Goldfinger

The story of a man who gave revenge the finger. 

[OPENING CREDITS SHOW OUR HERO, GOLDFINGER, DOING 'THE ROBOT' TO A POWER BALLAD]

We open on Goldfinger, a promising young touch-typist who patents a new technique dubbed ‘The Goldfinger’. It involves complex physics that I won’t go into here, but suffice to say, it’s frankly amazing — and well ahead of its time, typing-wise. But great success comes with great interest from a shadowy onlooker.

[FLASHBACK]

Here, we learn that they were childhood friends but Goldfinger blanked him at their school reunion (he’d let himself go a bit, so Goldfinger genuinely didn’t recognise him). We also see the boy saving him from a dog attack (played by the St Bernard from Beethoven but with red contact lenses to seem even more annoying). That way, Goldfinger knows that he owes him one, which may come up later. Also, the dog belonged to a man wearing a tuxedo, so that Goldfinger now associates tuxedos with evil (this will help later when he pursues Bond with disproportionate hatred).

[BACK IN THE PRESENT]

Goldfinger enters the touch-typing World Championships. It’s as big a deal as The X-Factor or Crufts in Goldfinger’s country, which looks a bit like Russia. Set to fast music involving guitars, a montage shows him rising through to the final. Much like The Karate Kid, or Dodgeball. So, to psyche himself up, he goes into his dressing room (which is by no means unusual for a touch-typing finalist)… but his nemesis is waiting! As Goldfinger tries to escape, the door slams on his finger. He’ll never win now! Or will he?! No, he doesn’t. Because his nemesis (who he still doesn’t recognise) planned it all!

[THE CHANGE IN FORTUNE]

By amazing coincidence, given our hero’s name, his finger has to be amputated. Now one digit short, he becomes increasingly bitter, shown by him sitting at a bar glugging shots of vodka and growing a beard. A drunk tramp sidles over — except that he’s actually a drunk, disillusioned scientist with a seemingly unbelievable, but very real, fear of computer keyboards. He offers to make a new finger for Goldfinger if he types all his emails for him (which surprisingly were around when the film was made). Goldfinger agrees. And in a very clever move, they design a finger made of gold! (Because of his name.) But not only that, it’s a Swiss army knife deal with gadgets built in. Even though he’s a glorified receptionist, they decide his finger should have a gun, knife and laser. It’s discussed that it also have a corkscrew but gold is deemed too soft a metal. This isn’t an issue for the weaponry though, for a valid reason that is explained in a deleted scene.

[PICKING UP THE PIECES… OR IS HE?]

So Goldfinger sets to work — getting the brews in, forwarding hilarious pictures of cats and of course, ploughing through the scientist’s correspondence. This includes a series of emails off a guy called Bond, James Bond, as part of a lengthy dispute on eBay (Bond sold him a joblot of DVDs that were Region 1 but didn’t state that on the listing). A resolution looks increasingly unlikely, and after one particularly underhand comment about Goldfinger’s mother, he sees red. What Bond doesn’t realise is that Goldfinger’s mother actually was a whore and he’s overly sensitive about it. That moment, Goldfinger vows to wreak revenge on Bond — spurred on by the fact his profile picture (which you usually wouldn’t see on eBay) shows Bond wearing a tux (which as we determined earlier, he hates).

[THE PRE-SHOWDOWN]

We see Goldfinger on various modes of transport, including a helicopter, until he reaches a front door. It’s opened by an unnamed security guard who he shoots with his gold finger (the finger having built-in padding that means this doesn’t hurt Goldfinger). Then another guard appears and Goldfinger stabs him! The padding has blunted the knife a bit, but the man still dies instantly and dramatically. Goldfinger creeps through the house until he hits a seemingly impenetrable door. There is a sign on it saying only lasers can cut through it. Camera pans to the remaining finger setting — laser. We hear the universal laser noise and the door falls down, revealing Bond pointing a gun in a tux (Bond is in a tux, the gun isn’t) and a woman (also wearing a tux, except that the trousers are fishnet tights) who runs off, doing the ‘call me’ hand gesture.

[THE ACTUAL SHOWDOWN]

A tussle between the two men commences. When the camera pans back, Bond is tied to an overly long table that wasn’t there before. Goldfinger courses his laser up the centre, starting at the furthest point from Bond. Despite cutting through the door in five seconds, it takes absolutely ages. Bond says, “I see you’re giving me the finger”. Goldfinger can’t think of a pun-based comeback so, remembering Bond’s slight on his own mother, says, “Like I did with yo momma”. He then passes the time by looking at Bond’s corkboard of photos. Most are of Bond on nights out or taking a picture of himself in a mirror with no top on, but then one catches his eye. It’s of two young boys. Initially this raises questions about Bond, until Goldfinger realises that one is Bond and the other is… himself! Bond is the boy that saved him from the dog when they grew up together, despite one being Russian-esque and the other being Scottish. The two men look at each other, realisation dawning (also, the sun is dawning at the exact same time to highlight this). Goldfinger remembers that Bond once saved him and now he must do the same.

[THE HAPPY ENDING]

He unties him and they get tipsy on Martini, reminiscing about that time Bond got off with Goldfinger’s sister — and the ensuing pregnancy scare. The final scene shows the two men doing Shirley Bassey covers on Bond’s karaoke machine. Credits roll.