Requiem for a Bond!

It’s time to finally face the fact: James Bond is dead. Yes, I know technically speaking he was never really alive to begin with, just a figment of Ian Fleming’s imagination. But it was that imagination which so ingeniously spawned the spirit of a man who seemed more fantastic to us than any living celebrity, sports player or politician. Hell, in my humble opinion, there hasn’t been a British character that great since the almighty Sherlock Holmes himself. I hope the two of them are drinking gin and exchanging stories together in some literary afterlife. Casino Royale is simply the last nail that was hammered into the coffin of James Bond. Don’t believe me? Just look at the facts.

Albert Broccoli, the original producer of the Bond films since Dr. No, died in 1996, which was right at the beginning of the Pierce Brosnan reign. Barbara Broccoli, Albert’s daughter, took over the franchise with her half-brother, Michael G. Wilson, after his death. It is no coincidence that it was right here when the James Bond we knew and loved so much began to go south.

All of the male fantasy elements that were firmly entrenched and a part of 007 began to disappear, one by one, as a combination of political correctness; ultra-feminism and rampant homosexuality destroyed our beloved British superhero.

First went the character of M. The idea of a spy network run by an older white man was considered too outdated. Never mind that Bond was mainly a male fantasy character molded after Fleming’s own persona. It’s macho, sexist garbage that was insulting to the politically correct world of the 21st Century that was dawning on us. Women don’t want to see an alpha male in charge anymore. Instead, Judi Dench was hired to replace him as the new head of MI6. No surprise there; it’s a woman’s world now, didn’t you know? Then went Q, with all of his clever live-saving gadgets.

Didn’t you know that women get bored when they’re forced to listen to how machinery works and what good it will do for you in the spy field?

Then of course went the entire SPECTRE organization, a terrorist group run entirely by men. As if that had no relevance to terrorism today, right? Osama bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed are probably laughing somewhere right now.

And what happened to Bond’s entire persona?

No more casual flings with beautiful, young woman half his age. No, the real Bond now has to be sensitive and respect women and treat them all like princesses. In every Bond film after, he has only one steady girlfriend throughout the entire movie and if there was an occasional fling, it would be with some mindless bimbo who didn’t know any better and usually ended up dead rather quickly, which happened here in Casino Royale. Judi Dench also reprimanded Bond for his outdated, manly ways. “I think you’re a sexist, misogynist dinosaur. A relic of the Cold War.” In effect, that is the scene where she almost literally chops his balls off in front of the whole world. That scene always made me cringe because I knew what it meant down the road. What I hated even more about having to witness her wreck his manhood was Bond’s subservient “point taken” reply. His submission to being emasculated was worse than the actual emasculation itself. The real Bond would have resigned in an instant if a female M were to reprimand him for being a man. Remember how he tried to resign in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service because M did not allow him more time to track down Bloefeld? Would he really react no differently in this case?
Furthermore, now that it’s the 21st century where everything is about youth and looks, the new Bond isn’t even allowed to be middle-aged anymore. Casino Royale did away with the likes of Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan. Now that Barbara Broccoli is in charge, it’s all about the big, blonde beefcake. Daniel Craig is under 40, he looks like he’s spends every waking hour at the gym(which makes me wonder where he gets the time to chase villains around the world for Queen and Country), and he is the ultimate dumb jock. The new Bond has no sense of class and style. It is up to his female assistant, Vesper Lind, to teach him. She has to show him how to wear a tuxedo, what dinner to order, what drink to get, etc.(Gee, a woman has to teach the dumb male jock how to behave. How utterly unoriginal and Femme-Nazi is that?) Even worse, the roles are completely reversed and Vesper Lynd ogles Bond, rather than the traditional vice-versa. “I’ll keep my eyes on our government’s money and off your perfectly formed ass.” If Bond were to say that to her in today’s political climate, he’d have his balls removed. (Just the fact that Miss Moneypenny threatens Bond with sexual harassment in Goldeneye for his usual flirting with her, is more than evidence enough of Bond’s demise.)

Last, but not least, the film is peppered with rampant homoeroticism. There are virtually no beautiful girls in bikinis or even cleavage and legs. Instead, we have Daniel Craig emerging from the sea in a speedo, showing off his pumped body in all its glory. I know that it was intended to be a clever homage to Ursula Andress in her famous bikini scene in Dr. No, but come on. And that’s not all. There’s a scene after the card game where the villain who weeps blood, Le Chiffre, captures Bond and strips him naked to a bottomless chair. He then proceeds to ogle him with the line “Wow. You’ve taken good care of your body. Such a waste.” Then he takes a whip with a large knot at the end and beats Bond’s testicles! Barbara Broccoli, please note one thing:

The majority of us viewers who are heterosexual men that grew up and loved your father’s Bond films do not, I repeat, do not want to see James Bond naked in a chair getting his testicles beaten! That is a major turn-off!

Casino Royale fails to live up to the glory that is James Bond. In my opinion, whenever somebody tries to take a time-tested classic formula and update it for the 21st Century, it ultimately fails. This is because the elements that went into the formula back then came from hands that did not worry about politics, target audiences, gender discrimination, the bottom line, etc. They simply created something that appealed to our basic instincts and the fantasy lives we wish we all could have. Now if only we could heed that lesson and return to the past, there would be better products. Mr. Bond, Resquiat in Pacem, wherever you are.