Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

May Swenson?s "The James Bond Movie" is a sharp, satirical commentary on spectacle, gender roles, and the absurdities of cinema, particularly within the context of the hyper-stylized, male-dominated James Bond franchise. Swenson masterfully juxtaposes the sensory immediacy of the viewer?s experience with the exaggerated unreality of the film, creating a layered critique of both the medium and its audience.

The poem opens with a relatable, mundane detail: the greasy popcorn and the absent Kleenex. This grounding moment establishes the speaker as a proxy for the audience—immersed in the cinematic experience yet conscious of its trivial discomforts. The greasy fingers and subsequent efforts to clean them with a piece of gum wrapper serve as a tactile anchor, contrasting sharply with the larger-than-life action unfolding on the screen. The speaker?s focus on such minute details undercuts the grandeur of the cinematic spectacle, suggesting a critical distance.

Swenson?s description of the action on screen is both vivid and hyperbolic. The "pill that’s a bomb inside the stomach of a man inside / The Embassy" sets the tone for a world where violence and destruction are rendered with lavish, almost sensuous detail. The explosion is described as "luxurious cauliflowers giganticize into motion," blending organic imagery with the absurd exaggeration characteristic of action films. The imagery is grotesque and mesmerizing, underscoring the spectacle’s surreal detachment from reality.

The second stanza shifts to a quintessential Bond trope: the indulgent, hypersexualized bubble-bath scene. Swenson?s portrayal of the 14 women surrounding a single man satirizes the franchise?s overt objectification of women and the absurd homogeneity of its "Bond girls." Describing the women as "delectable and sexless, twist-topped Creamy Freezes," Swenson employs food imagery to emphasize their commodification. The "varnished" wigs, "lush lips," and "caterpillar lashes" further dehumanize the women, reducing them to interchangeable, artificial figures that serve as accessories to male fantasy.

The speaker?s detached, almost clinical observation of the scene underscores its absurdity. The specificity of details—the "just the right amount and distribution of curly hair" on the man?s chest, the way the women’s "makeup fails to let the girls look naked"—draws attention to the calculated artifice of the film’s presentation of gender and sexuality. Swenson critiques not only the film?s portrayal of women but also its broader implication that such portrayals are glamorous or desirable.

The speaker’s gum-chewing and focus on cleaning her greasy fingers create a parallel narrative that runs counter to the film’s bombastic action. The folding and creasing of the paper square provide a quiet, meditative counterpoint to the sensory overload of the movie. This mundane action reflects the speaker?s disengagement from the spectacle, suggesting a critique of the passive consumption of entertainment and its shallow pleasures.

Swenson’s choice to end the poem with the folded gum wrapper—a small, personal act of order and control—contrasts starkly with the chaotic, over-the-top imagery of the film. This conclusion reinforces the speaker’s ambivalence toward the cinematic experience, highlighting the disconnect between the viewer’s inner world and the exaggerated external world of the movie.

"The James Bond Movie" is a layered and incisive poem that explores the intersections of spectacle, gender, and consumption. Through its juxtaposition of the banal and the extravagant, Swenson critiques the cultural narratives perpetuated by mainstream cinema while also reflecting on the role of the viewer in sustaining these narratives. The poem’s wit and attention to detail make it both an engaging commentary on a specific cultural artifact and a broader meditation on the ways we engage with media and its representations.

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