The scene in Diamonds are Forever called for more than one cat to be onscreen at a time.Ī genuinely terrified cat trying to get out of Donald Pleasence's armsĭuring the filming of the big final battle in You Only Live Twice, the cat that played Blofeld's pet was so panicked by the effects of the explosion on set that it ran away and was only found a few days later between sets, some say up on the rafters of the volcano set. Even within the individual films themselves, multiple cats have played the role. Because of the McClory controversy, there was some licence, and the character could not be called Blofeld, although he holds the trademark cat.ĭue to the length of the series, a number of cats have performed this role. During its development official footage of character renders released by the publisher featured the terrorist leader 'Number One' holding his Persian Cat, with the likeness of Donald Pleasence. The cat's first appearance was in the 2004 first-person shooter video game GoldenEye: Rogue Agent, developed by EA LA and published by Electronic Arts. However, it has associations with King Solomon of the Bible, who was noted for his wisdom, and more importantly wealth. The Solomon name is controversial since it appears with the parody of the Blofeld character mentioned above. It reappears in Spectre in 2015, and shows some friendliness to Bond, before being taken away by Blofeld. The cat would not appear again for many years after this, until McClory himself had died, and the legal rights were settled. If McClory had succeeded in making his second Thunderball remake known as Warhead 2000, before his death, then it is likely the cat could have reappeared in the 1990s. However, this film was not part of the Eon continuity. Here the cat appears clearly with Blofeld and there is little doubt who it is. Secondly, in Never Say Never Again, a non-Eon film which McClory was involved in.This is an injoke by Eon about dumping the Blofeld character, and thus McClory. The Blofeld clone is later unceremoniously dumped down a chimney by Bond using a helicopter, but not before Solomon the Cat manages to escape from him (and so survives). The man was not officially Blofeld at the time, but is clearly based on him. Firstly, in For Your Eyes Only, an Eon film in which a Blofeld clone character appears with a cat called Solomon.But there are two eighties appearances related to the McClory affair: Thus, the cat's official last appearance in Eon productions, before Daniel Craig's tenure, was in Diamonds are Forever. Blofeld's cat did not appear in Ian Fleming's books, but did appear in the films, so McClory considered it to be part of his creation. Kevin McClory fought for the rights to the story, and to the characters including Blofeld. Later we see it bedecked with diamonds.īlofeld's cat and the Thunderball controversyīlofeld's cat forms part of the controversy over Thunderball. In Diamonds are Forever, Blofeld's cat features heavily in the title sequence, opening with a shot of its face, then eye which cuts to a diamond. In Diamonds Are Forever, more than one cat appears owing to Blofeld's duplicates each having one of their own. The cat is absent from No Time to Die which is the first Bond film in which Blofeld is seen without his cat. Jan Werich with cat in You Only Live Twice It has a brief appearance in Spectre, where it jumps onto a captive James Bond's lap as the latter's adoptive older brother, Franz Oberhauser, reveals his change of identity. The cat is also seen in Never Say Never Again. It was initially a convention of the films not to show Blofeld's face, only a close-up of him stroking his cat (this is also the basis of the rationale for assuming the unidentified man killed by Bond in the opening sequence of For Your Eyes Only is Blofeld). Another was right before Blofeld's presumed death in For Your Eyes Only, where the cat is seen making a run for it when Bond reveals his survival and flies toward Blofeld. One scene was in You Only Live Twice when the base was discovered to be under attack by ninjas, where the cat is struggling to get out of Blofeld's arms (an unscripted reaction to the sudden explosions). Although implied to be loyal to its owner, there have been a few scenes that indicate that said loyalty was not absolute. The cat sits on Blofeld's lap in ThunderballĪlong with Blofeld, the cat made its debut in From Russia with Love and has appeared with the villain in every film appearance since (except for one). 2 Blofeld's cat and the Thunderball controversy.
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