Villain origin? (Spoilers)
Akbar Shar
LondonPosts: 58MI6 Agent
I'd read the fandom theory of Safin being Dr. No's son. Now, even if that is not the case (he wasn't in the family photo) then why the references. Safin's oriental wardrobe and gardens, the circular ceiling grill, the red suits, the angled walls, death in boiling water?
...one hundred caratsh rough!
Comments
The references were actually to the novel You Only Live Twice. In that book, Blofeld moved to Japan and I believe assumed the identity of a Japanese man - a Dr. I think. He grew his "garden of death" were people would go to commit suicide. Bond is assumed dead at the end of that book with a pregnant girlfreind.
I think that people assumed a Dr. No link because of the oriental garb and the fact that Dr. No had not been in the movies and he was actually the first SPECTRE agent introduced in the movies.
All the Craig movies have offered visual call backs to the earlier Bond series in one form or another. Among them:
Casino Royale: The pudgy Germanic guy whose Range Rover Bond crashes looks and sounds like an ersatz Goldfinger. The DB5, of course, is a throwback, and Bond wears a dark blue knit shirt and walks like Connery in several scenes.
Quantum of Solace: Fields drowned in oil not unlike Masterson suffocated with gold paint. Interestingly, Bond on the motorcycle looks like a throwback to Steve McQueen in The Great Escape.
Skyfall: The DB5 again. Silva's backstory of a rogue MI:6 agent is like Alec Trevelyan's, as is his using computers for his plots, but visually he looks like Max Zorin with the platinum hair.
Spectre: Blofeld's natural gas refinery with a Howard Johnsons in a shallow crater is a weak throwback to classic villain's lairs. Mr. Hinx is Jaws except he has metal thumbnails instead of metal teeth. The fight on the train conjures up any number of such in the other series, such as in Lie and let Die.
Blofeld in You Only Live Twice, the novel, assumes the name Dr. Shatterhand. He's clearly a foreigner, which is one of the reasons he irks the Japanese secret service, who legally can't do anything about him despite his flaunting convention and luring people to commit suicide at his palace.
Probably because of current events it struck me that Safin's disfigured face could be inspired by when NTRSS (Not The Russian Secret Service) poisoned Ukranian PM Viktor Yushchenko back in 2004.
theres supposed to be visual and thematic echoes to every Bond film in this new one, including to the earlier Craig films
There are many references to Dr No, including the opening credits, maybe more than any other film (except maybe OHMSS). I think that has to do with the way this one ended, therefor recalling how it all began.
there was a good fan-video I saw the other day quickly listed a couple dozen of these references while pairing specific shots alongside the supposed source. Many shots the camera angles and actors positions are precisely like scenes from earlier movies. If I find that same video later I'll post a link, unless someone else beat me to it.
EDIT: this is the video i was thinking of
Oh this is brilliant. I absolutely love callbacks, and love that they did this.
But damn you! Now I'll have to rewatch the entire Bond series just so I can truly enjoy all the homages! There goes the rest of my year, all thanks to you and your fascinating discovery... ;)
The video is good, but there are a couple of mistakes. Bond's house in Jamaica isn't ian Fleming's Goleneye, it's aset inspired by Flemig's house. And Bond doesn't drive on a road in Italy in GE. It's in Monaco, neighbouring France.
I started a thread after I saw NTTD about references to the previous films:
All the references mentioned in that thread, and the ones in the YouTube video Caractacus Potts mentioned in this thread, seem to fall into one of two groups; direct references in one group and what could be coincidences or mere similarities in another. To me, direct references are things that wouldn't have happened if they hadn't already been in an earlier film, such as the Dr No dots, the Aston Martin V8, the Delectados cigars, the M paintings etc. I find this group the most interesting. The second group is things that maybe we cannot tell if they were directly inspired and may have happened in NTTD anyway. For example, Madeleine under the ice. This happened with Bond in Skyfall, but are we sure it's definitely a reference, or just a similarity? Madeleine being in two Bond films; is this a Sylvia Trench reference as mentioned in the video? It seems to me a character being in two films can hardly be called a direct reference to a previous film, and the video is pushing it with some of the references. Bond visiting Vesper's grave as a reference to FYEO? Are we saying it wouldn't have happened in NTTD if it wasn't for FYEO doing it first? It's a logical part of the story that sets up the plot of the film.
I feel like I'm ranting a bit here but I do think that some of the so-called references are a bit of a stretch, and if it's true that every Bond film has a reference in NTTD, it would seem that the writers would have to come up with 24 (or more) references and fit a film around them, which seems a bit daft.
That's it, rant over.
I didn't like NTTD anyway.
Bond visited Vesper's grave in Fleming's OHMSS, but he wasnt attacked by Blofeld there, that happened in the FYEO film. so its not just a visit to a lovers grave, but that Blofeld chooses that moment for a carefully planned attack. I know I perceived the reference to OHMSS when I first saw FYEO in the theatre all those years ago, and that scene in the new film immediately made me think of both sources, and that it was clever how they combined them.
your point that we may look too hard is generally true, and applies to previous films as well. There are references I see in previous films that others have also spotted but have never been confirmed. For example does aVtaK pastiche plot elements from three Gardner novels or do I just see that because I want to see it? and others only I see and maybe I'm crazy. and a lot of this stuff is just ancient film tropes that predate Bond, like the villain explaining his plan before setting the easily escapable death trap.
one thing we do know is that DAD was intended to have references to the 19 previous films, that was part of the hype when it came out, and it did indeed seem forced and inorganic how they did it. and each of the Craig films since Quantum... seemed to be doing something similar if not quite so ambitious though I don't know if we had any proof of intent like we did with the hype around DAD. anyway, even if some of the connections we think we see are coincidence, thats part of the fun of looking for them. EON could tell us the answers if they chose, instead they let us have fun overanalysing.