Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Entertainment/2021 May 2
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May 2
editFemale James Bond?
editAre there any movies (especially, but not necessarily, from the Cold War era) where the protagonist is a secret agent similar to James Bond 007 in every way possible, but female (and not necessarily British)? 2601:646:8A01:B180:5063:99C7:C7F6:AAF2 (talk) 07:39, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- Does the Avengers TV series from the 1960s count? 173.228.123.166 (talk) 08:37, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- At one point in the earlier seasons of The Avengers, the opening title sequence explicitly identified Mrs. Peel as a "talented amateur", which contrasts with the professional James Bond. I don't know about Steed's other assistants over time, though. --184.147.181.129 (talk) 20:03, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- You might want to scan the list at Spy film, which lists, for example, Carve Her Name with Pride and Odette (1950 film). I have in wartime,n't seen either of those so I don't know how close they come to Bond.--Shantavira|feed me 08:35, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- Carve Her Name with Pride is about WW2 Special Operations Executive operative Violette Szabo who also described in the memoir Between Silk and Cyanide. I hadn't heard of the movie but it sounds interesting. 173.228.123.166 (talk) 08:41, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- And Odette was also a real-life SOE wartime spy. Life in the SOE was something very different from James Bond's adventures. --184.147.181.129 (talk) 20:03, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- Speaking of which, Ian Fleming also worked for SOE during the war, where he proposed what (after changing in some details) became Operation Mincemeat. Real-life SOE may not have been like a Bond adventure but Bond seems to have taken at least some inspiration from SOE. 173.228.123.166 (talk) 04:43, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
- And Odette was also a real-life SOE wartime spy. Life in the SOE was something very different from James Bond's adventures. --184.147.181.129 (talk) 20:03, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- Carve Her Name with Pride is about WW2 Special Operations Executive operative Violette Szabo who also described in the memoir Between Silk and Cyanide. I hadn't heard of the movie but it sounds interesting. 173.228.123.166 (talk) 08:41, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- There's a useful list here. --Viennese Waltz 12:04, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- If a character is too similar to a character owned by somebody else then you risk being sued so it's limited how closely James Bond can be mimicked. But there are many badass female film spies. PrimeHunter (talk) 14:38, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- La Femme Nikita, though more of an assassin than a spy. Clarityfiend (talk) 00:34, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks, everyone! By "similar to James Bond", I meant first and foremost that (1) the spy in question participates in direct-action missions (sabotage, assassination, etc.), not only intelligence-gathering, (2) she shows a fair degree of upper-class/upper-middle-class refinement (so Nikita fails on this count, she's much too uncouth), and (3) a significant part of her career takes place during the Cold War (on either side, or possibly even on both sides in turn -- although, TBH, it's unlikely that a Soviet agent would fit the second criteria, thanks to the marxist ideals of a classless society, not to mention decades of centrally planned austerity). 2601:646:8A01:B180:F98F:89E0:AF24:232 (talk) 09:50, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
- There was what some might consider a disconnect between the Marxist ideals and the reality of Soviet society. --Lambiam 11:57, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
- Even so, KGB field agents were decidedly not part of the nomenklatura (literally the "big names"), so they were still subject to the austerity measures (although not to the same extent as the common folks) -- and, more importantly, since they often came from working-class backgrounds (because upper-class and middle-class people were usually not trusted), they didn't have the upper-class refinement that James Bond or Emma Peel had. (Solzhenitsyn described this in some detail in the Gulag Archipelago -- according to him, KGB agents often had a lot of money (not only due to their high pay, but often from theft, extortion, etc., and after World War 2 also from their share of war booty), but very little taste!) 2601:646:8A01:B180:44D4:3A5C:5FE7:82B4 (talk) 03:19, 5 May 2021 (UTC)
- There was what some might consider a disconnect between the Marxist ideals and the reality of Soviet society. --Lambiam 11:57, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
- Thanks, everyone! By "similar to James Bond", I meant first and foremost that (1) the spy in question participates in direct-action missions (sabotage, assassination, etc.), not only intelligence-gathering, (2) she shows a fair degree of upper-class/upper-middle-class refinement (so Nikita fails on this count, she's much too uncouth), and (3) a significant part of her career takes place during the Cold War (on either side, or possibly even on both sides in turn -- although, TBH, it's unlikely that a Soviet agent would fit the second criteria, thanks to the marxist ideals of a classless society, not to mention decades of centrally planned austerity). 2601:646:8A01:B180:F98F:89E0:AF24:232 (talk) 09:50, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
- Atomic Blonde is set in pre-1989 fall-of-Berlin Wall Europe, and features a female MI6 agent. Salt centers around a female CIA agent. --Jayron32 13:17, 3 May 2021 (UTC)
Bernie Pollack
editWhy isn’t Bermie Pollack, the brother of Sydney Pollack in/ on Wikipedia? -- 2600:1700:FBE1:14F0:80CD:8524:C23F:72FA
- Because you haven't created an article for him yet. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 09:30, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- (Courtesy link: Sydney Pollack). Bernie is mentioned in Sydney's article, but a cursory websearch doesn't show me any substantial material about him that's from independent and reliable sources upon which a Wikipedia article could be based: most hits are on sites like IMDb which, being user generated, cannot contribute towards Notability. It's possible that a deeper and more informed search could turn up sufficient suitable sources, as could searches in (for example) Film industry journals that might not be online, or might be online but not accessible to web crawlers.
- Remember, mere information that a particular person existed and performed a job (presumably) competently (shown by for example, being included in film crew lists) is not sufficient by itself to merit a Wikipedia article: they have to have been written (or talked about) about at some length on several occasions by people entirely unconnected with them (which eliminates their own writings, material by family and friends, interviews, press releases and the like), and the resulting material has to have been published by an organisation with good editorial standards (which includes checking the facts involved before publication). Such material doesn't have to be accessible online – that's just an added convenience that makes our task easier. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.200.135.95 (talk) 17:18, 2 May 2021 (UTC)
- In 2012, Bernie Pollack received an award for Career Achievement in Costume Design from the Dallas International Film Festival, called a "Dallas Star Award" in the festival's press release.[1] (Watch him being interviewed on the occasion on YouTube: [2].) Under WP:ANYBIO, this makes him "likely to be notable". But I do not see enough material online for more than a stub, which could include a filmography. --Lambiam 11:46, 3 May 2021 (UTC)