25 Bonds: An individual dissection.

Tubes

Every Bond is different. Not just from actor to actor, but from movie to movie. With so many screenwriters, directors, and producers with their fingerprints on the series; it's left us with a constantly changing landscape. Bond as a character has evolved from decade to decade and even movie to movie. This is an attempt at distilling each Bond on a film by film basis.

Your task: attempt to describe James Bond within the confines of a specific Bond film. All films are open. Even CR'67 (which, of course, would be Sir James Bond, not the frauds).

I'll start.

James Bond in From Russia With Love: A man of the world, he's a natural in just about any environment. He makes friends easy. He's prone to vengeful action, as he slaps around Tatiana pretty roughly when he thinks she knows more about Kerim's death than she lets on. He's humorous, but in a twisted way. He attracts women quite easily and most that are with him don't seem to mind that he's probably doing someone else in a different country. Follow culinary law pretty strictly. Holds a disregard for gadgets.

Comment, criticize, post your own observations.

JobeGDG

Terrific thread idea, Tubes.

Quoting Tubes: A man of the world, he's a natural in just about any environment.

I actually get a real "fish out of water" vibe from Connery's Bond when he first arrives in Istanbul. When he says, "I suppose it's typical to have people tailing you in these parts" (or something to that effect; I don't remember the actual line), he's being ironic, and though he rolls with the drivers reply of, "Oh, yes sir," it always seemed that it was not the answer Bond expected.

It's a direct contrast to the scene in Dr. No in which Bond knows that he's being tailed from the airport, but is not the first to actually point it out, though he is on top of the situation, whereas in From Russia With Love Bond is the first person to point out the tail, but is not as on top of things as he thinks; the driver has to bring him up to speed. ("The game with the Russians is played a bit differently here," etc. etc.)

I love the reversal. Bond's arrival is Istanbul is one of my favorite scenes in the entire franchise, and the way Young, Maibum, and Connery change things up—a way that depends upon and honors the way things were before—strikes me as the best possible way to approach a sequel.