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STEPHEN'S MOVIE GUIDE

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)  

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND ON Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)



Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

Daniel Kleinmann's titles

The history of the Bond movies has seen the franchise survive a variety of attitudes to films, and to spy films in particular. From the Bond-mania of the mid 60’s, through the cynicism of the 70’s and indifference of the 80’s, and by the time Tomorrow Never Dies came around in the nineties, spy-mania was on the rebound. As Goldeneye finished shooting, “Mission Impossible” was filming in the 007 stage at Pinewood. 1997 saw George Clooney play a Bondesque agent undoing Balkan terrorists in “Peacemaker”.. even Kurt Russell sported a tuxedo when rushing to meet a national threat, in “Executive Decision”.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)


Perhaps most telling was the wave of movies lovingly parodying the Bond type movie.. from 1996’s “Spy Hard” and Bill Murray in “The Man Who Knew Too Much” in 1997, the trail of movies culminating in Mike Myer’s “Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery”.

While these parodies harked back to an earlier Bond style, the contemporary thrillers had a somewhat common theme – the enemy came from within, which was perhaps a comment on the times. The news was rife with issues such as Aldrich Ames - In 1994, Aldrich Ames, a CIA agent who was said to live a “James Bond like” lifestyle, was found to be a traitor. In Japan, home grown terrorists attacked the subway with nerve gas, and in 1995 an ex-soldier called Timothy McVeigh drove a truck of explosives into a building in Oklahoma, killing 167.

While these parodies harked back to an earlier Bond style, the contemporary thrillers had a somewhat common theme – the enemy came from within, which was perhaps a comment on the times. The news was rife with issues such as Aldrich Ames - In 1994, Aldrich Ames, a CIA agent who was said to live a “James Bond like” lifestyle, was found to be a traitor. In Japan, home grown terrorists attacked the subway with nerve gas, and in 1995 an ex-soldier called Timothy McVeigh drove a truck of explosives into a building in Oklahoma, killing 167.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

MGM was delighted with the success of Goldeneye, and with a new stock offering of the company (now under new ownership) taking place in 1997, they wanted to push ahead with the next Bond as quickly as possible, giving a challengingly close release date. To meet the challenge, the director’s wanted Martin Campbell back as director, but he was unavailable.. so they turned to Roger Spottiswoode, director of such ‘classics’ as “Turner and Hooch” and “Stop, or my Mom will shoot”. His directorial pedigree aside, he had a strong reputation as an editor, having been an editor for Sam Peckinpah, and it was recognised that with such a tight time scale the movie would need quick and efficient editorial control. The movie struggled with the script. Bruce Feirstein, utilising his journalistic background, provided an initial draft, but there were rewrites which went on up to – and during – the filming. When a film starts without a finished script, there are two key things which can happen – and did happen, on this movie. The budget balloons due to inefficiencies in planning and last minute changes – the budget on this movie went up to 110 million GBP. And the movie can become patchy – this movie has been accused by some critics as coming across as a series of action pieces with some exposition scenes inserted.



Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

The Late Albert C Broccoli


The loss of Albert Broccoli before the movie started was a sad start, and long time writer Richard Maibaum had also passed away. It is also the first Bond movie without any hint of an Ian Fleming source material. Another dubious claim to fame for the movie is that it was the first ever movie completely funded by product placement.

BMW in particular, who were in the second of their three movie contract, contributed the Z3, the motorbikes for the big chase, and the BMW 750iL which although un-Bond like does take centre stage in the one of the film’s most memorable set pieces. The marketing element is heavy handed enough, that we get a scene where he approaches an Avis desk, to get his BMW car, which he can drive with his SonyEricson phone.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

Brosnan has clearly ignored the advice on texting while driving

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

Despite challenges, filming continued, as a cast fell into place. Teri Hatcher came on board as an ex flame of 007, despite being 3 months pregnant. Jonathan Pryce slipped into the media mogul bad guy role, although he was reportedly unhappy with the way his character was rewritten, and perhaps this explains his often hammy dialogue, which could just as easily have been in the Austin Powers movies. One wonders how different it could have been if first choice Anthony Hopkins had accepted.

Michelle Yeoh, then relatively unknown in the West, made an auspicious debut as the Bond girl that really proved that Bond girls could be the equal of Bond – indeed, Bond appears to be playing catch up for most of the movie. In addition to Spottiswoode at the helm, the production benefitted from second unit director Vic Armstrong, legendary stunt co-ordinator of many of the most popular movies of all time.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

Return to Thailand for Bond



Although originally the plan had been to film in Vietnam, visas were revoked shortly before filming, and key scenes were filmed in Thailand instead. The opening scene was shot in the notoriously challenging mountain airfield in the Pyrenees, Peyragudes.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

Peyragudes Airfield in the Pyrenees

Other scenes were filmed at the huge tank in Mexico built for Titanic – the movie that TND was up against at the cinema on its release.

Against a backdrop of problems with script, production feuds, loss of key people, last minute changes in location and rushed schedule – there was one area in which the producers emphatically struck the right note. After the lukewarm response to Eric Serras idiosyncratic score in Goldeneye, John Barry personally recommended a young composer called David Arnold. Arnold had already issued a CD of modernised cover versions of Bond music, and was a huge fan of Barry’s style. Additionally, he already had big movie experience on movies such as “Stargate”, “Independence day” and “A Life Less Ordinary”. His score paid wonderful homage to the music of John Barry, while successfully updating it – notably in the car park scene in collaboration with The Propellerheads, with whom he had worked previously on his Bond themed album.

On release, critics were not as overflowing with praise as they had been on Goldeneye, noting the somewhat patchwork nature of the script, but Brosnan garnered praise for how effortlessly he had inhabited the role, and Arnold’s score was well received. The movie grossed well, just slightly short of Goldeneye, but then it was up against a little movie called “Titanic” on its release. So did the producers show a sure hand and pull victory from the jaws of the challenges besetting production, aided by a confident Brosnan performance, or is the movie too garbled to be classic Bond? Try watching it again and make up your own mind..



Trivia

Just before shooting the scene where Bond and Wai-Lin get on the motorcycle, Roger Spottiswoode took Pierce Brosnan and Michelle Yeoh aside - each without the other's knowledge - and told each of them not to let the other get in the driver's seat. The result is in the final film: Bond and Wai-Lin fight over who gets to drive before getting on the bike.



Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

When they had to re-shoot the car park scene it was too expensive to go back to Germany so it was done at Brent Cross shopping centre in London. Posters around the stores told shoppers that the explosions were nothing to worry about. It took ten days to shoot this car park scene and seventeen BMWs were used.

The original title of the film was "Tomorrow Never Lies", which makes sense when you consider media mogul Elliot Carver (Jonathan Pryce) was creating the next day's headlines in advance, then causing those events to happen. But a typo on an early script draft was adopted by the producers, and Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) was used instead.

Product placements, brand integrations, promotional tie-ins and sponsorships for this movie include BMW in their second film in a three picture promotional deal; L'Oréal Cosmetics; Heineken Beer; Dunhill; Ericsson Cellular Phones; Omega Watches, James Bond wears an Omega Seamaster watch; Smirnoff Vodka i.e. Smirnoff Red label Vodka; Brioni Clothing; Bollinger Champagne; Avis Rental Car Hire; and Electronic Arts' tie-in video-game.

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)

This is the first James Bond movie in the official series to have a running time under two hours since Diamonds Are Forever (1971). The next film to run under 120 minutes would be Quantum of Solace (2008).

Michelle Yeoh, who did most of her own stunts, asked her fellow motorbike stuntman to drive faster in the helicopter chase scene as it would make her hair fly out behind her, adding to the effect of speed.

Because snow was an essential ingredient for the opening action sequence, and the existing snow was already melting, the art directors had to truck in loads of extra snow just to meet production requirements. This sequence alone took two weeks to complete.

HALO stands for High Altitude Low Opening Jump. Stuntman B.J. Worth had to make eighty jumps out of a plane in order to film the HALO jump sequence, eight jumps less than the 88 required for Moonraker (1979).

First EON Productions James Bond movie to be presented by the "Albert R. Broccoli's Eon Productions" credit.

The end credits song "Surrender" was composed and sung in the style of a Shirley Bassey song, Bassey being a stalwart of Bond songs having sung a number of them. Composer David Arnold wanted this song to be used in the opening credits (the lyrics prominently feature the title 'Tomorrow Never Dies') but the producers preferred Sheryl Crow over k.d. lang. However, Arnold did incorporate the song instrumentally throughout his score.

Interesting cameo: Gerard Butler: makes an appearance as "Leading Seaman - HMS Devonshire."

Geoffrey Palmer: appears in the pre-credits scene as an Admiral aside Judi Dench's M character. Palmer and Dench starred together on As Time Goes By (1992).

Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
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