Original article published 12 May 2012.
I am in the process of rewriting and republishing old articles about James Bond’s outfits that are in need of a refresh and expansion. All former comments are preserved below.
James Bond arrives in the Bahamas in Casino Royale, wearing a light grey linen suit when deplaning. Bond frequently wears light grey suits in the Caribbean and in other places with hot climates throughout the first two decades of the Bond series, but this is his first grey linen suit of the series. Grey is not a typical colour for linen, which is often found in its natural ecru colour. When not natural, linen is popularly worn in cream, white, brown, green, blue and pastels, but not in grey. The linen suit looks more beige than grey on screen, but the suit is a neutral grey in real life. The colour grey has business suit connotations, and linen suits are more traditionally worn in non-business colours because they’re worn for leisure.
Nevertheless, the pale grey shade and linen texture of Bond’s suit still look perfectly tropical and relaxed so that Bond can blend in with the tourists yet stand out as the most sophisticated one on his flight. The linen is lightweight, probably Italian linen, and woven in a plain weave. It is an excellent cloth for comfort in the Bahamas’ heat and humidity. The wrinkles are not an issue in this setting.
Brioni made the suit, and the jacket has their usual cut for Craig with straight, padded shoulders and roped sleeve heads. The jacket is closely fitted in the torso, but the shoulders are wide, and the sleeves are full for a clean drape and plenty of movement. The sleeves look overly full, but this could be an illusion because they’re excessively long. All of Bond’s jacket sleeves are too long in Casino Royale, but these might be the most excessive. Some people like to cut their linen sleeves longer to compensate for the loss of length due to wrinkling, but the amount of length taken up by wrinkling is negligible, and these sleeves are overcorrected for wrinkling. These sleeves may also have been made longer to compensate for the short-sleeve shirt, but the sleeves are still much too long for that purpose.
The jacket’s front has three buttons in a slightly high stance, which was fashionable at the time. The lapels roll through the top button but not all the way down to the middle button, a common style in Italian tailoring sometimes called 3-roll-2.5. There are four buttons on each cuff, a single rear vent and straight pockets with flaps.
The jacket has peaked lapels, which had started to become trendy on single-breasted suit jackets and odd jackets at this time. This is Bond’s first single-breasted suit of the series with peaked lapels. In the past, Bond’s only single-breasted jackets with peaked lapels were his dinner jackets, his morning coats and his black lounge jacket for his wedding. Peaked lapels are usually considered dressier than the single-breasted jacket’s usual notched lapels, hence their use on more formal jackets, but they can be used on any type of jacket. On a double-breasted jacket, they’re the standard for all suits and jackets—both smarter worsted suits and relaxed linen suits—so the same can follow for single-breasted suits. With this suit, the peaked lapels do nothing to make it more formal; linen’s casual nature overrides any stylistic details. The peaked lapels merely make this a showier suit, flashier than what Bond normally wears. It portrays him as young and overconfident, which he is at this point in the film.
Bond only wears the suit jacket on screen for a matter of seconds when exiting the plane. He removes his suit jacket when he drives, something the average man might do to prevent wear or wrinkling on his jacket or for comfort, but Bond usually drives in his jackets. He does not don his jacket when he gets out of the car, instead choosing to assume the position of a parking valet in his shirt sleeves.
The trousers are in Brioni’s ‘Delta’ model and have a darted front, a mid rise and full-cut straight legs with turn-ups. A full cut befits linen, wearing cooler and preventing wrinkles compared to a slim leg. The amount of fullness is extreme, and it is emphasised by how the lightweight linen drapes. The trousers are sagging a little, which makes them look sloppy with a fuller break than intended. The trousers are detailed with angled side pockets and two rear button-through pockets, and they take a belt.
The sports shirt was designed by costume designer Lindy Hemming so that Bond could disguise himself as a parking attendant. It is made of white Indian cotton voile with fancy self-stripe patterns of a thick track stripe and a chunky chain stripe, which is bordered by thinner double-helix stripes on either side. Cotton voile means that the shirt wears cool because it’s lightweight and breathable, while the self-stripes ensure that the cotton isn’t sheer. While this cotton is superb for a warm-weather casual shirt, it could potentially make for a good dress shirt to wear with a dinner jacket too.
The shirt has a high two-button point collar, which was a fashionable style at the time in Britain. He wears the collar and the first button open on the chest to keep cool and look relaxed. The shirt proves to be very sporty when Bond removes his jacket to reveal its short sleeves that reach mid-bicep and its shoulder straps. The sleeves have separate cuffs added on, not turned up, which shows in how the stripes on the cuffs go around the arm. It is also detailed with a placket front and rear darts, which give the shirt a neat fit without it being too tight. The shirt was made for Daniel Craig and may have been made by Academy Costumes.
The short-sleeve shirt pays homage to Bond’s attire from Ian Fleming’s books. While it makes sense to wear a short-sleeve shirt to stay comfortable in the tropics, the literary Bond’s preference—as well as Fleming’s preference—for them extended to all climates because he didn’t like dirty shirt cuffs. However, it’s more practical for shirt cuffs to soil than for jacket cuffs to soil because it’s easier to launder a shirt. With the sweat in the tropics, it’s even more important to wear a long-sleeve shirt under a jacket to absorb the dirt and wear. The short-sleeve shirt with its texture and sporty detailing makes the outfit look complete with the suit jacket removed.
The shoes are a dark brown suede two-eyelet or three-eyelet plain-toe derby. They are made on a gently squared, chisel-toe last with leather soles. The shoe is from John Lobb Paris because it has their horseshoe-shaped rubber heel piece. This shoe is similar to the John Lobb ‘Luffield’ that Bond wears with his dinner suit in the film, but it has some differences that signify it’s another model—possibly the ‘Sandon’ two-eyelet derby. The ‘Perrier’ three-eyelet derby also has much in common with this shoe, but its last isn’t as chiselled. Bond’s socks are tan, attempting to be a halfway point between the light grey trousers and brown shoes.
The belt is made of a dark calfskin leather with a silver-toned rectangular centre-post buckle. The belt is so dark that it appears black, but it is more likely a very dark brown. If the belt is from John Lobb, like the shoes, they make a very dark brown leather that could potentially be mistaken for black on screen. The belt looks like it could be brown compared to the black rubber watch strap. A production still shows Bond wearing black leather shoes, either the John Lobb ‘Luffield’ two-eyelet derby or the John Lobb ‘Romsey’ two-eyelet George boot, after he has stepped off the plane. If the belt is indeed black rather than dark brown, it could have been chosen to pair with the black shoes and not changed when the shoes were changed.
The sunglasses are the Persol 2244 in colour 834/33. The frames are a gunmetal colour, which complements the grey suit, and the lenses are brown. The glasses have rectangular lenses with a sporty and trendy wraparound shape and a double bridge. The frame is metal while the temples are acetate.
Now Pay Attention
| SUIT | |
| Tailor | Brioni |
| Fabric | Light grey linen |
| JACKET | |
| Front buttons | 3, medium-high stance |
| Lapels | Medium-narrow peak |
| Shoulder | Straight with roped sleeve heads |
| Breast pocket | Welt |
| Hip pockets | Straight with flaps |
| Vents | 1 |
| Cuff buttons | 4 |
| TROUSERS | |
| Front | Darted |
| Support | Dark brown belt |
| Front/side pockets | Slanted side pockets |
| Rise | Medium |
| Leg | Straight and wide |
| Hem | Turn-ups |
| SHIRT | |
| Shirtmaker | Probably Academy Costumes |
| Fabric | White self stripe |
| Collar | Two-button point |
| Cuff | Short sleeve with cuff |
| Front | Placket |
| SHOES | |
| Shoemaker | John Lobb Paris |
| Style | Dark brown suede derby |
I had assumed the maker was Brioni like every other suit of his in this movie. It would tend to explain the long rise, full cut trousers. Certainly, the shoulders are strong enough to be theirs.
While I realize the reason is to keep cool, the fact that he dumps off his suit coat almost immediately and is wearing a short sleeved shirt underneath looks a little sloppy. They could have at least had him in long sleeves that were rolled up by the time he got to the hotel.
Then again, it serves the purpose of having him confused for the staff by that Goldfinger-lookalike. I’m almost certain he was a nod to the character… the accent, choice of attire and vehicle colour…
I don’t get the impression of Brioni with this suit. The biggest reason I question if this is Brioni is that the breast pocket is straight across and Brioni breast pockets always have a slant. But it’s not out of the question that it’s Brioni. The blue linen suit in the black and white scene really doesn’t look like Brioni.
Will you post a blog about the blue linen suit bond wears in the bathroom fight scene?
Actually the goldfinger look alike you stated, in my opinion, looks alot like Zarkofsky from Goldeneye and The World Is Not Enough…just saying.
Zukovsky, you mean?
The reason I say Auric Goldfinger is because of his clothing having accents of gold and the gold coloured SUV which Bond uses as a distraction.
I never really got the idea of lined linen jackets. As long as the jacket is not unlined, linen is useless.
Not really, it matters what the lining is. If it’s viscose or Rayon then it breathes very well (Hawaiian shirts are made from Rayon) and helps with the drape too. Half or quarter-lined is an option for summer.
Hi all,
I agree that it looks sloppy. I remember reading a interview with Linda (Lindy) Hemming who was responsible for the clothing in CR in which she stated that Bond had not quite gotten the hang of how to dress yet. This was said to fit in with the reboot and Bond getting his 00-status and so on. For example, Vesper getting Bond his first proper evening wear. This may be a reason to why he is dressed in this questionable attire. A consequence may also be that the beginning of CR may not be as good as other parts of the canon when imitating Bonds style. But, of course, if you like it you like it.
Nice, cool look. The black with brown is either sloppy if unintentional or just dumb if intentional – the idea that a 38 year old man can put together this obviously expensive and climate-proper outfit, but mix black with brown because “he isn’t the Bond we know” is a dumb marketing hook that detracts from the excellent script and movie that Casino Royale is. The jacket looks vaguely ill-fitting but that is a perfectionist’s complaint. Nevertheless, the ensemble is nicely elegant, quite perfect, even overdressed, for The One and Only Ocean Club. I find no problem with the short-sleeves in this one instance – it looks good, and, having just returned from the Ocean Club not long ago, I didn’t see anyone wearing long sleeves (or jackets) given the climate. Another nice outfit from Casino Royale.
Perhaps Bond was trying to match his belt strap with his Omega sea master planet ocean watch strap being that it too is also black. If that was the case he should’ve worn black derby’s instead. Or just went with a brown belt. I agree, the belt should’ve matched.
Jacket is rather well made, but chosen exactly one number too big – notice the misaligned cuffs and shoulders. It’s definitelly a hint to audience, as is a short sleeve shirt and belt/shoes mismatch.
The black with brown is an unfortunate oversight. He does it again in Quantum of Solace.
Apart from this faux pas, I like this ensemble– linen suits are a great way to remain cool in a warmer climate. Quite appropriate for the Bahamas. I’m not sure who made the suit, the shoulders do suggest Brioni, but it’s really anyone’s guess. I do remember reading somewhere that he wears a Diesel shirt here, but don’t take my word for it!
Overall I am fond of most of the clothes in Casino Royale.
It is a mystery why Brosnan did the same mistake in The World wearing black with brown. It may be possible that Craig wanted to match his black rubber strap with the belt, but it seems rather far fetched.
Maybe it’s just me, but even though the trousers sit at the natural waist – as they should – the trouser legs look particularly ill-fitting.
It just has the look of something that could have been pulled off the rack at any half-decent retailer.
-Kurt
The trousers may look ill fitting because of how long they are as opposed to the full cut. The large amount of break looks bad and smacks of buying pre-hemmed suit separates in the same inseam as one wears on their jeans. It’s a mistake many young people make when buying an inexpensive suit for the first time.
In addition to my previous comment:
Peaked lapels on SB suits were quite popular in the 1970’s. There has been a bit of a resurgence in the style recently; I dare say this is an example of it.
Regardless, it looks almost as if these peaked lapels were made by filling in the gorge from a notch lapel template, for they sit ridiculously high up.
Case in point: Had this jacket been made with notched lapels, the gorge would have been rather high up, but tastefully fashionable. On the other hand, the same gorge height combined with the peaked lapels creates an upward visual line that should be balanced with a slightly lower gorge height.
Mind you, I’m no fan of low gorges – and I also happen to like SB’s with peaked lapels – but these lapels are a bit too edgy to be tasteful.
-Kurt
The suit jacket does not fit at all. It’s too big on the shoulders, long n the sleeves and full in the chest. The trousers look good to me even with the full break. Short sleeves, not a fan especially this particularly with the shoulder pieces on and the awful pattern. Obviously black and brown goes with out saying. Love the shoes. They look like church’s Chetwynd in suede. I’m guessing church’s but probably john lobb as they provided the black lace-ups
The shoulders fit fine, they are just a wider style. Church’s was not involved with Casino Royale, and they didn’t make any derby shoes in this style. The John Lobb Tamar, which was made at that time, is the closest to these shoes.
I can’t see up close enough to know if the shoes are an oxford or derby style lace.
Do you have a link to a close-up of the shoe you suggested previously, the Tamar?
I replaced the last image with one that better shoes that the shoes are derbies. Actually, if the John Lobb Sandon was made at that time, it would be a better match with its more chiselled toe.
Is it the one and only time Bond wore a single-breasted, peaked lapels suit ? I mean, excluding dinner suits and morning wear outfits.
It’s the first one. Bond will be wearing another in Spectre.
So it occurs to me after having read your recent article on what the literary Bond wore that this outfit is as close as the screen version ever gets — in that he wears a short-sleeve shirt with a suit. Has anyone ever drawn this connection? From the sound of it, this choice was probably more just to reflect the climate, or to somehow connote Bond as not being on top of his game yet, but the fact that this was an unfashionable quirk that Fleming himself had that he passed onto his Bond makes me wonder if this wasn’t perhaps a subtle nod to the literary Bond. Casino Royale was certainly packed with other references.
The linen suit in the pre-title sequence is more like what Fleming’s Bond wore because it’s navy. You can see it here: https://www.bondsuits.com/navy-linen-suit/
There are a few outfits throughout the series that come a bit closer to Fleming, though Bond wears proper shirts with them.
Dear Matt
Is it usual to cut the sleeves of a linen suit coat a little longer, to make allowance for the inevitable creasing?
Also, would tailoring the coat to fit closely to the body be a mistake, as I imagine the general rule with linen is to cut the coat a little looser to wear cooler? I wear my coats buttoned and prefer a closer fit, with a slight flair to the skirt, to accentuate a slim waist. Is this silhouette considered inappropriate with linen?
There’s no need to make the sleeves longer. Creasing will have a negligible effect on sleeve length. The sleeves on this suit jacket are too long regardless.
A close fit is not inappropriate, but a suit with a bit of wiggle room will feel cooler since it’s not right up against your body. It’s up to what you feel most comfortable in. Trousers don’t need to be as wide as what Daniel Craig is wearing here to have the same effect, but they shouldn’t be as narrow as the Skyfall trousers to be as cool as they could possibly be.
Dear Matt
I believe, in the olden days, woollen flannel was considered a cool fabric for summer suiting. Cricket whites are still referred to as “flannels” today, and long flannel trousers were worn by tennis players in the 1930s, such as Fred Perry.
I imagine linen is the coolest to wear, but I would be interested to know if you would consider woollen flannel a cool fabric? Personally, I find it very light, and not good for winter wear.
Woolen flannel is certainly not a cool fabric because air not so much passes through the dense nap. All of my woolen flannel is very heavy, so I don’t have any that would be appropriate for summer. It’s excellent for winter when it’s in a heavier weight of 13-16 oz. In lighter weights, woolen flannel is not particularly sturdy. Even the white flannels of the 1930s were heavy by today’s standards. It’s generally not a light cloth. Worsted flannel can more often be found in lighter weights, and it holds up much better.
I think the idea with flannel as a summer cloth is two fold. Firstly, English summers are often cool – that’s why cricketers wear woolen jumpers, after all. Second, I understand that the flannel cloth is supposed to wick sweat away, giving the wearer the feeling that he isn’t as hot as perhaps he is. That said, I can’t imagine wanting to wear flannel, as opposed to lighter cloths, in summer.
Personally, although I like linen in the summer, I tend to think that a light wool with a more open weave is often cooler.
Is the shirt here linen as well? It looks like it to my eye…
What company is the white shirt?
The shirt was made by a costumer especially for the film. It is not from a company.
Interesting. I surprisingly like that shirt and was wondering for the longest time. I assume they made the similar shirt for the beginning of the film.
Matt , do you have experience with Cotton Linen blend suits ? What are their advantages / Disadvantages ?
And where can l find one ?
Holland And Sherry doesn’t carry the Fabric , and Anderson and Sheppard don’t make suits in this fabric either. They all either stock pure linen or linen-wool or linen-silk.
I have some cotton/linen blend trousers, and they are softer and wrinkle less than pure linen. Cotton wears more quickly than linen, and I don’t recommend getting a suit made of it. Pure linen and linen/silk are superior.
Thank you , Matt. What brand are your trousers ?
Mine are Bloomingdales’ brand.
Matt , l found this Linen Cotton blend Suit from Perry Ellis
https://www.perryellis.com/big-tall-tan-linen-twill-suit/4ahj4650_270.html?cgid=pelinenshop
Does it look good quality to you ?
Also , are the trousers of a good enough rise and fit to be worn with Braces , or are they too low ? I understand that they are flat front unlike my favored double forward pleated trousers , but since it’s the only one l can find , l am willing to compromise.
No, it’s not good quality. Cotton doesn’t wear as well as most other common suitings, so it’s not common to find it.
I really like the V-shape broad-shouldered look of this suit. But I don’t think Daniel Craig’s underlying body type necessarily fits this suit, yet somehow it still looks good. How can I replicate this with my suits? It seems he has no ‘shoulder divot’ issue either.
You need a lot of shoulder structure and roped sleeve heads to get this look. There are no shoulder divets because the sleeves fit well. Shoulder divots happen when the sleeves fit poorly.
Is Craig wearing his trousers too low? The crotch looks awful baggy, even considering the overall fit of the trousers.
Yes, they do sag a bit. It’s one of the many downsides to wearing a belt.
Yes, sometimes I wear a belt tighter than is comfortable to reduce the likelihood of trousers dropping lower than they should.
What led you to believe the suit jacket has a single vent? Just curious.
It’s visible in behind-the-scenes photos.
Thanks!
I’d assume the belt really is black, after Craig wears a black belt with brown suede shoes in Quantum of Solace and No Time to Die. I just figured that’s a look he prefers.
To my mind, very few people would have a brown, suede belt to match the shoes, so going with a black one as a standard belt seems justifiable. The same way that I assumed Brosnan had a black belt with his red-looking shoes and linen suit in The World is Not Enough, or how Cary Grant wore a black belt with his burgundy loafers and OCBD at the end of North by Northwest.
And as you noticed for the TWINE suit, a very dark brown belt is almost indistinguishable from black without and dark colors to compare it to.
“To my mind, very few people would have a brown, suede belt to match the shoes, so going with a black one as a standard belt seems justifiable. ”
Why not just wear a calf leather belt that’s a similar shade of brown as the suede shoes? The color matters more than the type of leather.
I’ve honestly never cared much about the matching leathers “rule”; if anything I like some contrast.
If a belt comes into play, it’s already a somewhat casual outfit to my mind (my first belted suits are two vintage Cyril Castle suits I picked up that are quite casual in nature––well, the mohair of the trousers of one dissolved on first wear so that one is a sports jacket now I guess lol). Other than those two, I only have belts on some WWII style chinos and similarly casual trousers.
When it comes to watches, if it’s a sports watch it really doesn’t matter; if it’s a strictly speaking “dress” watch then it’s black leather but that’s a different category altogether and belts aren’t relevant anyway.
I think contrast can be good between a belt and shoes, but it should be proper contrast, not brown shoes with a black belt. I can’t picture any type of contrasting belt working with this outfit. It needs to be more casual.
Grant’s suit trousers in NXNW were held up by side adjusters there is no belt.
His casual outfit at the end of the film has a belt.
Were the loafers burgundy? Always thought they were black.
The loafers were a dark shade of burgundy, almost the same color as the oxfords he wears with the grey plaid suit.
Interesting. Maybe they were made by Morjas?
J/K of course but it bugs me that so many ‘burgundy’ loafers look almost black. Maybe my eyes just don’t do well distinguishing dark colours but I keep getting emails from Morjas and their black, brown and burgundy shoes all look the same to me and that’s with their pro photography. In real life with natural (dimmer) light the variance in colour would likely be even smaller.
I just had a look at Morjas, and I quite like their dark colours. A good dark brown seems to be a lost art. Except at John Lobb Paris. They do excellent dark browns, especially if the belt here is indeed dark brown.
Twenty years later, I hate this outfit more than ever. Lindy Hemming’s concept of an un-schooled Bond fails to come across, undermined from the off by Craig striking poses and cat-walking off the plane, staring into the middle distance with his (silly!) sunglasses. Perhaps that’s down to the direction/editing. The colour is dull, the style is wretched, the trend-specific details dated and without merit … it’s telling the only thing in the comments that arouses any enthusiasm is the black/brown faux pas. A sartorial shrug, like a great deal of the CR wardrobe honestly.
I dislike it too. Few redeeming factors. Maybe it was intentional on the part of Lindy Hemming to make Bond appear unsophisticated (see also grubby Hawaiian shirt sequence earlier at the building site) but the structured shoulders, long sleeves, peak lapels, single vent, long and baggy strides, all combine to make it a poor look even if it was meant to be this way.
I own a grey linen suit in a similar shade but the cut is nothing like this.
It would have worked a lot better to give the jacket notch lapels and a hacking/ticket pocket combo if she wanted it to be more distinct from Brosnan’s linen suits and work well without a tie. I have no idea why they wouldn’t just stick with black shoes (with a grey suit) or switch the belt to a brown one that matches the shoes either.
I think the belt actually is brown, but it’s so difficult to say for sure.
Sort of echoing the general sentiment of other commenters, this is not a great look. To me, it looks like it’s something Bond picked up off the rack right before his trip because he needed something for the tropics. The excessive length in the arms and legs plus the boxy fullness do not make this appear as something a man who knows his clothes or has them made would wear. Even the shirt looks off; though I appreciate the nod to Fleming and how it serves a plot point by aiding Bond in duping security.
The general theory seems to be that this is Bond before he has learned to be Bond, Hemming herself has said as much. But it is so frustrating because production could not stick to that concept after this film. In QoS Bond is much more put together looking, but that makes little sense considering it happens days after CR ends. Then in the subsequent films Bond still looks like a man who cannot dress, just with everything being too tight instead of too large. I get they ditched Hemming, but again it just shows me they either had no plan or didn’t care about how they proceeded after CR.
Amen
At least Connery’s Bond had always worn bespoke tailoring as we know, but I doubt if adaptation of Craig’s Bond film had same approach. I could’ve think that Craig’s Bond buys just expensive Ready To Wear tailorings. This may explain his style is like too fashion forward at each time.
Yes, we’ve got the line : “It’s tailored!” but there’s an article Matt already considered about it and it doesn’t have realistic meanings for true bespoke.
Somehow Tom Ford and Brioni measured Daniel Craig to make their RTW tailorings, and somehow Bond had same measurements with Daniel Craig, I imagine. Generally, Bond(and Vesper) only have to get the most fitted one from stores, but he just failed for this suit.
“I get they ditched Hemming, but again it just shows me they either had no plan or didn’t care about how they proceeded after CR.”
Actually, I think the Craig films are extremely consistent from a character and story perspective. There were missteps along the way sure, but NTTD really does feel like the perfect culmination of the story started in CR.
I get you’re talking about clothes, but I don’t agree that they didn’t have a plan. Honestly, they couldn’t have planned it better. I’m only realising now how much of Bond’s ultimate fate was foreshadowed in the previous films.
Okay Brofeld.
There’s no way it was all planned. The disorganization of the SPECTRE production (as revealed from the Sony email leaks) really makes that clear.
It’s a bit much to expect them to plan 15-years worth of movies in advance, and not change anything along the way, isn’t it?
What I mean is that despite a few retcons and contrivances to the plot, the character of Bond and his story remains remarkably consistent across the films. At the end, he still feels very much like the same person who’s gone on the journey of the past five movies. From the young and reckless new recruit of CR, to the cynical and lonely veteran of NTTD.
Much of the credit for this must go to Craig; an absolutely phenomenal performer and one of my favourite actors. We were extremely lucky to have him in the role (despite some questionable taste in menswear). The next guy’s truly going to have his work cut out for him!
And even Brofeld aside, they are not consistent.
CR has the bizarre new origin for Bond where he’s not upper class and “learned how to dress at Oxford????” (this is not a thing; nobody associates going to university with learning how to dress. It’s Paul Haggis’s cluelessness about British culture.)
And then Skyfall to its credit fixes that by retconning Bond as a Scottish aristocrat once more. But that’s a pretty clear example of inconsistency before you even get to the Brofelephant in the room.
They don’t actually say he learned how to dress at Oxford. We can also say it’s just a bad read by Vesper. She’s an overconfident character, just like Bond. Remember, she’s being manipulated by Kabira, so she’s not as good at reading people as she thinks. Thematically, it ties back to the card game too, which is all about being able to read people. It tells you something about the characters, in a way that’s thematic to the story.
Yes, Brofeld is pretty naff, but I can kind of see what they were going for with it. I wouldn’t call it an inconsistency, though. We knew from the start that there was this mysterious organisation, lurking in the shadows and pulling the strings. I even remember some people speculating after Casino Royale, that SPECTRE and Blofeld were going to be behind it all, but the rights issues at the time made that a bit unlikely. I’m honestly surprised fans still get so worked up about it. This series is no stranger to pretty ridiculous plot contrivances.
Minor plot discrepancies (if you can even call them that) matter very little to me, because it isn’t the story of a Scottish aristocrat who went to Oxford. It’s the story of a blunt instrument; a rather broken and traumatised, but still strong and courageous man, hidden under a Savile Row (ok, Brioni or Tom Ford) suit, living his life on the edge, fighting to protect the innocent, coming to terms with the fact that he’ll never be able to live a normal life with the woman he loves, and that his pseudo-mother/father figure won’t lift a finger to save him should he fall into enemy hands. In the end, he has a chance to find the happiness that’s alluded him his whole life, only to be betrayed by the rogue actions of that father figure, and obliterated by the very people he dedicated his life to protect.
I don’t go to Bond films for tutorials in upper-class British culture, a world that, even in the novels, Bond never seems to quite fit into. I go to them because they’re great action-adventure thrillers starring this amazing character created by Ian Fleming. And in that regard, the Craig films, while not always perfect, delivered big time (for me anyway).
The fictional character Commander James Bond actually studied (Oriental Languages) at Cambridge University. The real James Bond (an American ornithologist) also studied at Cambridge University (Trinity College). After Dick Maibaum passed away and Michael G. Wilson focused more on production, the scriptwriting of the Bond franchise lost its edge.
Just to clarify my issue with inconsistency.
1. This not a great looking outfit to me. And considering how well Hemming picked out the linen suits for Brosnan, I think the questionable style and fit issues are intentional.
2. Production mostly abandoned using the outfits as a way of communicating Bond’s character after CR (dark suits in QoS seem to be the limit.)
3. Prior Bond films did not try and tell an interconnected story and Bond did not go on a “journey” or really have character development. This is likely one of the main reasons for the longevity of the series. For this reason consistency was less of an issue between films, it was more about getting the, and I hate this term, vibe correct.
4. The choice to make a long term interconnected story was not planned out in advance. QoS was basically rewritten on the fly during production. Skyfall was not conceived with any connection to a broader Blofeld plot; that was done post hoc. Did every detail need to be worked out, no, but it seems as though there wasn’t even an outline of a plan.
5. While not a fan of an interconnected story, it still could have been done well with a clear understanding of what the story would be. It seems like we never got a movie where Bond was at the top of his game, in fact each one feels like a reboot.
6. All of that said, there still is plenty to enjoy in the Craig films. I do not love a lot of the choices they made, but there were also many good ones.
Some great discussion above there – beyond Matt’s dissection of the clothing this is what I love about Bond and we Bond geeks’ affinity for minutia.
As for the ‘character’ development across the Craig series I’m in two minds. I love the slow reveal of the man behind the ‘blunt instrument’ exterior and how his personal motivations fit in to that characterization. On the other hand, there used to be a brilliant website named ‘Jump The Shark’ on which amateur TV geeks would chime in with their opinions on at which point any TV show jumped the shark. Unfortunately the site was bought by TV guide and all that entertaining content was dumped. Only a very few shows escaped the JTS award, one of which was Law and Order, and the consensus was that despite ever-revolving changes in actors and characters the series survived without jumping because the focus stayed purely and obstinately on the plot and story, and very little exposition was given to the back stories of the key characters (detectives and DAs). So this makes the case for those who (unlike me!) don’t really care about the man beneath the blunt instrument exterior and are happy (as was Fleming himself when he started writing) for Bond to be purely a cypher to drive the plot along, become endangered, engage in action and intrigue before dispatching the baddie and getting the girl.
(Interestingly as the books became exponentially more popular there was a commensurate demand by readers for more details about the man and Fleming was forced to reveal more – as we know a lot of which was his own outlooks folded into the characterization of his hero).
Well said. Apart from some aspects only needed for the intrigue in a few movies -Bond’s coat of arms in OHMSS, the property in Skyfall-, Bond’s character in the books and movies always seem to as a (upper) middle class person. He has studied in Oxford and Cambridge
(just like Dr. Frasier Crane ahah), but these elements aren’t particularly developed unless for one liners. Fleming himself apparently added a Scottish ancestry when he was writing OHMSS after being impressed by Connery’s performance in Dr. No. So originally there was none of that. In the movies before CR Bond is described as a dangerous man of resources, with extended culture about almost any subject, and elitist/sophisticated tastes in clothing, food and drinks, but he isn’t painted as an aristocrat. Only Moore could give that impression imo, for better or worse : that unflappable attitude, which reminds me a bit of David Niven -who himself played British aristocrats up to the caricature quite often.
‘Deplane’ may be my favourite ‘new to me’ word of the day (having previously used ‘disembarked’ for ships and airplanes alike).
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Also, is this the first time a cinematic Bond has indulged in his literary counterpart’s love of wearing short shirt sleeves under a suit jacket?
It’s funny how we have lots of words that seemingly mean the same thing, sometimes they are synonyms and sometimes they have subtly different meanings.
A flight attendant friend of mine told me once that Deplane was an industry term that eventually wound up in common parlance. It was used to refer to the process of passengers leaving the aircraft.
I’ve noticed that when the passengers are told to gather their things it is often “before deplaning” so the process; but you individually are told to watch your step when “exiting the aircraft” so the individual action.
The English language is sort of like tailoring, it is the little details that keep it interesting. That said I despise how it is now “rough air” instead of turbulence.
We’re going way off topic here but I have a high dislike for over complicating language, especially in the pursuit of trying to appear important. British TV weather reporters going on about ‘moisture’ and ‘precipitation’. You’re not fooling anyone pal. It’s England. It’s rain.
He wears a short sleeved shirt with his navy linen suit earlier in the movie.