Reporting For Duty
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Categories
Is Bond Hampered by His Own "Formula"?
Some of the other posts have got me thinking:
Has being formuliac hurt the Bond franchise in any way? I guess the answer is a resounding "NO". The films have always made truckloads of money and will continue to do so.
However there were instances (dating back to the seventies) where the films had become formuliac as EON has decided to "play it safe". The Craig films seem to veer away and some of my favorite films are ones that do not stick to the formula so much (CR, LTK, OHMSS, SF)
I have to say several films may have been hurt by EON "tying their hands" and sometimes (especially during the Nineties) the films did not reach their full potential, despite making hundreds of millions of cash.
But it all comes down to the bottom line
Your thoughts?
Has being formuliac hurt the Bond franchise in any way? I guess the answer is a resounding "NO". The films have always made truckloads of money and will continue to do so.
However there were instances (dating back to the seventies) where the films had become formuliac as EON has decided to "play it safe". The Craig films seem to veer away and some of my favorite films are ones that do not stick to the formula so much (CR, LTK, OHMSS, SF)
I have to say several films may have been hurt by EON "tying their hands" and sometimes (especially during the Nineties) the films did not reach their full potential, despite making hundreds of millions of cash.
But it all comes down to the bottom line
Your thoughts?
^ 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
Ingredients are a bit more general. They are part of the formula but can be adapted in different ways (i.e. glamorous settings, beautiful women and a sense of escapism).
Bond ALWAYS needs to have the latter. Ingredients can be played around with whereas a "formula" is more rigid.
At times in the 90s I think it was hampered a bit by the need to check off certain elements and the films lacked some uniquenidentity but even then there was enough variation of the ingredients to keep them fresh.
Is Bond hampered by his "formula"? No - not if it is all well done.
What are the main elements of the historically shown "formula" for James Bond?
Bond is: B-)
British
Does very well indeed with the ladies
Ruthless when needs to be
Charming at times
Confident
Has panache, or style that sets him apart from the herd
Loyal
Courageous
Physically fit and can fight
Perseveres beyond what most are capable of; never gives up
Thinks outside the box; whatever it takes to get the job done
Looks good in evening wear
Enjoys an alcoholic drink once in a while
Best of the best - he Is the best and most valued agent; he is the "go to " person to get the job done
...
Notable elements of Bond films: (that make it unique, you know you are watching a Bond film, not just another spy or action flick)
Title song is memorable, fun, and fits this kind of spy/adventure/iconic character
Title song woven into the soundtrack; established by Barry and still for many, many fans important in a Bond film - plus a memorable soundtrack all around
Gorgeous and exciting locations around the world
A glimpse of another arena we would not normally be a part of - great wealth, stunning estates, very high level technology or science, remote or exotic looking architecture and other cultural aspects that are interesting, fun, or intriguing for the general viewer (shows us something, even if just briefly, that is strange or different from our ordinary lives)
Excellent cinematography and high quality production values
Exciting fights
Exciting stunts
Strong or memorable villain
Beautiful Bond Girls/Women (however you want to word it)
Element of danger and intrigue
Fascinating and often stunning, great titles sequence and PTS
Gun barrel - it is iconic; traditionally at the beginning
I may add to this, but for me these are part of the winning "formula" that has established Bond films and help them flourish over all these years.
In other ways however, looking back on our Blu Ray Collection, some do seem a bit samey. We never have any flashbacks in films, or a movie like Die Hard, set in a swanky office block (would never be green lit and you can see why) or The Usual Suspects (Bond interviews a lackey in his MI6 office after the bigwig has seemingly got away) that sort of innovative approach, it is generally a straight down the line chronological narrative and imo that does spoil films like OHMSS, TLD and Craig's (a minority view on this site I know) as it still sort of has to fit in with the usual formula. They don't quite go far enough, and nowadays it's the self-referential approach that I find as annoying as others found the silliness of the Moore years.
The Bond formula is liberating!
In life,truth sets one free, as does awesome Bondness.
And yet the same story structure over and over is boring unto itself.
Take for example Blade Runner and Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. Two vastly different films, yet based both very faithfully on the same pattern of a classical noir detective story from the 1920/30s.
=D>
My omelettes are never the same, but always delicious. Except that one time I experimented with unfitting ingredients. A bit like the Brosnan era.
HEY! >:P
:))
If I may add one more (I think it's noted above but want to emphasize it). That's GLAMOUR. James Bond movies should be glamourous in my humble estimation. That is a matter of personal taste to some extent, but it is also somewhat indefinable. A little nebulous. It's what differentiates it from other franchises, like MI or Bourne, who also jet-set.
Some examples from GE (a movie that I think highly of because of its glamour) are the opening scene after the titles of the Aston/Ferrari in Monaco, followed by the Monaco casino. Or even the opening pretitles scene in QoS (crappy editing aside). Those scenes had glamour for me. The casino scene in TWINE did not.
I count few 'glamourous' scenes in LTK, which is why, while I enjoyed the movie immensely, it comes across less Bondian, in the traditional sense. TLD was more glamourous (particularly in Bratislava & in Vienna) which is why it feels more Bondian imo.
For me, the last Brosnan efforts did not feel glamourous enough (I'm talking specifically about TWINE & DAD). They just felt like action movies, and additionally a melodrama in the case of the former.
I like the analogy of a recipe. It's all about getting the ingredients right and cooking it to perfection. Anyone can have the ingredients, but if they don't know how to cook, or if they don't give it adequate care and affection, the end meal is going to taste like crap, even if you measured it right. That's why a director who knows what he/she's doing is critical. The importance of the director cannot be emphasized enough. He/she must respect the ingredients......must respect the essence of the meal he/she is preparing. Not give it 'lip service'.
Now for a perhaps controversial view. Retrospectively, if one looks carefully at QoS, despite it shaking up the formula quite substantially, and despite the short run time, and despite the arthouse style, it IS a Bond film imo. That is a credit to Marc Forster. He just messed up on the editing. More than any director, I think he shook this formula up, and still retained the essence of Bond. With more practice, he could be a very good Bond director who injects a different take while retaining the essence of what is Bond.
wait.
Quantum Of Solace?
Oh, nevermind, yeah, I liked that film.
Carry on.
Agreed on all counts regarding your points above. I think we all agree there are weak points to that film, which is why I realize my view is controversial. I just feel, despite the writer's strike and all the bs he had to put up with, Forster came up with an interesting shake-up of the traditional formula.
Without a writer's strike, we could have had 'filled in' characters. There is no bloody way anyone at EON is going to let the kind of editing that was done on QoS be done again on any Bond film, ever. So what's the risk?
The only risk is that Forster brings his arthouse style again, and a 'speeding bullet' Bond film again. That I'd be all for, with 'fleshed out' characters and no shakycam. That would be a modern Bond film shaking up the formula while still being a Bond film.
I love QOS for what it is. I love the editing in combination with the story and characterisations. It feels to me like an abstract view on the classical Bond film, and I love it for that. So I sharply disagree with the notion of any messed-up editing. The editing might have worked differently too, but it´s absolutely right as it is. As far as story and characters are concerned, I don´t think QOS shook up any formula more than CR did.
Reflecting the real world has mostly been a rather abstract thing for Bond films, so I cannot see how that is going to be a direct point of consideration
To get good b.o. results the filmmakers usually put in something for everyone, which most of the time means everybody will get a bit of what he likes, but not throughout the whole film. So the better the b.o., the bigger the chance hardcore fans will complain.
Most of the films I like best are not on top of the charts. I guess I like them because they don´t have to compromise so much.
Yes, I like QoS as well. I was not trying to turn this into a critique of QoS.
I was attempting to answer the question posed, in that 'is Bond hampered by its formula'. Yes, in the hands of many directors, it can be.
Marc Forster is one director who I have found could shake (no pun intended) it up a bit while still retaining the Bondian elements, and without cliches (unlike Mendes). I liked the arthouse style direction and the very fast pace, with no 'wasted space' so to speak. However, I think the editing is what most people have a problem with, regardless of the view of a few. Ultimately, if the editing was fixed, and if it had more fully developed characters (purely a writer's strike isse) I think that movie would have appealed to far more people.
Forster's only attempt at Bond was a different take on the whole thing and executed very stylishly. It was more original a take than CR, which really had a whole book to fall back on, and which was somewhat formulaic outside of the elements that came from the book.