corn and seed business and do well.

Something like that seems to have happened to James Bond. There was a time when he used to fight megalomaniac villains, who thought large - bringing about the end of the world, setting up space stations and such other interesting objectives. Now, he is reduced to fighting villains with a mother-fixation on 'M'. Where is the magnificence of megalomania and where is this paltry chasing of some sort of exalted serial killer? What next? Two hours of murder and mayhem, and unveiling a six year old boy, who thinks he is playing a computer game, as the master villain?

There was a time when Bond used to run over roof-tops, jump down sewers and fight villains, and within seconds enter a party as though he had stepped out of a band-box, with not a hair out of place. A sort of aspiring Hollywood Rajnikant. Now, he actually gets hurt, sports wounds and shows pain! What a fall for the original super-spy! In the near-future, I am sure there will be a movie with Bond, with his arm in a sling, being protected by others and hustled to safety. Or, horror of horrors, Bond having a heart-to-heart chat with the villain, causing the villain to repent and defuse the nuclear device he set up under the White House.

Time was when Bond's car was a combo car-submarine-airplane, in addition to being invisible sometimes; when his pen could do everything, including writing; when his watch was a laser, magnet and what not (it also showed time); and when you knew that if his car fell off the mountain into a gorge, he would come floating down on a parachute, if not flying a glider. NOW...I just cannot speak, my heart is too full. More of this and Bond might as well be a character from John le Carre's novels instead of Ian Fleming's.(My name is Smiley, George Smiley?)

But why Bond, alone? Batman is now an angst-ridden person resolving inner conflicts; Hercules and Achilles are mere battle-scarred warriors and not superhuman heroes; Loki is not a capricious god but merely driven by jealousy of the perceived favoritism shown by Odin to Thor - in fact, it seems like Hollywood has declared war against all elements of fantasy that is set anywhere in the 'real' world. I hope I will not live to see the time when there is a movie in which Hogwarts is set up by humans from a parallel universe and the wands are voice-activated devices that are programmed to do what the words mean.

When there is a whole world of movies for all this realism, this angst and all this agonizing, why pick on Bond? Or any of the other tales that mixed fantasy into the everyday world? Am I a lone dinosaur and is the rest of viewing world demanding realism in their movies - including the children who used to love these larger-than-life characters? Or is it that the directors feel the pressing need to show that they can do something more 'intellectual' than what the franchises have always stood for? Has the world grown away from all escapist entertainment and prefers everything to be more...mundane?

Maybe the day will come when some genius of a Hollywood director will film "The Tempest" with Prospero being a Computer genius, and Ariel and Caliban are mere apps! I hope that I will not live to see the day!

25 comments:

  1. Somehow, I tend to agree with everything you say that I have begun to appear like your pale shadow. Finally found something to disagree. I for one do not like pure escapism nor do I like pure realism. I think I more enjoy escapist stories with some grey shades and conceptual elements than the pure unadulaterated action, unless it is a spoof.

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    1. Yeah TF but you have enough other movies to watch. Do you really need even these movies to be converted to your taste, leaving people like me with nothing to watch? :)

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    2. Actually not, Suresh. I can't bear to watch the pure realism movies that everyone watches. So I need these elements in my escapist fantasy.That way I guess movie makers have discovered the unmet needs of this middle segment. But yes, I agree. They should continue to cater to the purely escapist people as well.

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    3. The point, TF, is that right now there is not much difference between a Bond movie and any of the other espionage movies doing the rounds. To dispense with almost ALL the elements that make the franchise unique does not seem to me to be very intelligent :)

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  2. Not a big Bond films fan but I get your drift! The same happened with the Spiderman series too, the first two parts had him demolishing the evil villains while the third part had him grappling with his own inner thoughts. A great fall indeed!

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    1. There is still an audience for larger-than-life heroes and larger-than-life villains. If all those movies are eliminated to conform with 'reality', movies will become very monotonous indeed!

      It also irks me, as a management grad, to have all that is unique about a brand being systematically dismantled :) Seems rather stupid - like Rolls Royce brand being used to sell a car like a Maruti Alto :)

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  3. While I have thoroughly enjoyed and probably still continue to enjoy those escapist fantasies with all time favorite heroes such as Batman, Spiderman and James Bond, I have to say that the current breed of superhero movies also excite me as well.

    If you ask me to pick sides, and choose one, I would really be at a curious conundrum I must say :)

    But I completely understand where you are coming from, truly do.

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    1. WHY is it an either-or, Jairam? THAT IS my whole point. I like the other ones, too, but I do not appreciate the idea of being totally deprived of these movies.

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  4. haven't seen most of these movies, but I guess everyone wants to move more towards reality...the larger than life roles are gone...but with that the fun is also gone, we want to see our superheroes flying, taking on a hundred villains and doing things no one can do....but the directors don't seem to get that idea, do they?

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    1. Exactly! There are times when one is in the mood for semi-real movies and some when one just wants a happy-go-lucky ride. AND, all the franchises one could depend upon to provide the latter are being messed up by these guys :)

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  5. I wasn't much of a BOND fan...but I totally agree with what u said. The charm is being lost...the superhuman like powers of super heroes has taken a toll too.
    If super heroes too have inner conflicts to fight...whats the point of calling then super heroes!

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  6. i really don't know what to say,only that nowadays people like to be able to relate with these characters,some flaws,some humanness is appealing,makes us think that even we can,even we are a superhero in some way,i guess our egos have inflated so much that we cannot accept anybody else as a 'hero'... and we find it insulting when we're shown these unrealistically evil but rather comical villians,we like anti heroes better than villians,we all have these inner conflicts and we very well understand that not everything is black or white,basically we know and understand more of the human psyche now than we ever did,so our movies have also evolved to suit that better.....wrong??

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    1. Seema! You are seeing things monolithically! See, you have cartoons, you have romantic movies, you have action movies, you have these super-hero movies....Just as there are people who like viewing life-like heroes and villains, there are people who like larger-than-life heroes and villains. There are times when the same person feels like seeing a super-hero flick and some times when he wants to see a real-life like flick. No?

      So, the point IS that when a certain franchise has acquired a reputation for sort of super-hero exploits and you kill it, it is stupid. IF you are turning every movie into a real life movie you are depriving the world of variety.

      What would you say if every movie made in the world were like the Life of Pi? The fact that Life of Pi is good is one thing; to produce movies of only that genre is another.

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    2. ur right,maybe :) in a way but there's plenty of movies with larger than life heroes maybe James Bond's franchise r reinventing Bond as someone closer to real life spies,after all Bond is no superhero,he's only a spy,...also i see no dearth of the kind of movies ur talking about,too many infact :) u shud see some South Indian movies,typical hero centric,larger than life movies :) have a nice day:)

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    3. firstly sorry for the late reply ... and yes i already figured tht ur south Indian because of ur name Sir :)

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    4. Ha! I assumed you would know.What I meant was that I do KNOW of the South Indian movies :) My point in the post was that it is a pity to have the BEST parantha shop in town changing to making pizzas and it is no consolation that there are other parantha shops in town :) There are other pizza shops too :)

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  7. Maybe they should portray their superheroes in the Indian context - poor job satisfaction, meagre wages, unfair performance appraisal, et al. And then maybe they should hang up their boots/capes/red undies and join politics. AamSuperhero Party anyone?

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  8. Hahaha, CRD! And what if Bond becomes Agent Vinod - you can always watch a Rajnikant movie instead :)

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  9. Stop watching Bond movies, go get tickets for Lingaa :) thalaivar will give u what u want :)

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    1. Not exactly! His villains are still ordinary - not the sort who build space stations and want to bring about the end of the world :)

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  10. Must hv run out of ideas.
    could hv shelved Bond instead of going in for reality.

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