Continuing our discussion of the book For Your Eyes Only, an anthology with five short stories. This is the fifth.
THE BOOK: FOR YOUR EYES ONLY
"THE HILDEBRAND RARITY"
THE PLOT
While in the Seychelles, Bond accompanies an abusive American millionaire and his wife to a small island in the Indian Ocean to look for a rare fish. The millionaire ends up dead, and Bond doesn't know who did it, but he covers it up to avoid an inquest in which he'd be a suspect.
THE COMMENTARY
Here's another non-formula story like "Quantum of Solace," where Bond doesn't have an assignment scene with M, isn't on mission, doesn't kill anybody, and so forth. He does end up with a girl, but I'm not sure it's romantic. Would we call this experimental?
Bond is in the Seychelles to determine if it's a suitable for a new base should the British have to move their old one from the Maldives. (The Maldives did become independent in 1965, although the last British troops didn't leave until 1976. That's all my meager research told me.)
The book opens with Bond hunting a huge stingray. He regards it as "an enemy," and the hunt is dangerous. I guess it is described this way to explain why this is a different scenario from when he's very fish-sympathetic later in the book. Anyway, the information we're meant to take away from this scene is that the natives use the stingray's tail to punish their wives, although this practice has been outlawed.
We're introduced to Bond's heretofore unknown friend Fidèle Barbey, who is part of an influential family in the Seychelles. He has agreed to aid a millionaire named Milton Krest, who has arrived in search of a rare fish. Barbey says he's insisted that his friend Bond accompany the expedition on the super-yacht Wavekrest.
The rare fish is the title drop: the "Hildebrand Rarity."
I don't know why a guy who presumably doesn't have to work would do this, nor why he would rope in Bond. I suppose if he thought it was going to be fun, he might want his friend along. But that belies all the abuse they accept, which certainly isn't fun and which neither should take lying down. At the very least, Berbey could use his influential family to take Krest down a peg when they got to port, which should temper Krest a little.
I guess we have to write it off to plot.
Bond and Barbey board the super-yacht. Krest shows Bond around the Wavekrest, and it is unbelievably luxurious. But the man himself is an ogre.
Krest brags that he picks up items like the Rarity in order to write off vacations on his super-yacht. He brags that he paid for the super-yacht by creating a charitable foundation and then giving himself the money. He continually insults both Barbey (whom he calls "Fido") and Bond. And he uses a stingray tail on Elizabeth, his British wife, which he calls "The Corrector."
As with the golf game in Goldfinger, this reader grew annoyed with Bond's passivity in the face of obnoxious aggression, but I guess that's just the English way. Meanwhile, Bond bonds with the Englishwoman (of course) and sleeps on some sort of boat patio instead of in his cabin, which is too close to Krest.
At one point, Elizabeth reveals that Krest is in trouble with the IRS and needs a spectacular find to justify all his writeoffs. For that indiscretion, Krest uses the stingray tail on her that night — Bond and Barbey hear her screams — and she spends the next day in her room.
This is not lost on anyone, including the reader. We're meant to hate Krest as much as everyone in the story.
Elizabeth told Bond on the first day of the voyage that her marriage is a happy one. But Bond wonders how long she'll endure this abuse. (I believe this is called "foreshadowing.")
The Wavekrest arrives at the island, Chagrin (ha!), and Krest directs Bond and Barbey to find his prize. (Krest treats them like employees, even though they're not.) When the fish is discovered, Krest uses a poison to kill the whole area to get the fish. Bond is appalled that an entire ecosystem is killed. He tries to surreptitiously chase away the Rarity, but fails to save it.
I was quite taken by Bond's deep feelings about the death of the fishy community he saw dying. Fleming himself was an animal-lover, so his avatar would certainly be one also. Too bad about that stingray earlier, which mitigates this humanitarian moment a little.
Do I need to justify that remark? OK.
I know there are big differences between hunting a predator one on one, and poisoning a harmless habitat. Still, if Bond hadn't killed that ray, the contrast with Krest would be that much starker. A writer in modern times, where the line between hunting and animal cruelty is thinner, would probably have Bond corner the ray, but let it go. (Like Teddy Roosevelt and the bear.) That would establish Bond's Tough Guy bona fides, but show how different he is from Krest. But Fleming was writing in the '50s, and probably didn't see any similarity between Bond's actions and Krest's.
On the trip back, Krest gets extremely drunk, and extremely abusive to Barbey and Bond. He says he'll use The Corrector on Elizabeth later, hoping to antagonize them and terrorize her. He exhibits “a violent cruelty, a pathological desire to wound," Bond observes. Bond exchanges some words (finally!) and retires to his patio. Elizabeth follows, for an intimate tête-à-tête. Bad move, as Krest catches them. Bond is spoiling for a fight, but Krest points out that all he has to do is blow the whistle around his neck, and his German crew will kill Bond and throw him overboard. Bond stands down, and Krest takes Elizabeth away for the promised abuse.
Bond believes that he has no business interfering in the Krest marriage, when Elizabeth herself has not asked for help and isn't making any effort to get out of the situation. I believe he's correct. It's a bitter pill, but you never know what's going on in someone else's marriage. For all Bond knows, Elizabeth is a masochist, or this is a game the two play with strangers. She did insist earlier that her marriage was happy, and absent any other comments, Bond is stuck with that description.
Bond goes to sleep, but is awakened by choking noises. He finds Krest in a hammock he sometimes uses on the deck, dead. The Rarity has been shoved in his mouth (the actual words are "down his throat," but the fish's spines are sticking out of the man's cheeks, which says "mouth" to me). This has (somehow) killed him.
Bond doesn't want an inquest in which he's a suspect, and will put the Service in a bad light. So he cleans up the murder scene, throws the millionaire and all evidence overboard, and the next day asks around innocently about Krest's whereabouts.
OK, let's stop here for a question. How did Krest die?
It's important, because now the book veers into a whodunnit. It's not much of a whodunnit — Elizabeth dunnit, that's who — but Fleming clearly wants you to entertain doubts. And how Krest died could, in fact, eliminate Elizabeth as a suspect.
For example, if Krest died of suffocation, did someone have to hold the fish in his mouth and clamp his nose closed? If so, Elizabeth couldn't have done it. She's described as petite, while Krest is tall and described as "hard and fit." Even dead drunk, Krest's autonomic thrashing as he suffocated would knock Elizabeth off him — and he'd be able to breathe again.
Could it be poison? I doubled-checked; Fleming established that one must be careful handling the Rarity because of its sharp fins. Not because it was poison.
Bond's other suspect is Berbey, who might have the strength to suffocate a drunk Krest. But Berbey had no reason to kill Krest, and handily passes Bond's mild investigative questions. Bond imagines that Berbey could have been driven to homicide if Krest had needled him some more ... but we didn't see that. For Berbey to be a viable suspect in a fair-play mystery, Fleming would have had to include that scene. And he didn't.
Further, when Bond runs his questions past Elizabeth, she passes them — but breaks into a sweat. Sure, they're in the tropics, or at least the sub-tropics, and everybody's sweating. But Fleming points it out, and when an author points something out, he's telling you something.
Weirdly, Bond never considers the possibility that one (or all) of the crewmen did it. A man as arrogant and abusive as Krest would certainly have no shortage of enemies, so why is that not considered?
Answer: Because Elizabeth did it, and Fleming wanted us to know it. For the sake of a bittersweet ending, he doesn't confirm it. And, for me, it works.
The coda is that Elizabeth intends to go to Mombasa, where Bond is also supposed to go, and offers him a ride. This being a Bond book, some hanky-panky is possible, although there's none of the typical Fleming innuendo to suggest it. Bond is hesitant, as she is probably a murderer, but agrees anyway.
That doesn't surprise me at all, given his feelings about "revenge of the community" in "For Your Eyes Only." Bond has no problem with murder, if it's justified. And besides, Elizabeth has no motive to kill Bond, so he's probably safe.
Either way, though, there might be sex. And what does Bond call sleeping with a woman who's trying to kill him? Tuesday.
SUMMARY
I like these offbeat Bond stories, this one being a truncated whodunnit. It's fun to see Bond when he doesn't have all the answers, and isn't always the protagonist. It also humanizes him somewhat.
STRAY BULLETS
- “The Hildebrand Rarity” is one of the few Fleming titles that hasn’t been used as a Bond film title. Others include "Risico," "Property of a Lady" and "007 in New York."
- The 2015 Bond film Spectre includes a scene in which M meets with Bond at a London safe house that features the sign “Hildebrand Antiques and Rarities” on the front.
- Fleming flew to the Seychelles on assignment for The Sunday Times, and used that experience for the setting in this story.
- Krest keeps using the word "feller," and I don't quite know what to do with it. When someone says "fellow" in a modern book, I Americanize it in my head to "fella," which sounds less archaic. (The only place I hear "fellow" is in "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow," which dates to the 18th century.) But "feller" is already Americanized; some areas of the country pronounced it that way in the last century and maybe some still do. But it sounds weird to me, so I change it to "fella" in my head. I'm curious how others interpret the word.
- The World War II connection: Krest was of German descent, and the crew of the Wavekrest were all Germans. That doesn't make them Nazis without Fleming telling us so (and he didn't), but if any of them were over 32 in 1960, they were probably in the war. Given their ready resort to violence, I can guess which side.
- The World War II connection II: Krest's first name, "Milton," was the alias of a Greek sea captain who helped British soldiers avoid being caught by German boat patrols during the war. That seems like weak tea to me, but I saw it on three different websites. (Of course, they were probably all copying each other.)
- Krest was the name of a drink Fleming enjoyed in the Seychelles.
- Fleming had seen the poison method used for obtaining samples in Jamaica (and didn't like it).
- "The Hildebrand Rarity" was first published in Playboy.
- I've been waiting for a SMERSH name-check in this book, but here we are in the last story with no mention. Is SMERSH history? (It literally was in the real world in 1960.) Maybe I'll find out in the next book, Thunderball.
THE MOVIE: LICENCE TO KILL
Year: 1989
Director: John Glen
Writers: Michael G. Wilson, Richard Maibaum
Starring: Timothy Dalton (James Bond), Robert Davi (Franz Sanchez), Carey Lowell (Pam Bouvier), Talisa Soto (Lupe Lamora), Anthony Zerbe (Milton Krest), Frank McRae (Sharkey), Everett McGill (Killifer), Wayne Newton (Professor Joe Butcher), Benicio Del Toro (Dario), Anthony Starke (Truman-Lodge), Pedro Armendáriz Jr. (President Hector Lopez, Desmond Llewelyn (Q), David Hedison (Felix Leiter), Priscilla Barnes (Della Churchill), Robert Brown (M), Caroline Bliss (Miss Moneypenny), Don Stroud (Heller), Grand L. Bush (Hawkins)
Notable songs: "Licence to Kill" was written by Narada Michael Walden, Jeffrey Cohen and Walter Afanasieff, and performed by Gladys Knight. The song became a top-10 hit in the United Kingdom, peaking at number six. It peaked at number 79 on Canada's RPM Top Singles chart but did not appear on the US Billboard Hot 100.
THE PLOT
James Bond defies orders and goes rogue to infiltrate and take down a drug lord who has maimed Felix Leiter and murdered his wife.
THE COMMENTARY
David Hedison returns as Felix Leiter, and I'm glad to see it. I prefer a "name" to play Leiter, as he's a major character in the mythos, and shouldn't fade into the background. So Jack Lord, David Hedison and Jeffrey Wright yes, Cec Linder, Rik Van Nutter, Norman Burton no.
The occasion is Felix's marriage in Key West, and I have to say I found Felix's wife overly affectionate to Bond (she kisses him more times than her husband), especially for a gal who is getting married to another guy, and that guy is present. Well, Bond's the hero of the movie, so there are perks.
My wife, who has heretofore been unimpressed with Timothy Dalton ("not handsome enough for Bond"), said she admits he does look good in a morning suit.
At the beginning, Bond, Leiter and a fella named Sharkey are presented as three amigos. I've never seen or heard of Sharkey, so I'm guessing he's a stand-in for Quarrel, who died in Dr. No, the book, and whose son died in Dr. No, the movie. Other elements from Live and Let Die make an appearance, so why not Quarrel? I mean "Sharkey."
Felix and Bond drop everything when they hear that a wanted drug dealer is in Key West to rein in his runaway girlfriend, and they drop everything to take him down. His name is Franz Sanchez, and he is played by busy '80s character actor Robert Davi. Bond is supposed to be an observer — he has no official standing in Florida — but, of course, he is key to taking down the bad guy. They parachute into the wedding, which is good, I guess? You'd have to ask a bride how she feels about that.
A CIA agent with the unlikely name Killifer, whom I had already pegged as a turncoat, helps Sanchez escape for $2M in unmarked 20s. The runaway gf is named Lupe, played by model/actress Talisa Soto, and Sanchez butchers her boyfriend ("give her his heart"). Then he whips her with a stingray tail as punishment. That's straight from "The Hildebrand Rarity," where Milton Krest uses one on his wife repeatedly, but here it's a one-off.
Sanchez isn't through. He murders Leiter's new wife (and there's an implication that she was gang-raped as well), and drops Felix into a shark tank. That latter is a scene out of Live and Let Die, and just like in that book, Bond finds a chewed-up but still alive Leiter with a note that reads "He disagreed with something that ate him."
The shark tank used on Leiter was at a marine warehouse (you know it's a warehouse, because it has a big sign that says "warehouse") owned by Milton Krest. In the book, Krest is described as tall and fit, whereas here he's played by short, skinny, weaselly, ptosis-suffering character actor Anthony Zerbe, who was all over television in the '70s and '80s. Krest has Mr. Big's smuggling operation from Live and Let Die, only instead of smuggling gold doubloons it's heroin. And he's not the boss like Mr. Big, Sanchez is. But he does has the Wavekrest yacht from "Hildebrand Rarity."
Bond investigates the warehouse, and we get the running gunfight amid fish tanks from Live and Let Die. Bond wins, and drops both Killifer and his $2M into the shark tank.
Bond then sneaks into the Wavekrest to figure out the rest of the smuggling operation. He does so, and gets close to Lupe at the same time. While he's there, he sees through a porthole that Sanchez's men are returning with Sharkey's dead body. I'm not sure how they knew about Sharkey, and his death is off-camera. But Bond escapes, stealing $5M in the process.
Returning to shore, Bond is taken into custody by British agents, who take him to M, who orders him to Istanbul. Bond refuses and resigns. He loses his English-spelling licence to kill, fulfilling the title drop. He fights his way out of custody and goes rogue.
Bond uses Felix's files listing CIA assets, and the people on the list have all been killed (presumably by Sanchez) except one: Pam Bouvier. She's played by model/actress Carey Lowell, another beautiful woman with distracting strabismus, like Grace Jones in A View to a Kill.
Bond meets her at a Bimini honkytonk where he actually orders a Bud with lime. I have no words. But Sanchez's men arrive and, thankfully, we don't have to watch him drink it. Bond and Bouvier have to fight their way out, saving each other's lives in the process. They escape on a boat and condense the "I hate you" to "let's have sex" cliche to about 20 seconds.
Bond and Bouvier go to "Isthmus City" (a stand-in for Panama City, Panama). Q shows up "on leave" to help; he knows where Bond is because Moneypenny has been keeping track. Bond infiltrates Sanchez's operation, and manages to get the local MI6 agent and some Hong Kong drug agents (some of whom are ninjas!) killed in the process. (Nice work, Bond!) This and Bond framing Krest with the $5M gets him into Sanchez's inner circle. (Sanchez kills Krest by making him explode in a hyperbaric chamber.)
Bond going to work for the bad guy, who doesn't know who he is, seems like a riff on Goldfinger. Meanwhile, Bond and Lupe seduce each other. (Bond is the third man Lupe has slept with in this movie, and Lupe is the second woman Bond has slept with, so it's not a moral struggle for either of them.)
Later, Bond is found out, but further frames Sanchez aide Col. Heller — which he doesn't really need to do, because Heller is really up to something. Heller is played by another busy character actor, Don Stroud, so you knew he was going to do more than just stand in the background saying "Yes, sir!" Bond kills Dario in a nail-biting scene, and then he and Bouvier (who's in a plane) go on a running dogfight with Sanchez's convoy of semis. There is much fighty-fight and many splodeys, but the good guys win.
At an after-action party, Felix tells Bond M has offered him his job back. Now his only decision is whether to have end-credits sex with Bouvier or with Lupe. He chooses Bouvier.
SUMMARY
I don't think they had much of a budget for this movie. For one thing, the fight stunts are really bad. For another, many of the actors spent much of their career on the small screen, giving it an episode-of-the-week feel. It is also rather slow-paced, and I was getting restless toward the end.
It was also a bit uneven, in that it couldn't decide if it was going to be a Roger Moore Bond movie, or something more serious. Many of the Bond tropes were left out, or were left in but played too seriously. It put the movie in a no man's land where it tried to distance itself from the Moore vehicles but didn't do so enough to be its own thing. Which I'm not sure I'd want anyway.
STRAY BULLETS
- Sanchez's chief enforcer is a scary-looking guy named Dario. Believe it or not, Dario is played by a very young Benicio del Toro.
- Sanchez's accountant Truman-Lodge is played by an actor named ... Anthony Starke? It's a little before your time, Tony!
- Bond sneaks by Krest's radar in a stingray costume. A nod to the one he killed in "Rarity," perhaps?
- The movie is named Licence to Kill, but ironically, for about half the movie Bond's licence has been formally revoked.
- The last movie where David Hedison played Felix Leiter was Live and Let Die, where in the book the character is maimed by a shark. Hedison's Leiter avoids that fate in Live and Let Die, but it catches up to him the next time he plays the character, in Licence to Kill. Destiny! Destiny! No escaping it for me!
Replies
Ooh, another l-o-n-g one.
I like how you've been using the covers of different editions for each story.
(I believe this is called "foreshadowing.")
Yes, I've heard of that.
Others include "Risico," "Property of a Lady" and "007 in New York."
I know you haven't gotten there yet, but (for the record) "Property of a Lady" is name-dropped in Octopussy.
"I'm curious how others interpret the word."
Like you, I mentally change it to "fella."
I haven't seen License to Kill in a long time.
"Jack Lord, David Hedison and Jeffrey Wright yes, Cec Linder, Rik Van Nutter, Norman Burton no."
I'd say, "David Hedison, Jeffrey Wright and Bernie Casey yes, Cec Linder, Rik Van Nutter, Norman Burton and Jack Lord no," but that's horseraces.
"My wife, who has heretofore been unimpressed with Timothy Dalton..."
Using my "equal parts lover and killer" scale, Timothy Dalton makes a convincing killer, but not a convincing lover. In that respect he's the opposite of Roger Moore (Roger Moore in the earlier films, anyway).
"Bond meets her at a Bimini honkytonk where he actually orders a Bud with lime. I have no words."
Really? Did that happen? (I must have repressed the memory.) That's taking "product placement" much too far.
Q shows up "on leave" to help
Unfortunately, there's precedent for this (but you haven't gotten there yet).
"It was also a bit uneven, in that it couldn't decide if it was going to be a Roger Moore Bond movie, or something more serious. Many of the Bond tropes were left out, or were left in but played too seriously. It put the movie in a no man's land where it tried to distance itself from the Moore vehicles but didn't do so enough to be its own thing. Which I'm not sure I'd want anyway."
That's a pretty good summation.
Using my "equal parts lover and killer" scale, Timothy Dalton makes a convincing killer, but not a convincing lover. In that respect he's the opposite of Roger Moore (Roger Moore in the earlier films, anyway).
Yes, I'd agree to that.
"Bond meets her at a Bimini honkytonk where he actually orders a Bud with lime. I have no words." Really? Did that happen? (I must have repressed the memory.) That's taking "product placement" much too far.
Pam Bouvier is sitting at a table. Bond sits down and they begin to talk. The waitress comes over and asks if they want anything. Bouvier says, "I'll have a Bud with lime." Bond says, "I'll have the same."
I nearly fell off the couch. And when the waitress brings the beers, they're in cans. (Presumably so you can see the brand.) I cannot force myself to imagine James Bond drinking a canned American beer.
Fortunately, as I said, he doesn't drink it because fighty-fight breaks out and the beers end up on the floor.
Pam Bouvier. She's played by model/actress Carey Lowell, another beautiful woman with distracting strabismus, like Grace Jones in A View to a Kill.
IMDB tells me that Carey Lowell went on to play Assistant D.A. (later Judge) Jamie Ross in 50-plus episodes of the Law & Order franchise. Her character was smart and still beautiful.
I don't think they had much of a budget for this movie. For one thing, the fight stunts are really bad.
Bond meets her at a Bimini honkytonk where he actually orders a Bud with lime. I have no words. But Sanchez's men arrive and, thankfully, we don't have to watch him drink it.
If they had funding problems it may explain this particular product placement, although all of the Bond movies have included high-end product placement.
I haven’t been able to find comments about the box office for Dalton’s first Bond movie, but this info is provided in the IMDB’s trivia for this movie:
Last James Bond film for six years. In August 1990, after the box-office failure of this film in the United States, director John Glen left EON Productions. Thirteen-time Bond screenwriter Richard Maibaum died on January 4, 1991. Some called this a "bloodless coup". Legal wrangling over the ownership of the James Bond character, coupled by these departures, delayed the release of the next film. In the interim, producer Albert R. Broccoli retired, and Timothy Dalton decided not to play the role a third time.
Another trivia item clarifies that Dalton was invited to return even after six years. Because of the time that had passed he was no longer contractually obligated. They wanted him to do a third and fourth movie. He couldn’t see ending his career as the character and declined.
IMDB tells me that Carey Lowell went on to play Assistant D.A. (later Judge) Jamie Ross in 50-plus episodes of the Law & Order franchise. Her character was smart and still beautiful.
I watched her in Law & Order long before I saw Licence to Kill. (My wife used to watch various L&O shows regularly, so perforce I did too.) So I recognized her in the movie.
I'm returning to this subject not because of that, though, but because I feel badly about pointing out the strabismus. I know I shouldn't, because it's basically drawing attention to a disability. But it does bother me at a movie-appreciation level, in that it confuses me what she's looking at, and at some lizard-brain level, because she might possibly be looking at me, Animal Man-fashion.
Then, to make up for my faux pas, I offer up the (quite true) assessment that I think she's attractive regardless. But that's just compounding the error, since mentioning a woman's looks is verboten.
Sigh. I've clearly got some growing up to do in this area.
Some called this a "bloodless coup".
Interesting! I have seen the names repeated in the producer/screenwriter credits as I typed them out, movie after movie. Since I've never seen a Pierce Brosnan James Bond movie, I'll be interested to see what the "next generation" brings to the table in GoldenEye.
[Dalton] couldn’t see ending his career as the character and declined.
So instead he's ending it as Niles Caulder. :)
But seriously, I wish Roger Moore had dropped out of the role when he got too old for it. If he had, some very bad James Bond movies might have been better.
Dalton's contract had expired, so he had the luxury of choice.
Looking at Roger Moore's Wiki page.......
Roger Moore - Wikipedia
.....after his fifth (of seven) Bond movies, he was reluctant to continue but was enticed to return. He had a problem with the "heartless killer" aspect of Bond, so he wanted to play him as a playboy and for laughs. This is probably why I like his first one, Live and Let Die, more than the rest. He seemed like more of a killer in that. He had a tendency to sign long contracts during his career. Amazingly, during his Bond tenure he made several other movies.