Grand Slam (Goldfinger, 1964)

So Goldfinger’s going to break into the world’s largest bank, but not to steal anything. Why?

Something suddenly clicks with Bond. Mr Ling, the Chinese man Bond saw in Switzerland, is known to Bond as an expert in nuclear fission. Bond realises the implications of this: Goldfinger has acquired a nuclear bomb. He’s going to detonate it inside Fort Knox, irradiating the gold supply of the United States for the next fifty-eight years. This will cause the value of Goldfinger’s own gold supply to increase tenfold.

Bond, in spite of himself, is impressed at Goldfinger’s genius. Goldfinger then warns Bond that if he makes any attempt to alert the authorities, Goldfinger will instead set off the bomb at a random – but significant – location. However, he is confident that Operation Grand Slam will succeed, and guarantees Bond a front-row seat.

At this point, Oddjob returns with the pickup. Goldfinger asks to be excused, as he has to separate his gold from Mr Solo. Bond looks crushed as he realises what Goldfinger meant when he said Solo had a “pressing engagement”. His attempt to smuggle a note out to Felix has failed horribly. As Goldfinger heads off, Pussy turns up in a considerably more revealing outfit.

She has suddenly become a lot friendlier to Bond, and leads him away. Leiter, seeing Bond walk off arm-in-arm with a lady, is convinced that Bond has control of the situation. Goldfinger’s ruse has worked.

Bond and Pussy wander over to a barn. Bond tells her that Goldfinger is quite mad, and she seems to be slightly concerned. Bond leads her inside. Leiter has seen all he needs to see, and leaves to report that everything is fine.

Inside the barn, Bond turns on the charm, but now that they’re in private, Pussy drops her nice-girl act and returns to being her usual self. Bond isn’t giving up, and they end up engaging in a brief struggle. Ultimately, they end up in the hay together, at which point Bond forces himself on Pussy.

Yes, although it wouldn’t have been seen as such at the time, Bond pretty much rapes her. She succumbs to his force pretty quickly, and ends up embracing him. This is all kinds of wrong, especially if you consider Pussy to be a lesbian, as it means Bond “converts” her from the ways of cement mixing, which makes the situation worse. So, even though this is a PG film, it features Bond raping the lesbian, Pussy. And yes, I structured that sentence so it contained the phrase “raping the lesbian pussy”, which should bring some very interesting site traffic.

A new day dawns, and signals the commencement of Operation Grand Slam. The whole thing is accompanied by this epic music, and I invite you to listen to it while you’re reading to get the full effect.

The Flying Circus takes off and flies in formation to Fort Knox. As planned, they release the nerve gas and swoop down over the area. All over the place, people drop to the ground. The pilots do a thorough job, ensuring that no-one is left standing. Soon, the entire area is littered with bodies.

Goldfinger’s men are standing by. When the pilots give them the signal, they all don gas masks, including Bond, who finds himself handcuffed to Oddjob. The convoy of trucks moves in. They drive past numerous scenes of destruction, and various bodies scattered about the place, including a familiar face:

Felix, it seems, was aware of Goldfinger’s plan, and was unfortunately present when the gas was dispersed. Bond has just run out of allies.

The trucks pull up to the fence at the front of Fort Knox. Kisch uses a spectrometer to determine that the air is safe, and signals to everyone to remove their gas masks. Goldfinger’s men get to work laying the dynamite along the gate. They step back and boom! They’re in.

The trucks pull up to the heavily-armoured front door. Not a problem for them, though; the back of one of the trucks opens up to reveal the laser that had previously threatened Bond’s manhood. They use this to cut through the door and gain access.

At this point, a helicopter arrives. It’s Goldfinger. And he’s brought the bomb with him.

Goldfinger is in an upbeat mood. Pussy is in the helicopter, having piloted it. She gives Bond a look of concern.

The bomb is wheeled inside the building, where Mr Ling activates it. The countdown begins. Bond is running out of time.

Outside Fort Knox, a device suddenly springs to life – and then all of the “bodies” do the same. Everyone, including Felix, was faking it. And their detector has just confirmed that the bomb is on-site, and active. It’s time for the cavalry to move in.

The doors to the actual vault are opened. Goldfinger, Bond, Oddjob and Kisch all move inside, along with the bomb. They take a look around. The inside is a veritable palace of gold.

Goldfinger is evidently in heaven, and looks slightly sad that he can’t take it with him. Bond has much greater causes for concern, as Kisch handcuffs him to the bomb and places the key in his breast pocket. Oh dear. “Goodbye, Mr Bond,” Goldfinger says, as Bond is sent via lift to the lowest level of the vault. Goldfinger departs. Oh dear.

 Bond immediately gets to work trying to figure out how to stop the bomb. Outside, the good guys show up, and begin a battle against Goldfinger’s men. Goldfinger panics, but he’s not giving up without a fight. He runs to the control room and closes the door to the vault. He then takes off his coat to reveal that he’s wearing a US Army General’s uniform. Goldfinger really has prepared for everything. He’s evil, murderous and crazy, sure, but he’s also a magnificent bastard.

Goldfinger whips out his gun, a gold-plated revolver. A man with a golden gun? What a silly idea. As American soldiers burst in, Goldfinger adds another name to the list of people he’s betrayed, by ruthlessly gunning down Mr Ling.

This temporarily fools the soldiers into thinking he’s on their side, and he takes the opportunity to grab a machine gun and mow them down. Goldfinger flees.

Inside the vault, Kisch is a little concerned at having been locked in with the nuclear bomb. He’s going to defuse it, but Oddjob, being a hell of a lot more loyal to his boss, stands in his way. Kisch objects and Oddjob tosses him over the railing for his troubles. Kisch falls all the way to the lowest level and is killed.

Bond, remembering that the key to the handcuffs is in his top pocket, begins to make his way over to the body, dragging the bomb behind him. Realising this, Oddjob begins making his way down.

Bond grabs the key, and immediately ducks as Oddjob’s hat zooms past. He hastily unlocks the handcuffs just as Oddjob arrives on the lowest level.

Oddjob grabs his hat and throws it again. It narrowly misses Bond and instead severs a power cable. The cable falls to the ground, sparks pouring out of it.

Bond returns fire with a gold ingot. It bounces off Oddjob’s chest with no effect. The two then engage in a fist fight, with Oddjob proving himself to be nigh-invincible. And all the while, the timer is ticking down.

Finally, Oddjob throws Bond across the room, and he lands in the vicinity of the sparking cable – and Oddjob’s deadly hat. Bond grabs the hat and, for the first time in the fight, a look of concern crosses Oddjob’s face. The two men circle warily. Then Bond takes aim and flings the hat.

Clang! The hat misses, and lodges itself in between the bars protecting the gold. With a grin, Oddjob turns and walks over to it.

Like lightning, Bond throws himself over to the severed cable. He grabs it just as Oddjob grasps the steel-rimmed hat. Bond touches the cable to the metal bars and:

With an explosion of smoke and sparks, Oddjob is electrocuted and falls to the ground, dead. Bond has no time to celebrate, however, as there’s still the matter of the atomic bomb that’s about to go off.

He races over and sees that he has less than a minute before it detonates. Using two gold bars, he is able to force the casing open, but is utterly confused by what he sees.

Upstairs, Leiter and co. have arrived and open the door to the vault. They begin to race down to Bond as he tries to figure out how to stop it. With only ten seconds to go, he figures he might as well try something, anything. He grabs a random cable and prepares to yank it out.

Before he can, a hand reaches past and stops him. It then flicks a small switch and the timer stops.

Naturally, it stops at 0:07. But of course. The hand is revealed to belong to one of the men with Felix: a bomb technician. “What kept you?” Bond asks dryly, looking somewhat shaken. Goldfinger came within a few seconds of succeeding.

Felix runs over and asks where Oddjob is. “He blew a fuse,” Bond replies. Oh Bond, you card!

He asks about Goldfinger, only to be told that he has escaped. Felix also reveals that Pussy was the one that contacted the government and warned them about Goldfinger’s plan, and also that she switched the Delta 9 for a harmless gas. Felix asks why she might have done this. “I must have appealed to her maternal instincts,” Bond replies, opting not to go for “I raped the lesbian out of her and banged her over to the side of good.”

Mission accomplished, Bond is being flown to the White House on a private jet. Apparently, the President himself wants to thank Bond in person.

Bond is relaxing in the cabin when he gets an unwelcome surprise: Goldfinger is on board, and he’s pissed.

Goldfinger has hijacked the plane, replacing the pilots with Pussy and himself. He plans to fly to Cuba, and will get his revenge on Bond to boot. Bond tries to act casual as Goldfinger cocks his revolver. He tells him that, as he told Pussy, it’s dangerous to fire a gun on a plane. He asks where she is and Goldfinger gestures to the cockpit.

Bond uses the momentary distraction to dive into Goldfinger. The two of them wrestle. After a few moments, the revolver goes off and takes out a window. The cabin depressurises. Bond quickly grabs a ledge, but Goldfinger is not so lucky: he is sucked out the window of the plane. The fact that it’s a small window, and that he is a somewhat rotund individual, causes him to get momentarily stuck, before he’s sucked out into oblivion.

The plane begins to plummet downwards. It falls far enough for the cabin pressure to return to more-or-less normal, and Bond rushes to the cockpit. Pussy is unsuccessfully trying to pull the plane out of its nosedive. Bond tells her that Goldfinger’s dead. Unfortunately, it looks like they’re about to meet with the same fate.

Back on the ground, Felix and co. have discovered the hijacking, and are following the progress of the falling plane on radar. Shortly before it crashes, a smaller signal falls away from it. It looks like Bond and Pussy have parachuted out.

The plane then reaches ground level, and crashes into the sea. It then explodes, because why the hell not?

Later, Felix is flying over a forest, looking for Bond and Pussy. They have indeed survived, and Pussy attempts to signal to Felix, but Bond pulls her to the ground, telling her “This is no time to be rescued!”.

So saying, he kisses her, and throws the parachute over them. Pussy is a willing participant this time, showing that Bond’s sexual prowess is so good, even lesbians will turn for him.

Now do you see why this is where the Bond films really took off? It is an epic film, with all the hallmarks of the Bond series present. Goldfinger is a fantastically evil and clever villain, Oddjob is the ultimate invincible henchmen, and Pussy is an intelligent and useful Bond girl. The theme is awesome, the gadgets are great, and the climax is tense. The only fault is that Bond himself doesn’t really have much impact on the plot. The only thing he contributed to stopping Operation Grand Slam was raping Pussy. Apart from that, he was pretty much carried along by the events of the plot. It’s a minor fault though, and this film forever defined how the Bond films would be presented. Goldfinger made a shitload of money; however, it’s the next one that will really bring in the cash.

JAMES BOND WILL RETURN IN

THUNDERBALL

For cast and crew details, check here

Screencaps courtesy of screenmusings.org