Best Short Story

Comments

• Ludovico

  May 2013 Posts: 15,524

  Sandy wrote:

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  Perilagu_Khan wrote:

  Ludovico wrote:

  AVTK I think was used as inspiration for the Skyfall PTS. As a short story, it is entertaining, a quality piece of spy fiction, but not Fleming's best. Some others simply go, to use a cliche, beyond the genre. QOS and THR for instance.

  
  How so?
  

  
  The bike chase, I think. It's a stretch but it might have given the writters the idea.

  
  And the theft of classified information. I don't know if it was intentional, but it has similarities.
• Perilagu_Khan

  May 2013 Posts: 2,483

  Ludovico wrote:

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  Perilagu_Khan wrote:

  Sir_James_Moloney wrote:

  007InVT wrote:

  thelordflasheart wrote:

  The short stories are so good that it would be hard for me to choose a best or favourite...
  
  If pressed, I loved The Living Daylights and From a View to a Kill. The first was an incredible evocation of Cold War Berlin and gave some insight into the dichotomy of Fleming's "ordinary man" wandering around Berlin (and reading a cheesy paperback to pass the time!) and the "blunt instrument" employed by HMSS.
  
  The second was a great detective story with that slight touch of the fantastic. Having traveled a lot for business in the past I also loved how Bond found himself at a cafe "waiting for something exciting to happen, which invariably never did". I well know that feeling, and the (incredibly rare) thrill when that something exciting actually does happen...

  
  Reading 'AVTAK' now.
  
  Why in heavens was this not the basis for the movie. It's getting more increasingly angry for the Moore films such as this one, Moonraker, et al.
  
  Like Fleming's stories weren't exciting enough? Give me a break EON!
  

  
  I agree. But to look on the bright side, it does mean that there is still significant Fleming material that remains unadapted. Fingers crossed for future films...

  
  I believe it was Babs or Michael who claimed there was no Fleming left to use in the films. Go figure.
  

  
  There is still a lot to adapt. Even so many lines left, characters, and I mean characters, as there are plenty of them who just had names from the novels or short stories, otherwise had nothing to do with the source material.

  
  Yep. Heck, even in SF they used the name Severine, which, of course, comes from "007 in New York." But there's all sorts of Fleming left to mine, if Micolli have the inclination and desire to do so.
• 007InVT Classified

  May 2013 Posts: 893

  Just finished reading Quantum of Solace and loved it. To be honest, this would make a great little audiobook or scene in a play.
  
  I like how Fleming experimented and not just delivered Kiss Kiss Bang Bang stories. I don't think he should get knocked for trying different things out, he must have needed some respite from pot driven action.
• 007InVT Classified

  May 2013 Posts: 893

  0013 wrote:

  Great discussion! I love all of Fleming's short stories! However my favorites are The Hildebrand Rarity, Quantum of Solace and The Property of a Lady. I would be much pleased with a faithfull adaptation (as part of a movie or as tv series) of this stories!

  
  I quite agree. A TV mini-series of all of these either stand alone or weaved in would be great.
  
  Wouldn't it be fun if all of them were meshed together into one movie, faithful to the books?
  
  It would never happen because Brand Bond has to be a certain way now, it would need to be an under the radar BBC thing that EON didn't care about.
  
  
• Ludovico

  May 2013 Posts: 15,524

  I do think his best short stories are often those that are least spy orientated.
• Perilagu_Khan

  May 2013 Posts: 2,483

  Ludovico wrote:

  I do think his best short stories are often those that are least spy orientated.

  
  You may well have a point there.
  
  
• Ludovico

  May 2013 edited May 2013 Posts: 15,524

  Perilagu_Khan wrote:

  show previous quotes

  Ludovico wrote:

  I do think his best short stories are often those that are least spy orientated.

  
  You may well have a point there.
  

  
  Maybe because the spy fiction genre works better as something on a large scale, the Fleming formula anyway. The short story as a genre deals with anecdote, non events, or rather small events that become significant. The short stories of Fleming that are spy adventures are good, entertaining, but they remain somewhat formulaic pulp fiction. FAVTAK is a neat adventure, but it is only that. The novels do more. THR, on the other hand, is a great tale about moral ambiguity and the banality of evil. It goes where the novels never went.
• 007InVT Classified

  June 2013 Posts: 893

  Finally getting around to reading Octopussy, Property of a Lady and The Living Daylights, which I am particularly excited about.