James Bond and the Vietnam War Protests?

Silhouette Man

As some of you may know the film image of James Bond and his adventures was used in the mass protests in the United States (and no doubt other countries) against the continuation of the unpopular Vietnam War. In the excellent book James Bond: The Legacy (2002) by John Cork and Bruce Scivally for instance there is a picture of one such public protest in the United States against the war where the protesters held up a specially made banner showing the then President Lyndon B. Johnson in Goldfinger poster pose with a gun and with the title "BLOODFINGER" appended to the image. No doubt there were similar protests when President Richard Nixon extended the war into Cambodia and Laos.

Kingsley Amis also refers to the Vietnam War in his interesting essay 'A New James Bond' (1968) (which was reprinted with some additions in his essay collection What Became of Jane Austen? and Other Questions [1970]) and how his being associated with Ian Fleming and Bond meant that he was labelled by the Left as pro-American and by extension in favour of the Western imperialism that led to the unpopular Vietnam War.

There's also the fact the there was a plan to film TMWTGG in Cambodia with Roger Moore as Bond in 1968 but this had to be scrapped due to the civil unrest in that country and the wider context of the Vietnam War. Veteran Bond director Guy Hamilton also said in the SE/UE Making of TMWTGG extras that he wanted to have James Bond visit Saigon in Vietnam but he decided this wasn't a very bright place to send James Bond in light of the ongoing conflict there.

And finally, James Bond also accidentally strays into North Vietnamese waters in TND due to the off-centre GPS device.

The purpose of this thread is to collect together any other links with Bond and the Vietnam War and specifically these types of protests.

I'm looking forward to getting some interesting feedback from my fellow members, as always! -{

broadshoulder

Silhouette Man wrote:

As some of you may know the film image of James Bond and his adventures was used in the mass protests in the United States (and no doubt other countries) against the continuation of the unpopular Vietnam War. In the excellent book James Bond: The Legacy (2002) by John Cork and Bruce Scivally for instance there is a picture of one such public protest in the United States against the war where the protesters held up a specially made banner showing the then President Lyndon B. Johnson in Goldfinger poster pose with a gun and with the title "BLOODFINGER" appended to the image. No doubt there were similar protests when President Richard Nixon extended the war into Cambodia and Laos.

Kingsley Amis also refers ion his interesting essay 'A New James Bond' (1968) that his being associated with Ian Fleming and Bond meant that he was labelled by the Left as pro-American and by extension in favour of the Western imperialism that led to the unpopular Vietnam War.

The purpose of this thread is to collect together any other links with Bond and the Vietnam War and specifically these types of protests.

I'm looking forward to getting some interesting feedback from my fellow members, as always! -{

I'd say he had more involvement in the Afghan war 1979-89. He was actually involved with that...

Absolutely_Cart

The Vietnam War was particularly an American and a French issue - not a British one.

None of the Bond books or films discussed the Vietnam War. But the character of James Bond is generally a hardline conservative who probably would have supported the efforts against the communists.

Loeffelholz

Absolutely_Cart wrote:

The Vietnam War was particularly an American and a French issue - not a British one.

None of the Bond books or films discussed the Vietnam War. But the character of James Bond is generally a hardline conservative who probably would have supported the efforts against the communists.

Interestingly, Ian Fleming---in a 1964 interview he gave with Playboy magazine very shortly before he died, said that he imagined that Bond's politics were probably "left of centre," but also gave the impression that it wasn't something in which he'd invested a great deal of thought. I was always fascinated by that. I'm just guessing that that was more about social issues of the time rather than the predictable stance against hardline communism as defined during the Cold War.

“I don’t think that [James Bond] is necessarily a good guy or a bad guy. Who is? He’s got his vices and very few perceptible virtues except patriotism and courage, which are probably not virtues anyway. He’s certainly got little in the way of politics, but I should think what politics he has are just a little bit left of centre. And he’s got little culture. He’s a man of action, and he reads books on golf, and so on—when he reads anything. I quite agree that he’s not a person of much social attractiveness. But then, I didn’t intend for him to be a particularly likable person. He’s a cipher, a blunt instrument in the hands of government." - Ian Fleming

My edited version of that interview is here:

http://jamesbond.ajb007.co.uk/ian-fleming-in-his-own-words/

Silhouette Man

Absolutely_Cart wrote:

The Vietnam War was particularly an American and a French issue - not a British one.

None of the Bond books or films discussed the Vietnam War. But the character of James Bond is generally a hardline conservative who probably would have supported the efforts against the communists.

That's true but there are other links such as what Amis was referring to more generally as I mentioned in the OP.

There's also the fact that there was a plan to film TMWTGG in Cambodia with Roger Moore as Bond in 1968 but this had to be scrapped due to the civil unrest in that country and the wider context of the Vietnam War.

James Bond also accidentally strays into North Vietnamese waters in TND due to the off-centre GPS device.

Silhouette Man

I'd love to get this thread started up again and get a bit more discussion going if at all possible?

I do find it a fascinating (and largely ignored) Bond topic. See the OP for the evidence I have collated so far. -{

Napoleon Plural

You Only Live Twice clearly is influenced by Vietnam in that it anticipates Apocolypse Now when Bond 'becomes' one of the natives when going undercover on a mission, like Brando did. Eventually, his bosses are forced to send out a gunboat (M's submarine) to retrieve him.

Charmed & Dangerous

Regarding TND, several scenes were planned to be filmed in Vietnam. From Wikipedia:

"... Scenes were planned to be filmed on location in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and the production had been granted a visa. This was later rescinded, two months after planning had begun, forcing filming to move to Bangkok, Thailand. Bond spokesman Gordon Arnell claimed the Vietnamese were unhappy with crew and equipment needed for pyrotechnics, with a Vietnamese official saying it was due to "many complicated reasons". "
(The link to the original article from 1997 which cites those reasons appears broken, unfortunately, but the title hints at political issues with China).

superado

Interesting observation regarding the Vietnam War specifically. In fairness, the height of tensions hadn't happened yet in Fleming's lifetime though I can't recall if there's any mention even in passing about past conflicts in French Indochina. WW2 was such a monumental event that influences and references to it in both the books and movies cannot be ignored, but for the Bond movies, I suppose the extremely divided public perceptions about the Vietnam War kept it out since EON deliberately went for an escapist, pretty reality in the look and feel of the Bond movies, which after all were not part of the "concerned cinema" movement like Lazenby's "Easy Rider."

Gassy Man

Napoleon Plural wrote:

You Only Live Twice clearly is influenced by Vietnam in that it anticipates Apocolypse Now when Bond 'becomes' one of the natives when going undercover on a mission, like Brando did. Eventually, his bosses are forced to send out a gunboat (M's submarine) to retrieve him.

Apocalypse Now is an adaptation of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, among other things, a social criticism of British colonialism and cultural norms.

Silhouette Man

Gassy Man wrote:

Napoleon Plural wrote:

You Only Live Twice clearly is influenced by Vietnam in that it anticipates Apocolypse Now when Bond 'becomes' one of the natives when going undercover on a mission, like Brando did. Eventually, his bosses are forced to send out a gunboat (M's submarine) to retrieve him.

Apocalypse Now is an adaptation of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, among other things, a social criticism of British colonialism and cultural norms.

Yes, I read it back in 2003 for my degree. I've never seen Apocalypse Now though. I really must remedy that. Though wasn't Heart of Darkness a polemic against Leopold II's Belgium and their conduct in the Congo more than anything else?

Charmed & Dangerous

I like your new avatar, SM, do you mind me asking what it is?

Silhouette Man

Charmed & Dangerous wrote:

I like your new avatar, SM, do you mind me asking what it is?

Thank you, C&D. I'm glad you like it!

I just picked it after a search for a "80x80" avatar on Google Images. I didn't really know what I was looking for, just something a bit different from the Colonel Sun 1970 Pan paperback cover and the black skull avatars that I've had in the past as AJB profile avatar.

I settled on this flag/emblem design as it is bold and memorable and I really like it. It's meant to be a winged hammer. A little research confirms that it comes from the cover art of the album Sign of the Hammer (1984) by the heavy metal band Manowar:

http://static1.gamespot.com/uploads/square_avatar/854/8549877/2365546-manowar+-+sign+of+the+hammer+-+80x80.jpg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sign_of_the_Hammer

Quite coincidentally, I've since discovered that this album was actually released the day after I was born. Spooky!

Firemass

Sign of the Hammer be my guide!
You're a Manowar fan SM? -{

Silhouette Man

Firemass wrote:

Sign of the Hammer be my guide!
You're a Manowar fan SM? -{

No, I just liked the image. I'm not familiar with their music.

Thunderpussy

At first SM, I thought it was a design from Brokenclaw's totem pole.

Silhouette Man

Yes, I too thought of Brokenclaw as the image is rather totemic in nature. I guess that you could say that it's dual purpose!