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Best Short Story
Just curious which short story everyone would rate as "the best." My vote would be "The Living Daylights." Just re-read it recently (the last time was about 30 years ago). I had forgotten just how good it is. Fleming really gives you the feel of Cold War Berlin. And you really get inside Bond's mind, drifting from the business at hand (killing the KGB sniper to save the defector) to thinking about the attractive girl cellist. And then the plot twist at the end! Any other nominations for best short story?
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Comments
For Your Eyes Only, darling.
Ah, thank you! Same as the movie, I wasn't sure. I need to get to my fav bookstore and order these.
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...
But special mention has to go to Octopussy and The Hildebrand Rarity.
And I'm not sure of the title of the story idea that Fleming gave to Roald Dahl to write but that is also a brilliant one!
Milton Krest may be Fleming's best character in either the short stories or the novels. And Fidele Barbey is not far behind. The section where Krest pours the Rotenone and Bond witnesses the destruction of the sea creatures is as powerful as anything Fleming wrote. And the conclusion is perfectly done. Who killed Krest? We really have no idea, because the two prime suspects, Barbey and Mrs. Krest, don't tip their hand at all. Perhaps they collaborated, but you just don't know.
In sum, it's a tremendous short story.
Set in Vermont by the way!
No mentions of Risico? My favorite.
Yeah, true about TLD. I think all of Fleming's short stories are excellent, but my favourite would be 'The Hilbrand Rarity'. THR has an interesting, exotic location (like many of Fleming's yarns ofcourse), Bond is off duty and doing what he loves, interesting characters, and I find it particularly intriguing the way he decides to get rid of Krest's body. This book offers us a unique insight into Bond's character. We also learn that Bond has a concern for the environment which pleased me. It's horrible how Krest kills off all those fish.
And as Khan said, the "who dunnit" question at the end was a wonderful denouement to the story.
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 wonder where John Logan falls into this?
QOS too:
"Quantum of Solace was chosen as the title of the 22nd Bond film; none of the story was used for the film's plot"
Now that you mention it, I think it might in part. It's an exciting story and has an amazing Bond girl (although Mary Ann Russell might not be the most typical name for a Bond girl), but it's not my favourite short story. That would be The Living Daylights, as many others have stated before me. Bond's rumblings as he gets ready to do something he despises, the description of Berlin, the cellist (from what I remember Fleming even finds an excuse to name his famous sister Amaryllis).
I believe it was Babs or Michael who claimed there was no Fleming left to use in the films. Go figure.
How so?
The bike chase, I think. It's a stretch but it might have given the writters the idea.
I'm not so sure about that (would be interested to see the quote.) MGW was a screenwriter on all the 80s films and I think they all did a really good job of utilising the scraps of Fleming that were left (apart from AVTAK, of course). Especially FYEO, which did a fantastic job of combining Risico & For Your Eyes Only into a single coherent story (with a bit of Live and Let Die thrown in for good measure) and TLD, which used the short story cleverly as a jumping-off point for a whole new plot.
There really isn't that much Fleming left to use, IMO. But there's some, so hopefully we'll see it...
FYEO seems the only decent attempt MGW has made.
I have to say that I'm very partial to his attempts in OP and LTK too - he deserves brownie points for managing to use bits of Property of a Lady and The Hildebrand Rarity!
I'm sure there's a thread somewhere (although it might be on AJB) listing what's left of Fleming to adapt. I'll try to find it as I'm sure you're right. I'd still love to see a film version of MR with Guntram Shatterhand as the villain and Gala Brand as the Bond girl.
http://www.mi6community.com/index.php?p=/discussion/6187/whats-really-left-of-fleming-to-adapt/p1
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.