Having lost a few hands at Baccarat, the bewitching Sylvia Trench proposes raising the stakes, to which an unseen 007 quips: "I admire your courage, Miss?"
"Trench, Sylvia Trench. I admire your luck, Mr?" answers
Sylvia.
'Bond, James Bond,' he replies, as he flips open a gold lighter to
illuminate a cigarette.
Few actors could have caused such a lasting impact from an introduction so minimalistic and almost plain. It was a perfect testament to the hypnotic presence and distinctive dulcet tones of Sir Sean Connery. The moment made cinematic history and catapulted Connery to superstardom.
But Connery’s early impoverished life was light years away from
the eventual glamour and global superstardom he would eventually achieve. He was born
and brought up in the Fountainbridge district of Edinburgh. At the age of 15,
Connery dropped out of school to enlist in the Royal Navy, but quit following a
bout of stomach ulcers.
Subsequently, he worked bricklayer, bouncer, lifeguard, and coffin polisher.
Connery invested his free time in bodybuilding, even securing third place in
the 1950 Mr. Universe contest.
He then moved to London, where he managed to be part of a chorus in a production of South Pacific (1953). He also joined the local library to embark on a rigorous self-improvement program exploring the works of Shakespeare, Shaw, Proust, Ibsen, and Dostoevsky.
Soon films and television were calling. He earned critical plaudits in the TV Drama Requiem for a Heavyweight (1956). He played supporting parts in films such as Hell Drivers (1957), Action of the Tiger (1957), and the World War II romance Another Time, Another Place (1958). He was widely praised for his performance as the dashing but deceitful Count Vronsky in Anna Karenina (1961)
Connery was the romantic lead in the musical fantasy adventure Darby O’Gill and the Little People (1959). In attendance for a screening of the film were the Broccolis, producers of the upcoming first Bond film.
Their notions were validated after a series of screen tests, and hence Sean Connery was cast in the role that made him a global superstar.
This move was much to the chagrin of Bond creator Ian Fleming, who had envisioned Bond in his own image of an upper-class Eton educated Englishman.
Fleming remarked, “I’m looking for Commander Bond and not an overgrown stuntman,” adding that Connery was “unrefined”. Fleming preferred the likes of David Niven or Roger Moore, to play his creation. Both men eventually went on the play James Bond.
But Fleming changed his mind upon meeting Connery and seeing him
bring 007 to life on the big screen. Fleming even wrote a half-Scottish ancestry for
Bond in his later books as a tribute to Connery's portrayal.
Connery credited his performance as 007 to Terence Young, who directed the first 007 films, Doctor No. Young took Connery under his wing to teach him the ways of the upper-class English gentry.
Connery was careful to retain his now trademark Scottish accent and all those his unique traits, Young merely polished the rough diamond. The result was Connery looked as comfortable in a Saville Row suit at the swanky baccarat clubs in London as he did battling thugs in the crowded gypsy settlement in Turkey.
Dr. No was a huge success and was followed by the equally successful From Russia with Love, one of the best entries in the series.
The
next in the series was Goldfinger, it was on a much grander scale than its
predecessors and the display of technical wizardry were spectacular. Connery
after two films had made the part his own with his blend of ruthlessness and
sardonic wit.
The results were remarkable, almost every aspect of Goldfinger from the music to the double entendre names of the leading lady became iconic. It established the formula for the Bond films, with megalomaniac
villains, spectacular stunts, majestic sets, beautiful Bond girls with
risqué names, gadgets, guns, and humor. At the center was Connery who was now
an undisputed global superstar.
But in addition to commercial success, the films also served as effective propaganda for the West during the Cold War era. Bond became a universal icon symbolizing the power and the benevolence of the West. The most effective way to influence minds is to slip the subtle message in an entertaining premise. It would not be an exaggeration to suggest that for regular people the narrative of the cold war was effectively shaped by these pictures and myriad other imitations.
While the Soviets and their allies were deranged, deviant, repressed, and crooked brutes perpetually downing vodka, Connery’s Bond was the virtuous patriot defending his country and its values while enjoying all the luxuries only afforded only through free-market capitalism.
This was aspirational to many irrespective of nationality, perhaps even those in the former Soviet Union. The Berlin Wall may have come down in 1991 but the films managed to transcend the walls to influence minds. A perfect instance of the effective usage of soft power.
It is also said that Connery’s popularity as Bond, along with the emergence of other actors from working-class backgrounds such as Michael Caine, Richard Burton,
and Peter O’Toole did a lot to thaw the ice-cold rigidity of the class
structure in England.
Connery’s superstardom and the fact that he proudly wore his Scottishness on his sleeve, also made him an enduring ambassador for Scotland. Many around the world think of Scotland synonymously with Connery. It wouldn't be unfair to say that Sir Sean is the most famous Scottish export alongside Scotch Whiskey.
During his time between the Bond films, Connery did Woman of Straw (1964) which had him conspiring to
inherit his disabled uncle’s wealth and Hitchcock’s Marnie (1964), where he
enters into a troubled marriage with the psychologically disturbed Marnie.
As Connery did his fourth Bond film Thunderball, which was a record-breaking blockbuster, he began to grow weary of the formulaic plots and limitations of the celluloid Bond. As the budgets grew he began to realize he was playing second fiddle to overwhelming technical wizardly.
Connery’s hunger for artistic challenges was satiated when he
played a defiant prison inmate of a British military prison camp in North
Africa in The Hill (1965). The character was complex and unlike anything he had
done before, he relished every moment of it and delivered an explosive but
heart-breaking performance.
By the late 60s, Connery felt he was underpaid for his Bond films compared to the handsome profits the films had generated. He also grew tired of the relentless media attention. By the time he did his fifth Bond film, You Only Live Twice(1967), Connery decided to hang up his Walther PPK forever, almost forever.
But as luck would have it, Connery’s replacement George Lazenby
quit after the release of his only Bond film, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
The film had also underperformed compared to the previous Connery Bond films. The producers terrified that the series may be in deep jeopardy went back to Connery
with Diamonds Are Forever (1971).
Connery was offered $1m and a promise from United Artists to
fund two films of his choice. Connery donated to his entire fee to setup up his
trust to help deprived Scottish children.
The film was a huge success, but Connery had vowed not to return. The excellent and amiable Roger Moore eventually took over as 007 and went on to make seven spectacular pictures that led the franchise to new heights of success.
Connery’s next was the blistering Nietzschean psychological drama The Offence (1973) where he played a police detective suffering from an almost debilitating PTSD owing to the relentless violence surrounding him. Connery flawlessly captured the deep agony and the anguish of his tortured character, it was almost like watching an implosion. Yet the heartbreaking melancholy of the character was retained making him both perpetrator and victim.
This was a career-best performance for Connery, right up there with the best of the best such as Pacino in Serpico or Brando in Streetcar or DeNiro in Taxi Driver. It should have earned Connery all the plaudits and awards. Alas, it was poorly marketed, leading it to be unreleased in several markets. The commercial failure meant that it was largely ignored during Award Seasons and at Festivals. That truly is a great shame.
In subsequent years, Connery was a mellowed Robin Hood opposite Audrey Hepburn as Marian in Richard Lester’s 1976 film Robin And Marian. He was a rebellious Arab chieftain who kidnaps an American widow almost causing a global armed conflict in The Wind and the Lion (1975).
Connery starred alongside his old friend Michael Caine as British Soldiers in search of adventure in the outstanding and underrated The Man Who Would Be King (1975).
There was the tale of forbidden love in another of Connery's underrated efforts, Five Days One Summer (1982).
All of these were morally ambiguous and not necessarily heroic characters, an emphatic departure from the 007.
Then in 1983, Connery gave into temptation and reprised the role that made him a superstar in the aptly titled Never Say Never Again (1983). The film was not part of the official Bond series, yet made its way to cinemas owing to a lawsuit lost by the producer of the official series.
Connery had always complained about the domination of technical wizardry in the later Bond films. Here he had an opportunity and the relative independence to explore the depths of the character while retaining the elements of action and adventure, the way it was eventually done with the Timothy Dalton and Daniel Craig films.
Alas, the opportunity was squandered and makers played it safe by mimicking the light-heartedness of Roger Moore's Bond films, making it seem like a lame unintended parody.
I didn't help that at 53, Connery was both out of touch and out of shape to play Bond. That very year, a few months before, Moore’s own Bond movie from the official Bond series, Octopussy, had released. The press called it ‘The Battle of the Bonds’.
While Moore was almost three years Connery’s senior, he was in better shape and spirit for the part at the time. Octopussy was a much better film with all the elements of the official series such as the gun barrel introduction and the signature theme.
Consequently, Octopussy outperformed Never Say Never Again at the box office. Connery never returned as 007, ever again, well, almost never again.
Connery then played a 14th-century detective attempting to solve a suspicious murder at a monastery in the riveting 1986 adaption of Umberto Eco’s novel The Name of the Rose.
When it was time to cast the father of Harrison Ford’s the
intrepid adventurer Indiana Jones, the makers Spielberg and Lucas turned to
Sean Connery who brought gravitas and humor to the role in Indiana Jones and
the Last Crusade (1989).
Connery then went on to play the stoic Russian submarine captain who defects to the west in pre-glasnost days in The Hunt for Red October (1990).
He was then laid back alcoholic publisher who is unwillingly drawn into a world of espionage and eventual falls for Michelle Pfeiffer in the adaptation of John Le Care’s The Russia House (1990), Connery delivered nuanced and restrained performance. The romance between Conney and Pfeiffer was beautiful and sensitive. But once again like The Offence, it was ignored by both critics and audiences.
Perhaps his superstardom and his association with a character like Bond caused critics and Award season voters not to treat him as seriously as perhaps Pacino or Brando?
His critics often complained that always retained his distinctive Scottish accent despite playing a Russian Submarine Captain, an Arab tribesman, King Arthur. He once explained in an interview with Michael Parkinson that his goal was always to get the emotions of the character right and that it was the emotions that were universal enough to connect with the audience.
Connery also played mentor to Wesley Snipes’s police detective in the murder mystery Rising Sun (1993).
Connery then played what could be a version of James Bond i.e. incarcerated former British Agent who assists a daring rescue operation in The Rock (1996), the film was a huge success and Connery was a scene-stealer.
He played an aging master thief in the exciting caper Entrapment (1999) that had him falling for Catherine Zeta-Jones. He was a reclusive author who mentors a budding writer in Finding Forrester (2000).
Then in 2003, Connery surprised everybody, when he announced his retirement from show business following the release of the enjoyable but muddled The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen aka LXG (2003), where he played an aging legendary hunter Allan Quartermain.
By
that time corporate houses taken over Hollywood. Connery had
struggled to steer the film in the direction he thought was right which led to
constant conflicts with the film’s director and the studio bosses. He went
on record that he was tired of dealing with ‘idiots’. This was an abrupt,
unremarkable, and somewhat sad ending to an extraordinary career.
But that was Connery, never relenting to pressure and always doing what he felt was right. Back in the 70s, he could have continued to played Bond for at least another decade and made many millions more. But he genuinely wanted to push himself as an actor, the mixed commercial and critical response didn’t matter. He could have carried on after LXG, with parts in the Lord of the Rings series and the Matrix, but he had made up his mind it was time to quit.
Then in 2005, Sir Sean returned as 007, no it wasn't a movie, it was a video game that used images of his younger likeness as James Bond while Connery did the voiceover, it had been twenty-two years since he had last played 007. For fans, this was almost like an opportunity to walk in the original James Bond's shoes.
His life beyond cinema was also not without controversies. In an
interview with Playboy Magazine in 1965, Sean Connery saying "I don't think there is anything
particularly wrong about hitting a woman, although I don't recommend doing it
in the same way that you'd hit a man. An open-handed slap is justified if all
other alternatives fail."
In December 1987 television interview with Barbara Walters, he reiterated his position from 1965 saying "I don't think it's good [to slap a woman], I don't think it's that bad. I think it depends entirely on the circumstances and if it merits it." In Vanity Fair in 1993, he said: “There are women who take it to the wire. That’s what they are looking for, the ultimate confrontation. They want a smack.”
His first wife Diane Cilento whom he divorced in 1973 claimed that
he struck her on several occasions, Connery vehemently denied the allegations.
But it is important to note that his female co-stars from Ursula
Andress from his first film Bond film to Catherine Zeta-Jones in his last romantic
film he praised him for being kind, generous, and a thorough gentleman. He
remained married to Micheline
Roquebrune, a French painter,
for 45 years. He eventually altered his stand when he said that no violence against women was acceptable.
Connery was a member of the Scottish National
Party (SNP) that has campaigned for Scottish independence from
the United Kingdom.
At 90 years of age, Connery has lived a great life, he has touched
the lives of many through his vast body of work and through his charitable
endeavors. It is important to celebrate his life rather than merely mourn his
passing.
Harrison Ford paid a perfect tribute to Sean Connery during his
AFI honor, "John Wayne gave us the old west, Jimmy Stewart gave us our
town, but you, Sean Connery, gave us the world."
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