Daily Dialogue — September 21, 2017

“Shaken, not stirred.“

— Goldfinger (1964), written by Richard Maibaum & Paul Dehn, based upon the novel of Ian Fleming

The Daily Dialogue theme for the week: Bar. Today’s suggestion by Gisela Wehrl.

Trivia: The phrase first appears in the novel “Diamonds Are Forever” (1956), though Bond himself does not actually say it until “Dr. No” (1958), where his exact words are “shaken and not stirred.” In the film adaptations of Fleming’s novels, the phrase is first uttered by the villain, Dr. Julius No, when he offers the drink in “Dr. No” (1962), and it is not uttered by Bond himself (played by Sean Connery) until Goldfinger (1964). It is used in numerous Bond films thereafter with the notable exceptions of “You Only Live Twice” (1967), in which the drink is wrongly offered as “stirred, not shaken,” to Bond’s response “that’s right,” and “Casino Royale” (2006) in which Bond, after losing millions of dollars in a game of poker, is asked if he wants his martini shaken or stirred and snaps, “Do I look like I give a damn?“ The American Film Institute honored Goldfinger and the phrase on 21 July 2005 by ranking it #90 on a list of best movie quotes in the past 100 years of film.

Dialogue On Dialogue: Commentary by Gisela: “ I suppose you can hardly expect for anyone not to know this line. It’s a running joke within the Bond movies and I suppose bartenders couldn’t stand hearing these words, when someone orders a Martini. Technically it is not James Bond who it says it every time and more often he is not in or at a bar, when it is said. But there is in ice bar within an ice hotel in Die Another Day.