In Casino Royale, Vesper Lynd is a foreign liaison agent from the HM Treasury's Financial Action Task Force assigned to make sure that Bond adequately manages the funds provided by MI6. However, she is secretly a double agent working for Quantum.
At first, Lynd is doubtful about Bonds ego and is hesitant to be his trophy at the poker game with Le Chiffre.
Her kidnapping by Le Chiffre causes Bond to give chase; they fall into Le Chiffre's trap, but both are saved by Quantum's majordomo, Mr. White, who shoots and kills Le Chiffre for betraying the trust of his organisation by misappropriating the funds.As in the novel, Bond and Vesper vacation, hoping to start a new life. Unknown to Bond, however, Lynd is still doing the bidding of Quantum. Despite complying with her orders to deliver the money, the thugs take her hostage when Bond confronts them, and lock her in an elevator while they do battle with him. After several explosions, the flooded building sinks, but Lynd resigns herself to a tragic end and locks herself in, even as Bond frantically tries to open the elevator. In her final gesture, she does not try to escape but she kisses Bond's hands to clear him of guilt, (an allusion to the earlier shower scene in which Bond had kissed hers to do the same for her). Bond finally gets her out and tries to revive her using CPR, to no avail.
Analysis:
The scene begins with non diegtic sound, which is fast at first to show the tension of the scene. However this changes, when Bond see’s Lynd, who is stuck in Le Chiffre’s trap. The music begins to fade away, as we begin to hear Lynd say “I’m sorry James.” The female representation, when Vesper says this, suggests Females are weak and inferior, as she is apologising to the male. However, is can also be suggested that she is powerful, because there is a close up of Bond crying for her, which makes him seem weak instead of her, as he is the dominant character in the film.
Vesper is portrayed as a beautiful female and an object of desire. This is reinforced by her elegant red dress, which shows her as attractive. It connotes love and danger, which can link to her job position, and how dangerous she is to Bond. This can be contrasted by the key lighting, focusing on her, which portrays her as innocent; this reinforced be her actions, as she has betrayed Bond, but has given herself up to save him. The close up on their faces, looking at each other, shows how much she means to him. Bond is willing to do anything to save her life, suggesting she is desirable.
The sound is mellow, when Lynd comes closer to Bond, when she kisses his hand. This is to show the love between the two characters; it also has illusions to a previous scene in the film, when he kisses her hand. This gives the film a sub genre of romance; however the main genre of the film is action, as it is a James Bond film. Therefore, the target audience of the film would be, males aged 16-35, of ABC1C2D class, and the secondary audience would be females aged 16-25. It would target these audiences, because the film has various appeals to each gender; Bond is seen in the film to be a object of female gaze (shown in the scene when he is in his trunks, coming out of the water) and Lynd is an object of male gaze, throughout the film. As a result, the film can agree with Laura Mulveys theory, of male gaze, but can also oppose it, as Bond is attracting to the female audience. Another scene, which reinforces this, is when Bond is nude, and is being beaten up by the enemy.
The scene follows the Proppien theory, of narrative roles. Bond is the lead character, who is the hero, and Lynd is seen to be the princess, who is being rescued. She is also presented as ‘the helper’ because she was initially there to help him. When he is doing CPR on her, implies he is saving her, and as he hold her, suggests she was stereotypically meant to be the ‘prize.’ Her role as the ‘helper’ is reinforced at the end of the scene, when he looks at her mobile phone, and see’s she has left him a message, giving him the details to where to find Mr White, the enemy. Propps enemy narrative theory is also supported in this scene, with the villain of the film present in the scene. He is looking down upon Bond and Lynd, as she is dead in his arms, suggesting he has 'won' but really has not as Lynd as left Bond clues as to where to find him.
As this is a Bond film the audience expectations are fulfilled. Bond is in trouble, along the way he finds a woman, and then saves the day, however, is subverted as his heart is broken. This follows Todorov’s narrative structure; the equilibrium at the beginning, when Bond is
doing his usual duty, but then there is a disruption, which causes him to fight, with a new equilibrium- he has to take revenge on Lynds killer.
This is presented as a patriarchal society, as the male (Bond) is in control, which is reinforced by the distribution methods form the institution. On the film poster, Bond is positioned at the front with a gun- reinforcing power and authority and Lynd is behind, in a fragile position, looking towards Bond, shows her as dependent on Bond.
No comments:
Post a Comment