It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
^ Back to Top
The MI6 Community is unofficial and in no way associated or linked with EON Productions, MGM, Sony Pictures, Activision or Ian Fleming Publications. Any views expressed on this website are of the individual members and do not necessarily reflect those of the Community owners. Any video or images displayed in topics on MI6 Community are embedded by users from third party sites and as such MI6 Community and its owners take no responsibility for this material.
James Bond News • James Bond Articles • James Bond Magazine
Comments
Completely agree. I loved that title when it was announced at the end of OP.
As for the short story, Fleming reused an idea he had initially intended for MR, where the motorcycle assassins were nazis rather than Russians.
Like just about everyone who's spoken up so far, I have always thought it was terribly obvious that the wife is the killer. A friend recently read the short stories and asked me who I thought had dunnit; I told him to cherchez la femme. I'm also not sure why Bond would worry about travelling onward with Liz; it's not as if she's going to get a taste for murder and do him in too.
I love the opening description of the underwater world, as soothing as a screensaver. I was reading in bed, and this was the perfect scene to take with me into sleep.
Reading the books in quick succession like this, I have started to notice phrases, adjectives and metaphors repeating - like the 'chorus line' of squid (first seen in LALD, I think?). Who cares, though, when they're this good?
Others have covered the several references to this story in LTK; I'm going to claim that the film's Hemingway House scene is a nod to Fidele's 'Old Man and the Sea' gag, and I don't care how much of a stretch that is.
Milton Krest, a man whose preferred tipple is vodka in soup. It doesn't get much more evil than that. And I can't easily forgive Fleming for giving him the voice of Humphrey Bogart, one of my top most admired and adored human beings.
I couldn't find any information about the post-war patchouli boom, so I assume it suddenly became popular as a perfume ingredient. Was there another patchouli boom a few years after this story, when it became in demand for hippies the world over?
I grew up ten minutes from Ringwood, where Liz comes from. It's terribly dull and if I'd grown up there I'd probably have run off with a rich American too.
Finally, what happened to the poor old stingray? Bond was going to eat it before he went off on his cruise. Did it go to waste or did Fidele pop it in the freezer for later?
Campari must be an acquired taste. I'm still trying to acquire it. I've found, for myself, it tastes best with bourbon. But then I'll ask myself wouldn't I be happier just drinking the bourbon?
Enjoy! I too hope you come back with some excellent Fleming rarities!
I think Fleming is generally regarded as inhabiting one of the higher echelons of pulp (without actually being considered great literature as perhaps other genre authors like Tolkien have). I'm probably biased, but I think maybe his greatest works deserve a place somewhere in between the two realms. When he was great, he truly was great, but there are admittedly weaknesses in his novels.
I was being deliberately hyperbolic in declaring Rhoda Fleming's greatest villain. Still, it sounds like I probably do think lower of Rhoda as a human being than most here. I find her fully culpable for her actions.
Wish I could read Lycett's biography before rereading TSWLM (and that's definitely not going to happen with my schedule), but I'll take your word for it on the book's autobiographical nature. I am very interested in revisiting that one.
Yes, he did!
You'll notice this of many writers—especially those who write rapidly—when you read their works in quick succession. (My goodness, how Stephen King repeats phrases, ideas, character traits, dialogues, even amongst his earliest works!)
Yes, he can be very spotty. Still, as you say, enjoyable when he's in on mode.
Oh, it is. I worked very hard to acquire it :) I still find Aperol a bit nicer, being sweeter.
I'm glad Fleming set one of his stories in Paris, even if it's just in a short story. The forest setting too feels uniquely Bondian to me and will reappear in "For Your Eyes Only." Fleming's descriptive powers immerse you fully in the forest right from the beginning with that excellent "PTS" of the dispatch-rider being shot down.
Mary Ann Russell—a girl so nice she must be named thrice—bursts off the page despite the story's brevity. In her black jeans and with her lifesaving .22, MAR truly is the strong and capable Bond girl the filmmakers keep heralding as a first-of-a-kind with each new film (again, silly, shoehorned-in dramatics aside). That she saves Bond's life is a first for a Bond girl and a delightful surprise.
The climax, after several pages of some beautifully written not-a-whole-lot-going-on, actually offers some of Fleming's most thrilling action. After defeating the would-be assassin on two wheels, Bond cleverly draws out the accomplices with a mimicked bird whistle. Then everything goes wrong and the grapple with the forward-most man, "fingernails flashing towards his eyes," is real thrilling stuff. Bond clubs at the man with his gun but misses and finds his own weapon being turned on himself. Then there's the boot to the head and the red mist clouding his vision and for all we know Bond's on his own out there and about to die. Again, Fleming simply writes it all superbly. You can't help but race line after line to the finish.
I wish the story had been bigger and that more of interest had been going on throughout, because Paris is a great setting, Mary Ann Russell has great potential (ought to turn up on film sometime), and Fleming's prose throughout is most enjoyable.
No scrambled eggs proper in this one, but the unlucky dispatch-rider does wonder whether he should have his eggs scrambled or fried for breakfast in his final moments in this world.
L007K UP! L007K DOWN! L007K OUT!
I think so too, and it's no coincidence that this is a favourite of mine among the short stories.
It's a wonderful opener, with a great description of the killer on the road: his gauntleted hands like paws, and the wind flapping at his cheeks. (How do you tell a happy biker? Flies on their teeth!)
It was nice of Fleming to detail the route so exactly; I can picture him travelling it and daydreaming. You can find it on bondmaps. It would be entirely feasible for me to go and ride it, but Parisian drivers are terrifying so perhaps I'll give it a miss.
Bond behaves exceptionally well and professionally throughout this story, when he's not fantasising about picking up a French tart or inviting Mary Ann to inspect birds' nests. He finds first the 'invisible man' then the concealed scratches on the tree trunk, lies in wait for the enemy to appear, and even takes on the brave and dangerous job of standing in for the dispatch rider, which allows him to dish out some rough justice.
He gets a charmingly childish kick out of the motorcycle, which reminded me of the 'Comes from never growing up at all' line when he gets to ride one in TND.
Mary Ann is one of Fleming's favourite things, a woman who drives like a man. I enjoy her conversation with Bond in the car, but she lets herself down by getting hysterical for no good reason. ('A professional I barely know is doing his job' is not a good reason.)
I assumed SHAPE was a fictional organisation, like UNCLE, but Wikipedia has just proved me wrong. Oops!
For some reason, the bit about the 16-year-old Bond - 'That had started one of the most memorable evenings of his life, culminating in the loss, almost simultaneous, of his virginity and his notecase' - made me think of this photo from another thread:
Not as much as I'd like to be, but the way my schedule is now there's not anything I'll be able to do about it. I maybe end up getting real behind, but if I do I'll still read the books, just at my own pace.
I read this while giving blood, which means it must be four months since we started on CR!
(I’m reading from the Quantum of Solace collection, and my Donor Carer asked me if it was as good as the film, so I explained about the short story titles. She told me she’d given Fleming a go in her youth but decided they were ‘boy books’, although she does like a good murder mystery. One of the best things about Bond fandom is the conversations you get to have with strangers.)
A great opening; you’re not sure whether you're supposed to like or dislike this rather boring (and rich) old couple, but then the real bad guys appear and there can be no doubt. The moment of pathos as Judy’s car swings up the drive is just perfect.
As you’ve probably noticed by now, I’m a big fan of scenes in M’s office and around HQ generally, and I always love those peripheral glances out of the window at a lost London. Oh, Bond - I do regard the sound of two-stroke lawnmowers with just as much fondness as you have for the old kind!
Some interesting thoughts on the morality of personal involvement and revenge. I'll bear those in mind when we get to OP...
I enjoyed accompanying Bond on his romp through the woods, for both his stalking technique and his private thoughts. The best things in America are chipmunks? That's what happens when you spend too much time on your own; you go a bit funny. (I have never seen a chipmunk. I'd love to.)
I’m not over-impressed by the way Bond treats Judy when they meet. Here is a woman who has got to the exact same place as Bond on her own initiative, without any help from MI6 or the Mounties, and while grieving for her parents, plus successfully snuck up on our top agent from behind. Bond’s reaction is to patronise her, threaten to spank her, then fantasise about shagging her when it’s all over.
I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt by saying that the situation reminds him of Tilly Masterton and he’s acting unpleasant because he feels guilty about that.
At least his picnic-based first aid is pretty nifty. And he’s going to take her to meet M, which is a nice touch. (For Bond that’s probably the equivalent of taking a girl home to meet your parents.)
I’ve been a bit down on Bond’s womanising during the short stories, I think because the format means the love interest angle is rushed and feels forced. I’ll let him get his kicks when we’re back on the novels, I promise.
No, though we have American grey squirrels and they've almost eliminated our native red ones :( (I have been lucky enough to see a few red squirrels. They're cute.)
I believe it!
Yes, only Fleming truly knows about Bond's past. He used discretion in placing Bond's deflowering at age 16--given Bond's proclivities, I'd expected an even earlier age. I wonder how all this fits in with Bond's obituary in YOLT, where we're told Bond had to leave Eton after "alleged trouble with one of the boys' maids" and then went on to Fettes, which he left at the age of 17. Did Bond go to Paris before or after his experience with the maid?
Fleming is also very fond of using "gunmetal" as a color. One of his favorite colors actually.
I don't think the Bogart voice really works either. Bogart's voice was perfectly suited to the gruff man of the world, the reluctant hero. Giving it to an outright scumbag and creep is off-putting and conflicts with our picture of Bogart. Anthony Zerbe, who portrayed the character in LTK, had the right voice for the part.
Being relatively ignorant of alcohol, I read Kingsley Amis's Everyday Drinking a few years ago to increase my knowledge. Shortly after finishing it, I was at a wedding party and asked the barman for a Normandy, one of the drinks Amis gave a recipe for. What I didn't realize was that Normandy wasn't a standard cocktail but a drink Amis had invented. The poor waiter, having no idea what a Normandy was, decided I had actually said Negroni, and brought it to the table. I took a sip and thought it the vilest concoction devised by man. I was unable to finish it, and everyone I offered it to declined after one taste. Never again!
Thank you! I did indeed find a couple of rarities in the British Library, which I will share soon. Nothing earthshaking, but it made my trip to London, and later Naples, even more worthwhile.
Yes. I do get annoyed by the public's idea that Fleming had anything to do with pulp, which was a thing of the 1930s. The Bond novels were intended to be, and initially seen as, up-market thrillers for an "A" audience, the sort reviewed by the Times Literary Supplement. But after they became mass market successes the pulp tag was applied. Fleming's proper place is as a master of a vein of genre literature. He might not have been in the "Shakespeare sweepstakes," but he was a better stylist and practitioner of the thriller genre than many critics and academics are willing to recognize.
Absolutely. She would translate beautifully to the movies, and I'm surprised she hasn't appeared in one yet (perhaps the filmmakers are put off by her name being non-sexual?). I'm also surprised that despite FAVTAK being a very visual story, none of its elements has ever used in a film. The movie of AVTAK might have been a little less crummy if it had anything to do with its source.
On to FYEO:
That is a very good question, and I wish I knew the answer! I wish that the answer was yes and that Lee had survived to play the scene--it would have been his crowning glory in the role. For once M loses his cool entirely: "Dammit...That's just what I mean! You rely on me. You won't take any damned responsibility yourself...I'm the one who has to do that. I'm the one who has to decide if a thing is right or not...Oh well, I suppose it's what I'm paid for. Somebody's got to drive the bloody train." I can so easily picture Lee saying all that. I can still imagine Ralph Fiennes saying "How's your coefficient of toughness, James? You haven't got to the dangerous age yet," though perhaps he should save it for the next Bond actor. And whoever he is, I want to hear him say "These people can't be hung, sir. But they ought to be killed."
Oh, and Fleming tell us Bond "had never suffered the tragedy of a personal loss"--so much for Vesper!
The briefing is a great scene, but Amis thought it showed M at his most monstrous, arranging a private hit job through government property. I don't feel the same, primarily because Gonzales and Von Hammerstein are such obvious scum that they deserve "the law of the jungle," but Fleming understands the ethics are still murky, and doesn't let Bond off the hook:
Bird-killing (and fish killing, as in Hildebrand) is a sign of complete, low-down evil in the Bond books. Von Hammerstein thus joins the Robber, Krest, and Scaramanga in the ranks of Fleming's scummiest bad guys. Now we know he deserves to die.
Oh, they're nothing special--just ground squirrels with black streaks. You might as well just watch a Chip 'n' Dale cartoon.
Though in this case, M is a sort of father figure to her too, having been the best man at the wedding of her parents. I imagine the old man was pretty impressed by Judy's vengeance. Oh, to have been a fly on the wall at that meeting...
I completely forgot about that! I guess Fleming hadn't yet decided Bond was an orphan.
The first tears since his childhood came into James Bond's blue-grey eyes and ran down his drawn cheeks into the blood-stained sea.
Knowing what we later do about Bond's early life (and his orphaned nature) I've always taken his last instance of crying as his reaction to his parents dying.
You could see it that way, sure. I just think that, with the kind of person Bond is, him crying over something is a big deal because it's not a response he often has even to high danger and despair. What quickly comes to mind is the death of his parents.
It's hard to tell when Fleming decided he'd be an orphan, but from the beginning Bond feels like an orphaned figure to me and that is backed up by a lot of the writing and how he reacts to certain things, whether it was intended or not.
As has been noted, the two earliest scenes, the assassination of the Havelocks and Bond's meeting with M, are the strongest parts of the story and each exceptionally well crafted. I particularly like M's analogy of the commanding admiral being the only one who doesn't know what to do and the dynamic of Bond having to in a sense make the call for M on this one (although this must be the third or fourth time Fleming has used the "novelty" of M's calling Bond by his Christian name as a signifier for an important conversation, and it does lose its impact—not something you'd usually notice though, I reckon, unless reading the entirety of Fleming in quick succession as we are). It is refreshing and interesting to see M so emotionally vulnerable.
Judy, like MAR from FAVTAK, is a surprisingly strongly painted Bond girl for such a short story: a vengeful, gray-eyed "Robina Hood" in her forest green garb and with her bow and steel-shafted arrows. Unforgivably, Fleming makes a similar mistake as the one he made with MAR by confoundingly reducing the resourceful and strong-willed Judy to "a different girl" whose eyes are now "soft and obedient" and who speaks "softly" and "docilely" and gets reprimanded "I told you this sort of thing was man's work" and who ultimately must "[fall] in behind" Bond. The story still could have ended with romance amongst the flying bullets and arrows without that "heavy hand" of the author turning poor Judy into a docile and obedient plaything, the very sort of woman Bond says he could never respect in "Quantum of Solace."
Regrettably, Judy, a character deserving of such sympathy, is three times referred to as a bitch—once to her face as "a silly bitch" and twice in Bond's thoughts as "the silly bitch" and "the hot-headed bitch." And there is, as has been mentioned, the quite out of place and frankly bothersome moment where Bond, in his anger over the woman, "[luxuriates] briefly in the thought of what he would do to [her] once all this was over." What he would do to someone he's just met, who's just suffered terrible loss, who has displayed no interest in him whatsoever? An off moment for Fleming and Bond if ever there was one.
And then there are the "brown monkey-hands" belonging to the despicable gunmen who take out the Havelocks. Such things can be breezed over in enjoyment of Fleming, but in larger conversations and deeper analysis of his work, they are, as has been noted previously in our Flemingathon, unfortunately still there.
The climax is good. The setting with the house beside the lake and the diving platforms and the scum hanging out and having a good time is all wonderfully described, and the shootout is pretty exciting too. I particularly like the detail of the poor kingfisher being shot down out of the air and ground underfoot. This idea of recklessly and purposelessly killing beautiful animals—especially birds, like the pelican in LALD—is used repeatedly by Fleming to characterize his villains.
Chs. 1-8 ("Take It Easy, Mr. Bond"—"Big Fleas Have Little Fleas...")
Dedicated to Ernest Cuneo-Muse (the novel, not my thoughts). Familiarish name, that.
Not since Moonraker have the stakes been so high—and even then the stakes were only revealed in the final act. Come to think of it, the Bond novels, while thrilling and full of glamor and larger-than-life characters and quality writing, don't generally have much going on as far as stakes go. Certainly nothing even approaching the global panic of atomic weapons threatening two of the Western world's major cities. Fleming went big here, and though Bond trivializes the role he's likely to play (much as in Diamonds Are Forever), thinking he'll at least pick up a nice suntan, the reader obviously knows better.
Yet again Fleming has M refer to Bond by his Christian name, thus signifying an atypical conversation.
Moneypenny comes fully into her own here, receiving a great page-spanning paragraph of dialogue straight from her "desirable" mouth. There's more Moneypenny in these opening pages of Thunderball than in all the previous novels. And I believe this is the first time we see Bond really flirt with her. Previously, all his detailed office interaction had been with Loelia. Moneypenny gets a great filmesque line about Bond not knowing what to do with his hands: "About the hands—that's not what I've heard." Which leads directly into the '65 film's exchange about spanking her on nuts/yogurt and lemon juice.
The story "prologue" at Shrublands is written in a rather comedic fashion, taking full advantage of the situational humor inherent in putting the great 007 in a recovery center for the elderly on a diet of tea and vegetable soup. M's crusading against the nutritional sins of white bread and pasteurized milk with Bond rebutting with things like "I don't eat all that much bread, sir" reads almost exactly the way the scene is played in Never Say Never Again. Perhaps my favorite bit at Shrublands is when Bond picks up his dinner from the serving lady with the "wardress face" and consumes the soup with his "fellow inmates," all the way "down to the last neat cube of carrot."
The Pat and Lippe stuff is certainly much more excitement in the romancing and action departments than we usually get in the first few chapters of a Bond novel. Mink gloves and Tong tatts and Spaghetti Bolognese! Bond even nearly gets assassinated on his way out of the office in London!
The voice of the author somewhat brilliantly comes in at the close of this "prologue" to assure the reader that: "James Bond was right. The outcome of this rather childish trial of strength between two extremely tough and ruthless men, in the bizarre surroundings of a nature clinic in Sussex, was to upset, if only in a minute fashion, the exactly timed machinery of a plot that was about to shake the governments of the Western world." In other words: "Fasten your lap-strap, dear reader."
Blofeld is introduced in a remarkably grandiose way with a thoroughly detailed backstory. The perfectly black doll-like eyes with long feminine lashes that can instill either great comfort or absolute terror are a superb touch. The visual gives me the chills just thinking about it. And his philosophy that "fast and accurate communication lay, in a contracting world, at the very heart of power" seems remarkably prescient for our 21st century world where control over the dissemination of information is everything.
The death of No. 12 is wonderfully executed. Even more chilling is the revelation that Blofeld devises unique deaths for each of his executions, at one time even garroting a man with a wire noose he "casually" flips over the man's head and pulls tight. Must say, at first I questioned Fleming's decision to have Blofeld, this villain of all villains, issue an apology and return half the money to the family his man had wronged. But then I reread the paragraph and discovered Blofeld only says he did what he "considered necessary," betraying no hint of morals or ethics. For surely, if SPECTRE is to be taken seriously in future threats or demands, they must always honor what they claim to the letter. Indeed, for Blofeld and the continued success of his criminal organization, a demonstration that they genuinely "mean what they say"—to pinch a line from OHMSS—would be necessary.
Bond, after having the fate of the free world dumped in his lap and nearly being assassinated on his way home from work, orders from May the largest, most calorie-loaded breakfast in all of Flemingdom. "And bring in the drink tray." Because life's too short. Ain't it just?
Scrambled eggs count: 1 (done May-style)
I might be in the general vicinity of Shrublands this weekend. Not planning to check in, mind.
A good point that we tend to forget, since the stakes are so often high in the Bond films. Goldfinger and Thunderball were undoubtedly responsible for starting the trend.
Comparing this scene to the film version also brings up another issue: in Fleming it's M who has the hunch to send Bond to the Bahamas. In the film it's Bond who has to convince a skeptical M to do so. This was one of the more annoying things about even the classic Bond films--they turned Bond into a know-it-all Superman. I much prefer M being the one with the bright idea.
I wonder why Fleming was so slow to use Moneypenny. For a long time he preferred Loelia Ponsonby, but Moneypenny by far had the more memorable name. Realism suggests that M and the Double-O section would their own secretaries, but Ponsonby and Moneypenny were such similar characters that it makes more sense to feature just one.
It's a wonderful, character-based sequence, with no source in the earlier film scripts, and provides perhaps the richest comedy in the Bond novels--a far richer sort of comedy than the groaner puns so beloved by the films. And of course the Shrublands sequence in the film is much less funny than the original, thanks to that unnecessary plastic surgery subplot butting in. I love the humor in M turning into a health nut, followed by Bond, albeit after a bit of hysteria:
The icing on the cake is that when a big, stressful job finally arrives, Bond and M drop the health stuff instantly, much to May's relief. And why the hell hasn't May been used in a film yet? A sassy Scottish housekeeper would be a perfect addition to Bond's universe. Why didn't she feature in Skyfall instead of Kincaid? I'm sure she could handle a shotgun.
I love that passage. I know that by conventional standards of creative writing it's a violation of "show, don't tell," but in Fleming information is often delivered to us via this "dossier" format, which places us in the positions of agents. The reader naturally wonders "what sort of man becomes the head of an organization like SPECTRE?" and Fleming answers that question in fascinating detail. SPECTRE's meeting is another wonderful set-piece--Fleming obviously loved criminal meetings, as seen in FRWL, GF, and TMWTGG. The film's visualization of the scene is especially memorable, thanks to Ken Adams's sets--the boardroom of the world's most immoral corporation--and the eerily menacing, metallic voice of the unseen Blofeld ("Our expectations were considerably hiiiiiiigher Number Three.")
Yes--the film of Spectre, despite its many screw-ups, got this right by placing Blofeld in the surveillance racket.
I'd hoped something corresponding to the garrotting and SPECTRE's "honor" code would have showed up in Spectre, since they help dispel the Donald Pleasence/Dr. Evil image of Blofeld as a chair-bound, cardboard villain, but alas...
Yes, thank you for quoting that section! I love Bond's anger-fueled hyperbole there: "M was a dangerous lunatic–-a danger to the country. It was up to Bond to save England."
That notion struck me as well. As Fleming typed this out, I believe he was already envisioning utilizing Blofeld in at least one more novel.
Domino was my favorite Bond girl when I was a kid. As I grew older I realized I just liked her so much because she was hot. She's a pretty vapid entity in the film. There's almost a kind of interesting forlornness that enters her character at times, but that rides a pretty fine line with the vapidity and it soon dissolves again into nothingness. (Not knocking anyone who still digs Domino; I still dig her myself.)
@Birdleson, I will be keeping up with the thread and will update with my thoughts on the books when I get to each. I plan to finish all the books in the first bit of 2018, to make it a half a year project.
I definitely look forward to seeing how Bond continues to develop. I was pleasantly surprised in just the first few books how Fleming kept a strong continuity from story to story, and how he was still calling back to Bond's early adventures in FRWL to make the plot feel that much more intense and to show how things had been building to SMERSH acting against him. It made all the past books really feel like they meant something.
But the real draw of it all is Bond's character, and how he changes and in some ways grows over time. After years of underestimating his villains we actually see him refusing to underestimate No, for example, and his battles with his job are also fascinating, starting with him wanting out and seeing the soul-erosion of it in CR and MR, but finding that he needs it to function in FRWL, etc. I think many would be surprised that Fleming crafted such a deep and interesting character who was just as conflicted and contradictory as we are as humans. I've been able to appreciate so much more about the character since reading the novels all in a line, and have seen things in the movies now that give off a Fleming feeling that make me enjoy them more as well.
Definitely. Felix is there to make Bond seem more human--he's more down-to-earth and approachable, makes more wisecracks, and one senses he'd be more fun to hang out with, whereas Bond is more reserved and melancholy. The Bond films have never captured this dynamic; they wrongly thought making Felix more interesting would detract from Bond.
It also takes place at night, which would have been more atmospheric onscreen but probably impossible to pull off well in 1965, for various technical reasons.
I've probably mentioned this before, but I once gave a copy of Thunderball to a friend who'd never before read Fleming and hadn't seen the film. He loved it and raved about the suspense in the scene leading up to the final battle, as Bond swims into the uncertainty of the night. I found this very interesting, because I'd never experienced that suspense, having seen the film before reading the book. He also loved Domino and wanted to make sure she killed Largo in the film.
Celi was such a dull piece of miscasting. He seemed more like a bored middle-manager than satyr-like international playboy-terrorist. Fleming's Largo is something of an evil mirror image of Bond--what Bond might have turned into if he didn't have a stronger moral compass. The film does not convey that at all.
I liked literary Domino a bit more and would place her in the top rank of the Bond girls. Fleming really brings out her fiery, "to hell with you" quality--she even tells Bond "I hate you" after he tells her the truth. It's impossible to imagine Auger doing that convincingly, beautiful as she was. Fiona was probably the best femme fatale in the Bond movies, but I will forever resent her for taking Domino's fire away, though I know the screenwriters were to blame. The film is an adaptation that's true to the letter but not the spirit of its source.
I'm okay with Bond's increased vulnerability--as you point out, TB is a more cinematic, epically-scaled book, so Bond's vulnerability helps keep the book from getting too grandiose. In any case, he's still made of stronger stuff than the average men, who would have probably swam away from the airplane corpses and octopuses like a bat out of hell (well I would anyway). But Bond, despite retching at the foulness of the water, is able to snatch the ID and watch off Pettachi's rotting corpse, inspect the fuselage, proceed past the horror show of flesh-hungry octopodes, locate the cyanide cannister, count the corpses, verify the bombs are gone, and search for the fuses before finally losing his nerve, all the while slashing away groping tentacles from his naked legs. It's probably the most horrific scene in all the books, and would have probably given nightmares to generations of children had it been faithfully adapted.
Yes, afterward M goes into a Jekyll and Hyde phase, leaving readers to wonder if they encounter nice or nasty M each time Bond drops in. Amis thought M was as much of a monster as Fleming's villains (like them, he gets that occasional red glint in his eye!) and some of the most amusing passages in the Bond Dossier make his case. My own feeling is that Fleming had decided to start having fun with the character by having him make Bond's life more difficult. And perhaps Fleming was drawing on memories of various bosses from Naval Intelligence and the newspaper world.
Before I close, I'd like to draw attention to two more things.
First, did anyone notice there seemed to be more Nazi references than usual? Spectre recovers Himmler's jewels, Largo has the "ruthlessness of a Himmler," Spectre's roster includes "three of the top surviving members of the former Sonderdienst of the Gestapo," and Blofeld gets irritated and thinks "Germans will always obey orders, but they wish to be quite clear where final authority resides. The German generals would only obey the Supreme Command if they knew Hitler approved the Supreme Command."
Hitler is named twice more:
"Certain great men of history, perhaps Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, Napoleon, among the politicians, have had these qualities. Perhaps they even explain the hypnotic sway of an altogether more meager individual, the otherwise inexplicable Adolf Hitler, over eighty million of the most gifted nation in Europe."
"Dr. Stengel, the fashionable doctor of Nassau, was not only fashionable but a good doctor. He was one of the Jewish refugee doctors who, but for Hitler, would have been looking after some big hospital in a town the size of Düsseldorf."
All these references seem designed to accent Blofeld and Spectre's villainy--he and his organization are the inheritors of the Nazis and therefore true enemies of mankind.
My second point of interest: Does anyone else find Thunderball's ending unusual? It's almost manic-depressive. It starts passionately, with Bond, drugged and ailing, rousing himself to find Domino, and there's a great callback to the beginning of the book:
Bond staggers toward Domino's bed and kneels down beside it. She grasps his hair, pulling his head closer to her and says "You are to stay here. Do you understand? You are not to go away." Bond doesn't answer. "Do you hear me, James? Do you understand?" she says, as she feels Bond slipping toward the floor. She looks down and finds him asleep. Domino sighs, positions herself to where she can see him whenever she wishes to, and closes her eyes.
The passionate start had led us to expect a grand kiss and embrace (as it would in Bond film). Instead Fleming completely dashes these expectations--the ending, with both characters going to sleep before they can embrace, is almost deathly. It's downbeat in a way only a few other Bond endings are. I would even say that it's a sad ending. After all, we know from previous books that Bond will go away--he won't stay here, or anywhere, with Domino, even though he's fallen in love with her. Domino's sigh is her acknowledgment of this sad truth. She's finally met the man she dreamed of, ever since she fantasized about the sailor on the front of Players packet, but he must go away, and he does before her eyes. I would love to see this in a Bond movie. But I don't it'll ever happen. We've seen Bond films with straight-up tragic endings and big-happy-kiss endings. But never a bittersweet ending.