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Cast & Crew
Meeting the people behind the Bond films is a real pleasure and when they actually help you with your work it's even better.
For the first edition of 'On the tracks of 007', we flew to Mallorca to interview veteran Bond director Guy Hamilton. He was so kind to provide us with a nice foreword for the book as well.
More recently, Sir Roger Moore added some of his personal thoughts and memories to paper, for a future edition of the book. Both forewords are added below.
I've been very fortunate in my career to have travelled the world and visited some of the most beautiful countries and locations that you only really ever read about - the added bonus being my travel was all at the expense of kindly film producers.
Of course, my journeys with James Bond eclipse all others and when I think how lucky I was to film at the picturesque Iguazu Falls, the Monasterial heights of Meteora and the bayous of New Orleans coupled with the vibrancy of India, the remote charm of Phang Nga Bay and the adrenalin fuelled vistas of San Francisco Bay, I really couldn't have asked for more.
Many of the locations we used are now huge tourist attractions. A few years ago, whilst holidaying in the Far East on a Star Clipper with a group of Scandinavian friends - the King and Queen of Sweden and the Crown Princess among them - we decided it might be fun to visit 'James Bond Island' in the aforementioned Phang Nga Bay; back in 1974 it was a beach, a rock and a few bats. But then (and now) it was a bustling, crowded resort with gift shops galore and no room to moor even the smallest of dinghies. Of course James Bond's visits injects hundreds of thousands, if not millions, into local tourism economies long after he has left.
Looking at the photographs in this book also makes me realise what a clever bunch of filmmakers I worked with on the 007 movies: Northolt Aerodrome doubling for South America in Octopussy; the Nene Valley Railway in Octopussy becoming East Germany; the Renault car factory in Swindon becoming a villain Zorin's manufacturing lair; and the Eifel Tower ... oh hang on, that was real.
Enjoy the ride; this really is a fun packed book and the ultimate Bond travel brochure!
Roger Moore
2012
2012
All Bond directors are indebted to Ian Fleming for having had more than a passing interest in travel ( vide THRILLING CITIES, 1959 ) and allowing us to roam the world filming his stories, always set in exotic locations. All the more exotic because in the 1960’s package tours and economy airlines had yet to appear and only a ticket to a Bond movie could take you to these exciting places.
James Bond always travels 1st Class, simply because Bond villains never reside in squalid or sordid settings – no, they inhabit the most exclusive hotels, the largest villa, a castle, yacht, plane. I even wanted a long, thin swimming pool that turned out to be in Mr Big’s personal Boeing 747 (Somebody thought that was silly).
Once the general outline of the plot had been agreed, the real hard work begins. To search high and low, far and wide for places and things that can be used in a Bondian way (in other words nobody else would ever think of using it that way) and incorporating these ideas into the script.
Fleming had set much of DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER in Saratoga Springs in New York State which in prewar days had been a very smart centre for the horse racing community, gamblers, thieves and con men but had sadly fallen on hard times and out of fashion. Gambling, gangsters.. now where would you find that today? “Shall we have a look at Las Vegas.?”
Knowing my fondness for jazz, writer Tom Mankiewicz suggested a New Orleans jazz funeral.
“Great..but what else is there in New Orleans?”
“Bayous..how about a motor boat chase in the bayous. It would be even better if the boat could jump the levee.. Oh, look, there’s a crocodile farm.”
“How about marooning Bond on that little island and surrounding him with hungry crocs..? Great, but how does he get off? We’ll work that out later..we’ll think of something.”
Cubby Broccoli and I took a look at Lebanon, nice Casino but not much else.. Iran: a total washout, dreadful infrastructure, no place for a Bond unit. We moved on to Thailand and discovered Phuket and put that on the tourist map.
I just hope that the ON THE TRACKS OF 007 fans have as much fun as we did in hunting out our locations.. which are now yours.
Guy Hamilton
Mallorca - June 2008
