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Any Non-Fleming Material You Would Like To See Adapted?

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  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 16,838
    Some_Kind_Of_Hero wrote: »
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    There was also the fight in the cargo hold of the plane in The Living Daylights (1987) being taken from Gardner's Licence Renewed (1981). Both Role of Honour (1984) and A View to A Kill (1985) feature airship climaxes but I suppose that could be coincidental as a thriller idea, though observe the closeness in time of release of both novel and film. There are several other smaller examples of film lifts from the Gardner novels in a famous article by John Cox of The Book Bond blog.

    You also have the danger of being intentionally trapped inside a crashing elevator in both A View to a Kill and For Special Services. As you say, a number of these similarities could be coincidental, but once you begin to add them up and compare the proximity in timing, they start to read more like inspiration than coincidence.

    Ah, yes. I completely forgot about that one. There are so many so I just gave a few illustrative examples. I wish I could find that article by John Cox from 2001 so I could share it here. Pretty sure I shared it here before but I can't seem to find it currently. Another one that comes to mind was that Baku was used as a location in both The Man From Barbarossa (1991) and The World is Not Enough (1999).
  • Herr_StockmannHerr_Stockmann France
    Posts: 782
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    Another one that comes to mind was that Baku was used as a location in both The Man From Barbarossa (1991) and The World is Not Enough (1999).

    Speaking of The Man From Barbarossa, while I already mentioned my appreciation for the premise of this novel and how it could be the perfect basis for a movie (come on, seeing Bond investigate an organization hunting down war criminals and blackmail a government as part of a larger plot to overthrow him is a great cinematic concept!), I think it might be interesting to revisit Gardner's concept of teaming up Bond with foreign agents. In a way, Barbarossa was what I would have imagined if the TSWLM premise had been used again during Dalton's tenure.

    While it's impossible to predict what the future of the series will be after Craig leaves, the relationship between the agents in Gardner's pen, between tension, distrust and betrayal, is definitely something I would like to see on screen.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    edited March 2021 Posts: 16,838
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    Some_Kind_Of_Hero wrote: »
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    There was also the fight in the cargo hold of the plane in The Living Daylights (1987) being taken from Gardner's Licence Renewed (1981). Both Role of Honour (1984) and A View to A Kill (1985) feature airship climaxes but I suppose that could be coincidental as a thriller idea, though observe the closeness in time of release of both novel and film. There are several other smaller examples of film lifts from the Gardner novels in a famous article by John Cox of The Book Bond blog.

    You also have the danger of being intentionally trapped inside a crashing elevator in both A View to a Kill and For Special Services. As you say, a number of these similarities could be coincidental, but once you begin to add them up and compare the proximity in timing, they start to read more like inspiration than coincidence.

    Ah, yes. I completely forgot about that one. There are so many so I just gave a few illustrative examples. I wish I could find that article by John Cox from 2001 so I could share it here. Pretty sure I shared it here before but I can't seem to find it currently. Another one that comes to mind was that Baku was used as a location in both The Man From Barbarossa (1991) and The World is Not Enough (1999).

    Thanks to a Google search I finally found the classic John Cox article I referred to above -

    Déjá vu, Mr. Bond: The surprising similarities between the continuation novels and the James Bond films:

    https://www.thebookbond.com/2011/11/deja-vu-mr-bond-surprising-similarities.html
  • FatherValentineFatherValentine England
    Posts: 737
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    There was also the fight in the cargo hold of the plane in The Living Daylights (1987) being taken from Gardner's Licence Renewed (1981). Both Role of Honour (1984) and A View to A Kill (1985) feature airship climaxes but I suppose that could be coincidental as a thriller idea, though observe the closeness in time of release of both novel and film. There are several other smaller examples of film lifts from the Gardner novels in a famous article by John Cox of The Book Bond blog.

    As a reader of Gardner's books, and a defender of his often indefensible ideas, I do have to say that a lot of this could be coincidence. If only because there are only a finite amount of place to have a shootout, or a fight, or a chase. I don't think, for example that the chase in SF was a rip off of Taken 2, so much as people happen upon an idea around the same time and then it's just a matter of who gets it out first.

    I don't understand why they would rip off a small element of Gardner when they expressly stated they wouldn't take his whole plot/novel for inspiration.

    Saying that, I haven't read that blog so maybe I could be convinced that EON really were taking inspiration from him.

  • echoecho 007 in New York
    Posts: 5,346
    Herr_Stockmann wrote: »
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    Another one that comes to mind was that Baku was used as a location in both The Man From Barbarossa (1991) and The World is Not Enough (1999).

    Speaking of The Man From Barbarossa, while I already mentioned my appreciation for the premise of this novel and how it could be the perfect basis for a movie (come on, seeing Bond investigate an organization hunting down war criminals and blackmail a government as part of a larger plot to overthrow him is a great cinematic concept!), I think it might be interesting to revisit Gardner's concept of teaming up Bond with foreign agents. In a way, Barbarossa was what I would have imagined if the TSWLM premise had been used again during Dalton's tenure.

    While it's impossible to predict what the future of the series will be after Craig leaves, the relationship between the agents in Gardner's pen, between tension, distrust and betrayal, is definitely something I would like to see on screen.

    I don't know if it was because I read the Gardner novels during my teenage fascination with Bond, but I think that his high concepts (if not the way he executed them) would be interesting directions for Bond to go after Craig, that would NOT be personal revenge stories and NOT more MI6 "Scooby gang" stories, such as:

    A female Blofeld

    A villain who puts a price on Bond's head (Bond being chased has, sadly, been forgotten in the films these days)

    A multinational but internally suspicious team working to bring down a common enemy

    Also, the recent electricity debacle in Texas makes the nuclear-meltdown plot in Licence Renewed seem more timely...as long as they execute it better than in TWINE.
  • FatherValentineFatherValentine England
    Posts: 737
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    Some_Kind_Of_Hero wrote: »
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    There was also the fight in the cargo hold of the plane in The Living Daylights (1987) being taken from Gardner's Licence Renewed (1981). Both Role of Honour (1984) and A View to A Kill (1985) feature airship climaxes but I suppose that could be coincidental as a thriller idea, though observe the closeness in time of release of both novel and film. There are several other smaller examples of film lifts from the Gardner novels in a famous article by John Cox of The Book Bond blog.

    You also have the danger of being intentionally trapped inside a crashing elevator in both A View to a Kill and For Special Services. As you say, a number of these similarities could be coincidental, but once you begin to add them up and compare the proximity in timing, they start to read more like inspiration than coincidence.

    Ah, yes. I completely forgot about that one. There are so many so I just gave a few illustrative examples. I wish I could find that article by John Cox from 2001 so I could share it here. Pretty sure I shared it here before but I can't seem to find it currently. Another one that comes to mind was that Baku was used as a location in both The Man From Barbarossa (1991) and The World is Not Enough (1999).

    Thanks to a Google search I finally found the classic John Cox article I referred to above -

    Déjá vu, Mr. Bond: The surprising similarities between the continuation novels and the James Bond films:

    https://www.thebookbond.com/2011/11/deja-vu-mr-bond-surprising-similarities.html

    Cheers for posting the link @Dragonpol. I do think a few of these are a bit of a stretch (Coldfall and Skyfall for example). Otherwise, a good resource, thanks.
  • mtmmtm United Kingdom
    edited March 2021 Posts: 12,821
    FatherValentine wrote: »
    Dragonpol wrote: »
    There was also the fight in the cargo hold of the plane in The Living Daylights (1987) being taken from Gardner's Licence Renewed (1981). Both Role of Honour (1984) and A View to A Kill (1985) feature airship climaxes but I suppose that could be coincidental as a thriller idea, though observe the closeness in time of release of both novel and film. There are several other smaller examples of film lifts from the Gardner novels in a famous article by John Cox of The Book Bond blog.

    As a reader of Gardner's books, and a defender of his often indefensible ideas, I do have to say that a lot of this could be coincidence. If only because there are only a finite amount of place to have a shootout, or a fight, or a chase. I don't think, for example that the chase in SF was a rip off of Taken 2, so much as people happen upon an idea around the same time and then it's just a matter of who gets it out first.

    I don't understand why they would rip off a small element of Gardner when they expressly stated they wouldn't take his whole plot/novel for inspiration.

    Saying that, I haven't read that blog so maybe I could be convinced that EON really were taking inspiration from him.

    Yeah I think if you're doing an adventure film then scenes set in planes, lifts etc. are pretty standard ground and someone in Bond's world was always going to turn up at a racecourse at some point; I'm not convinced the only place they could be getting these ideas was Gardner's books.
    The only one where it's hard to think they weren't being influenced (well, apart from Colonel Moon) is in calling their film Licence Revoked. That is a pretty blatant nod to the books.
  • RichardTheBruceRichardTheBruce I'm motivated by my Duty.
    Posts: 11,722
    Also peril in an elevator shaft (For Special Services) comes to mind.

    They're in part justified I'd say, but also just an eventuality to appear in a Bond film.
  • __M____M__ MidwestUSA
    Posts: 9
    Trigger Mortis.
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