We have a friend, David Andrew. Bored with what he regarded as a plain dull first name he decided to change the name David to something far more exotic. Unfortunately he chose the name of his all-time favourite popstar, Prince, and ever since his life over the past few years has been tabloid hell. But it’s a different matter for those born with the name of a more famous by another. Such was the case of real life bird book author and ornithologist James Bond whose name Ian Fleming took and used for his books about the super spy. He was The Other Fellow and director Matthew Bauer has taken the concept of those whose name is also James Bond in his debut documentary.
There is clearly no end of people who share the same name and this could make a very dull film if it just featured James Bond the civil servant, the accountant or whatever with no story to tell. What Bauer has done though is find several men with the same name with incredible stories. So we have the theatre director irritated that about the stupid comments when people know his name asking him amongst other things, how many women he beds, a question he finds truly galling and immediately stonewalls any further questions after he informs them that he is gay. Or there’s the American black man who found himself serving 60 days after being stopped by a cop who disbelieved that Bond was his actual name and it got worse when he was wanted for murder and yet another James Bond who lived in the same city found what he thought was himself all over the local news. But they get more bizarre….there’s the elderly Swedish man who lost his father during the WWII and adopted the Bond name, assumed the mantle of actually being the super spy, living the life and runs a James Bond museum. That this story includes some footage of him showing a class of school kids around his museum of genuine Bond memorabilia as one of the kids gives the camera a bit of side eye says it all. It’s the sort of look not seen since Prince Andrew’s told his staff, ‘Well, that went well’ after the Emily Maitlis interview.
But by far the best story and one that turns the film into far darker territory is that of a woman, the victim of terrible domestic violence, who changed her son’s name to James Bond. Under normal circumstances this might be seen as some sort of child cruelty akin to Amanda Holden parents telling her that she should go into acting. But here the reason is a quite brilliant bit of thinking and turns her story an empowering one making it the standout moment of what is a highly entertaining documentary
related feature: How they made the James Bond Olympic sequence with The Queen
related feature: Ian Ogilvy chats to us about being approached to play Bond
Here’s director Matthew Bauer at the premiere along with several James Bond’s talking about the making of The Other Fellow and answering audience questions….
Here’s The Other Fellow documentary…..
