Homme de lettres complet – Ian Fleming’s James Bond Correspondence

In his day Ian Fleming used to be not just a journalist and author, he also was – little surprise there – an avid writer of letters. Over the years he corresponded with famous contemporaries and friends – amongst them Raymond Chandler, Somerset Maugham and Noël Coward – as well as with editors, readers and fans all over the globe. Ian Fleming’s nephew Fergus Fleming now compiled and edited a volume of Ian Fleming’s Bond-related letters that Bloomsbury publishes this Thursday, October 8th. On 400 pages readers will catch a backstage glimpse of Fleming’s writing process, on the thought process that went into many curious details of the original Bond novels, and also on the effect the Bond phenomenon had on his creator.

You can order the book at Amazon UK and of course also at your local bookstore. Fans in the United States will have to be patient until November 3rd.

SPECTRE video blog on UK filming

The tourism board VisitBritain has posted an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at some of the SPECTRE action filmed in the UK – including London and Blenheim Palace.

‘Writing’s on the Wall’ official video released

The official music video for the SPECTRE theme track ‘Writing’s on the Wall’ has just been released (just under two hours later than the planned time of 0:07 in the UK, apparently prompting “a lot of angry emails going round”). It features new footage from the film interspersed with Sam Smith singing at various locations, including what appears to be Museo della Civilta Romana, a museum in Rome which is also the setting for a key scene in the movie itself.

Sam Smith SPECTRE theme is UK number 1

He’s faced a week of mixed reviews, but Sam Smith has succeeded where Shirley Bassey, Duran Duran and even Adele failed. His theme for SPECTRE, ‘Writing’s on the Wall’ has gone straight to number 1 on the UK singles chart, with 70,000 streams and sales. Its the first time a Bond track has topped the charts in Britain.

SPECTRE – The final trailer is here!

SPECTRE latest TV spots

A couple of new TV spots for SPECTRE have been revealed over the past week or so, and are now available online courtesy of Sony Pictures. A final minute-long trailer is expected in the next few days, after initial showings in cinemas on Wednesday.

‘Writing’s on the Wall’ – released off the wall…

So the day today officially saw Sam Smith releasing his latest pet fad, SPECTRE’s main tile song Writing’s on the Wall, into the big wilderness of the world wide audience, to the considerable buzz of the social media and Bond fans all over the globe. If you haven’t done so already you can currently catch the tune on Spotify and iTunes. Feedback amongst fans was – predictably – controversial and the discussion is still going on. Feel free to have your say about Writing’s on the Wall’s merits in this thread of our forum.

New SPECTRE video blog – The action of SPECTRE

The 007th Chapter: Licence Renewed – King of the Castle

A literary meditation by Jacques Stewart

In my youth (that’s not a location update) I set a “quiz” for my College. Brain-mashers like “Abbreviations excluded, name the only U.S state written using one line of typewriter keys” (Alaska; no-one knew (no-one cared)) and “Name the only country written using one line of typewriter keys”. Peru, but some “body” said Eire (fair point), another that “it’s Republic of Peru, actually, I know thart, actually, because I gap-yeared tharh, actually, licking yurts, communing with my spirituality, yah, and photocopying for my uncle at KPMG Lima.” There was such a fight. I encouraged it. Ectually.

I also had a round on “James Bond”. This was 1993 (hence “typewriter”), with 007 as relevant and welcome as anything else dead for four years that sane folks hoped would never return, like Eastern European communism, that Dr Who children’s programme or the Ayatollah Khomeini (give him time). Select questions went:

1. Which two Bond films to date do not feature a helicopter? (Child-like optimism to say “to date”, but child-like I was (rather than current lifestyle choice of childish), and brilliant. Precocious, smackable little weasel)

2. Why is A View to a Kill unique amongst the Bond films? (Keep it clean. In early 2015, this answer still holds)

3. Which author has written the most James Bond novels?

There were others, such as Q’s I.Q. to the nearest five points (it’s five; trick question), something something watches something (it really doesn’t matter) and Anne Fleming’s inside leg measurement (loads of people knew it; some reputation, that) but I’ve forgotten the rest.

continue reading…

New artwork for SPECTRE

Another week, another SPECTRE poster.  This one brings back the classic “007 with Bond girl”-motif, keeping the “Day of the Dead”-pic in the background – but with more colors!

There´s also a new banner artwork –  so one may doubt that this is the final one sheet.  Maybe there´s another one combining Bond with the villain called… um… what´s his name?