Features

Robert Harling’s recently published memoir of Ian Fleming sheds further light on James Bond’s creator. Buy from Amazon UK One book that seems to have largely flown beneath the radar over the last few weeks is Robert Harling’s personal memoir of Ian Fleming. Harling was a typographer, designer, journalist and novelist who knew Fleming well. They […]

Although not expecting much from this slender volume, it turns out to over-deliver. A handy pocket companion for all Bond fans. Buy from Amazon UK or Amazon.com. Back in the 1980s I once bought a Bluffer’s Guide. It was fun, but very superficial.  Short. It covered modern art, just a sentence or two for each […]

Guest author Edward Biddulph revisits his childhood with the James Bond 007: Ultimate Sticker Collection from Dorling Kindersley. Buy from Amazon UK or Amazon.com I don’t know about you, but when I was young, I loved collecting Panini football stickers every four years when the World Cup was on. Saving up my pocket money to buy […]

By the time A View To A Kill was released in 1985 I was over 007. The last James Bond movie I’d seen on the big screen was For Your Eyes Only (1981) and by the time Octopussy came out two years later I decided to stick with the Connery films and the books. Available from […]

Released in 1995, Goldeneye proved to be a key entry in the James Bond series. Among the various reasons for its importance, not least was ensuring 007’s survival. The film heralded many changes for the James Bond series. First of all Goldeneye introduced a new James Bond in the shape of Pierce Brosnan. It also introduced a female […]

The latest James Bond cinema outing, SPECTRE, has received almost universal critical acclaim, so I am taking my life in my hands by offering here a completely contrary view. I saw the film with my wife, yesterday; she very much enjoyed it – I thought it amongst the worst films I have seen. I say […]

James Bond’s cars usually need some pretty extensive work by the end of the film, which is probably why comparison site MyCarNeedsA.com asked me too propose my top 5 Bond cars.  Obviously Aston Martin has to go in there, but how can I avoid only including Aston Martin cars? Wet Nellie is almost as iconic as the DB5, so […]

Last month saw the publication of The Man With The Golden Typewriter: Ian Fleming’s James Bond Letters, edited by Fleming’s nephew, Fergus. Here he answers a number of questions posed by The James Bond Dossier.  I understand that you have no memory of meeting your uncle, who died when you were 5 years old. When did […]

Today sees the official release of the first issue in a new series of James Bond comics, the first time 007 has been seen in this format in two decades. The first issue begins a six part adventure named VARGR, written by Warren Ellis with artwork by Jason Masters. This story is set in the modern […]

After being bitterly disappointed by Skyfall I was hardly jumping with joy when it was announced that Sam Mendes was on board for another film. However, SPECTRE is a whole lot better. Although Mendes is undoubtedly a talented director, there were too many elements of Skyfall that I disliked. While individually I would probably have been […]