New James Bond = Daniel Craig.

I've often thought that there could be something in redoing the original Bond stories as period pieces now -- picturing an England grinding along in a post-WWII austerity, Bond as blatantly bigoted and viciously cynical antihero searching for some sort of temporary release via his assignments. The film Bonds have barely ever touched this aspect of the character except sporadically -- part of Dr. No, a fair amount of For Your Eyes Only and The Living Daylights, my own underrated favorite, as I still think Dalton was a great and perfectly cast actor in a promising but ultimately failed script. And trying to convey all the internal reflections and monologues in the books would be hard. But it is interesting, for all of the Fleming 'sweep' in his stories, just how much of a Le Carre character the literary Bond is in the end -- it's a tension that the films understandably lost early on, because the spectacle provided its own rationale.

yeah, i remember reading a bit of the CR novel in a film class, and I wonder if they'll have the torture sequences in this one.

Indiana Jones and The Trussed-Up Agent

I'm not going to defend them down to the last word or anything, but I always thought Fleming's own wonderfully biased statement of intent -- "I have no messages for suffering humanity... they are written for warm-blooded heterosexuals in trains, plains or, in bed" -- sums up what they are. Colin Wilson, a somewhat curious man in general, did I think capture what Fleming was about with the title of his study of UK mystery/thriller authors -- Snobbery With Violence. That applies to Fleming's work perfectly, but as I muttered above, it's tempered by two great gifts -- his sense of pace and tension and Bond-as-patriotic-antihero.

If I had to pick any of the books offhand -- Casino Royale (the first one, no 'preset' ideas of Bond even in Fleming's mind, a very black ending all around), Moonraker (first full-on megalomaniac supervillian, plays with the idea of one last Nazi counterattack in the atomic age, and actually has my favorite sequence in all the books, Bond exposing Drax at cheating at cards), and On Her Majesty's Secret Service and You Only Live Twice (last fully revised and completed Bond novels before Fleming's death, obsessed with mortality and vengeance, and very much meant to be considered as two parts of an overarching story of love and revenge).

For sheer description, any of the Bond books set in Jamaica or the Caribbean -- Live and Let Die, Doctor No and Thunderball -- are probably the best. That was the area Fleming loved most in the world and it shows (though you could spend a year unpacking all the colonial assumptions in each book).

-- mark s (mar...), Yesterday 8:52 PM. (mark s) (later)

trust me, it works :(

my favourite was probably thunderball, which had a naked back with two bullet-holes in it, which were cut right throgh the cover

http://www.mi6.co.uk/sections/articles/images/literary_casino_royale1.jpg

http://img.tfd.com/thumb/c/cb/YouOnlyLiveTwiceNovel.jpg

they have a bunch of objects from the story -- like "man w/golden gun" has a golden gun, some banknotes, a watch, a scooped stilton, a snakeskin, a cork thing i can't identify, and a pic of the girly du jour -- all tumbled together and beautifully lit and photographed

I've been hearing this a lot. It seems like a small concession to the realities of espionage. Who makes a better spy, a heartbreaker or an weathered average-looking bloke? I wonder if the new bond film will take a "back to basics" approach and more closely approximate the novels, which, although fantastical, had Bond engage in at least some espionage instead of just shooting it out with bad guys.

I never read it though. Stinky pages.

Casino Royale has one of the greatest opening lines in any fiction ever.

So if I go see this one in the theater, which is looking much more likely now, that'll be the first time since 1989.

Several reviewers noted one joke that deliberately breaks a Bond tradition. When asked if he wants his vodka martini shaken or stirred, Craig replies: "Do I look like I give a damn?"

"One day the time will come for a black Bond and hopefully I can audition for it," the 36-year-old said at the MTV Europe Music Awards in Copenhagen.

Diddy, who appeared in Monster's Ball in 2001, said: "It's a dream of mine to play a great role like that."

Actor Daniel Craig's first outing as 007 is later this month when Casino Royale is released.

"I love the Bond they have now," said the musician. "He's a great actor and I think they made a great choice."

The rap star - real name Sean Combs - vowed that he would keep the audience entertained if he were to land the 007 role, saying: "That's what we get paid to do."