Movies - The Man with the Golden Gun

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	Movies - The Man with the Golden Gun

The Man with the Golden Gun is the thirteenth and final James Bond novel written by Ian Fleming and published posthumously in the United Kingdom and the United States by Glidrose Productions, in 1965. It was followed a year later by Fleming's short story collection, Octopussy and The Living Daylights.

It is also the ninth official James Bond movie and the second to star Roger Moore as British Secret Service agent Commander James Bond. The Man with the Golden Gun was made by EON Productions and released in 1974. The film was produced by Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman and was the final Bond film to be co-produced by Saltzman as his partnership with Broccoli dissolved after the film's release. Saltman's 50% stake in EON Productions parent company, Danjaq, LLC was then purchased by United Artists. The resulting legalities over the Bond property delayed production of the next Bond film, The Spy Who Loved Me
for three years. The interval would be the longest break in the series until the six-year hiatus between Licence to Kill
in 1989 and GoldenEye
in 1995.

The novel

Plot summary

It has been nearly a year since James Bond disappeared, and was presumed dead during his mission to Japan. Then, a man claiming to be Bond appears in London and demands to see M. After much scrutinising and interrogation, the man's identity is confirmed, but during his debriefing interview with M, Bond tries to kill him with a cyanide pistol; the attempt fails.

Meanwhile, the British Secret Service have learned that after attacking Blofeld's castle in Japan (chronicled in You Only Live Twice
), Bond suffered a head injury and subsequent amnesia. After living as a Japanese fisherman for several months, Bond headed north, into the Soviet Union, to learn his true identity. While there, he was brainwashed and programmed to kill M on returning to England.

Now deprogrammed, Bond is eager to prove himself worthy of again being a 00 agent. M assigns him to Jamaica, to locate and gain the confidence of one Francisco (Paco) "Pistols" Scaramanga, an assassin, known as "the man with the golden gun", because of his golden .45 calibre revolver; Bond is assigned to kill him, because he killed several SIS agents.

In mid-assignment, Bond, who has managed to become Scaramanga's temporary personal assistant under the name of Mark Hazard, learns that Scaramanga is involved with a syndicate of American gangsters and the KGB, who are working several schemes, including the destabilisation of Western interests in the Caribbean's sugar industry, running drugs into America, smuggling women from Mexico into America and launching casinos in Jamaica. Initially unaware of Bond's presence in Jamaica, Felix Leiter has also been recalled to duty by the CIA and assigned to Scaramanga's hotel staff.

Bond kills Scaramanga during a train journey, with the assistance of Felix Leiter and his former secretary, Mary Goodnight, now assigned to the Kingston station of the Service. Leiter goes one step further and liquidates Scaramanga's gangster allies. In the process of all this, both Bond and Leiter are badly wounded, but they survive. Bond is offered a knighthood (KCMG — Bond already has CMG) for services past and present to Britain — but he turns it down because of his love for anonymity.

Trivia

The novel makes reference to events in the short story "The Property of a Lady", which had been published in a special Sotheby's Auction House publication the previous year. This reference would have been lost on the general public, however, who would not get to read the story until it appeared in the paperback edition of Octopussy and The Living Daylights in 1967.
Being the last James Bond novel by Ian Fleming, this is actually the first time M's full name, Admiral Sir Miles Messervy, is ever said. In previous novels, any reference to M's name had been censored by 'dashes'.

The controversy over the novel

The Man with the Golden Gun novel has been a controversial and speculative subject since its publication in 1965, the year after Ian Fleming died. Supposedly, since Fleming died before completing the final draft manuscript, speculation is that the novel was edited and finished by other writers before publication. Kingsley Amis often has received credit for either completing or editing The Man with the Golden Gun, but this has been denied by several sources, including Andrew Lycett in the biography Ian Fleming: The Man Behind James Bond, claiming Fleming had finished it and was subsequently read and edited only by Fleming's editor William Plomer. John Cork, co-author of James Bond, The Legacy (and producer of the documentaries included to the Special Edition DVD releases of the James Bond films) also claims that Fleming had finished it and that he, Cork, actually had seen the original un-edited typescript — although he admits Amis had read it and had offered ideas that were not implemented. The introduction to the Titan Books reprint edition of the Colonel Sun comic strip explicitly describes the Golden Gun manuscript as "unfinished" at Fleming's death, and credits Plomer with polishing it for publication; the book also supports Cork's account that Amis's involvement was restricted to unimplemented suggestions for the manuscript.

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Movies - The Man with the Golden Gun

The novel

Plot summary

Trivia

The controversy over the novel

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