The Politics of James Bond: From Fleming's Novels to the Big Screen (review)

Jeremy Black explains that his study approaches the entire Bond corpus by analyzing British geopolitics in an effort "to re-create the international world within which Bond was supposed to operate" (ix). He notes that while Bond began as a product of the Cold War, "the setting and dynamics of the adventures changed, as the cultural, historical and political environment in which the Bond character operates altered" (x). Unfortunately, this study merely sketches the broad contours of historical shifts in British geopolitics in the context of the Cold War and offers very little in-depth analysis of how British politics frames these novels, stories, and films. The complete absence of footnotes compounds this problem, so that if one wished to explore the historical backdrop of GoldenEye (1995) by learning more about the "Aldington-Tolstoy libel action" (162), for instance, one would be out of luck. The omission of footnotes and the absence of a proper bibliography (the book does contain a two-page listing of books for "Selected Further Reading") certainly suggest that the intended audience for the book is not an academic one.

The most immediately apparent failure of the book, however, is its over-reliance on plot summary. The study provides lengthy recapitulations of the stories of every Bond novel and film, but only soundbites of the historical and political context. For example, the Burgess and Maclean spy scandal is briefly mentioned as a source of tension in the relationship between the intelligence services of Great Britain and the United States during the Fifties, but the impact of their defection on Fleming's representation of MI5 and MI6 isn't developed. The defections of Guy Burgess, Donald Maclean, and, later, Kim Philby represent traumatic moments in the history of British intelligence, shocking events that would fuel spy fiction on both sides of the Atlantic, most notably John LeCarré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1974). Does Fleming respond to this blow to the integrity of the Secret Intelligence Service beyond making Bond infallible? Do the films? The scope of Black's study, encompassing all fourteen of Fleming's James Bond books and nineteen movies of the 007 franchise (from 1962-1999), leaves little time or space for anything but a cursory treatment of these historical events.

Nevertheless, Black notes that changing social attitudes, primarily a more politically correct environment, thanks in large part to the feminist movement, contributed to the evolution of the Bond films. This begrudging response begins with the slightly less sexist treatment of female characters begun in The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) with Anya Amasova (Barbara Bach), Bond's KGB counterpart, competitor, and collaborator. What is perhaps more interesting, and unmentioned by Black, is the way in which Bond taps into the backlash against political correctness in the Nineties with the Pierce Brosnan films. Black duly notes the infamous speech by the new female M (Judi Dench) in GoldenEye, describing Bond as a "sexist, misogynist dinosaur, a relic of the Cold War" (qtd. in Black 100). This moment of self-criticism, however, exemplifies what Slavoj zizek calls "enlightened false consciousness": "I know very well that James Bond is precisely what M describes him as (sexist, misogynist, etc.), but nevertheless I will relish his objectification and callous treatment of women." In short, the film pays lip service to political correctness, thereby allowing the audience to enjoy more thoroughly Bond's notorious politically incorrect behavior. Black's study could only benefit from more theory in this vein, particularly in addressing the cultural work performed by the Bond texts on their particular historical context. Black briefly addresses this relationship in his conclusion, contending that the films undertake "a general move away from specific political contexts" to offer a compensatory form of "escapism," a "refuge from the reality of British decline and the decay of traditional British values" (213).

The history of the film industry seems to be a significant blind spot in Black...