15 replies to this topic

[Napoleon Solo]

http://www.telegraph...ritish-spy.html

[Mr. Blofeld]

Dahl may have been a dashing British spy, but he was a screenwriter...

[Moderator's Note: Do not skirt the auto-censor.]

[Johnboy007]

It always blows my mind that the same person that wrote You Only Live Twice wrote "The BFG" and countless other classic children's stories.

[Scottlee]

It's not hard for me to believe at all. Some of Dahl's children's book are wonderful and I loved them as a kid, but technically they were far-fetched and very 'out there' just like the plot in YOLT.

[DaveBond21]

It's not hard for me to believe at all. Some of Dahl's children's book are wonderful and I loved them as a kid, but technically they were far-fetched and very 'out there' just like the plot in YOLT.

I was also a big fan of Dahl, as a kid, and loved the BFG, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Boy and The Witches.

His stories were imaginative but also mature. He never talked down to children.

[Johnboy007]

It's not hard for me to believe at all. Some of Dahl's children's book are wonderful and I loved them as a kid, but technically they were far-fetched and very 'out there' just like the plot in YOLT.

I didn't intend to judge quality. Just simply the same person writing You Only Live Twice and kids books.

[Marc-Ange Draco]

It's really quite similar to Ian Fleming having written Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and From Russia with Love...Dahl's writing was mostly for children, while Fleming concentrated on the more adult(-content) books--with some crossover for each. I am consistently stunned at how bad YOLT really was...but then again, the original story wouldn't have worked as well, as, say, Moonraker's original plot would have--I still want to see Moonraker as a movie--complete with the great two chapters in Blades, playing bridge.

[Craig Arthur]

"Die Another Day" is a pretty faithful adaptation of the novel, "Moonraker". Every aspect of the Moonraker story is there if you are willing to look. From the target range in the Universal Export basement (now a virtual reality simulation), to Blades (with fencing replacing bridge), the villain changing his face, etc.

PS I am still eager to know what you think of my new article Marc Ange!

[Marc-Ange Draco]

"Die Another Day" is a pretty faithful adaptation of the novel, "Moonraker". Every aspect of the Moonraker story is there if you are willing to look. From the target range in the Universal Export basement (now a virtual reality simulation), to Blades (with fencing replacing bridge), the villain changing his face, etc.

PS I am still eager to know what you think of my new article Marc Ange!

I suppose that your idea of carryovers from Moonraker to DAD isn't that big of a reach--while I can see your point, I have a hard time connecting one of my favorite books to my least favorite official-canon movie. I don't dispute that you're on to something, but I'd almost rather -not- make the connection. Part of what I like about Moonraker is that the whole setting and story are rather contained and approachable (by 007 standards, at least)--whereas DAD feels too extreme and impossible for me to connect the dots between the two.

As to your article, I'm afraid I have no idea what you're talking about--(for clarification, there's another MarcAnge Draco--not me--perhaps something you mentioned to him?)--but if you'd be so kind as to point me in the right direction, I'd be interested to see what you have to say!

Edited by Marc-Ange Draco, 03 September 2008 - 06:20 AM.

[Qwerty]

So, Mr Bond, are you actually a leg or a breast man?

A startling new biography of Roald Dahl, published last week, reveals that the beloved children's author was involved in a string of shady sexual liaisons when he was a British spy during the war. He is said to have acquired 'several useful pieces of intelligence' by seducing women who were close to the sources of power.

As you'll know if you've ever done a pub quiz, Roald Dahl wrote the screenplay for You Only Live Twice. This new biographical information sheds an interesting light on his keenness to get involved in the Bond canon: perhaps the screenplay was a confessional.

These revelations could be very useful for the Broccoli family. We know they have run out of Ian Fleming plots to film. They can't keep reshooting the old ones with new actors. So why not, instead of returning to the original Fleming novels, return to the original Dahls?

Stories are all the same, after all. 'Men's books', 'women's books', 'children's books' - they all offer right and wrong, a chase and a challenge, a crisis and a resolution. However old we are, as readers, we all want the same satisfactions. If the Broccolis need new hooks on which to hang them, a legitimate treasure trove is waiting ...

Read more...

http://commanderbond...n...&item=49040 - The Observer

[MicroGlobeOne]

Dahl may have been a dashing British spy, but he was a screenwriter...

[Moderator's Note: Do not skirt the auto-censor.]

I'd have to disagree. Dahl's script is one of my favorites. No matter which way you look at it, the man was a master.

[Mister E]

"Die Another Day" is a pretty faithful adaptation of the novel, "Moonraker". Every aspect of the Moonraker story is there if you are willing to look. From the target range in the Universal Export basement (now a virtual reality simulation), to Blades (with fencing replacing bridge), the villain changing his face, etc.

No that is called a bastard-ization of a novel, not a faithful adaptation.

[terminus]

Remember too that Dahl was the author of a lot of adult fiction, he was the brains behind Tales of the Unexpected which ran for years.

[Scrambled Eggs]

Anyone who likes Fleming would probably get a kick out of Dahl's adult short stories.

Thats a nice article by Victoria Coren. She'd be a decent Bond girl actually - journalist and professional poker player.

[Gabriel]

Dahl was an excellent and prolific writer of adult and children's fiction. That the film he wrote was arguably responsible for dumbing down the Bond series for decades is not really something to blame him for. Broccoli and Salzman were strong producers and would have told him what kind of script to write. That he wrote a film that has, in many ways, defined people conceptions of Bond, Blofeld and SPECTRE shows just how talented a writer he was.

[Turn]

Dahl was an excellent and prolific writer of adult and children's fiction. That the film he wrote was arguably responsible for dumbing down the Bond series for decades is not really something to blame him for. Broccoli and Salzman were strong producers and would have told him what kind of script to write. That he wrote a film that has, in many ways, defined people conceptions of Bond, Blofeld and SPECTRE shows just how talented a writer he was.

I agree. YOLT is hardly my favorite script in the series, but Dahl did fine with what he had to work with and that is the direction the producers wanted him to go in.

An article in Playboy about Dahl at the time of YOLT's release talked about his getting familiar with the series. The only film he'd seen at the time was GF, so they had to show him the other films, so the producers had the disadvantage of having a writer who wasn't that familiar with the series to begin with.

Anyone know why Richard Maibaum wasn't involved in scripting YOLT?