Introduction:

• The James Bond Phenomenon
• Hitchcock

Michael Armstrong vs. James Bond

That Arresting Rhythm: Opening Credits and Murders

Conclusion

The Bond Formula and Hitchcock's Reaction

A frequently discussed aspect of the James Bond films and Ian Fleming's novels are their formulaic nature. In every book, transposed into every film, the same predictable elements occur, though the order and specifics may vary.

• M gives James Bond a task or mission
• The villain or the agent of the villain are introduced
• Bond and the villian or agent will battle
• The Bond Girl appears and Bond seduces her
• Bond, and occasionally the girl as well, are captured and tortured by the villian or agent
• Bond kills the villain or agent
• Bond and the girl escape to temporary happiness 8

Furthermore, included in every Bond film are a series of spy gadgets; in From Russia With Love they include a wristwatch with a wire hidden inside it to strangle your enemy; a briefase with gold sovereigns, a dagger, and tear gas hidden inside it; an expandable rifle, and a tape recorder disguised as a camera. Bond, ultimately, will always defeat his enemies through superior beauty, physique, and technology 9.

Bond recieves his tools at M's office

Hitchcock, well aware of this pattern and the typical techniques of making a spy film in the mid-1960s, spoke in detail about his deliberate attempts to create Torn Curtain as an anti-Bond film. First of all, he tells François Truffaut that in order to start the film on a note of "mysterioso," he altered the traditional beginning of giving a man a mission:

"You have it in every one of the Bond pictures. A man says, '007, you go there. Bring back the gun or this or that.' So I did that scene anyway, but instead of playing it at the beginning, I brought it in as a surprise in the middle" 10

Likewise, he insists that Torn Curtain is not

"a James Bond type 'comic strip' film with its invincible hero and mechanical gimmickry" 11

Hitchcock claims his usual superiority, this time by insisting that his own film possesses a mystery that the Bond films do not and that his film, not a cheap "comic strip," is a work of art. It is not difficult to see from these comments that were Hitchcock to have his way, every element in Torn Curtain would be composed in direct opposition to the Bond films. However, the director was under pressure from the studio to produce a commercial film with a marketable soundtrack and so despite the hostility toward this new subgenre of films, Hitchcock was forced in some ways to squeeze at least partially into their mold.

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