The four stereotypes that defined the ‘Bond girl’ for decades: “I was handed a slim dossier”
Every long-running franchise in Hollywood has a strict set of rules, tropes, trappings, and archetypes that it adheres to with each new instalment. As one of the industry’s most monolithic, James Bond is no different, which hasn’t always been a good thing.
Just like a Mission: Impossible movie requires Tom Cruise to pull off a death-defying stunt, every chapter in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is obligated to feature a post-credits teaser of things to come, and Indiana Jones carries his signature fedora and whip combination; 007 has his own must-haves.
The secret agent will wear a tuxedo at some stage, he’ll more than likely drive an Aston Martin, he’ll order a martini that’s got to be shaken and not stirred, he’ll carry an assortment of gadgets dispatched by exposition master Q, and he’ll save the world from a villain who may or may not have a distinct physical characteristic and dwell in a secret lair of some description.
They’ve all been part and parcel of Bond’s world since 1962’s Dr No and no film in the series feels complete without them. However, the first three decades of 007’s globetrotting escapades were also defined by their poorly written and one-dimensional female characters, which turned out to be non-negotiable.
Plenty of former ‘Bond girls’ have gone on record voicing their dissatisfaction with how their characters were treated, not to mention how the legacy of being reduced to a notch on the protagonist’s bedpost affected their careers. It wasn’t until the Daniel Craig era that the paradigm definitively shifted for the better, matters that weren’t helped by writers being forced to adhere to four stereotypes.
Screenwriter Bruce Feirstein made his 007 debut by penning GoldenEye alongside Jeffrey Caine, and he’d stick around to write Tomorrow Never Dies solo before teaming with future stalwarts Neal Purvis and Robert Wade for The World Is Not Enough. When he first boarded the good ship Bond, though, he was surprised to discover there were certain limitations in place for the women.
“I first went to work on the Bond films in September 1994, writing the last draft of GoldenEye, Pierce Brosnan’s debut as 007,” he recalled to Vanity Fair. “At the time, I was handed a slim dossier (what else would you expect?) which detailed the four basic ‘Bond girl’ archetypes.”
That first of the quartet was ‘Angel with a Wing Down’; “an otherwise innocent woman (somehow connected to the villain) whom Bond usually saves.” There was also ‘Naive Beauty’, “an innocent woman caught up in the plot by accident, whom Bond always saves.”
‘Comrade in Arms’ was described as “a competent woman with whom Bond relucatantly joins forces and is then forced to save,” with the four being rounded out by ‘Villainous Vixen’; “a truly insane woman whom Bond sleeps with but never saves.” They were hardly the most well-realised or in-depth characters for a writer to work with, but that was how Bond wanted its women to be presented.
Hardly the most progressive parameters, but nonetheless indicative of how limiting the ‘Bond girl’ trope was from the Connery to Brosnan eras. Thankfully, things have changed for the better.
