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LL Cool B As Bond, James Bond steps up for his 20th adventure its time to look at what makes him the ultimate male movie icon, why he's so darn cool, and why he always seems to live to Die Another Day. by Michael Caulder If there's a single fact that shows the difference between James Bond and all those who have followed in his path it's that over the course of twenty pictures, three-quarters of the women Bond has slept with have tried to kill him. Not only have they tried to kill him, they've been paid to kill him, and usually by someone they are sleeping with, working for, and supposedly, loyal to. Some men feel a sense of guilty accomplishment if they can stir the passions of a woman enough that she ends up hating them if things go badly; other men think they've found a thrill by parachuting from fifteen thousand feet onto the top of a mountain and then surfing the crest of an avalanche from summit to base; still others assume they've been living simply by travelling through time in a series of amusing battles against anachronistic doppelgangers. It's not that these aren't all good things, but when paired against forty years of extreme assassin sex, they come off a touch impotent. |
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Experience alone should warn Bond that the odds are against him whenever he takes to bed, but even amongst these less-than-ideal circumstances Bond is not only able to perform, he's able to maintain the composure needed roll away from standard post-coital attack by a razor-sharp pendulum. All this while other popular agents are unable to perform simply because their "mojo" was stolen while they slept. It's a cute premise that makes for many hilarious escapades and misunderstandings, but while Mr. Powers is struggling with self-doubt, Bond is getting the job done. Government agencies often say they need "a new kind of agent," and just as often they turn to the daredevil world of extreme sports to find someone both crazy and skilled enough to compete in the volatile and adrenaline-filled world of international intrigue. What they are really saying is they that need someone like Bond. For though he shuns the limelight that comes with the television coverage of competitive events, he himself virtually created the world of extreme sports. While anyone with a low threshold for common sense can jump out of a plane, it takes someone with the will of cold steel to do so sans parachute and yet never have his heart rate reach the century mark. And while the street luge team sits around a hookah, high-fiving each other before they go back to Staples to sell desk lamps, Bond is absconding with a top secret sub and seducing a woman whose life he just saved all while ignoring his boss with a you-can't-fire-me smirk. |
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Comparing the state of the modern secret agent to James Bond is like comparing a photocopy of a fax to the original blueprint: The broad strokes are there, the sex and adrenaline. But what's lost are the subtle nuances that make the double-entendres work. "Powers" has a certain masculine edge to it and "Triple X" is a fine moniker that a certain kind of woman would find enticing. But as any woman knows, be she a Money Penny or a Pussy Galore, a man who starts with a "Double O" pretty much owns the night. |