Aston Martin, film Bond’s favorite ride, faces new uncertainty

Iconic publicity still for Goldfinger with Sean Connery leaning against the Aston Martin DB5.

Aston Martin, the preferred ride for the film James Bond (not so much the literary version), isn’t having a good time. In fact, the maker of luxury-car makers faces a lot of uncertainty.

The Guardian, in a Jan. 7 report, said Aston Martin’s financial results are faltering.

James Bond’s favourite car marque is now predicting adjusted profits of between £130m and £140m for 2019 – almost half the £247m it made the previous year. Analysts had been forecasting profits of £196m. Over the first nine months of 2019, Aston Martin racked up a pretax loss of more than £92m.

But that’s not all.

The Financial Times (CLICK HERE to see a Bloomberg summary of the FT story) has reported that Geely, a Chinese automaker, is interested in acquiring a stake in the automaker. Here’s an excerpt of a Bloomberg summary of the FT story:

Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. of China has held talks with management and investors in Aston Martin Lagonda Global Holdings Plc about taking a stake in the U.K. carmaker, the Financial Times reported.

(snip)

The company said last month it was in talks with potential investors, and this week showed the depth of its financial troubles by reporting a severe decline in profit in its first full year as a listed company.

Geely is conducting due diligence, the FT said Friday, citing unidentified sources. A technology partnership is also a potential outcome of talks, the British newspaper said.

Some perspective: Aston Martin is a runt in the global auto industry. It was owned by Ford Motor Co from 1987 to 2007. Ford was in the midst of a financial crisis in the 2000s and unloaded Aston Martin to a group of investors.

In 2008, Ford sold Jaguar and Land Rover to India’s Tata Motors. Aston Martin, Jaguar and Land Rover have all figured into James Bond films after Ford divested them.

Regardless, Aston Martin figures into the Bond film series since 1964’s Goldfinger.

Periodically, Aston Martin talks about diversifying from James Bond. No luck, so far. Four (or so) Aston models, past and present, will be in No Time to Die.

At best, Aston Martin faces an uncertain future.

UPDATE (Jan. 11): An outlet called Autocar, in a Jan. 10 story, reported that Aston Martin won’t proceed with a production version of its Raptide E electric car. Instead, the vehicle will become a “research project” for further Aston electrification efforts.

At one time, the Raptide E reportedly was going to be in No Time to Die but that didn’t happen.

How marketing of 007 novels evolved over a decade

007 continuation novel authors William Boyd and Sebastian Faulks and friend, 2013.

It seems that Ian Fleming Publications has altered how it markets James Bond continuation novels over the past decade.

In 2008, in time for the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ian Fleming, IFP brought out Devil May Care with Sebastian Faulks “writing as Ian Fleming.”

You got the feeling that this was a bit of a lark for Faulks.

A decade ago, the author gave an interview to The Financial Times.

“Fleming’s guiding principle was to write without pausing to reflect or edit,” wrote Rosie Blau of the FT. “By contrast, Human Traces took Faulks five years. But for Devil May Care he followed Fleming’s lead and gave himself six weeks: ‘You don’t have those long moments where you ponder for about an hour: ‘What is he thinking now?’”

The thing is, Fleming did a lot of revisions once his draft was done and he headed home after his annual winter trips to Jamaica. If you’ve ever visited Indiana University’s Lilly Library where many Fleming manuscripts are stored, you can view how 007 creator’s marked them up extensively.

In other words, Fleming didn’t spend six weeks and shove out a novel. But you wouldn’t have gotten that impression from the 2008 FT interview.

After Faulks, IFP had a series of Bond one-offs by other “name” writers, including Jeffery Deaver and William Boyd.

Anthony Horowitz, author of Trigger Mortis and the upcoming Forever and a Day

Trigger Mortis, published in 2015, appeared to follow that pattern. Another “name” author, Anthony Horowitz, came up with a story that took place immediately after the events of Fleming’s Goldfinger novel.

For the 110th anniversary of Fleming’s birth, Horowitz has returned. His story again relates to the timeline of Fleming’s originals. This time, Forever and a Day is billed as a prequel to Casino Royale, Fleming’s first 007 novel.

The “writing as Ian Fleming” gimmick is long gone. Faulks was the only one of the recent continuation novel authors who tried it.

At the same time, Forever and a Day, isn’t getting the big launch that Devil May Care received a decade ago.

In 2008, the literary Bond could be found on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean pretty quickly. This time out, Forever and a Day will be published in the U.S. more than five months after it debuts in the U.K.

Intense U.S. fans of the literary fans, of course, can arrange to buy a U.K. copy and have it shipped over. But it’s still not the event Devil May Care was in 2008.

SPECTRE reviews continue to arrive

SPECTRE teaser image

Reviews for SPECTRE continue to roll in following Wednesday’s U.K. press showing.

As of Thursday night, 24th James Bond film has a “fresh” rating of 86 percent at the ROTTEN TOMATOES WEBSITE. That’s pretty high, but not quite as high as the 93 percent rating for 2012’s Skyfall.

Of course, there are a lot of SPECTRE reviews yet to come in as the movie gets released early next month outside the U.K.

Regardless, here are excerpts from some additional reviews from some noteable media outlets. We’ve tried to keep this as spoiler free as possible (specifically trying to keep out plot details), but the super spoiler adverse probably shouldn’t read reviews anyway. Enough with the disclaimers. Here we go.

SIMON REYNOLDS, DIGITAL SPY: “Spectre winds up as a direct sequel to Skyfall in both story and theme, delving into Bond’s personal history in a bid to bring new layers to a character who’s barely changed over the course of 50 years. However, the latest film’s big needle-shift for the Bond canon (no spoilers here!) just doesn’t pack the emotional punch of Vesper Lynd or M’s death. Consequently, this feels like a misfire when measured next to the superior Skyfall and Casino Royale.”

NICHOLAS BARBER, BBC: “After years of struggling with its identity, the series had finally stopped trying to compete with the stripped-down toughness of the Bourne franchise, and had embraced the flamboyance and humour that its fans had loved all along….But the long-awaited follow-up (to Skyfall) is a case of ‘Be careful what you wish for.’ As hungry as some of us were to see a new Bond movie stuffed with old Bond movie ingredients, the trouble with Spectre is that it has too many of them.”

HELEN O’HARA, GQ; “There were hints, in Skyfall, that the grand Daniel Craig era of the stripped-back, gritty Bond was over. That film reintroduced classic Bond elements like the Aston Martin DB5, a male M and Moneypenny, gradually shaking off many of the lifts from Bourne and its ilk. Now in Spectre, we’ve moved right past that Connery tribute and into an even broader tone that harks back louder to the Seventies films, making this an awkward marriage of Craig and (Roger) Moore.”

BEN TRAVIS, EVENING STANDARD: “Digging into Bond history, returning director Sam Mendes has, against all the odds, delivered a film that at least matches, and perhaps even betters, Skyfall….Spectre feels even more like a classic Bond film than previous Craig outings….Hoyte Van Hoytema’s stunning glacial cinematography reflects a Bond film totally at ease with itself.

DANNY LEIGH, FINANCIAL TIMES: “And therein lies the problem: after the sombre excellence of Skyfall, Spectre tries to tweak the formula while clearly being thrown into panic at the thought. Everything feels so reliant on its business-class sheen, the grooming, tailoring and tie-pins, that anything other than gunmetal and a scowl unbalances the tone.”

If you want to read more reviews, CLICK HERE to see Rotten Tomatoes’ list of SPECTRE reviews. There are links if you want to read entire reviews.

John Logan’s (brief) comments about 007’s film future

Bond 24 writer John Logan

The Financial Times on March 8 published A FEATURE STORY ABOUT WRITER JOHN LOGAN. The story is mostly about Peter and Alice, a new play he wrote with Judi Dench and Ben Whishaw. But the co-writer of Skyfall does have a brief comment about 007’s film future.

The FT’s Sarah Hemming writes that Logan, hired to pen the scripts for Bond 24 and Bond 25, in her words “hopes to build on Skyfall in examining the complexities of Bond’s character.”

“Fleming’s courage in showing Bond’s fear and vulnerability and depression was really interesting and something that a modern audience can accept,” Hemming quotes Logan as saying. “I think Skyfall demonstrated that they want more layers to that character. And those are the layers that Fleming wrote.”

To view the entire FT article (headlined “After Bond, Peter meets Alice”), just CLICK HERE.

Logan was brought into Skyfall by director Sam Mendes to rewrite a script by Neal Purvis and Robert Wade. All three scribes shared the final writing credit. Mendes said this week he won’t direct Bond 24.

Also, here’s a quick note of appreciation to The James Bond Dossier, where we found out about the FT story. You can read that Web site’s post on the subject by CLICKING HERE.