One of my favourite films, so favourite that i never bothered to read the book before. I know, putting the cart before the horse is so unlike me.
Anyways, i’ve finally put things right and read the book, and guess what? I totally enjoyed it.
Like the film, it’s aimed directly for young children, i’d say around 7 or 8 years old, but it’s also good for us Boomers who loved the film.
How do they compare? Well the book only has some glimpses of the James Bond theme coming through, whereas the film, which was made well after Ian’s death, has all the Bond tropes shoehorned into it somewhere and is much more the James Bond for children thing. Example would be that in the book Caractacus is married to Mimsie, but in the film they needed to work in the Bond girl trope somehow, so they killed off Mimsie and created Truly Scrumptious. They also made the arch villain much more Bond like with the big castle, and all that, and gave him the Bond henchman in the Kiddy Catcher.
But the book is still good and well worth getting if you have young children to give them a good reading to before you make them sit and watch the film: i’m sure they’ll love it because Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is, without a doubt, the best James Bond film ever.
Enjoy.
Ian’s Page