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Auric Goldfinger

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Auric Goldfinger
In-universe information
GenderMale
AffiliationCommunist China (film)
SMERSH (novel)
SPECTRE (GoldenEye: Rogue Agent)

Auric Goldfinger is a fictional character in the James Bond film and novel Goldfinger. His first name, Auric, is an adjective meaning of gold. Ian Fleming chose the name to commemorate the architect Ernő Goldfinger who had built his home in Hampstead next door to Fleming's; Fleming disliked Goldfinger's style of architecture and destruction of Victorian terraces and decided to name a memorable villain after him. According to a 1965 Forbes magazine article and The New York Times, the Goldfinger persona was based on gold mining magnate, Charles W. Engelhard, Jr. [1]

The name Auric refers to the one valence state of gold that allows chemical combination.

In 2003, the American Film Institute declared Auric Goldfinger the 49th greatest villain in the past 100 years of film. In a poll on IMDb, Auric Goldfinger was voted the most sinister James Bond villain, beating out in order Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Dr. No, Max Zorin, and Emilio Largo. [2]

Auric Goldfinger was played by Gert Fröbe. Goldfinger was banned in Israel after it was revealed that Fröbe had been a member of the Nazi party during the Second World War. The ban, however, was lifted many years later when a Jewish family publicly thanked Fröbe for protecting them from persecution during World War II.

Gert Fröbe, who did not speak English well, was dubbed in the film by Michael Collins, an English actor. Of his role as Goldfinger, Fröbe later remarked: "I am a big man, and I have a laugh to match my size. The ridiculous thing is that since I played Goldfinger in the James Bond film there are some people who still insist on seeing me as a cold, ruthless villain - a man without laughs."

Novel biography

In the novel, Auric Goldfinger is a 42 year-old expatriate who emigrated at age 20 in 1937 from Riga, Latvia. He is 5 feet tall, has blue eyes, red hair, and has a passion for his tan.

Goldfinger's name was borrowed from Ian Fleming's neighbor, architect Ernő Goldfinger, and his character bears some resemblance. Erno Goldfinger consulted his lawyers when the book was published, prompting Fleming to suggest renaming the character "Goldprick", but Goldfinger eventually settled out of court in return for his legal costs, six copies of the novel, and an agreement that the character's first name 'Auric' would always be used. Goldfinger is typically a German-Jewish name, and the protagonists of the novel know this, but neither Bond nor Mr. Du Pont think Goldfinger is Jewish. Instead, Bond pegs the red-haired, blue-eyed man as a Balt, and, indeed, Goldfinger proves an expatriate Latvian.

Now a UK commonwealth citizen naturalised to Nassau, he has become the richest man in England, though his wealth is not in English banks and he hasn't paid taxes on it. Rather, it is spread as bullion in many countries. Goldfinger is the treasurer of SMERSH, Bond's nemesis.

Goldfinger is obsessed with gold, going so far as to have yellow-bound erotic photographs, and have his women painted head to toe in gold so that he can make love to gold. (He leaves an area near the spine unpainted, but painting this area also is what kills Jill Masterton, as in the film). He is also a jeweller, a metallurgist, and a smuggler.

When Goldfinger first meets Bond in Miami, he claims that he is agoraphobic; a ploy to allow him to cheat a previous acquaintance of Bond's at a game of two-handed Canasta. Bond figures out how Goldfinger is managing this, and blackmails him by forcing him to admit his deception. Goldfinger is also an avid golfer, but is known at his club for being a smooth cheater there, also. When Bond contrives to play a match with Goldfinger, he again cheats the cheater by switching Goldfinger's Dunlop 1 golf ball with a Dunlop 7 he had found while playing.

Goldfinger is the owner of "Enterprises Auric A.G." in Switzerland, maker of metal furniture, which is purchased by many airlines including Air India. Twice a year, Goldfinger drives his vintage Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost car from England to Enterprises Auric. Bond learns that Goldfinger makes dead drops of gold bars for SMERSH along the way, and that his car's bodywork is 18 carat (75%), solid white gold under the ploy that the added weight is armour plating. Once at Enterprises Auric, his car is stripped down, melted and made into seating for an airline company that Enterprises Auric is heavily invested in. The plane(s) are then flown to India where the seats are melted down again into gold bars and sold for a much higher premium rate; 100 to 200% profit.

Operation Grand Slam

Goldfinger during "Operation Grand Slam".

"Operation Grand Slam" is Goldfinger's codename for his scheme that involves "knocking off" the U.S. Bullion Depository at Fort Knox, Kentucky. Through the use of a nerve agent (GB, also known as Sarin), Goldfinger plans to poison the water supply at Fort Knox, killing everyone at the base. From there, Goldfinger would use an atomic warhead designed for a Corporal Intermediate Range Guided Missile that he had purchased for one million USD in Germany, to blow open Fort Knox's impregnable vault. With the help of American gangsters, Goldfinger would then remove roughly 15 billion dollars in gold bullion by truck and train, and escape to the Soviet Union on a cargo boat.

After publication of the novel, the details of "Operation Grand Slam" were questioned, with critics noting it would have taken hours if not days to remove 15 billion dollars from Fort Knox, during which the U.S. Army would inevitably intervene. The issue of getting every soldier on the base to drink the poisoned water without an alarm was also raised. A final problem that was the "clean" atomic bomb, tactical or not, in all likelihood would not only have annihilated the door vault, but would also have taken all the gold behind with it. (Careful placement would be needed.)

Consequently, the film uses a different plan: The bomb is dirty, and the destruction and contamination of the gold is the objective, so that the value of Goldfinger's own gold would increase tenfold. The film even points out a couple of the flaws in the novel's original plan during a confrontation between Goldfinger and Bond.

Bond foils Goldfinger's plan by getting word to Felix Leiter of the impending operation, by means of a message taped inside an airliner toilet. With the help of The Pentagon, Leiter is able to stop Goldfinger and foil the operation. But Goldfinger escapes.

Conclusion

Later, Goldfinger and his henchman learn from SMERSH who Bond is, and determine to take him with them in defecting to the Soviet Union. They pose as doctors to incapacitate crew and passengers (including Bond) with drugged inoculations. Then they hijack the BOAC Stratocruiser, carrying Goldfinger's total savings of gold. The hijacked plane is headed for Soviet Union airspace. In the novel, Goldfinger's henchman Oddjob meets his end by being sucked through an airliner window after Bond pierces it with a knife. Goldfinger then attacks James Bond by kicking him. Bond and Goldfinger have a brief struggle, which Bond ends, after being described as "going berserk" for the first time in his life, by strangling Goldfinger to death by hand. Bond then turns to the pilots and forces the airplane to turn back from its intended flightpath, and this causes it to ditch in the ocean after running out of fuel. The airplane sinks rapidly due to its payload of gold, and Bond and Pussy Galore are the only survivors.

Henchmen

Associates

In addition to Henchmen, Goldfinger enlisted the help of several American gangsters:

  • Helmut M. Springer — The Purple Gang (Detroit) (This gang is not fictional, but existed historically).
Mr. Springer backed out of the deal and did not participate in Goldfinger's Operation Grand Slam. Moments later, Mr. Springer had an "accident", falling down the staircase as he was leaving. In fact, he and his bodyguard are killed by Oddjob.
  • Jed Midnight — Shadow Syndicate (Miami, Havana)
  • Billy (The Grinner) Ring — The Machine (Chicago)
  • Jack Strap — The Spangled Mob (Las Vegas); see Diamonds Are Forever
  • Mr. Solo — Unione Siciliano (the Mafia)
  • Miss Pussy Galore — The Cement Mixers (Harlem, New York City) The Cement Mixers had previously been a band of all-female acrobats headed by trapeze artist Pussy Galore, called Pussy Galore and the Abrocats. When their act failed, they had become cat-burglars. Pussy in Fleming's novel is openly lesbian, but is ultimately seduced by Bond.

Goldfingerisms from the novel

  • Money is an effective winding sheet.
  • The safest way to double your money is to fold it twice and put it in your pocket.
  • Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action. (Attributed as a saying in Chicago, and used in three sections also as titles for the novel's three main sections).
  • I have had many enemies in my time. I am very successful and immensely rich, and riches, if I may inflict another of my aphorisms upon you, may not make you friends but they greatly increase the class and variety of your enemies.

Novel trivia

  • Goldfinger fancies himself an expert pistol shot who never misses, and always shoots his opponents through the right eye. He tells Bond he has done so with four mob heads at the end of the novel. This is reminiscent of the Bugsy Siegel shooting and the "Moe Green special" shooting in The Godfather.
  • Goldfinger's Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost of the novel is particularly appropriate for a personal armoured car with white-gold armour, as some of this model was converted to the Rolls-Royce Armoured Car during and after W.W. I.
  • In the novel, Bond snoops in Goldfinger's house and finds himself being filmed. He exposes the film and frames Goldfinger's ginger cat for the deed (even Goldfinger's pets are yellow). Goldfinger returns and punishes Bond by openly giving Oddjob the cat to eat for dinner (commenting later that "curiosity killed the cat.") Oddjob demonstrates his lethal metal rimmed Bowler hat for Bond on a piece of wood, while holding the hapless cat under the other arm.
  • The airplane which undergoes explosive decompression in the novel is a Boeing 377 Stratocruiser with a service ceiling of 32,000 ft.
  • In the film's famous scene, a laser replaces the novel's metal-cutting buzzsaw. Bond is also put to torture at the same time, as Oddjob works his pressure points. Dialogue ommitted in the film:
Bond: (politely) "Then you can go and --- yourself." [word omitted in the novel]
Goldfinger: "Even I am not capable of that, Mr. Bond."

Film biography

Arguably the most famous James Bond villain in any film, Goldfinger's obsession is gold. Goldfinger is a gold smuggler, accomplishing this feat by having a car built with gold body castings and transporting it via airplane. Once the car arrives at its destination, Goldfinger has the body-work re-smelted. Goldfinger is also an avid golfer who plays with a Slazenger 1 golf ball (changed from a Dunlop in the novel presumably for legal reasons). He is defeated, however, when he is tricked by Bond after attempting to cheat.

File:007Goldfingerlaserclassic.jpg
Goldfinger with Bond in one of the film most famous scenes.

Auric Goldfinger owns many properties throughout the world including "Auric Enterprises, AG", which is the headquarters for most of his smuggling operations. Located in Switzerland, it is where Bond nearly gets cut in half by an industrial laser when Goldfinger has him bound to a table. "Choose your next witticism carefully, Mr. Bond; it may be your last."

The film also contains what is considered one of the most famous exchanges between Bond and a villain:

Bond: Do you expect me to talk?
Goldfinger: No, Mr. Bond. I expect you to die!

Goldfinger also owns a stud-farm in Kentucky called "Auric Stud".

In the film, Goldfinger’s ethnicity is Teutonic, given Gert Fröbe's heavy German accent (which required dubbing) and dyed red-blond hair. Fröbe was chosen as the villain because producers Saltzman and Broccoli had seen his performance in a German thriller titled Es geschah am hellichten Tag (It happened in broad daylight, 1958), which is based on the story Das Versprechen (The Pledge), by Friedrich Dürrenmatt. In that film, Fröbe was a psychopathic serial killer named Schrott, who vents his frustrations with his dominating wife against children. Broccoli and Saltzman had seen the movie and decided upon the 'big bad German' for the role. In the film, a new Goldfinger fascination with Nazi gold history is revealed when Bond tempts him to betting high stakes against a lost, historical Nazi gold bar, an incident not in the novel (the golf game is merely for a large amount of cash).

Last Words: (After Bond asks about Pussy) Goldfinger: "I will deal with her... later. At the moment she is where she ought to be... At the controls-"

Scheme

Goldfinger's film scheme, codenamed "Operation Grand Slam", involves breaking into the U.S. Bullion Depository at Fort Knox, penetrating the main storage building with the high powered laser, and detonating a "dirty" nuclear weapon inside, thus contaminating the United States gold reserve and thereby dramatically increasing the value of his gold holdings.

Death

After his plan to contaminate the gold is thwarted, Goldfinger kidnaps Bond and plans to take his vengeance before fleeing to Cuba. During a struggle aboard an airplane, his golden pistol goes off and shatters a window. In the fate suffered by his henchman Oddjob in the novel, he is sucked out to his death.

Henchmen

Goldfinger's golden motifs

  • In the novel Goldfinger has a yellow-jacketed pornographic book and gold-painted prostitutes, a yellow-painted car, yellow briefs for sunbathing, a blonde secretary, and a ginger-colored cat (which is eaten by Oddjob). He employs Korean servants who are repeatedly referred to as "yellow-faced." The film keeps the color of auto and secretary’s hair, but not the other insensitive or vulgar material. In compensation, the film adds many similar motifs by making Goldfinger's female henchmen (henchwomen?) in the film (save his jet stewardess) red-blonde, or blonde, including Pussy and all of her crew (both Tilly and Pussy specifically have black hair in the novel). Goldfinger also sports yellow or golden items of clothing in every film scene, including a golden pistol when disguised as a Colonel. Goldfinger's factory henchmen in the film wear yellow sashes, Pussy at one point wears a metallic gold vest (as does stewardess Mei-Lei), and Pussy's pilots wear yellow sunburst insignia on their uniforms. A bit of Goldfinger's homage to gold ("I love its color, its brilliance, its divine heaviness.") is one of few dialogue lines from the novel to be kept relatively intact in the film.
  • In the novel, Goldfinger may even eat and drink gold. At his house, Goldfinger and Bond dine on cheese soufflé, and curry (which in pre-1970 Britain referred to a dish colored yellow with turmeric; see British section in curry), and Bond drinks Piesporter Goldtröpfchen wine (named for town and vineyard, but like all white wines, gold in color).

See also

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