We are just having a lazy Sunday; Lyn is out in the garden enjoying the sun, and I think I’ll go join her soon. This morning, before she got up, iii put on ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’ as I felt like some good old 007. To be honest, my reaction was mixed: there is not much plot, and what plot there is is rather long and drawn out. I’m also not sure I like George Lazenby as bond either. Having said that, there were some brilliant touches: for example, there is a art where bond thinks he has resigned from MI6 and is going through the stuff in his office, and we hear snippets from the theme tunes from previous bond films. What struck me the most about OHMSS, though, was the way in which it differs from other Bond films. It is more romantic, and we see a more tender, softer Bond. That contrasted greatly with the bond of the last one I saw, which was You only Live Twice.

This made me think a bit: only in a franchise as huge as bond can we see such hug variations in plot and character. So far, six actors have played 007, and they all play him differently*. I think the case could be made that the Bond franchise is itself a genre. I’m sure this will have been suggested elsewhere before, and I don’t think the allusion is a perfect one, but if we expand the definition of genre slightly, I think the Bond franchise has genre-like qualities. It can’t e called a series, as that implies a sequence of films which follow on from one another, a la, say, star trek. Nor can it be called a saga, a la Star Wars or The Lord of the Rings**. With a few exceptions, the individual films in the series pays no heed to the others, while having common motifs and adversaries; they are also timeless – that is, they are always set in the period in which they were made. With the exception of Q, the dramatis personae do not age. Thus I think the bond Franchise has become too big to become anything other than it’s own genre.

Anyway, while it feels good to blog about film again, and there is much more I could explore on the subject, there is an Indian summer outside I don’t want to miss, so I’ll just send you here while I go hunt down a nice, cold martini.

*my favourite is still Daniel Craig, btw.

**Although LOTR might better be termed a trilogy.