Goldfinger

So... can we all just agree that James Bond in the 60s was weird... like really weird.

I think when you look at it subjectively, the movie seems really iconic. Sean Connery is the suave misogynist that made the role iconic, the plot is perfectly Bondish with Goldfinger, using a random laser and wanting to break into Fort Knox... a woman named Pussy Galore...

It all kind of ties into the whole legend of James Bond. You don't really need to see the movie to be a fan of the lore. The movie is really iconic just as an image of pop culture.

But if you actually watch it, the movie is weird as hell.

And before I go on, I have to admit, I messed up. I wanted to start at the earliest Bond I could find. I thought the earliest Bond Hulu had was Goldfinger... until I just figured out that they had From Russia with Love so I may go back before I move on in this journey through the Bond movies that could go as far as my journey through the earlier Tim Burton/Schumacher Batman films or as short as my journey through the Nolan Batman films. Only time will tell.

 Goldfinger begins with James Bond (played by Sean Connery) just doing his crazy spy stuff. He's reckless, he's cocky, and dear lord, he's a misogynist.

Daniel Craig did an interview recently where he kind of reminded the world that James Bond is not really the hero you want to look up to. Mainly because he treats women like absolute shit.

Now I think a lot of this is a product of the era Bond was created. In the 60s and even before that when the books were written, it was totally cool to send a woman away, tell her its because they're doing "man talk" and slap her ass as she was walking away.

Now the fact of the matter is that thing have been cleaned up quite a lot since Sean Connery's Bond. If Daniel Craig did that to a woman, the movie wouldn't make any money because feminist groups would be blocking the entrance. And thats a good thing. I'm glad we can still have this iconic character but have him updated for the time.

But anyways, Bond is doing his thing, and he's given a pretty simple task. Observe Auric Goldfinger. Don't troll him. Don't sleep with his girlfriend. Observe him. And what does Bond do? He trolls Goldfinger then sleeps with his girlfriend. And it ends horribly.

Now I think one of the surprises of this movie was how much I actually enjoyed Auric Goldfinger.

Gert Frobe plays Goldfinger and his character is set up pretty early. He doesn't like to lose and he's evil. That's it. There's not much of a backstory, he's just evil. Now I know that this is kind of a theme in the Bond movies and that's really what they used to be known for before the reboot with Daniel Craig, but Goldfinger is so hokey and so 60s, that it actually really works.

Prior to watching this movie I always saw Goldfinger as the fat guy that Chris Farley would eventually parody in Austin Powers. I never really knew that much about him nor did I really want to.

And is he the best Bond villain? No. I think there are a lot of more menacing and just not as silly villains in the series, but I understand why he's iconic.

This movie really kind of highlights something that I've never really understood with James Bond... He's not very good at his job.

Like I already mentioned how he botches up the first task he's given and it ends horribly, but the rest of the movie Bond doesn't do a good job at any task that he's given. He's suppose to ellict Goldfinger to buy a bar of Nazi Gold and he fails at that. He's suppose to sneak into Goldfinger's factory without being detected and he fails at that and gets captured. The rest of the movie is really kind Bond is captivity and not even doing a really great job escaping.

So what does he does he do instead of actual spy work in this movie?

Well... he plays Golf with Goldfinger.

I'm not even joking, he spends a good ten minutes of this movie, playing golf and just trolling Goldfinger. There's a short scene where he tried to do his job and it turns into a bet that Bond eventually cheats his way out of.

I do have to give him credit, Connery does where that hat like a boss though. Like I really don't think Daniel Craig's Bond could pull that off.

But anyways, remember how I said the majority of the movie is him captured? Yeah they give him just enough time to show off all the gadgets on his car before he magically ends up on a plane piloted by... Pussy Galore...

Now where Goldfinger was interesting because he had a little bit of explanation to his character and he was just evil for the entire movie, Pussy Galore has absolutely no explanation to her character and is sort of evil... but not really.

First off, what horrible parent, Galore as a last name or not, decides they're going to name their child Pussy? And that's her name. Its not like Pussy Galore is an alias, in either the movie or any of the expanded universe of James Bond. Her name is legally Pussy Galore. And she's totally cool with it. She puts it on the name of her flying circus business. So I mean I have to give her some credit for taking that name with stride but I cannot believe that this was actually a thing that was not only accepted, Pussy Galore is considered everyone's 2nd favorite Bond girl.

And she's also the product of the classic Bond. She's this strong independent woman, doesn't fall for any of the charms of Bond... until he "seduces" her in a barn in a scene that is a lot more rapey than people probably remember. After that she really tosses all her ambitions away and wants to save this random rogue who really kind of forced himself on her.

That's another thing about 60s Bond that I find hilarious. My parents didn't let me watch Bond when I was younger because of the overtly sexual stuff in it, but the truth is, it was the 60s. It was risque to to show a bit of cleavage or a girl in Bond's shirt and showing any kind of nudity wasn't even in the question.

Now even today's Bond doesn't really show any of the sex scenes, a lot of it is left up to the imagination like the old movies. I think if they put a sex scene in a Bond film it would just be in bad taste and it would just be weird.

If I'm excluding any odd James Bond sex scene, please let me know because I could definitely be wrong about that, but from what I remember, it still always starts with kissing, camera pans to next scene and they're naked in bed.

But anyways, moving on from the overt censorship of the 60s.

I'm going to admit something in this post. This is the first time I've ever watched a full length Bond movie with Sean Connery as Bond.

And... I get it. I get why a lot of people consider him to be the quintessential Bond. I always used to associate Sean Connery with being Indiana Jone's father in Last Crusade. And while I still do, I think I'm finally understanding that the guy did have a career outside of that and it was a major success with these Bond movies.

Yeah the movie has a lot of sexism in it and Connery is the vehicle in which a lot of that sexism happens but you do have to appreciate how he began this franchise (I know Goldfinger wasn't the first Bond film) and the legacy he left behind.

So how is Goldfinger as a whole? Its... kinda dumb.

Yeah I get that a lot of it is the classic Bond and a lot of it is very iconic that we remember it, but the majority of this movie is just Bond captured, the action and fist fighting has really not aged well. And the plot, while interesting (breaking into Fort Knox) takes absolutely forever to actually get executed that its only about a 10 to 15 minute segment in the entire movie and kind of ends anticlimactically.

However, I do have to give the movie credit where it is due. It did set the stage for the spy film genre to explode.

Yes it was cheesy, yes it was campy and ridiculous, but at the same time it fed into the legend that is James Bond. Without it, we wouldn't get fantastic movies like Casino Royale and Skyfall.

Sure you can blame a lot of the campiness and ridiculousness on the time, but I think that's less an excuse and more of an origin story of the serious spy movie.

I think at the time, Spy films were just starting to get noticed but weren't taken as seriously and James Bond blazed the trail. So much that we can have a year like this one where we have 5 Spy movies in a year (Kingsmen, Spy, Spectre, Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, Man from UNCLE) and we consider that normal.

So is Goldfinger a great movie? No. But I'm going to pull exactly what I should pull from that movie. The iconic likes like "'Do you expect me to talk?' 'No Mr. Bond I expect you to die'" The campy gadgets and machines, the blatant sexism that we condemn today but was totally cool in the 60s, and Sean Connery just giving it his all.

But those are my thoughts on Goldfinger. What do you think? Comment and Discuss below. You can also send me your thoughts via Twitter @cmhaugen24 and you can also let me know what you want me to review in the future. For updates on future movie news and reviews, follow me on Twitter and lets have a conversation.

I'll leave you with this. I'm gonna try and go out and see Spectre either this weekend or next weekend. Hopefully I can and I can give you my review on it, I've heard differing opinions on it. I'm not sure if its bad or if its just not as good as Skyfall. Thoughts? Enjoy the trailer!