A franchise as old and iconic as the James Bond series will always incite myriad opinions and beliefs in people. Everyone has their own version of the character, as well as their own version of what the character should be. Now it seems that South African filmmaker Wayne Kramer (Running Scared) has his own ideas for how to take the 007 franchise and turn it into a gritty, R-rated film trilogy.

Appearing on Adi Shankar's Bootleg Universe Pitch Show, Kramer explains that if given the opportunity, he would take the James Bond franchise back to its roots and keep it true to Ian Fleming's source material. The primary inspiration for this pitch is what's referred to as the "Blofeld Trilogy" A.K.A. ThunderBallOn Her Majesty's Secret Service and You Only Live Twice. In telling this story, Kramer would strip away many of the elements of the Bond universe that have become cliché over the years - see: the villain's evil lair, Blofeld's white cat, and outlandish schemes - in favor of a story that is much more personal and grounded for the characters involved.

Kramer would bring James Bond's universe back to the era Ian Fleming intended them to be set in, the 1960s, effectively freeing the story from many of the technological trappings that Skyfall fell into. This creative decision would also entail making the films not only more violent, but decidedly more sexual in nature; the Bond films have always featured sexual content, but glossed over things like nudity and Bond's own sexual prowess. For this reason Kramer states that Michael Fassbender would represent his first choice to play this R-rated Bond, due to his work on films like 2011's Shame. For Blofeld, Kramer would cast Ben Kingsley, and for the role of Tracy Bond, his first choice would be Game of Thrones' Natalie Dormer.

Michael Fassbender as David in Prometheus

With the recent release of Spectre, it now seems unlikely that Kramer's specific vision for the Bond franchise will come to fruition any time soon. With Spectre and Blofeld now established within the universe of Daniel Craig's modern Bond universe, to go back and produce this sort of reboot simply won't be feasible for quite some time.

Kramer's ideas are not exactly groundbreaking, since Daniel Craig's freshman outing as 007 attempted to take the character to a much darker and grittier place. He even notes during his pitch that if Casino Royale had featured a protagonist not named James Bond, the film would have been much more likely to receive an R-rating.

Spectre is now playing in theaters.

Source: Adi Shankar