Gumbold/Blofeld
SeanIsTheOnlyOne
Posts: 544MI6 Agent
In OHMSS, how does Draco learn about the link between Blofeld and Gumbold ?
In the novel, Sable Basilisk, from the College of Arms, learns Blofeld was born in Gdynia after asking Gumbold for a birth certificate to establish the possible family tie with the de Bleuville line. To check this piece of information, Sable Basilisk indirectly contacts the British consul in Gdynia (and learns the pages of the civil register referring to Blofeld have been torn out). This procedure, reported to the Foreign Office, permits to make the link between the name "Blofeld" and the College of Arms. That's why Bond is sent to meet Sable Basilisk.
In the movie, this matter is not very clear. How could someone in touch with Draco learn about the link between Blofeld and Gumbold (especially considering the letters Bond copies in Gumbold's office do not contain the name "Blofeld") ? I know Draco says three of his men left him to join Blofeld, but I hardly imagine one of them betraying his new employer and contacting Draco. What for ?
Comments
In many books, the author painstakingly (or sometimes not so painstakingly, of course) joins the dots so the protagonist is following a clear, logical course. When these books are filmed, the links are often glossed over or omitted entirely to keep the film moving quickly. This can lead to lapses in logic- the Harry Potter films are well known for this, there's plenty of material online where fans complain about exactly this sort of thing.
In this case, I suggest that screenwriter Richard Maibaum simply wanted to keep the film from getting bogged down in exposition, an area in which it was already heavy.
But why didn't Maibaum add a simple line when Bray tells Bond about Gumbold and Blofeld, exactly like in the novel ? Does this Draco/Gumbold plot hole just permits to expose the romance, with Bond visiting Draco for his birthday and finally gettng what he's after thanks to Tracy ?
But Bond would have fallen in love with Tracy anyway and the Gumbold matter could have been faithful to the novel. In that case, the scene where Bond goes to Bern to copy the letters would have been useless and then this length could have been saved to expose the plot properly and not so heavily.
Not what we're discussing, but that scene was often excised in early versions of the film.
Short answer is, of course, I don't know. I suggest that Maibaum selected the scenes from the novel he felt were essential, added some of his own, and didn't worry too much about the connections.
Draco is well connected and a rival of Blofeld; doesn't seem impossible he'd have heard of a link between Blofeld and a lawyer. He's got a construction site next door after all! 😄
Yes @emtiem exactly. Bond specifically asks Draco to investigate where Blofeld is:
BOND "You have avenues of enquiry not open to me."
DRACO "What is is you want?"
BOND "Where is Ernst Stavro Blofeld?"
So, as said above, it really doesn't matter how the link is made, Draco sets his underworld organisation onto the case and does Bond's work for him and discovers - as he later reveals - "There may be a connection between Blofeld and a lawyer in Berne, name of Gumbold."
[I might have the dialogue slightly wrong]
I don't think it matters at all how Draco came by this intel; he's got it, Bond digs deeper, finds the direct evidence and we have an operation in motion. Anything more would, as @Barbel says, simply slow down the movie.
I understand your respective points. From my point of view, if Fleming didn't use Draco to give Bond a lead to find Blofeld, it's probably because he imagined another means, and what a means ! The part with Sable Basilisk in the novel is a real masterpiece, and I would have loved it to be in the film.
I take this opportunity to ask you guys about Shaun Campbell.
In the novel, when Campbell is captured by Blofeld's goons, he directly asks Bond to confirm he's on his side because he has no idea about Bond's secret mission. Then Bond tells Blofeld he doesn't know this man to protect his cover. But he guesses Blofeld will torture Campbell to learn the truth. From this moment, Bond becomes very suspicious and acts carefully.
In the movie, Campbell is present when Bond arrives at the train station, so we can guess he knows about the mission, something Blofeld confirms when he confronts Bond in his office. Why then does Campbell try to get access to Piz Gloria while Bond is supposed to stay undercover ?
Simply because that's what he does in the novel. His presence earlier in the film (the Gumbold sequence, the train station) is added to what Fleming wrote thus creating this inconsistency.
My idea as to why his part was expanded - his actor Bernard Horsfall was a friend of Peter Hunt's (he turns up in other Hunt films such as "Gold") so it may have been Hunt's idea to give him more to do.
I think the deleted scene in OHMSS with that rooftop chase would help to get things clearer, but as it is, OHMSS is a near perfection for me.
The thing is, many people were complaining about the length of the film and some found the pace a bit slow and boring.
If those things in the novel were added to the film, it would increase the length of it and would make it a bit boring for the people.
OHMSS is already a long film.
I mean the book was full of expositions, and seeing those expositions in the film would make it a bit boring and would drive people to sleep.
Maibaum just did what's essential to do for a screenwriter, get the important parts in the book and connect it by using his creative license, and I think it did well, and they need to do it to reduce the film's length.
If we're including all the parts of the novel, including the minor things, then that would make a 3 or 4 hour film, or probably more longer, to be honest, long novels like OHMSS could work as a TV series, episodic and I felt it's an intentional move on Fleming, especially the Blofeld Trilogy was continuous, a sequel after a sequel.
But it wouldn't work in a film.
It worked in the novel because it's long enough for us to read it, but do we mind it seeing on the film that's already a 2 hour long (probably?), Again, I'm talking the expositions regarding Sable Basilisk, and that whole Gumbold scenes.
It's no different from the Muntz subplot in Casino Royale, I don't know why they've removed that from the film either, but in the book, it played an important role, especially regarding to Bond investigating Le Chiffre's connection to SMERSH.
So, I don't mind those details getting lost in the film.
The important for me is the film executed the book well and it's somehow worked for me.
We all agree the movie is wonderful. I never complained about its quality. I just think the novel is so great and so well written that I regret some missing elements/inconsistencies in the film.
Personally, I don't consider OHMSS as a long/heavy Bond novel (Carte Blanche is probably one of the most boring I've ever read). There are many expositions indeed, but it doesn't appear so difficult to summarize it in a movie script. FRWL is far more complex IMO, and the movie has to deal with SPECTRE manipulating both sides, keeping Rosa Klebb a member of Smersh but secretly working for SPECTRE, something the novel is not confronted to.
@Barbel anyway, shouldn't Bond get suspicious after the incident with Campbell, like in the novel ? They both know each other and given the context, it's hard to believe, when you are a professional spy chasing the world's most wanted and brilliant criminal, the man will leave the place quitely like a lost tourist, despite what Blofeld says. In the following scene, Bond is strolling along the corridor to get into Ruby's room like if his cover was still safe while in the novel, his concerns are growing up quickly because he knows time is not an ally. Do you see my point ?
Campbell is a weird one. It is assumed he's an MI6 officer because he's British, but if you watch the film there's actually more suggestion that he's one of Draco's men!
Bond is, after all, officially off the case and on leave when he goes to Gumbold's office so MI6 shouldn't actually know he's there (M certainly seems unaware of it when we see him with his butterflies), and we see Campbell quite clearly on Draco's construction site passing Bond the photocopier equipment with full assistance of Draco's crane driver. Notice how the safe cracker is quite a lot bulkier than the pocket one Bond had in the previous movie... could it be that the photocopier/safe cracker isn't from Q Branch at all but is Draco's equipment? And it makes sense that Draco would be trying to give backup to his future son-in-law by sending Campbell to watch over him in Piz Gloria too. I'm not sure it's ever stated that Campbell is MI6, is it? He could be putting on an English accent to make the tourist act more convincing for all we know.
You could say that it's Bond pulling in a favour with the local Head of Section and persuading Draco to let him on his site etc. but I'd argue there's more evidence in the film to say that he's not MI6 than he is.
So that may explain why he goes up the mountain: Draco isn't entirely clear on what Bond's plan is (unlike M) and Campbell feels he should be up there trying to help. If he had been MI6 he'd have been more clued in on Bond's plan and so wouldn't have interrupted.
@SeanIsTheOnlyOne Oh yes, definitely. Again, this is Maibaum and Hunt's work. The scene you describe ("Sir Hilary" going to Ruby's room) is essential so he can be surprised by Bunt and Gunther, which is essential so we can have the big Bond Vs Blofeld scene. None of this is in the novel, where our man gets the hell out of Piz Gloria asap after the Campbell scene but is cinematically necessary to provide the confrontation scene absent from the novel.
@emtiem interesting theory !
But let's suppose Campbell is not related to MI6 and actually works for Draco. His presence at the train station would mean Draco knows from Bond himself about his stay in Switzerland, something very disturbing. In the novel, even people from station Z are not informed, precisely because it's top secret and because the risk of spreading it is too big, even within the house.
Furthermore, Blofeld says Campbell was a talkative man: "I know everything about your mission Mr. Bond". Campbell knew because Draco does. In that case, assigning Campbell to reach Piz Gloria wouldn't be a very clever move considering the risk of exposing Bond's cover.
It's a fair point, but then we find out that Draco does indeed know that Bond is in Switzerland as Tracy later says that "Papa told me where to find him" when she comes to Bond's rescue.
You're right that Campbell going up wouldn't seem very clever, but I guess all we do know is that Draco knows Bond is in Piz Gloria- we don't know how much he knows beyond that or even if Bond himself told Draco about it or he found out just by tailing him with other men. So Campbell could still be working for Draco and yet not know the entirety of Bond's plan: he may well be there without Bond's blessing. Whatever Campbell tells Blofeld may well be wrong: and after all Bond's 'mission' isn't terribly complicated as he's basically just there to get Blofeld- what is it that Blofeld thinks he knows about it? Bond tells Blofeld that Campbell will have reported, which infers he's MI6, but then Bond would say that to try to scare Blofeld; and indeed no-one from MI6 does actually turn up to help.
I should say I'm not wed to this theory and I'm sure the filmmakers probably intended him to be MI6, but it's a bit of fun and does rather add up given what we're shown onscreen.
The problem and my point is the film that's already long and adding those expositions would have certainly add up to the film's length, I've heard many people complaining on the length and pacing of OHMSS, and what summarization they've did regarding the story and the plot was I think, reasonable.
Too many expositions would have probably slower the film's pacing.
What I always love about the film adaptation is that they took the events at the opening of the novel, which Fleming had in his fairly oft-used flashback format, kept them in the same order but removed the flashback element, and it made no difference to the story 😄
(Forgive if I'm wrong about that: it's been a very long time since I read it!)
Yes, it made more sense, especially for the romance angle, in film, Bond truly rescued Tracy, in the film, Tracy decided not to take suicide after sleeping with Bond, which really helped in making the romance more believable.
In the book, the suicide scene happened after Bond slept with her, so does meeting Bond made her a lot more worse, and that scene easily turned me off on their romance, and one of the reasons why I didn't buy the relationship in the book.
It also didn't helped that Tracy in the book showed no indication that she fell in love with Bond, I see that Bond loved her, but did Tracy loved him too? I don't see that, there's no indication regarding this.
I mean reading the scenes of her character in the book made me think that: "Come on, Bond you deserved a better woman than this! You're just wasting your time on her, Mr. Bond."
That's what makes Tracy a disappointing character in the book, for someone whom Bond would marry, she didn't deserved it, she just don't deserve Bond.
At least with the previous Bond Girls, based on their actions and dialogues, there's a hint or feeling that they loved Bond, much as Bond also fell for them.
With Vesper, I felt that she really loved Bond, the same with Tiffany, their banter with Bond really convinced me into thinking that they loved each other.
With Tracy, there's nothing, there's no love in her, it's Bond who's carrying their romance, I felt pity for Bond for loving a wrong woman.
She just looked at Bond as a fulfilment of her sexual desires, and as a way to get out of her problems, but she didn't loved him.
Bond may loved Tracy, but Tracy didn't loved Bond.
When it comes to Bond getting married, he deserved a better woman, and Tracy is not just for it.
I mean, in general, the romance angle really worked better in the film, the romance in the book was somewhat rushed to give way for Blofeld's plot.
I don't buy the romance in the book, but I truly did in the film, it helps that Tracy was a much better character in the film too 😊 and they've spent more time together, there's a development.
In the film, I truly believed and bought that Tracy loved Bond, because of their banter, their dialogues, and the fact that yes, they've spent more time together.
But anyway, we're straying too far from the topic, I'm afraid. 😅
I know we've had a thread about the Shaun Campbell character before: in the book his capture leads to a powerful character moment for Bond, it does seem as if his presence in the film is a vestige from the book that was never fully adapted to match the slightly changed plot.
In most of the films closely adapted from Fleming, there is a big difference in how much content is devoted to what aspects of the story. Typically Fleming will write 150 pages of descriptions, backstories, interior monologs, technobabble and Fleming's "foibles", and then all of the "action" happens in the last 50 pages. The films typically reverse that ratio. There's action all the way through, and the villains headquarters and final battle usually takes up the last quarter alone. Exposition is usually blink-and-you-miss-it, and character content is usually witty dialog with backstories left to our imagination.
OHMSS must have been challenging to adapt in this way, as the whole point is Bond falls in love, gets married, then [spoiler]his bride dies[/spoiler]. Unless they actually drop the really important stuff (as they did with the previous film) how do you adapt the Tracy plotthread without starting the film with forty minutes of mostly exposition and character development?
@SeanIsTheOnlyOne mentions FRWL as another exposition heavy film where they actually further complicated Fleming's plot. But in the book, the Konspiratsia content was fully half the book, with Bond not even appearing til aprox pg90. Whereas in the film, that's all over after about 15minutes, even with the extra layer of complication.
That's why I think the Fleming books aren't compatible with films, especially as they tend to be shorter, and more entertainment laden.
They could worked well with TV series, with some episodes dedicated to the heavy expositions.
But in films they're not going to work because it would bore the audience, even No Time To Die seemed to rushed those expositions regarding Safin, to give way for bombastic action scenes and cinematography.
It would kill the pacing of the film, but in TV series they could worked.
The 60's films were already slower paced, and those had not included all those expositions from the Fleming books, then what more if they've included them? That would have been slower than what it was.
Integrating Tracy into the climax rather than having her disappear; and, as SeanIs points out, having Draco give the only clue which leads to Blofeld, does improve the story too. Tracy/Draco need to be woven into the plot, which Fleming does do, but threading them in even more helps it.
@MI6_Headquarters I totally share your feeling. In the novel, the romance with Tracy seems a little bit superficial, whereas it is very credible in the film. My theory is Fleming didn't really intend to develop that part, precisely because it was not the heart of the plot. I even wonder if having some fragile female character Bond would fall in love with being the daughter of a very powerful criminal, one of those able to challenge Blofeld, was not simply a means in his mind to make Bond succeed during the climax.
Some of the points raised about the novel are reasons why, despite its excellence, OHMSS only gets a 9 from 10 IMO.
The deletion of the roof chase and the reveal that Blofeld is secretly listening into Bray's office conversations was a good move. While depriving us of excitement during a long lull, the deletion in fact makes Bond's Piz Gloria sham more credible. Had Bond eliminated the SPECTRE agent, Blofeld would surely realise the College of Arms and Sir Hilary are dubious in their aims. The version we have makes more sense considering everyone's reactions as seen. Also, as a viewer who appreciates a slow build of tension, the Piz Gloria scenes draw me into a sense of security, like Bond, and the eventual escape is a sudden, dramatic and intense series of actions, recalling FRWL, yet heightened to almost filmic perfection.
I always assumed Campbell was an MI6 man, but since spotting the Draco construction signs, I am not so sure. In the book, Campbell's appearance is a great moment of tension. It forces Bond to take action. As has been pointed out, in the film, OO7 barely blinks after his appearance. Doesn't Blofeld mention that Campbell is British, when we see his corpse hanging upside down? Can't recall.
In fact, here, Blofeld hardly needs Campbell's confession at all, he has already rumbled Bond as an imposter after that Augsberg slip, and the nighttime antics. If anyone here downloaded my vanity novel adaptation of the OHMSS script, they'll notice I clarified Campbell's role in a much more certain fashion, one which works well, although it too would have extended the movie's run time.
OHMSS is a Peter Hunt movie and, unlike today's filmmakers who want to untie every knot and cross every T, he is on record as believing it is better to keep the action flowing rather than slow it by explaining everything to the 'nth' degree. I'm with Hunt on this, although sometimes his cut work was over zealous [TB springs to mind]. For me, OHMSS is one of the most coherent Bond movies ever made. We are really splitting tiny hairs here.
@chrisno1 said:
Also, as a viewer who appreciates a slow build of tension, the Piz Gloria scenes draw me into a sense of security, like Bond, and the eventual escape is a sudden, dramatic and intense series of actions, recalling FRWL, yet heightened to almost filmic perfection.
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I believe OHMSS has a sense of tension and release like no other Bond film. Every time I watch it. the moment when Bond is locked up in the machine room, I get a sensation in my tummy exactly like when a roller coaster pauses for a second between ascent and descent. The geography helps with this sensation as well.
The ski chase is one of the most exciting action scenes in the series, not because it's got the best action, but because you really feel the pressure that Bond has got to get away. The music obviously helps too as it's the most exciting theme for a movie ever.
The stunts in the FYEO ski chase are, arguably, better; but the tension is less because the chase doesn't have as much importance to the plot.
Some of the points raised about the novel are reasons why, despite its excellence, OHMSS only gets a 9 from 10 IMO.
@chrisno1 9 is a fair mark. For many people, OHMSS is Fleming's best with FRWL, which is quite understandable, but TB is definitely my bedside Bond book, although it is not as thrilling as the two others plotwise (regardless of the way McClory and Whittingham were involved in it).
Funny, I do consider it as one of the weakest Bond books (6/10, to be fair), mainly for the issues stated, the disjointed plot, the rushed romance, a weak or meh Bond Girl, and the slow pacing (yes, some scenes in the book took for so long and I've got bored), and the overused of foreign languages like German/Swiss, French and even Italian that my lack of understanding with them lessened my enjoyment of the book.
And kinda odd because the film is one of my favorite Bond films 😊.
@MI6_Headquarters each to his own 😉
The two chapters introducing SPECTRE, beginning with FIRCO and ending with Blofeld, belong to my favourite literary Bond moments. Just exquisite 😊
I'm talking about OHMSS, the book, I'm seeing that novel/book gets rated highly, but not for me, the film on the other hand is one of my favorites.
Thunderball is one of my favorite Bond novels/books along with Moonraker and Casino Royale.
Thunderball is an underrated Fleming/Literary Bond book, the plot is better than OHMSS, way more realistic, anything is better, especially the Bond Girl.
I'm talking about OHMSS, the book, I'm seeing that novel/book gets rated highly, but not for me, the film on the other hand is one of my favorites, probably my favorite Bond film of the lot.
Thunderball is one of my favorite Bond novels/books along with Moonraker and Casino Royale.
Thunderball is an underrated Fleming/Literary Bond book, the plot is better than OHMSS, way more realistic, anything is better, especially the Bond Girl.
OHMSS (the book) just disappointed me, I don't find it enjoyable as the others, the foreign languages kind of lessened my enjoyment of the book because I don't understand them, the plots are disjointed, the romance was rushed, Tracy is weak (and to the lesser extent, annoying Bond Girl, she's so immature), Tracy is a disappointment especially coming after the complex and great Domino Vitali from the previous novel, the book is also slow paced that some parts of it nearly got me putting the book down especially the Agriculture and Fish part, it kinda bogged down, it's so slow.
The film (OHMSS) on the other hand is one of my favorite Bond films, enjoyable, more compelling, more impactful, and it's such a great watching experience, and Tracy (played by Diana Rigg) is my favorite Bond Girl of them all.
The Book/novel OHMSS - 6/10, still being fair.
The film/movie version gets a 10 for me, it's almost perfect.
@MI6_Headquarters my mistake ! I thought you were talking about TB and I tried to remember where Fleming used german words/expressions, so I was a little bit confused 😂
I like the novel OHMSS. I put it in my top 4 with CR, TB and YOLT (yes I belong to those people who like pretty much the japanese atmosphere of the novel, although I have to admit the plot is not the best element). But I see your point.