Diamonds Are Forever A Connery Finale

 As well as being on a road kick and healthy eating kick, I am also on one of my occasional Bond kicks...James Bond that is.

As with everything, my kicks go in cycles, though I think the healthy eating kick needs to be a bit more permanent.

Recently I read what could be called an "off-canon" Bond story, if there is any such thing, called Colonel Sun. It was written by author Kingsley Amis (alias Robert Markham) 4 years after Bond creator Ian Fleming's death. It was definitely something I consider many steps away form Fleming, yet Amis seemed to understand the core concept of James Bond and the character's history. That book was written years after the tale of Bond's one marriage and its tragic end. In fact, the Bond we see im Amis's rendition has not exactly lost his killer edge that helps him to survuve, but in terms of women, he has become more relaxed and much less guarded than he once was, letting things happen as they do because he has seen it all before and knows what to anticipate.

I bring this up again so soon because it segues into the topic of one of my favorite Bond movies, Diamonds are Forever. I first saw this movie about 35 years ago, a rental at the video store. When it was on TV, whatever ratings system the local paper used gave the movie 4 stars.

Now, I said this was one of my favorites in terms of James Bond...but I don't think it earned 4 stars. 3 maybe, or even that wonderful status of 2 1/2.

Critical aren't we, Bryan?

Yes, but I say the same for many a kooky movie that I enjoy watching. 4 stars is reserved for some level of acclaim, be it an epic war or western or other period piece that keeps my ass glued to the seat afraid to miss something. There is a long silly moon buggy chase scene in Diamonds that is easy to go relieve myself during.

After You Only Live Twice, Sean Connery quit playing Bond, and in my opinion, rightly so. He had become such a celebrity in the role that it was hard to escape its hold. After the seeming disaster of On Her Majesty's Secret Service (the movie was actually quite good except for the actor playing Bond), the producers pretty much begged Connery to return, giving in to a few costly demands along with it being his final Bond movie (well, not quite). 

If one looks at Connery thoughout Diamonds, they likely notice he's a bit older around the eyes since 1967, and much of the old intensity from 1962-63 is gone. In fact, much of the time he looks like he is on a lark, much like the next 7 Roger Moore Bond movies. The exception here is Bond strangling a woman to get information and slapping an insolent Jill St John, two acts that Moore never performed.

Of course, I have read the book many times, one of my favorites because it flows quite well. The basic diamond smuggling plot from the book gets the movie going for about an hour or so with some variation before he realizes he did not kill the real Blofeld.

Let me go back a bit.

In 1969, Bond married Tracy and just an hour or so later, Ernst Stavro Blofeld and his ugly henchwoman Irma Bunt tried to gun both down on the road but only Tracy had died. Cut to the opening of 1971's Diamonds and James is scouring the earth looking to find and kill Blofeld. He finally tracks him to a plastic surgery clinic where more than one Blofeld is being created. Bond kills one and then believes he is confronted by the real one, whom he also kills.

After that, the diamond smuggling caper begins with Bond following wily Tiffany Case to America to see what is happening to the diamonds being smuggled from South Africa. He impersonates smuggler Peter Franks, is almost incinerated at a Las Vegas mortuary, and shows his dice-rolling acumen in a casino. He meets casino-hustling Plenty O'Toole who is impressed with his ability to rake in the dough. They are about to have a one night stand before Tiffany Case has her men toss her into the pool several floors below. Plenty is later killed by a (assumed) homosexual pair named Mr. Wint and Mr. Kidd who are killing everyone involved in the diamond smuggling to close up shop.

Soon, Bond finds out who took the diamonds, a Dr. Metz. He sneaks into Metz's van at a gas station while now seemingly reformed Tiffany provides a distraction. He is taken to a scientific facility where there is apparently a radiation risk (he is given what is obviously a useless device to wear on his chest called a radiation shield). Once Bond is discovered, the movie descends into a silly antic of a moon buggy chase which evolves into a car chase in and around downtown Las Vegas (actually a fun scene if you know the places they show).

After that, Bond decides to pay a visit to the elusive and reclusive Willard Whyte by climbing to the top of the Whyte House, wher ehe meets not Whyte but a very much alive Blofeld with his one remaining clone. Of course, Bond kills the wrong one and the real Blofeld tries to have Bond killed and buried by Wint and Kidd, but Bond escapes.

The real Willard Whyte is found and rescued after Bond is beaten up by guards Bambi and Thumper (another silly scene), and thereafter, Blofeld's base is discovered on an oil  rig where Tiffany is a willing prisoner who tries to help Bond but is revealed to be a fairly brainless "broad", unlike the Tiffany of earlier in the movie. Nevertheless, she and Bond escape after Bond ram's Blofeld's bathosub into the rig's main headquarters building. Wint and Kidd make one final assassination attempt on two on a cruise ship before Bond sets one on fire and the other with a bomb, both going overboard to their deaths.

Truly, once the Blofeld nonsense is kicked up more than halfway through the movie, the film loses a lot of flavor...3 stars the first half, two stars the second half.

The book, however, is not just in Nevada but also in Saratoga Springs, New York. Plus, the book was published in 1956, 5 years before Blofeld was introduced in Thunderball. The mob is heavily featured in this story, a break from the Soviet SMERSH stories previously published. Wint and Kidd are also in the book, shown as butch assassins. Tiffany Case is also in the book, but her character stays true as a troubled young woman trying to make it in life, even if it is working for gangsters.

And that takes me to Ernst Stavro Blofeld himself. The movies introduced him as a mysterious character who is the head of SPECTRE as early as From Russia With Love in 1963, then Thunderball in 1965. His face is not seen in either. He is finally fully seen in You Only Live Twice in 1967 in the form of Donald Pleasance, a fairly creepy and perhaps the best Blofeld characterization. In On Her Majesty's Secret Service, Blofeld is a taller and more eloquent Telly Savalas, and he also did a good portrayal. 

But in Diamonds, he is played by Charles Gray, a quite NONTHREATENING performer. If you are not familiar with Gray, you might remember him as the "Criminologist" in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The producers fell on this one in terms of Bond villain casting, and that is the weak part of the movie.

Back to Connery, he walks through the movie so nonchalantly, you'd almost think it was meant for Roger Moore. The threatening bra strangulation and slapping Tiffany are about the only moments you can see it's a shadow of the cold war spy we met in 1962 (well, I first saw him on some ABC Sunday Night Movie or a Blockbuster rental).

So why do I like this movie? It has a good feel before Bond is reunited with Blofeld more than halfway through, and any movie featuring Las Vegas during the majority has a certain appeal for me.

2 for U.S. 2

 It surely has been a bit since I covered any highways, school taking back up again and all, but I have not gotten even close to forgetting my mission of celebrating the greatest U.S. highways created starting 100 years ago next year.

So far, I have covered much of what I consider the desert giants. That was actually easy because if one looks at a highway map of the United States, the eastern half is like a maze, or rather a latticework of roads, while the west is much more sparse.

I also covered highways tht originated in Detroit as well as U.S. 6.

This evening, we will examine what I call the "Northern Tier Highway", known as...

2 is unique in its own right as there are two distinct secions of it.

The eastern portion of U.S. 2 is only about 460 miles, stretching from Maine to just barely into New York. This looks like a highway I would enjoy exploring, especially in the fall when the New England colors and temperatures give images of apple cider and cinnamon donuts..not that I'm doing much in the way of donuts anymore, but having grown up in the eastern U.S., the memory sticks. Not only the colors, but the small towns and countryside along with older building architecture are a sight to behold...and dearly miss when one such as I have lived among newer cookie cutter homes for quite some time now.

While U.S. 2 sees a good around of countryside through Maine, New Hampsire, and eastrern Vermont, its last several miles cross several parts of Lake Champlain. Plus, it begins just west of the Canadian border at New Brunswick and ends just south of Quebec near the northern end of U.S. 11.

However, that is just the beginning. Just a few hundred miles west in the start of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, U.S. 2 begins at I-75 in St. Ignace, just north of the Mackinac Bridge. 2 cuts through heavily wooded areas of northern Michigan after traveling along the northern banks of Lake Michigan. It meets U.S. 41 to travel through Escanaba together, then depart to Wisconsin, then Michigan again and back into Wisconsin after passing through Ironwood.and coursing through northern Wisconsin's ruralness before crossing into Minnesota south of Duluth and then heading into Minnesota's northern woods, farmland, and passing by many lakes along the way. I can just imagine the fun of this drive!

In North Dakota, U.S. 2 sees fewer lakes and many more empty prairies, perhaps wondering if Laura Ingalls Wilder traipsed through those areas.

And then we hit Montana...all 667 miles of it! And much of that land is as empty as North Dakota with even LESS water! After many hundreds of miles of plains and small towns, 2 crosses I 15 in Shelby and then passes through the Blackfeet Reservation before heading by and giving access to Glacier National Park. After many miles of empty plain, U.S. 2 finally hits the Rockies and is a mountain road well into Kalispell where it meets U.S. 93. It maintains a woodsy-mountain feel into Idaho as it heads to join U.S. 95 to Sandpoint and then follow the Pend Oreille River into Washington before it cuts south to be part of the Spokane metro area. It joins I 90 briefly before going into the vast emptiness of central Washington, looking at times like much of Montana. After a long while, it crosses the Columbia River north of Wenatchee and heads into the Cascades, crossing Stevens Pass before ending in Everett at I 5.

U.S. 2 is definitely a more sparse highway as it cuts through the northern tier of the nation, but it does provide access to many scenic and exciting areas...just a lot of distance between them. I would likely find U.S. 2 to be fun in New England with its throwback feel to Minnesota's many lakes to Montana's vast emptiness. A little of something for everyone!

Here Comes The Colonel Sun

    I am not sure who is not aware of this, but aside from roads, I am a HUGE fan of James Bond. I remember when ABC used to play a combo of the Roger Moore and Sean Connery entries during the summer on Sunday nights in the 80s and early 90s.

   Later on, I began to read the original source material written by Ian Fleming between 1953 and 1965. While some of the movies stayed fairly true to the books, a few strayed considerably, particularly The Spy Who Loved Me, You Only Live Twice, Moonraker, and The Man With the Golden Gun. Of course, we all know that theatrical license needs to be taken to make a movie watchable. Trust me on Moonraker, that book put me to sleep.

   In the early 1980s, an author named John Gardner picked up the Bond concept in a series of novels that ran between 1981 and 1996. These books were more in the vein of Roger Moore silliness than Fleming's cold and calculating secret agent. I read most of them quite easily within a day or so, which may have been the problem. Gardner's prose was was simple without diving too deeply into sensory detail, which at the time suited me fine. Even now, I skip past long paragraphs describing gorgeous sitting room furniture because the plot is at a standstill.

   Even Fleming's novels went through a metamorphosis. Casino Royale, Live and Let Die, Moonraker, Diamonds are Forever, and From Russia With Love were not overly inundated with long detail. Doctor No and Goldfinger started to get into more detail, and On Her Majesty's Secret Service and You Only Live Twice had long paragraphs in tinier print that irritated the hell out of my eyes.

   The 1950s Bond novels tended to pit Bond against the Soviet secret service organization called SMERSH, with two exceptions. In the 1960s, the new enemy became SPECTRE, led by mega-villain Ernst Stavro Blofeld. SPECTRE was what many of the early Bond movies focused on and even rewrote from SMERSH material. And then came Roger Moore...and I don't want to talk about that...at least not in this article.

   In 1968, British author Kingsley Amis, fascinated by Bond, wrote his own Bond novel called Colonel Sun. I just finished this book and I have to say...meh!

   I picked up a copy at my favorite local thrift store months ago and just recently decided to delve into it. Now, this is the only Amis book I have ever read, so I have nothing to compare this book to except Fleming novels...particularly the SPECTRE entries in terms of long paragraphs I can do without. Thankfully, the story went only 194 pages.

   One thing I can say for Amis is that he had done his research, specifically on Bond's superior name M and M's domestic staff at him home Quarterdeck, as they were featured briefly in On Her Majesty's Secret Service 5 years previously. 

   The plot is a bit odd, but worthy of transformation into a movie. In fact, it would not amaze me if elements of the book were already part of other films. The basic idea is that M has been kidnapped by Colonel Sun Liang-tan and his men and taken to a Greek Island. Sun had intended to grab Bond as well, but Bond foiled that plot. After consulting with his higher-ups using a planted clue, Bond deduces that M was taken to Greece and once there makes contact with Greek blooded but Communist-leaning Ariadne Alexandrou who is supposed to take him to Soviet friends but not for evil purposes. In short time, Bond and Soviet Major Gordienko form an uneasy truce before Gordienko is killed. After Bond and Ariadne recruit the help of her father's old comrade Niko Litsas, they come to Sun's fortress on Vrakonisi, a Greek Island, where a Soviet detente gathering is happenig. Sun and Nazi von Richter intend to kill everyone at the gathering and pin the blame on M and Bond.

   Bond, as well as Ariadne and Litsas, is eventually captured by Sun's people and, after a brief reunion with M, is taken to a basement to undergo physical and psychological torture performed by Colonel Sun himself. This part of the book to the climactic ending is the most readable...and it is only about 30 pages, but at least the action is palpable. The torture described is gruesome and I was amazed that Bond did not suffer permanent damage from it...but this IS Bond! Litsas sees to von Richter's demise while Bond first stabs Colonel Sun and later kills him. At the end, Bond is offered a medal by the Soviets, which he must refuse. Like with other Bond girls, he and Ariadne vow to spend time with each other when they can. This is a pattern in Bond books...by the next one, the previous book's Bond girl left him. As the next Bond book was Gardner's  1981 Licence Renewed, we never hear of what happened with Ariadne.

   Ariadne Alexandrou is fiercely passionate of Greek legend and history...and probably the most erotically described Bond girl of all time. Put into context of Bond's tragically short-lived marriage, Bond completely gives himself to her, damn the consequences. James Bond was already world-weary by 1963, tired of the hopeless pursuit of Blofeld and in 1964 when he found Blofeld, he strangled his enemy to death, and in 1965 was temporarily brainwashed to think he was a Soviet assassin assigned to kill M. 

   I appreciate what Amis is trying to do here, showing Bond as a quite seasoned agent who is less active than he once was, taking many an opportunity to take a round of golf. In some way, his way with women has not changed, but he is the wiser for his experience, falling almost happily into Ariadne's clutches, knowing it was going to happen one way or the other.

   As for Colonel Sun himself, he appears to be a Chinese version of Blofeld, waxing philosophical when performing torture. The scene in which Bond undergoes this agonizing torture almost seems like it should have been in You Only Live Twice shortly before his swordfight with Blofeld and then strangling him to death. Sun is evil, and yet at the end his emulation of the Marquis de Sade is revealed to not have the satisfactory feel he expected and he even apologized to Bond for this failure before dying. Sun is in fact a recreation of SPECTRE in terms of a third party trying to destroy the other world powers.

   For a one-off attempt at a Bond story, Amis did ok. It was like he had an idea he had to run with so he could get to other literary inspirations. I know that feeling well. Sadly, there was no 1970s literary representation of James Bond, leaving fans to deal with....Roger...Moore! As much as I dig the last name, no thank you!

   

Motor City Beginnings

 What comes to mind when you think of Detroit?

Whoa WHOA! Watch your language! Yes, I know Detroit has a less than stellar reputation in more than a few areas, but HIGHWAY wise, Detroit was the starting point for many a U.S. highway....still is for two.

It does seem odd that Detroit is the starting point for anything travel-related because Detroit is in such an odd location, and as Canada is accessible in 3 areas of Michigan, any highway would not seem probably in terms of distance.

First, let's talk about the "in memoriam" highways.

U.S. 10 once began in downtown Detroit as Woodward Avenue and headed north-northwest to Pontiac, Flint, Saginaw, and Bay City before taking a more westbound course toward Lake Michigan. Via ferry, 10 continued in Wisconsin and crossed the state into Minnestoa where it serviced the Twin Cities and continued across the state into North Dakota, then Montana, Idaho, and finally Washington, where it ended in Seattle. For the most part, U.S. 10 was a route across farmland and prairies of the Midwest. However, from central Montana to northern Idaho and again through the Cascades, 10 took a curvy and steep disposition.

As the Interstate system developed, U.S. 10 was truncated to starting in Bay City and ending in West Fargo, North Dakota, having been largely replaced by I 90 and I 94.

U.S. 16 once began in downtown Detroit as well, radiating northwest from there as Grand River Avenue and serviced Lansing and Grand Rapids before ending in Muskegon at Lake Mchigan. Like 10, a ferry crossed the lake to Milwaukee and 16 continued across Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, and most of northern Wyoming to end in Yellowstone. Like 10, U.S. 16 crossed the Midwest's farmland and prairies before climbing the Bighorn Mountains of Wyoming and heading north and then west to the gates of Yellowstone.  Now, the route from Yellowstone to Rapid City, South Dakota is all that is left of U.S. 16. 

In a way, U.S. 16 is still in need of a trim. After meeting U.S. 20 in Worland, Wyoming, it is shared with that highway along with U.S. 14 further north. Technically, 16 is just a tacked on route much like U.S. 70 was in California before 1964.

All right, enough with the old shortened stufdf, let's get to the highways that have lasted!

First up:

U.S. 12 has had what I would consider incredible luck in its survival. Originally ending in Miles City, Montana, it was extended to Missoula, then Lewiston, Idaho and then to Aberdeen, Washington, almost making it to the Pacific Ocean, but not quite. 

Not only has 12 been extended, it has survived the Interstate freeways that could have heavily truncated the route. Yet, U.S. 12 has managed to be a mostly independent entity, albeit there are times when 12 shares pavement WITH an Interstate freeway, but never for that long a time.

Similar to U.S. 10, 12 goes through the northern portion of America's heartland, and also sees a good amount of mountains in Montana, Idaho, and the Cascades of Washington. Unlike 10, however, 12 isn't connected via ferry across Lake Michigan. Oh no, it crosses southern Michigan before heading southwest into Indiana and then northwest and north into Illinois and the Chicago metro area before heading north into Wisconsin, then Minnesota, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, and Washington.

If there were a journeyman status for any existing highway, U.S. 12 would be a contender!

Finally, we have a highway that does not exactly meet the criteria here in terms of beginning in Detroit. specifically DOWNTOWN Detroit, but rather begins just north of Pontiac, which is an ex-urb of Detroit. With that, I introduce our final act for this article.....

U.S. 24 is at heart a Midwest highway, only its last almost 160 miles is in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado. In the Detroit area, it begins as Dixie Highway and then becomes Telegraph Road all the way to Toledo, Ohio. From Toledo, 24 begins a west/southwest journey through Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois and some of Missouri before it settles on a mostly western excursion through Kansas and eastern Colorado. In Limon, 24 heads southwest to Colorado Springs and then enters the Rockies, eventually heading north to end at U.S. 6 west of Vail. It once traveled with 6 all the way to Grand Junction, but like U.S. 16 and U.S. 70, 24 served no other places on its own so it was decomissioned west of its end at 6 in 1975.

And there you have it! 4 historic U.S. highways had their beginnings in the Detroit area, 3 of them actually starting in downtown Detroit!