Kathryn Bigelow touted for Bond 23 director`s chair by Empire

Empire Magazine are touting Kathryn Bigelow to become the first female director in the James Bond series by recommending her for the 23rd 007 outing. Their argument for Bigelow was posted on their blog today:

Ten directors have hollered “Action” on a James Bond picture.

And in 47 years and 22 movies, they’ve all been blokes. In the equal opportunity 21st century, this begs a question: isn’t it time Bond was directed by a bird?*

Bond 23 is two years away. Regular writers Neal Purvis and Robert Wade have been hired alongside Frost/Nixon scribe Peter Morgan to craft a suitably incendiary, continent-hopping action adventure.

No director is attached. Used to be, they’d return for repeat business, but in the last two decades only Martin Campbell has sat in the Big Chair twice.

John Glen holds the record, with five, and it’s 20 years to the week since his last outing, Licence To Kill, opened – nearly slaying Britain’s best-loved filmmaking series.

The film itself is somewhat underrated: it’s a tense enough thriller and, hair aside, Dalton wasn’t a bad Bond. He was just a terribly grave one... all frowns and angst and inner turmoil. Daniel Craig take note: Bond needs to have fun.

So, discount the rumours which suggest Bond 23 will have a drug-themed plot, with 007 returning to Afghanistan for the first time since Dalton’s debut, The Living Daylights. It would be spectacularly ill-advised, given the real-world carnage over there, and Bond producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson are not idiots.

Taste aside, they should also remember the lesson of 007’s screen history: don’t take Bond too seriously for too long.

Quantum Of Solace came close to navel-gazing on occasion and the iconic spy needs to become full-blooded again and not just through the odd one-liner – actions speak louder than words. The true Bond is professional, pathological and hedonistic: he adores his work.

So, if he’s to be brash, rash and go ballistic once again, why give the megaphone to a woman? Because the woman is Kathryn Bigelow and with The Hurt Locker she shows she knows what Bond is all about: adrenaline.

Yes, her eighth feature is set in Iraq, but it’s not an Iraq War movie – another of those worthy, sombre lectures masquerading as entertainment. Instead, it’s about a man – Jeremy Renner’s bomb disposal expert – obsessed by his job, addicted to his job.

The opening caption – quoting war reporter Chris Hedges, reads: “War is a drug”. And The Hurt Locker is a one long high: set-piece after set-piece, bomb by bomb, always explosive. This is what Bond is supposed to be.

And while Bigelow doesn’t endorse being hooked to an endorphin-rush, she understands it. Any political or moral comment in The Hurt Locker is implied, not preached. This is what Bond needs.

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