TV Review: Fleming. The Man Who Would Be Bond (2014)

 Fleming. The Man Who Would Be Bond (2014) directed by Mat Whitecross

Ian Fleming (Dominic Cooper) has great ambitions but few accomplishments as World War II begins. He's failing at his stock broker job. His brother Peter (Rupert Evans) is a famous travel author who's had lots of fun adventures abroad. Ian lands a job with Naval Intelligence. His imagination gets a freer rein and he's able to lead a more free-wheeling lifestyle (which fits with his hedonistic tendencies). Many lovers pass through his bed though he has little interest in them as persons. The woman he truly wants is the more unreachable Ann O'Neill (Lara Pulver), who is married, well-connected, and a bit of a hedonist too. As Fleming hatches elaborate espionage plans, his romantic life gets more complicated. He's a bit hard nosed, though, not really loving women as much as himself. Fleming is insubordinate, even to his own mother (Lesley Manville). He is wily enough to dodge most problems and come out on top.

The show goes to great lengths to compare Fleming to his fiction creation James Bond. Fleming is a ladies' man with an aloofness and brutality toward his enemies. In the show, they go a little overboard depicting Fleming as bitter and cruel. Though he was accomplished, he was not very likeable, either to the characters in the story or to me as a viewer. Fleming gets the girl in the end though the circumstances are not at all convincing (it's not a spoiler to write about that because the show starts with them honeymooning in the Caribbean in 1953 and then flashing back thirteen years). The larger story of World War II and the supposed origins of Bond are more interesting, especially the Easter Eggs thrown in throughout for Bond fans.

The show is a mish-mash of good and bad elements with the bad weighing heavier.

Not recommended--just watch an actual Bond film, even the bad ones have more entertainment value than this does.