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I mean, there are female directors who I’d like to see direct a Bond film, and I like the idea of a female villain if it’s done well… one or the other or both are fine. So I’m not quite sure how to answer this question.
@007HallY you make some great points. Maybe it wasn't the best comparison to make. I suppose behind the lens and in front are two different things. Yes one doesn't need to be mutually exclusive to the other. I appreciate your feedback and will keep this in mind for future content.
No worries, just my personal opinion. The questions in this thread have all been interesting and engaging. Honestly, even if I don’t like this question for the reasons I said it’s still an engaging one, so no foul really.
A female villain would've worked greatly under a female director, because a female director knows how to capture what's the best in female persona (think of how Phoebe Waller Bridge caught the best in the female characters in there like Paloma and Nomi), because a female director understands a female character more than male directors.
So, I think the dynamic of having a female villain would've been much more great had it been directed under a female director.
I Just don't think male directors really got female characters right especially the villainess ones, especially in the Bond films (maybe Young, although his interpretation of Fiona Volpe was more veering into sexual, which what the majority of men have in mind when creating femme fatales), and again, Elektra King which used her charm and sexuality as a weapon to bring her plans to life (which was another wish fulfilment for men), unlike female directors and writers when they're more about the dynamic, the complexity and the fleshing out, because they're females, they understand it more.
That's the thing, most male directed female villains always have that sexual stereotypes into them (like they're always using seduction), unlike those directed or written by women, which are more compelling as they have more character, more dimensional and more complex or fleshed out than just being a subject of sexual desire.
So, I'm into both.
In what way are female villains different from male-ones? Isn't Bond constantly using his sex-appeal? Isn't that how Largo got control over Domino in the first place?
If anything both sexes use their seductiveness for their own advantage. Both goodies and baddies. Didn't Camille sleep with Greene to get to Medrano?
Fiona isn't just interesting because she's sexy (as can be) and using it, but also as she's an independent woman, calculative, and definately not shy of killing (she, after all, plans to kill Bond when it isn't dangerous for the operation anymore).
But to answer the question: definately both, but if one must choose, a female director. To my mind they balance action and character usually better than men do. Men get carried away with the blowing-up stuff too much, and forget there's a story to be told as well. If anything, Wonder Woman showed how it should be done.
For some reason, since Craig started, I find TWINE unwatchable. Not most of the other films--although I was always bored by TND--but TWINE especially.
I'd like to see a female villain *and* a female director. I think that's the direction Eon is likely to go, so that she doesn't come across as one-note. Bringing a Bond girl back as the main villain--but perhaps keeping her in the shadows for some of the story--would be kind of exciting.
Yes I find TWINE a struggle too now. Good story ideas, but everything about the film is sluggish and artless. It does feel oddly like a ripoff of a Craig film which gets everything wrong.
I can't really answer the female villain/director question: I would like both of those but they're not really comparable as they're quite different things, so I can't really pitch one against the other.
A female villain I guess is more likely, as sadly there still aren't many female directors in the top echelon. I genuinely can't understand why it didn't happen during Craig's run.
One of my favourite ideas I read on here which I still can't quite get out of my head was a suggestion that Helen McCrory's character from Skyfall should have returned to become C in Spectre. Just think how magnificent that would have been.
(Yes, in terms of how the Government works it doesn't make sense as she'd have had to been a top politician becoming a civil servant, which doesn't happen; but who cares).
There was never a future in the Indiana Jones world- it was always a one-off.
But she is supposed to be showrunning a Tomb Raider project for Amazon, amongst other things.
The opinions you two have are right up my alley. More or less, at least, since I still like TND (probably rivalling GE for me), but TWINE is just a notch above hell, aka DAD. Either way, it really doesn't give a clue of whether a female director or another female villain might make a difference.
As for PWB mentioned above, I don't see why she shouldn't be a suitable director if she decided to try.
I think she definitely could pull off Moneypenny. However, she’ll probably be over 40 by the time the Bond comes around. The other roles I think would be great for her. I want her to act in Bond, as well as write.
Okay throughout the series Bond has battled an evil organization known at SPECTRE. First appearing in DN and subsequently showing up as the villain in 5 of the next 6 films, SPECTRE was lead by Blofeld. By the time of DAF SPECTRE wasn't mentioned but Blofeld was featured. The organization next appeared in the film SP and returned to be wiped completely out in NTTD.
On the whole the film series has featured villains out for themselves and not tied to any organization. While there has been more films without featuring SPECTRE, the "brand" holds some cachet with hardcore fans.
One could argue that aside from DN-FRWL-TB the organization hasn't been properly featured in film. Or that Blofeld, due to constant re-casting, has yet to be properly brought to the screen. Then you have the damage that Mike Myers did with Dr. Evil.
So it begs the question:
Would you rather the new Bond battle SPECTRE again OR battle individual villains?
I think the depth of literary Blofeld is overstated...really he's three different characters across three novels "explained" by his shapeshifting nature. He's perhaps most interesting in OHMSS because of the snobbery aspect.
Fleming's best villains were one-offs with clear objectives...Dr. No, Goldfinger, Drax.
Before Spectre, I would have loved them to have held onto the rights for #Bond 7 and then graft an overarching plot like the 60's Bond, that lead to Spectre and Blofeld. But Spectre kind of did that in rushed unsatisfying way.
I think even in OHMSS, Blofeld was still a weak character there, mainly because of his motivation there that doesn't makes sense (he's doing his plan because he wants the UK Royal Family to give him a title, a nobility), it made him a pretty shallow character, there's no menace, he's not even threatening, more like a watered down version and mainly frustrated.
I think Blofeld's strongest point was in Thunderball, he's really at his most menacing (the violet scented breath, his descriptions, the way he executed a SPECTRE agent), he's this very dangerous boss, and the snobbery was even more evident in there.
Yes, I agree about the Best Fleming villains were those one offs from the earlier books.
Individual villains, well even back in the classic era, Bond did survived without Blofeld and some of those characters proved to be more interesting than Blofeld like Franz Sanchez or Alec Trevelyan for example (and they didn't came from any novel).
I think it's more interesting to have an individual villains, because you can do more things with them, with Blofeld, it's just limited because he's already a character with built in features, that those traits or characteristics that the audiences were expecting of how Blofeld should be, and when one changed an aspect, it would be very risky whether the people would've accept it or not.
With individual villains, you can do more dynamics and aspects, you can do new things, you could do different tones (something that you couldn't do with Blofeld).
SPECTRE alone migt've been more interesting as an organization, if without Blofeld, because I think Blofeld was too much parodied at this point that his menacing charisma was no longer there, meanwhile, the SPECTRE organization, even just the symbol alone was still menacing, but people already expected Blofeld to show up as their leader, but they could still have the chance to subvert expectations, maybe change the leader (it's not Blofeld, this time), but I don't know if it's still would've worked.
And again, it's limited, very few things that you could've done with SPECTRE, or with an organization in general, and I think, a villain that's part of an organization do lessen their threat or their menace, than those standing on their own, because they're really powerful with their resources doesn't need to come from a group and they could provide for themselves, and they could explore more things.
That's the thing, one could explore more things in an individual villain, rather the one that's part of an organization, in general.
It makes more sense when you view it from the perspective of Blofeld’s slowly going mad/turning into an ego maniac (it’s actually kinda sad seeing him try to justify his previous failed plans to Bond in YOLT, proclaiming himself as some sort of great man even though his current endeavours amount to being a recluse with a garden. Even in OHMSS SPECTRE isn’t really a thing anymore and his want of the title is very strange). I get what you mean though, in concept he’s a very mercurial character.
I get the YOLT one, it's the most bizarre version of him, and I think the menace in him was back in the book, and yes, I liked the bizarreness in that one, especially with that 'Hitlerian Laugh', it's kinda scary, and yes, the book in general was really sad and poetic, and there's Blofeld who had gone mad, crazy and became a monster, he's turned delusional that the readers even realized that Bond could've gone that way too if not for his job, because like Blofeld he had lost everything, it's poetic.
It's also one of the reasons why I also liked Doctor No (although, compared to Doctor No, he's not dangerous).
But in OHMSS, even down to his descriptions, it's not weird, just kinda odd, because I don't even felt (while reading the parts about him) that he's dangerous, that he's menacing or threatening, it doesn't even helped that he's even funded by the Soviet Union (Russia) in his plan in there, to which made him looked like a frustrated man, and yes, his obsession for that title/nobility was strange that it lessened more of his strengths as a villain, it's just felt shallow, and to the lesser extent, nonsensical, he's like a kid doing bad things because he's asking for a candy (something that his parents couldn't give).
I think it's his weakest appearance, those are all felt silly, I get the concept, but in terms of villainy, it's kinda off, just no threat or menace.
Blofeld is a decent villain in the book but compared to the earlier ones, he's not on par, had Fleming just continued with the way he wrote Blofeld in Thunderball, I think he would've been great, at least.
The best Bond villains in the book were all in the earlier ones and were individual villains:
Le Chiffre, Mr. BIG, Hugo Drax, Rosa Klebb/Red Grant, Dr. No, Goldfinger.
That’s not an uncommon opinion. Personally I find Blofeld in OHMSS unsettling. He comes off as this benign figure but he has these flashes of madness/menace to him. In a sense he is a frustrated man - his criminal empire is disbanded, he’s altered his appearance which mirrors his decline into madness, and he seems to want to cement himself as someone notable with the title.
It’s kinda interesting that every time Bond encounters Blofeld there’s a subversion of some sort. And that his and Bond’s fates/downfalls are so tied together. It’s why I think it’s hard adapting Blofeld. You lose those aspects and he becomes just an ordinary villain. Personally I hope we don’t see him for a while in the film series, if ever again.
Yes, but I think YOLT did that job better or portraying him in that way as a frustrated man who clearly gone crazy and turned into a monster, as the evil side of him had already ate him as a whole, and he'd seen himself as a good one who wants to help people commit suicide to avoid the same fate as him, he's being an advocate of death, and one may see it happening on Bond if not for his job, because like Blofeld, he'd lost everything.
In OHMSS, like what I've said, he's like a child doing bad things because he's asking for a candy (something that his parents couldn't give), I get the concept about him preserving or maintaining his glory by giving himself a nobility, but in terms of being a villain, it just doesn't worked, yes, he became a crazy guy in there, I've seen the signs myself.
I think the 60's Bond films did handled him better, he's powerful, dangerous, threatening, menacing, and frustrated, and for me, it ended in OHMSS with him forcing United Nations to forgive him from his past crimes and to be given an amnesty.
So, as much as he's a villain, there's an arc in there, knowing that all of his plans had failed (DN, FRWL, TB and YOLT), his only hope was to please the International Government to forgive him, and quite manipulative in he was doing bad acts to force them into doing so, maybe Blofeld didn't know how to do it in right way, if Bond just helped him, he might've been redeemed ;).
I don't count the DAF Blofeld one in that arc, for me, it's just a rich man (maybe the real Williard Whyte) trying to impersonate Blofeld, or maybe he's Christoph Waltz' version, that's why their banter in that film was almost light, both of them also have hair.
But yes, I think it's time to stop Blofeld from coming back this time, his tenure was done since 1969.
Of course, drawing attention to a toupee is not what they wanted to do in 1971...