James Bond on location
Entry posted by anile ·
322 views
Bond on location
 |
The Bond franchise understands these requirements. That is why their location scouts have been working overtime for 44 years to bring us the most magnificent backgrounds imaginable.
So, as the movie world becomes increasingly hysterical over the upcoming release of Quantum of Solace, we take a look back over the most memorable Bond film locations – and sneak a peek at 007’s latest archenemy’s hideaway.
Jokulsarlon, Iceland
 |
|
Which film: Die Another Day, 2002Remember the invisible Aston Martin? And the frantic car-flipping and mortar-firing chase across a frozen landscape that follows its discovery? While the car itself might stretch the imagination, the extraordinary glassy landscapes, distorted icebergs and milky-blue glaciers that created the slippery stage for the action are very real. You can track them down on the south-east coast of Iceland, where boat trips on the glacier lagoon are available. But sorry, there are no courses in stunt driving on ice – yet. |
Verzasca Dam, Switzerland
 |
| Which film: Goldeneye, 1995 Who could forget the opening sequence to Goldeneye? Pierce Brosnan's Bond performing a spectacular bungee-jump from the top of a 220m-high dam and reeling himself down to break into a top-secret chemical weapons factory. However, unlike most of Bond’s more bowel-loosening stunts, you can actually recreate this spectacular freefall for yourself. If you have the stomach for it, commercial bungee jumps are on offer from the very same Swiss Verzasa Dam where the original stunt took place. The dam, with breathtaking views down to Lake Maggiore and Italy, is located near to the picturesque Italian-speaking Swiss town of Locarno. |
Mount Asgard, Nunavut, Canada
 |
| Which film: The Spy Who Loved Me, 1977 In one of the best-loved stunts of all time, Roger Moore’s Bond escapes his pursuers by skiing off a mountain – and, half way to oblivion, unfurls a Union Jack parachute in tune to his theme music and the opening credits. It is classic Bond. And the setting where stunt man Rick Sylvester performed the Base jump is just as extraordinary. According to the script, the action takes place in the Austrian Alps, but the cliff scene is actually of sheer-sided Mount Asgard in the northern reaches of Canada’s Baffin Island. The surrounding Auyuittuq National Park is also known for its exquisite fjords, glaciers and ice fields. |
Meteora, Greece
 |
| Which film: For Your Eyes Only, 1981 Cast your mind back to the early 80s and you may recall – a, for once, genuinely ruffled – Roger Moore fumbling with crampons and carabiners, while battling a stray henchman on a sheer-sided stone bluff that, to the casual onlooker, appears utterly impossible to scale. These Bond bad guys knew what they were doing when they chose a hideout in Meteora, Greece. Here monasteries teeter from the top of apparently impregnable rock fortresses with vertical sides. The mountains, shooting upward from the plains of Thessaly near Kalambaka, have inevitably become a rock-climbing mecca since the film.
|
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
 |
| Which film: Moonraker, 1979 Bond has brawled with meanies in some hairy locations over the years. But surely none more so than in his classic showdown with Jaws on the Sugarloaf cable car in Rio. To jog your memory, the metal-mouthed villain halted Bond’s car by chomping his way through an inch-thick metal cable, then shimmied down the wire for some high-flying fisticuffs. The two-stage cable car ride is still one of Rio’s top attractions, and if no bad guys happen to hop on board, you can always work off excess adrenaline by joining local rock climbers and abseilers on the mountain’s flank.
|
Phang Nga Bay, Phuket, Thailand
 |
| Which film: Man with the Golden Gun, 1974 And who could forget the idyllic beachside setting for Bond’s legendary pistol duel with Christopher Lee’s arch villain, Scaramanga? The three-nippled bad guy chose to hide his evil lair amid the spectacular rock stacks and secluded bays of Phuket Island, in Thailand. These days, publicity shy super-villains with memorable birthmarks would find Phuket a tough place to hide: it is Thailand’s most developed beach resort. And the Thais were so enthused by the attention they got from the film’s release that they renamed Ko Tapu Island as James Bond Island. |
Lake Palace, Udaipur, India
 |
| Which film: Octopussy, 1983 If you recall Maud Adams’s silky smooth Bond girl, Octopussy, then you’ll surely remember that she lived in an impossibly exotic floating palace of white marble, adrift in an Indian lake and guarded by female members of her octopus cult. Sounds like pure fantasy, right? But the very real location in which the scenes were filmed is the 18th-century Lake Palace of Udaipur, once a summer retreat for Indian royalty. Now an upper-crust hotel, it covers every inch of an island in Lake Pichola – making the palace appear to float on the lake surface. It is best visited in late September or October when the lake is full. |
Orient Express, Europe
 |
| Which film: From Russia with Love, 1963 It is still one of 007’s best-loved fight scenes, despite being one of the earliest: the classic scrap between Connery’s Bond and the dastardly Red Grant that took place in a noisy, claustrophobic cabin aboard the Orient Express. Bond caught the ever-glamorous locomotive in Istanbul, but to reenact his adventure these days you would have to take your booby-trapped attaché case and leggy companion to Strasbourg or Vienna, the current end points on the Orient Express’s route. |
Monte Carlo, Monaco
 |
| Which film: Never Say Never Again (1983), Goldeneye (1995) Monte Carlo is a tailor-made backdrop for Bond’s more suave moments: the glitzy casinos, the swanky yachts and flashy swimwear all seem to leap straight from the pages of an Ian Fleming novel. No wonder Bond filmmakers have returned here time and again. It is in Monte Carlo harbour that Pierce Brosnan’s Bond encounters the suggestively named Xenia Onatopp, whom he also races on the dramatic zigzagging roads found just west of Monaco. But Bond is most closely associated with the city's Belle Epoque casino, which inspired Fleming's first Bond outing, the novel Casino Royale from 1953. |
Himeji Castle, Japan
 |
| Which film: You Only Live Twice, 1967 It can be a hard life being Bond. One minute you are hunting down evil masterminds, the next whisked off to a stunning Japanese castle for a spot of ninja training and dalliances with a girl named Kissy Suzuki. The castle where Sean Connery’s Bond and Japanese secret service leader "Tiger" Tanaka plot their attack on Blofeld in this early Bond picture is actually the exquisite Himeji Castle, found in Hyōgo prefecture. A Unesco World Heritage site, it is one of the most visited castles in Japan.
|
Jamaica
 |
| Which film: Dr No, 1962 Of course no list of Bond locations is complete without a nod to Jamaica, setting for the first film, Dr No, and sometime home of author Ian Fleming. It was here that perhaps the most famous scene of all was filmed: that of Ursula Andress emerging from the sea in a barely there bikini and singing Underneath the Mango Tree. These days you can stay in Fleming's former home in Oracabessa, which has been converted into a luxury resort hotel, and take a tour of the film’s numerous locations. There's even a James Bond Beach, although the unforgettable beach scene was filmed elsewhere. |
Paranal
 |
| Which film: Quantum of Solace, 2008 And, finally, to Quantum of Solace. The new Bond film was filmed in Latin American locations from Chile to Panama and Mexico. However, several of the most spectacular scenes were reserved for the ESO Paranal Observatory in Chile’s northern desert; its shallow dome-like Residencia was deemed the ideal evil lair of Dominic Greene, the film’s central villain.
|
0 Comments
Recommended Comments
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now