Sony Leaks thread

[DramatistDreamer]

Just because Rush Limbaugh doesn't like Black people, he shouldn't try to speak for Ian Fleming, who lived part time in Jamaica, by the way, and wrote many of his novels there.

I'd like to think that had Fleming be alive, he'd see a Black man playing Bond as a natural progression. Although everyone has their prejudices, I can't imagine Fleming to be what Rush Limbaugh imagines him, especially seeing that Fleming loved living on an island where Blacks make up 80% of the population. I know that Whites lived in apartheid South Africa but knowing what I know of the geography and history of both lands, Jamaica is not, nor was it ever South Africa. South Africa had plenty of land for Whites to separate themselves from the Black population where as Jamaica, an island the size of Connecticut, if you didn't want to be around Blacks, you'd be in pretty tough luck!

Interesting tidbit but the scene that in the first 007 movie where Ursula Andress comes out of the water (a scene recreated by Halle Berry in a later film) was supposedly inspired by an island woman emerging from the water. And guess which island? In fact, parts of the first 007 film were actually filmed in Jamaica.

By the way, Limbaugh is an imbecile who proves this daily.

[marceline]

DD, I love your Kat and David user pic. Goodness how I loved them.

As for what Limbaugh thinks... Don't care. Never cared. Never will care. I've always wondered if he goes to NA meetings for his addiction. I can't imagine being someone in that group and having to listen to the bullshit he spews. There's nothing about him that makes me think he actually works his program so it's just a matter of time before he relapses assuming he hasn't already.

Lord what a horrible movie that was. I say that as someone who was a big fan of both the original series and Smith.

Idris Elba would be a flawless Bond. Especially this grittier version we've seen since Daniel Craig took the role. But I admit to having no perspective. I'd watch Idris Elba in anything. If someone announced he was playing Mary Poppins, I'd say, "What took so long?"

Even the New Yorker agrees...

[quartermainefan]

I agree with Rush on this one. James Bond is a white guy from from England. I don't think it is racist to point that out. You can change it and make him black, but it won't be Bond. Just like making Bond american is ridiculous or if they decided for the next movie the Hulk should be pink and not green. Then, there is the matter of ok we will have a black James Bond, but Idris Elba? He isn't particularly good looking. I rolled my eyes when CBS made Dr Watson an asian women on that Sherlock Holmes show too.

I know what the characters are supposed to look like in my head and I react to casting based on that. If they hired a white guy to play Superman and he had blond hair and a ponytail it would wrong too.

[Eric83]

Did you feel the same way when they made Blair a southern white woman on OLTL?

[quartermainefan]

I thought that was very weird but Blaire was/is hardly iconic. Blaire is a non-entity compared to the other characters I mention and there is no hard and set image for her.

[marceline]

James Bond is a fictional character. It's like arguing that Santa Claus is white. Bond has been played by Sean Connery, Roger Moore and Pierce Brosnan. It's not like those men all look alike. The only reason Bond is white is because he's only been played by white guys. The only Bond characteristic that is truly set in stone is the fact that he's British. Everything else is up for grabs.

[DramatistDreamer]

Thanks marceline! Kat & David...they just 'worked', you know? They had amazing chemistry. In fact, I even loved the friendship that they each had with Bridget, it was so organic but I really think it just boiled down to the fact that the actors all functioned as professionals and just did their best to make the scripts work.

A lot of today's soap actors seem to let personal grievances and preferences get in the way of doing their jobs. Of course, it doesn't help that the writing often leaves much to be desired.

Back on topic though,

it's interesting to read about the backstory of the novels vs. the films. James Bond (there is an interesting anecdote behind the very name), in the novel, was really based on a composite of various people, one of which included a Serbian double agent nicknamed Tricycle. I don't know about anyone else but that doesn't exactly scream British to me.

And those going by what they think was the authors supposed strict wishes. Well, if we go by a sketch that was supposedly made of James Bond, Daniel Craig wasn't supposed to be Bond then. In fact, the only Bond who bears any resemblance to the sketch would probably be George Lazenby or perhaps Timothy Dalton. Obviously, the producers have their own ideas and they adjust accordingly.

[NothinButAttitude]

Sorry but I find your statement to be hypocritical. So it's OK for characters to be white-washed [e.g. Jesus Christ, Moses, Noah, countless Native American & Asian figures throughout Hollywood cinematic history], but a black James Bond isn't? And regardless if Mia Korf's Blair was iconic or not, which some die hard OLTL fans would say she was, it was clear white washing. Cultural smudging. You can't claim it is OK for Blair to be recast with a white woman but Bond can't.

[Eric83]

Pretty much.

[marceline]

I guess I see the point. After all, a black Bond would make this seem so unrealistic:

[quartermainefan]

I guess if Blair was around for 50,75 years and the entire world has agreed upon what a character is (Robin Hood is a white man who wears green and shoots arrows, Sherlock Holmes is a tall thin man who wears a hat and smokes a pipe, and so on) I would say I couldn't claim that. Since Blaire Kramer is a cultural non-entity not recognized by even 1/100th of 1% of the population in this world I can claim it and I do.

I understand the desire for black action heroes but for me James Bond is a urbane white guy just like when I watched that crapfest Man Of Steel movie and I was looking for Jimmy Olson and all I found was some girl named Jenny, I went "WTF!"

[quartermainefan]

Oh, I am not against racial switching in casting on general principle. It is just after 50 years it seems a little late and that ship has sailed. But in 1967 BATMAN replaced the perfect Julie Newmar with the equally perfect Eartha Kitt and it worked just fine.

[alphanguy74]

Well, then let's have him suck a dick in the next feature. We can put him in lavender and let him mince around like Henry Gibson's Mariposa in Wonder woman.

[Juliajms]

I agree with this. With somethings I'm a traditionalist, but having a black James Bond wouldn't even stretch my imagination given the way the character has been recast so often.

[marceline]

The only reason the entire world agreed on it is because the world wasn't given a choice. Now we've been given one and the world is no longer in agreement.

But back to the larger topic of the Sony hacks, I cracked up at learning that Sony set up a website where people could rent or buy The Interview.

"Here. We set up this website because we got hacked. Please give us your credit card information." And I'll be damned if people didn't do just that. Between that and the people who think that this was all a publicity stunt, I weep for the critical thinking skills of our population.

When you're making movies about real people or telling stories where the ethnicity matters to the character (think: West Side Story or Showboat) then I lean towards hewing as closely as possible to realism. (That's one reason why I can't stomach Elizabeth Taylor's "Cleopatra" even though I adore old Hollywood movies.) But when you start dealing with sci-fi/fantasy, I say mix it all up. I love Latino Spiderman, black Bond and gay Dumbledore! Give me Asian Santa Claus, Inuit Rupunzel and if you want to make Superman a blond with a ponytail, let er rip.