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It's amazing the details one so easily forgets - it's been too long.
Special thanks from Pervis and Wade
Plot twist:
Quantum is actually run by Max Zorin who had $ billions salted away and survived the plummet into San Francisco Bay. Hey it worked for RDJ as Holmes, Matt Damon in Bourne and even DC in SF...
But even Zorin had benign bizarre elements: the Aryan overall appearance, a classic in Bond movies. It was more subtle than Silva, but still. Of course this thread is assuming the villain will be properly cast. And any oddity must not seem to be added to the character, but springing from him, like Richard III's appearance in Shakespeare's play. A scar has a history, there is a reason why it is there, one does not wear a scar, you have it and it shapes you, or says something about you.
Certainly clothes and mannerisms tell a story about a character but I don't feel physical deformities are the right way to go no matter how dramatic they may be depicted on the screen as this can be seen as being prejudicial to people with disabilities.
In that case we might as well stop playing Richard III, as the main character has pretty much all the disabilities and deformities one can think of.
The challenge with physical appearances is to keep it new and original. Scars, burnt marks and battle wounds have been done to death. I think they did very well with Silva, going very subtly, yet with an abundance of small touches that makes him very odd from his very first entrance. You do not know about the cyanide yet, but there is something about his face, his way of talking, the brightness of his teeth, that looks and feels strange.
An idea in a similar vein, vaguely inspired by the novel's Hugo Drax: a botched plastic surgery job. A few years ago, the main villain wanted to go into hiding and change identity and changed his appearance, but things went wrong. Not like the Joker in Batman 89 wrong, but wrong enough to, instead of looking like another person, he looks somewhat unnatural, like an old man who used too much botox or something.
True. But Zorin did have the concrete blonde hair, and a rather quirky personality. I think the main point is that Bond villains cannot be plain. They cannot be everyman. They have to stick out in some way, and one method of doing this is by giving them a very distinctive physical marker.
Agreed completely with your first paragraph. Indeed, in OHMSS Fleming describes Blofeld has having unsettling dark green eyes. I would love to see this eye color in a future Bond villain.
Your second paragraph, I'm afraid, is errant nonsense.
But why not if it was good enough for Shakespeare?
http://www.plasticsurgeryportal.com/articles/the-ultimate-disguise-criminals-using-plastic-surgery-to-evade-capture/369
Richard lll was recorded as being a hugely disfigured King and this would be a constant reminder and motivator for his actions so yes, a writer such as Shakespeare would see this as dynamite material for portraying an interesting character riling against his deformity and shading his every decision which is after all what is a point of discussion here.
I just don't feel comfortable rooting against the bad guy here who is going to have a stunted limb, hump on the back and the like. Why not go the whole hog and have conjoined twins as the lead villain? OK, an extreme example. For me there's nothing wrong with depiction by the interesting characters played by Robert Davi and Benicio Del Toro - yes the scaring for Sanchez is now a bit hackneyed and is falling into being a caricature parody. All I'd want is a striking appearance as touched on by Silva in SF.
Richard III was also not nearly as evil as Shakespeare depicted him. In fact his reputation was pretty much tainted by Tudor propaganda. What I am trying to say is that people now understand artistic licenses. No bald people ever complained about Blofeld's baldness or people with eyepatch about Largo's one.
And one can root for a villain, at least for a while. I want Bond to have a run for his money and go against a real malevolent and intelligent adversary. I come back to Shakespeare: when does one want Richard III to fail? At the end of the play of course, when he gets retribution for all the evil he has done, but also when he had time to show how clever he was climbing to power.
So what? Where's the harm in it? If a person with a physical deformity gets bent out of shape because of Bond villains then he's got far greater problems than his deformity. And it's not Eon's job to kowtow to such people.
Indeed. And I am not sure any dwarf was unhappy about Hervé Villechaise playing a villain. I am sure many envied him for playing in a Bond movie.
I think the very worst thing that could happen would be someone complaining that they did not cast an actor with whatever deformity they gave the villain.
How about a villain of either sex masquerading through wearing an Islamic burka - keeping it topical - like Scaramanga they could pass through Customs unnoticed. In John Gardner's Never Send Flowers the villain David Dragonpol dresses as a nun with a habit of olden times in order to carry out an assassination in Rome, so anything's possible.
Yes, Blofeld in drag was not what I had in mind. Thanks for the additional info on nuns - I didn't know that but I'm always on the look-out for additional inspirations for Never Send Flowers. Interestingly, Gardner has a man dressed in the habits of a nun in his later PC Suzie Mountford novel No Human Enemy (2007) so it seemed to be something that he was interested in - again there is the religious influence as he was a Church of England priest at one thing and had a degree in Theology from St John's College, Cambridge.
Also, on the surreal environment, are you referring to John Gardner there or something else entirely, and could you possibly expand on what you mean by that at all? It's just that I'm intrigued by that comment, @Ludovico.
I think because it just seemed so camp and pointless - it was unnecessary and made no real narrative sense, like much of the film in fact. I still can't quite fathom what that crazy DAF film was all about...
Not sure why exactly, but I always thought it worked in TB, but not in DAF. I guess Bouvar was not in a comedic scene, and he was no Blofeld. I think the scene in TB was used for shock value.
I meant the Fantômas universe. He even disguises himself as a bride (his daughter) to avoid her marrying one of the good guys. And it is all played in a straight face, not as comedy but pure suspense.
Le C's weeping blood was cool.
Dr. No's metal hands rocked.
Post-plastic surgery Stromberg?! Whatever do you mean Mr chrisisall?
;)