CALLING all UK Bond Fans
bondfans
Posts: 1MI6 Agent
Dear London-based Bond fans (or those willing to travel!),
We are looking for Bond enthusiasts of all kinds as part of a research project on the heritage of the James Bond franchise. We are arts marketing academics and would like to invite you to a focus group on the 15th/16th of July in central London. Would you be willing to meet for 60-90 minutes to discuss your views? We are interested in what first attracted you to Bond, how your relationship to all things Bond has developed and your favourite and most hated elements of the franchise! The purpose of these focus groups will be to understand the franchise’s continued success. Your views will be fully anonymised.
Tea and coffee will be available and to compensate you for your time we will offer £10 towards your travel costs.
Please contact Chloe Preece at chloe.preece@royalholloway.ac.uk with any questions.
We look forward to talking to you soon!
We are looking for Bond enthusiasts of all kinds as part of a research project on the heritage of the James Bond franchise. We are arts marketing academics and would like to invite you to a focus group on the 15th/16th of July in central London. Would you be willing to meet for 60-90 minutes to discuss your views? We are interested in what first attracted you to Bond, how your relationship to all things Bond has developed and your favourite and most hated elements of the franchise! The purpose of these focus groups will be to understand the franchise’s continued success. Your views will be fully anonymised.
Tea and coffee will be available and to compensate you for your time we will offer £10 towards your travel costs.
Please contact Chloe Preece at chloe.preece@royalholloway.ac.uk with any questions.
We look forward to talking to you soon!
Comments
I've contacted them and will travel to central London on Wed. the 15th July.
I also sent 2 pages of text of the extent of my knowledge on Bond.
So it should be interesting.
Bleuville. "Piz Gloria is private property and my servant told you down at the station" Blofeld-OHMSS.
But do please tell us how it was
Yes - With pleasure M , with pleasure !
If convenient I guess you need to arrange with them (Chloe Preece), a Focus Group appointment if you want to attend.
It's being held at Senate House, Malet St , WC1E 7HU on 15 / 16 July.
This is what I wrote..... (a lot of it is common knowledge to us "experts".)
OPINIONS ON JAMES BOND – 50 YEARS and MORE..
James Bond Books.
I’ve read all the books which are a pleasure to re-read. 14 Fleming stories and then the continuation
novels by other writers. Robert Markham (aka Kingsley Amis) 1968. John Gardner 1981 onwards-
(also 14 books) Raymond Benson-1997 on. Single books by Faulks, Deaver, Boyd and Horowitz.
(When there was a continuing author-several books-he would also produce a novelisation of the
Film script story. I would look forward to buying these, but Benson was the last to do this, as with
one book authors, they’re not asked to do a “Film story book” which is a pity. You had a paperback of the “Die Another Day” film story but not ever since. So no novelisations of the Daniel Craig films.
Of the Fleming books good ones are Moonraker, From Russia With Love, Goldfinger and the
Blofeld Trilogy of Thunderball, OHMSS and YOLT.
In For Your Eyes Only(1960)-Five short stories- good ones are Risico and
From A View To A Kill. The Living Daylights appears in the Octopussy book.
Elements of the Octopussy book (pg 44) will be in the new film Spectre. A body is found at the end of
an ice glacier which implicates the murderer after several years.
James Bond Films
I first saw the Bond films in London in 1968 as double-bills when my Dad took us 3 sons to see them.
I was 12 at the time and on holiday sought out the book stories they were based on to read.
My absolute favourite is On Her Majesty’s Secret Service –both book and film, as the story was translated to screen faithfully by Director Peter Hunt in 1969 with the New James Bond-George Lazenby. The 2nd Unit director John Glen, had directed ITV’s Danger Man and later in the 1980s directed five films with Roger Moore and Timothy Dalton.
The films began with Dr. No in 1962. Early on they followed the book stories with humourous
One-liners added. Then later on you hope for bits of the Fleming short stories included.
For Your Eyes Only -1981 and Licence To Kill (made up title) used characters from The Hildebrand Rarity – Milton Krest. An example of the way the films expand on and exagerate, is that in the
Book of OHMSS, Draco had one helicopter to attack Piz Gloria. In the film he had 3 helicopters and
On the LP music record the painting has several helicopters attacking.
Usual features of the films –
1. They might have a gadget that is fictional but in later years is made for real.
(e.g.-Goldfinger’s Homer tracking device, can nowadays equate to mobile phone tracking or Sat-Nav guidance.)
2. They feature 2 or 3 women characters. One is a love interest who tragicaly gets killed by villains, the 2nd a villainess makes things difficult for Bond, and maybe another ally finishes the film in Bond’s arms.
3. The plot story may feature a topical subject, that later happens in the real world.
( Water shortages in QOS film. Détente cooperation between Russia and the West in TSWLMe film )
4. An unusual hechman villain who becomes popular with the audience.
(e.g.-JAWS in 2 films. Oddjob in Goldfinger. Boris Grishenko in Goldeneye.)
5. When the main villain (e.g. Blofeld) is telling off one of two underlings, usually one of
them is nervously sweating, but it’s the other calm one that gets killed.
(In Thunderball one of the underlings chairs electrocutes him. In YOLTwice Blofeld berates Osato for not killing Bond but it’s his assistant Helga Brandt that is dropped into the pool with Piranha fish.)
6. In the John Glen 1980s films when there’s a quiet moment, there will suddenly be a loud noise
to make the audience jump. e.g.- Pigeons suddenly flapping out of a cliff face.
7. In several Bond films the producer, Michael G. Wilson makes an acting appearance in the
background-a bit like Hitchcock did in his films.
James Bond Toys and Merchandise Collecting.
With a new Bond film I look forward to buying various related merchandise.
Things I definitely will buy is the Music soundtrack CD, any Corgi Toy model cars,
Books about the making of the film, Trading card photos from the film (Rittenhouse), and the DVD of the film.Previously- photo stickers album(Topps or Merlin) and Lottery scratchcards with character photos.
Magazines are good if they are about the new film, but a lot of publishers revamp old photos of
the previous films –which to me is old news overworked.
At collectors fairs you can look out for the old toys, books and magazines.
Between March 2007 and Feb. 2013 I collected all 134 x 1:43 scale models in the part-work
The James Bond Car Collection which had any vehilcle from the Bond films including many
Aston Martins and 4 Lotus Esprits as well as a Dr. No Dragon Tank.
Good models with a diarama background and sometimes model figures in the cars.
A thin magazine accompanied the models every fortnight.
The Music of Bond.
Over the years I’ve bought soundtrack LPs, cassettes and CDs and play the music on the car CD.
The composers were John Barry, George Martin (LALDie), Marvin Hamlisch (TSWLMe),Bill Conti (FYEO) and David Arnold and recently Thomas Newman.(does all Sam Mendes film scores.)
John Barry is the original and best composer and as a result I have bought CDs of his other film music. (e.g.-Zulu, The Ipcress File, Dances With Wolves and lots more.)
Repeated playing gets you familiar with the individual tracks from each section of the films.
The flip side is that there are many “Best of Bond” music CDs not always sounding rightl-but sometimes amusing.
Websites.
There is mi6-hq which has daily news on Bond stuff. Particularly good in getting photos
of the new film in progress. For Spectre film I’ve seen stills of Mexico, Morocco, Rome and
snowy Austria.
Ajb007 is a Bond topics discussion site –you can read or join in. Sections include –
Books, Films, Music, Events, Memorabilia and Collecting and more.
007.com is the official EON site with photo sections.
Toys of Bond and Jamesbondtoys are some uk sites. Listing collectibles.
Producers and Directors
Harry Saltzman and Albert R. (Cubby) Broccolli are the 2 producers who created EON Productions
(EON – Everything Or Nothing) and their film production company DANJAQ s.a. which is a shortening of their wives names Danni and Jacqueline. These days the producers are Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccolli.
For legal reasons on the Thunderball film the Producer is named as Kevin McClory who had the film
rights from winning in court against Ian Fleming.
Directors of Bond Films. (11 Directors of 24 films.)
The Producers appoint the Director of the film.
For - 1.Dr No,2. FRWL and 4.Thunderball it was Terence Young (x3)-who had the savoir faire of a James Bond. (e.g.-Men’s Fashions, knowledge of Food and Drinks, and being a British Gentleman.)
For- 3.Goldfinger, 7.Diamonds Are Forever and 8.LALDie 9.TMWTGGun it was Guy Hamilton (x4), who added jokey humour and made shorter length films- about 1h 35m.
For – 5. You Only Live Twice and 9.The Spy Who Loved Me and 10.Moonraker it was
Lewis Gilbert.(x3)
For – 6.OHMSS it was Peter Hunt (x1), who edited the previous films.
For – 12.13.14.15.16. FYEO, Octopussy, AVTAKill, TLDaylights and Licence To Kill it was
John Glen (x5) (another film editor and 2nd Unit director on OHMSS.
For 17-Goldeneye and 21-Casino Royale it was Martin Campbell.(x2)
For 18-Tomorrow Never Dies it was Roger Spotiswoode. For 19- TWINE – it was Michael Apted.
For 20-Die Another Day it was Lee Tamahori.
For 22- Quantum Of Solace it was Marc Foster.
For 23-Skyfall and 24- SPECTRE it was Sam Mendes.(x2)
Bleuville
Excellent...again, please report back -{
Bond opinions at Senate House-2pm Wed 15 July.
I arrived a bit early after I had travelled on the coach from Bristol and then tube to Russell Square.
Met the two young lady interviewers Chloe Preece and colleague (sorry I'm terrible at names!) at room 236 on the 2nd floor
and were joined by a flamboyant Indian chap of about 40 yrs age. (apologies to him I didn't recall his name). We both had similar knowledge of the Bond film history going back in time. He did state that he had not read the Bond books whereas I have, but it didn't bother him. He said he had been to the sort of Istanbul locations featured in FRWL like the St Sophia Mosque and the railway station.
He had also previously met Barbara Broccolli and - Ajay Chowdhury who urged him to read the books.
First of all we were offered cold drinks and pastry cakes and they do give you a £10 M&S gift card to cover some of your travel expense.
We were asked what was your favourite Bond film-Me-OHMSS other chap-FRWL. What's the worst? In recent times QOS and going back possibly Moonraker. Our conversation was recorded for later referral. What do you dislike? For me-it's wanting the gunbarrel sequence returned to the start of the film, and in future having a Bond actor with black hair in the Connery mould.
We discussed how originally the films would be like a travelogue showcasing unknown countries like Russia and Japan.
I also emphasised my favourite interest in the music-particularly by John Barry and others which I play on the car CD almost every morning. In the pre-video age before the mid-70s ,in order to see the film again you had to go to the cinema repeatedly.
A Bond film was a special event as you couldn't see it any other way. Nowadays they're repeated on ITV continuously and DVDs are soon available. I talked about collecting related toys, books CDs etc. depending on what you can afford.
I realised that if you live in London you have a headstart in terms of getting autographs at premieres and depending on your connections maybe seeing preview showings of the upcoming film. I meant to discuss the continuation books , but didn't!
After an hour an a half's discussion we both departed and my co-interviewee helpfully directed me to the Comic and Film Store.
Then afterwards I walked to Fortnum & Mason for some expensive biscuits and chocolates.
At the National Express coach station I was pleased to see the 007 service to Canterbury. One day I will go on that service to unexplored Kent towns.
cheers, Bleuville.
By the way, they are still looking for Bond interviewees. Just contact Chloe Preece as mentioned in the "Calling all Bond Fans" message.
Bleuville.