James Bond is back and big at the box office

Nov 2 2008 by Roz Laws, Sunday Mercury

The 22nd Bond film has just opened, to mixed reviews but big box offices. Here’s a look behind the scenes at the making of Quantum Of Solace.

QUANTUM Of Solace sees James Bond undertaking twice as many stunts as in Casino Royale – and most of them are carried out by actor Daniel Craig himself.

Second unit director Dan Bradley says: “Daniel is willing to do just about anything to get a good shot.

“In the Siena rooftop chase there were several leaps across streets and alleyways from four and five storey rooftops and Daniel did them all. He even jumped out of a window and dropped 20 feet toward the roof of a speeding bus. It’s pretty impressive.”

Stunt co-ordinator Gary Powell agrees: “Daniel is doing more stunts than ever before. He is in a building full of fire, there are fire balls exploding behind him, fire balls in front of him, he’s landing on fire, sliding across the floor on fire. But you know he can do it, he is more than capable.”

You get some idea of the huge scale of the £130 million production when you realise that at one point there were two units filming in Panama, another one preparing to film in Chile, three separate units in Italy and people working on six stages at Pinewood Studios in England.

To film an exciting car chase on mountainous Italian roads, they used SEVEN identical models of Bond’s favourite car, the Aston Martin DBS, which cost around £160,00 each.

One of them was destroyed when a stunt driver lost control and drove it into a lake, but at least the production recouped some of the cost. A wealthy fan is believed to have paid £200,000 for the written-off Aston Martin.

Gary says: “We take all the traction controls off the cars, so when we want to do a big wheel spin, the car will allow you to do it.

“We’ve put a hydraulic hand brake in so the stuntman can use it to spin the car round corners.”

Quantum Of Solace was filmed in more countries than any other Bond film – Panama (which doubles for Bolivia and Haiti), Mexico, Chile, Italy, Austria and Britain.

Daniel says: “I think it’s important that we see Bond go places that excite you. For me, as a kid, the Bond movies transported you to another world.”

UKRAINIAN star Olga Kurylenko might already have two marriages behind her at the age of 28.

But she must the first Bond girl in history who is glad NOT to have slept with 007.

“I’m very happy I didn’t have to do that,” says Olga, who plays feisty Bolivian Camille. “Why would I want to do that with Daniel Craig, somebody I didn’t have personal feelings for?

“Those types of scenes are so hard to do.

“So it was so much better for me that Camille didn’t have a relationship with Bond.”

Impeccably dressed in a rich-purple theme, with knee-high boots over leather trousers and a large, stainless steel diver’s watch, former Vogue model Olga is the prettiest film star I’ve met since a luminous Sharon Stone was promoting Martin Scorsese’s Casino more than a decade ago. The billboard posters just don’t do her justice.

Now that she’s also got Hitman and the forthcoming Mark Wahlberg thriller Max Payne under her belt, Olga’s not interested in reappearing in a future Bond movie.

Nor does she seem bothered that Camille might just have set the standard for a new generation of empowered female action characters.

“I wouldn’t want to get involved in anything like that because then you end up making a sequel and then another sequel.”

Meanwhile, women shouldn’t despair about Daniel Craig’s lack of love action and nudity in Quantum of Solace.

Producer Barbara Broccoli says: “Bond represents the time that he’s in. I think men are growing up!

“This Bond is also somebody who does bleed, and I think that’s much more exciting for women.

“And, yes, I’m always trying to get him to take his clothes off, so don’t worry about that!”

GRAHAM YOUNG

THE death of Agent Fields, the British girl played by Gemma Arterton, is horrific but almost glossed over in the film’s relentless pace.

It’s a shame, as it’s an important moment and a repeat of the way a Bond girl dies in Goldfinger by being covered in gold.

Now Agent Fields is drowned in oil – but Gemma didn’t even get a stunt double in to suffer such a nasty fate.

She says: “I was dowsed in oil and had to lie there for almost two hours. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t see, I couldn’t breathe properly and I couldn’t hear because all the oil went in my ears. At the time I thought it was quite unpleasant but then I thought this is something I will always remember and it will be an iconic part of the film.”

Gemma, who also played Tess Of The D’Urbervilles in the recent BBC drama, thinks it might have been fate that she won the role.

“On the way to my audition, Nobody Does It Better was playing on my car radio, so I think it was meant to be.”

DVD

● BRENDAN Fraser is a college teacher, trying to keep alive his late brother’s theories about seismic activity in JOURNEY TO THE CENTRE OF THE EARTH (PG). He disappeared 10 years ago while attempting to prove that Jules Verne’s novel was no science fiction and that volcanic tubes go thousands of miles down towards the earth’s core. Now Fraser discovers he was right, on a fun, fast-paced action-packed adventure along with his nephew Josh Hutcherson and guide Anita Briem. They encounter giant mushrooms, man-eating plants and dinosaurs. Best of all, it’s in 3D and special glasses come with the DVD.

● Steer well clear of THE HAPPENING (15) because it really isn’t, er, happening. Writer/director M Night Shyamalan, once so good with The Sixth Sense, continues his downward spiral with another stinker. Mark Wahlberg and Zoey Deschanel try to flee a lethal airbourne virus in a film which starts well but then becomes badly-paced, repetitive and devoid of tension. The script is often laughable while the cast seem to have forgotten how to act.

● Martin Scorsese made the documentary SHINE A LIGHT (12) about his favourite band, The Rolling Stones. It mainly comprises concert footage from a gig for Bill Clinton at the beautiful Beacon Theatre in New York, interspersed with behind-the-scenes footage and old interviews. There’s a great early one with Michael Parkinson when Mick Jagger says he hopes they should last “at least another year”. Four decades later, it’s easy to see why the Stones are still huge, but this film doesn’t always capture their amazing energy. The choice of numbers is a little strange and it threatens to become slightly dull at times.

● If you’re at the other end of the age scale, you’ll probably much prefer teen singer Miley Cyrus, playing both herself and her TV alter ego in HANNAH MONTANA & MILEY CYRUS: BEST OF BOTH WORLDS CONCERT (U). We get concert footage in 3D (glasses are supplied) and in between there are rehearsals, vox pops with fans and doting dads running in high heels to win sold-out tickets for their daughters.