So there we were, motoring between tall hedges with the twin towers above their lonely beach playing peek-a-boo with us as we edged nearer to Reculver on the North Kent coast. "James Bond came down here in his Aston Martin DBIII in Moonraker" I said. "Really?" she replied, somewhat suspiciously. Quite rightly. Bond's visit was in Ian Fleming's Goldfinger (1959): He came up with a crossroads. To the left the signpost said RECULVER. Underneath was the ancient monument sign for Reculver church. Bond slowed, but didn't stop. We did, and spent a happy hour wandering about the gaunt ruins and beach, trying to avoid being in that other photographer's viewfinder. "Don't worry" he said, "I'll Photoshop you out". On the pub verandah later I mused: That's what people will say about me. "What happened to Peter Ashley?" "Oh, he got photoshopped out". Read more about the church here, read the original James Bond books to see just how much they contrast with the gadget laden later films. I really like them, and think I'll read Moonraker again, this time following Fleming's narrative in the right order, instead of backwards trying to find the word 'Reculver'.
4 comments:
Funny how 'He got photoshopped out' would once have meant something like, 'He spent too much of his money at Fox Talbot or the London Camera Exchange.' Back then, they'd have used the old cinema phrase, 'The Face on the Cutting Room Floor' to refer to one's elimination from photographic media. Now it's all virtual scissors and digital deletion.
But enough, already. Great photograph.
Thankyou Philip. I feel like I've been re-edited.
Of course reculver features in moonraker also. Perfectly understandable befuddlement.
Welcome back...I must regenerate too! Funny you should mention Ian Fleming and the Kent connection - whilst pottering around the country lanes at Petts Bottom (close to Canterbury) we happened upon a pub - The Duck; a blue plaque on the wall proclaimed that Ian Fleming wrote 'You only live twice' here in 1964. Was he a Kentish Man? or is it Man of Kent? I can never remember.
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