Bond, James Bond

If Matt Damon’s quotes in a recent Miami Herald interview are true, then he has sealed his fate as a non-actor. While his screen abilities are starkly limited, a careful study of and reverence for one’s own aesthetic often make up for one’s shortcomings. If Damon indeed did want to blossom into an actor of stature, then he never would have reprimanded his chosen lineage. Petty bickering is the modus operandi of choice on America’s modern “Reality Television,” but it has no place for screen legends. Slandering Ian Fleming’s novel and film character easily seals his fate as an immature, juvenile, and narcissistic Gen. X’er. If his assessment of James Bond was true, then he would get a shallow plug for his crippled film career. It wasn’t, and any educated adult with a fondness for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang knows this. Bond was never a misogynist, and his playboy attributes in Fleming’s definition were an attempt to disguise the pain of his murdered wife. In Fleming’s novels Bond is a different character all together. He is broken, tired, and lonely. The necessities of cinema created a different character, one that was synonymous with a l940’s-style leading man. If Damon is threatened by Bond’s knowledge and savvy in the films, then he more is afraid of his own shortcomings on the screen and in the bedroom. It is not that often a would be actor gets it this wrong. James Bond was an iconoclastic hipster. He was the real Hugh Hefner and achieved his fortunes with the quill of his own pen. He didn’t bed women. He earned them with savoir-faire, obviously something of which Damon has no understanding.