Colin Firth and Taron Egerton star in the movie Kingsman: The Secret Service.
The idea of James Bond has always had a much larger role to play in the culture than the James Bond films themselves. Even if we restrict the context to cinema alone, there exist far more riffs, spoofs and imitators than actual Bond films.
Plus any movie that has anything remotely to do with spies and/or international intrigue cannot help but exist in 007's large shadow.
Kick-Ass and X-Men: First Class director Matthew Vaughan's new film Kingsman: The Secret Service (in theatres this week) exists to gleefully subvert certain Bondian notions and wholeheartedly embrace others. It references other British spy traditions (Harry Palmer, The Avengers) aswell, but as the title suggests, it's first and foremost a Bond riff. And a pretty fun one at that.
• Read more: Kingsman's Sophie Cookson more than 'the girlfriend'
It's not quite as witty a response to Bond as Kick-Ass was to superhero films, but there's enough joy (and cool action) in the gimmickry to keep things very entertaining. And it makes its genre-subverting intentions clear thanks to the twice-uttered quip, "It's not that kind of movie".
Taron Egerton in a scene from Kingsman: The Secret Service.
Watching it got me thinking about my favourite examples of Bond-derived movies - a designation that can apply to a huge number of films.
Bond existed in the public imagination prior to the release of Dr. No in 1962 thanks to the popularity of Ian Fleming's novels. But once the Sean Connery-starring film was released, the cinematic aesthetic that Bond represented calcified permanently in the minds of audiences, and a torrent of derivatives wanted in on the act.
A mere four years later, two film franchises offering cheaply comedic American spins on the now widely familiar tropes were launched. James Coburn starred in Our Man Flint, which generated a sequel (In Like Flint), and Dean Martin played Matt Helm for the first of four times in The Silencers.
The following year, audiences saw the first James Bond spoof to feature James Bond as a character. Casino Royale starred David Niven as a retired Bond and traded in the kind of loud movie satire that prevailed in the late '60s.
There are many further crummy James Bond spoofs, one them even starred Sean Connery's brother, Neil.
The most famous Bond spoof of them all, the Austin Powers films, were heavily informed by both the Flint and Matt Helm films, as well as the original Casino Royale. The first Austin Powers movie was more a spoof of a James Bond spoof than a direct spoof itself, if you catch my spoof. It again speaks to how much more influence the idea of James Bond has than James Bond himself.
A scene from Austin Powers.
In a real-life journey of self-actualisation that mirrors the central character arc in Preston Sturges' Sullivan's Travels, I have recently softened my snobbish disdain for the Austin Powers series. I previously allowed the hideousness of parts two and three to overshadow the underdog charms of the relatively delightful first film, but I've since realised that to fight against the broad crowd-pleasing antics of the sequels is to fight against comedy itself. And they look like classics next to The Love Guru.
There were of course plenty of serious James Bond wannabes in the '60s - Kingsman co-star Michael Caine offered an appealing working class spin on the British spy with the Harry Palmer films, which kicked off in 1965 with The Ipcress File, quickly followed by Funeral In Berlin in 1966 and Billion Dollar Brain in 1967.
Although Britain had a spy thriller tradition that stretched way back past Bond (and included Alfred Hitchcock films like 1935's Secret Agent and 1938's The Lady Vanishes) post-Bond thrillers like 1965's The Spy Who Came In From The Cold undoubtedly got a boost from the association.
By the 1970s, large portions of the audience were starting to view Bond-like figurse with suspicion, and espionage movies like Three Days of the Condor and The In-Laws were positioning the little guy as the hero.
One '70s spy thriller that offers an interesting commentary on Bond was The Day of the Jackal (1973), in which a suave, British killer for hire (Edward Fox) methodically plots to assassinate French President Charles de Gaulle.
As well as defining and redefining the spy genre, the early Bond films also set the standard for the large scale action sequences that would become the bread and butter of every blockbuster made since that that didn't involve magic, a monster or (deep) space.
The most famous result of this aspect of James Bond's movie legacy is the Indiana Jones films, which according to popular lore came into being when Steven Spielberg told George Lucas that he always wanted to direct an action-packed James Bond film, and Lucas replied that they should just do their own version.
A scene from Indiana Jones.
The Indiana Jones films went on to define all sorts of other cinematic tropes themselves, but it's notable that they can all be indirectly traced back to Bond.
The undeniably intriguing idea of the "working class Bond" reared its head again in the 1985 cult classic Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins, which was renamed Remo: Unarmed and Dangerous for its international release when it became apparent that the original title had been overly optimistic.
The Last Boy Scout and The Long Kiss Goodnight screenwriter Shane Black recently attached himself to a Remo reboot (a Remoot?), which is very exciting news indeed.
James Cameron's 1994 hit True Lies often functioned as a big budget ode to Bond, the last film perhaps until Kingsman to successfully riff on 007 in such a direct manner.
A scene from Mission: Impossible.
In the modern film era, the Mission: Impossible and Bourne franchises have each done a very respectable job of carving out their own spy mythology, and neither is really trying to evoke or respond to Bond. Notably, when Cruise tried to Bond it up a little in 2010's Knight & Day, his efforts were not especially appreciated.
Direct attempts to replicate the Bond formula with some sort of twist, such as the embarrassing 2002 Vin Diesel vehicle XXX, have rarely clicked. Although it should probably be acknowledged both teen Bond riff Agent Cody Banks and latter-day Bond spoof Johnny English both made enough money to generate sequels. Even if Alex Rider: Operation Stormbreaker did not.
But the idea of Bond has crept into other modern films in occasionally interesting ways.
Ron Lola Run director Tom Tykwer's underrated 2009 action thriller The International stars Clive Owen as an interpol agent chasing bad guys all around the world. The globe-trotting pursuits project a geographic authenticity that the Bond films have almost never achieved, and Owen is fantastic as an agent driven forward by a steely determination.
A scene from The International.
The International often comes across like a grounded, more realistic version of a Bond film, and viewing it forces one to consider the tantalising prospect of a Clive Owen Bond, a once seriously-mooted notion that was apparently scuppered when Owen cameoed in the Steve Martin version of The Pink Panther as a Bond-esque character.
Quentin Tarantino once said that if given the chance to do a Bond film, he'd make it a period film set in the '60s. That kind of innovative treatment was further hinted at via Michael Fassbender's supporting performance as a quick-talking British agent seriving in World War II in Inglourious Basterds.
Thanks to Fassbender's totally committed delivery, every second of Lt Archie Hicox's relatively brief screen time was an absolute delight, and couldn't help but evoke the idea of a film centred around the character as some sort of proto-Bond. Which is a film I would totally see.
* What are your favourite James Bond riffs in other movies? Comment below!
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