Tom Hiddleston's Three Fave Bond Films Say A Lot

He's British, he has exquisite diction, and he looks all sorts of great in a suit. No wonder journalists can't shut the hell up about Tom Hiddleston and Bond movies. During an interview on Entertainment Weekly radio when asked "What's up with you and Bond?", Hiddleston responded, “Honestly, I don’t know. Apart from the fact that people have watched The Night Manager and started to throw my name around in that conversation, I really think that’s it." The question makes a little more sense when placed in context of Hiddleston's recent role in The Night Manager, in which he plays a worker at a hotel who becomes an undercover spy.

While remaining tight-lipped about the chances of him becoming the iconic British spy, Tom Hiddleston opened up about his response to the James Bond films, saying, “Of course it’s flattering when people float that idea, because as a child growing up in Britain, Bond is the center of your world. I grew up with Sean Connery and Roger Moore, and BBC used to run those movies on Saturday night and it was all we talked about on the playground Monday morning. So it’s very strange to be in that conversation.”

Hiddleston also named his three favorite Bond films:

Off the top of my head, probably I could say my top three are From Russia With Love, Live and Let Die, and Casino Royale. … If I could take one to a desert island, it would probably be From Russia With Love.

Veeery interesting. OK, so while you may know me for my work in entertainment journalism, I'm also the leading global authority in IFAOTOC: In-depth Film Analysis Of Totally Offhand Comments. So what Tom Hiddleston may have thought was a casual top three James Bond pick is actually incredibly revealing.

From Russia With Love

What a choice, Mr. Hiddleston. The movie, in general, centers on James Bond doing whatever the hell he wants: I mean, dude sets fire to the sea at one point. James Bond in this film is a clear personification of the rampant impulses of the Id. I feel that as such, it is in no way a stretch to thus suggest that Hiddleston may feel hampered by contemporary British mores and would like to run wild.

Live And Let Die

This is a weird one. I'll just leave it at that. Trust me, I'm the expert.

Casino Royal

While Hiddleston could, of course, be referring to the 1967 Peter Sellers James Bond spoof of the same name, I'm going to wager he meant the more recent Daniel Craig movie. This movie was famous for a return to a more pared-back vision of Bond: blood and gore rather than wisecracks and gadgets. Could Daniel Craig be a stand-in for Man in Freud's Civilization And Its Discontents? Could Craig's position on the edge of society, protecting it but never entirely participating in it, be representative of the way most of humankind's most primal instincts are harmful to a healthily functioning community? Let's say yes for the sake of a tenuous article about the analysis of James Bond film choices by one Hiddleston.

You guys, I think we can all agree that we've learned something today — not just about Hiddleston or James Bond, but ourselves as human beings and the way our feelings about one smartly attired British spy are a reflection of our wider response to the world as a whole.

Images: United Artists (2); Columbia Pictures