Goldfinger Sept 17th, 50th anniversary opening night

timmer

Eager movie fans rioted with the opening of GF, 50 years ago today. Bondmania was on!

http://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/articles/goldfinger_premiere?t=&s=&id=03755

ggl007

Great photos!
What a beauty Miss Blackman!

RogueAgent

A few pictures there i have not seen before!

MayDayDiVicenzo

http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/236/rare-and-unseen-bond-photos-images-and-posters

timmer

This thread btw, in the opening post, links to the detailed mi6 homepage article about the excitement surrounding the actual debut of GF the film.
Sept 17th (yesterday) was a historic Bond 50th anniversary.
@maydayDiVicennzo, the pictures are just colour borrowed from the home page. They are not being presented as rare, although maybe they are. I don't know.

It does seem that the GF premier on sept 17 launched what would become the Bondmania phenomenon.

grunther

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/columns/history-legacy--showmanship/goldfinger-50th-anniv

i'll be watching it tonight with a mint julep. my favourite film.

timmer

That's a great article linked above @grunther.
Some real Bond heavyweights weight in with their thoughts on the Goldfinger Phenomenon, 50 years later.

Lee Pfeiffer: Goldfinger, more than any other Bond film, influenced the trends in pop culture during the 1960s. The previous two films, Dr. No and From Russia with Love, were sizable hits but it was with Goldfinger that the series found the formula that would define the series for decades to come. Director Guy Hamilton emphasized the tongue-in-cheek aspect of the humor moreso than the first two films had done, yet he was careful not to go “over-the-top” into slapstick. It was Goldfinger that primarily launched the spy craze of the mid-to-late 1960s and the introduction of the gadget-laden Aston Martin DB5 was largely responsible for this. The vehicle proved to be such a hit that Bond was still driving the car fifty years later in Skyfall. Goldfinger influenced pop culture on an international level and proved that Bond was not a provincial hero but, rather, a character that people in vastly different cultures could relate to.

Steven Jay Rubin: Goldfinger was the film that catapulted 007 from a first rate action series to a true international film phenomenon. It was so successful that it was the first movie screened in a movie theater 24 hours a day (in New York City) and probably made money faster than any film since Gone with the Wind. Creatively, it was the film that perfectly balanced Sean Connery’s coolness, throwaway humor and pure sexiness with some terrifically dramatic action scenes. Although there are, arguably, better James Bond movies, Goldfinger is still the launching vehicle for the series, a film that never loses its freshness and remains the 007 adventure that is the most pure fun, without getting silly or stupid. It also features the best prop in the series—the truly ultimate driving machine—the Aston Martin DB5 with modifications.

grunther

Great comment here:

John Cork: A great villain needs to get more powerful, seemingly smarter during the course of a story. The film starts with Bond busting Goldfinger as he cheats at cards, then Bond steals Goldfinger’s paid companion. But Goldfinger exacts a brutal price for this. Bond then beats Goldfinger at golf, but all-too-soon Bond finds himself strapped down with a laser pointed between his legs, his car destroyed. This is the halfway point of the film. Hero and villain have traded blows almost as equals. But when we enter the laser room, it is like we have passed through the looking glass. Goldfinger isn’t a rich gold smuggler, but an obsessed man who is on the verge of destabilizing the global economy. Even late in the film, when Bond points out the absurdity of trying to tote the gold out of Fort Knox, Goldfinger is one step ahead. When he discovers that Bond has been able to foil much of the plan, he whips off that overcoat and no one in the audience ever saw his escape coming. Most actors who have played Bond villains gradually allow 007 to get under their skin, to unnerve them as the story progresses. Not Gert Frobe’s Goldfinger. He snaps that pencil early on, and that’s it. He gets calmer and smarter as the film progresses. I love that. He is, for me, the perfect villain.

RC7

grunther wrote: »

Great comment here:

John Cork: A great villain needs to get more powerful, seemingly smarter during the course of a story. The film starts with Bond busting Goldfinger as he cheats at cards, then Bond steals Goldfinger’s paid companion. But Goldfinger exacts a brutal price for this. Bond then beats Goldfinger at golf, but all-too-soon Bond finds himself strapped down with a laser pointed between his legs, his car destroyed. This is the halfway point of the film. Hero and villain have traded blows almost as equals. But when we enter the laser room, it is like we have passed through the looking glass. Goldfinger isn’t a rich gold smuggler, but an obsessed man who is on the verge of destabilizing the global economy. Even late in the film, when Bond points out the absurdity of trying to tote the gold out of Fort Knox, Goldfinger is one step ahead. When he discovers that Bond has been able to foil much of the plan, he whips off that overcoat and no one in the audience ever saw his escape coming. Most actors who have played Bond villains gradually allow 007 to get under their skin, to unnerve them as the story progresses. Not Gert Frobe’s Goldfinger. He snaps that pencil early on, and that’s it. He gets calmer and smarter as the film progresses. I love that. He is, for me, the perfect villain.

This bang on the money and why I adore his portrayal in the film. I would love for them to introduce a villain as heavy-weight as this at some point in the future. The whole Bond-Goldfinger dynamic drives the film at every turn.

timmer

The Bond-Goldfinger dynamic does indeed propel the film along. Fleming's book I think must have helped, as the novel is very much about their relationship as well.
What I do like about the book and it comes through in the film too, is Bond taking verbal potshots at GF at every opportunity. Some of them quite stinging.

My favourite little barb from the book is Bond blithely enquiring "How's the agoraphobia, Goldfinger?" as they stroll down the wide open expanse of the golf fairway.

Connery gets his share of barbs in as well.