“He caught a bullet instead of the plane.”
BOND 21
THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH
Michael Apted . 1999
The title stems from the motto that Ian Fleming gave the Bond family 30 years before in both the novel and film. On Her Majesty’s Secret Seavice: Orbis non sufficit
Didn’t help.
Variety said that Bond had become Austin Powers
– trapped in 70s’ gimmick, gadgets, double-entendres.
In Istanbul, Bond tells Denise Richards as a (laughable) nuclear scientist called Christmas Jones: “I’ve alwaysdreamed of having Christmasin Turkey.” And: “I thought Christmas only comes once a year.” Carry On Bond!How Brosnan hated these quips.Or, he hated the duff ones.
London tabloids said as it was the last Bond film of the millennium ,it would feature cameos by virtually all previous Bond girls, including: Ursual Andress, Barbara Bach, Famke Janssen and Diana Rigg. Instead, the film marked the first acting credit in a Bond film for producer Michael G Wilson – as General Chandler – after uncredited cameos in every Bond since The Spy Who Loved Me (following a try-out in Goldfinger).
Elektra King . Sharon Stone and Catherine Zeta-Jones were in contention before French actress (and director)SophieMarceau won the villain with the line:“There’s no point living, if you can’t feel alive.”
Alexander King . Billy Bob Thornton was suggested when 007’s blown up pal was to be a Texan and not Robert Calder’s UK oil tycoon.
The Cigar Girl . Both Kelly Brook and dancer Jean Butler were seen for the girl behind the explosive opening – Maria Grazia Cucinotta.
Q . Desmond Llewelyn the much loved Q, died in an car smash soon after the movie opened. He was 86.
Pierce Brosnan thought the film was pretty damn good, actually. “I was very comfortable with it. When it’s your third one, you’d better know what you’re doing, and enjoy what you’re doing. Having Michael Apted there was great, too, because he paid attention to character and to story, not that the other guys didn’t, but Michael just listened. ??I liked the moral ambiguity that was brought back to Bond’s character.? When we met and talked about it, our conversations were about that exactly. Who is this man? What’s at stake for him? Seeing behind the curtain of who he is a little bit more, making it so the writing has some meaning, some emotional cornerstone so the character has a motivation and can have more of a relationship with someone like M, for example.
“If anything, the bells and whistles around [Bond] have gotten so big, it was a challenge to make it a real drama within the context of a Bond movie. I was really impressed with the final result, especially the fact that Michael really paid attention to the casting of it, and used his cinematic flair. He’s not the obvious choice, maybe, for a Bond film, but he’s a wonderful filmmaker and has a touch with the camera and story. And he was clever enough to let the guys who do all the technical wizardry get on with it. He used them without interfering with what they did. They’ll say: ‘Ah, this is good, it goes back to the old days.’ But we’re still in a 1990’s movie.”
“One of the keys to the longevity of the series,” suggested Michael Apted, “is that you have five actors with five completely different interpretations of the role. That’s interesting. Pierce doesn’t feel that he has to live up to Connery’s Bond or Moore’s Bond, because he’s grown into the character and made it his own. In many ways, I think his Bond is the nearest to Fleming that has been done so far. Brosnan a very interesting man because he’s come to stardom late, which I think is always interesting. I think it makes people much more compassionate, much more workable, much more humane,.
“I wanted to deliver a Bond film, an action movie, but also wanted to make the characters interesting. That’s what Pierce wanted, that’s what the Broccolis wanted. That’s why they hired me – they felt that there hadn’t been interesting enough characters in the last couple films. ??In many ways it reminded me of the first two Bond films as those were pretty straightforward spy films with interesting characters. Bond was also a lot more hard-edged in this one.”
Best line was outside the film… when MI6 tried to ban all shooting near its Thames-side HQ.
The UK Foreign Minister
Robin Cook overruled his spies…
“After all Bond has done for Britain,
it was the least we could do for Bond.”