James Bond in film Deighton together with Sean Connery to work on a script. The script ran into difficulties after accusations from Eon Productions that the project had gone beyond copyright restrictions, which confined McClory to a film based on the "Thunderball" novel only, and once again the project was deferred. Towards the end of the 1970s developments were reported on the project under the name "James Bond of the Secret Service", but then producer Jack Schwartzman became involved and cleared a number of the legal issues that still surrounded the project and licensed the rights from McClory. With Connery still committed to the
James Bond filmography "Variety", considered that "Craig comes closer to the author's original conception of this exceptionally long-lived male fantasy figure than anyone since early Sean Connery", and he went on to say that "Craig once and for all claims the character as his own", while Steven Spielberg called Craig "the perfect 21st-century Bond". Paul Arendt, writing for the BBC, agreed, observing that "Daniel Craig is not a good Bond. He's a "great" Bond. Specifically, he is 007 as conceived by Ian Fleming—a professional killing machine, a charming, cold-hearted patriot with a taste for luxury. Craig is the first actor to really nail