GoldenEye at 30

You know the name. You know the number. Premiering on 13th November 1995, GoldenEye introduced Pierce Brosnan as James Bond, reacquainting audiences with the character after a six-year hiatus following Licence To Kill. To celebrate, here are 30 facts to mark its 30th anniversary.

1. 1. GoldenEye marked the first time Barbara Broccoli was credited as a producer. Previous to this, she was credited as an Assistant Director on Octopussy and A View To A Kill and as an Assistant Producer on The Living Daylights and Licence To Kill. 
4. 2. The film’s title was inspired by the name of Ian Fleming’s house in Jamaica where he penned the novels and short stories. 
7. 3. The film was directed by Martin Campbell. The filmmaker would later go on to steer Daniel Craig’s first 007 outing Casino Royale. 

2. 4. Because Pinewood Studios — Bond’s spiritual home — was fully booked, GoldenEye was shot at Leavesden Airfield, a former Rolls-Royce helicopter engine factory only 20 miles from London. The studio space ultimately took up 1.25 million square feet of interior space, with one of the biggest backlots in the world.
5. 5. GoldenEye became the first film with a title sequence designed by Daniel Kleinman. He subsequently went onto create title sequences for Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough, Die Another Day, Casino Royale, Skyfall, Spectre and No Time To Die.
8. 6. The swallow dive in the pre-credit title sequence was shot at the top of the Lago di Vogorno dam at Ticino in Switzerland.
11. 7. The jump was performed by British stuntman Wayne Michaels. The team consulted bungee-jumping experts at Oxford University, who advised that a jump from such a tall structure meant the stuntman would be “jumping into the unknown.”

2. 8. The pre-title skydiving sequence was conceived by B.J. Worth at Big Sky Productions in Montana. It was Worth’s idea to add Bond on a motorcycle into the scene.
5. 9. The sequence was captured in two parts. The first half featured base jumper Jacques “Zoo” Malnuit speeding a motorcycle over the cliff and leaping off the bike into a freefall. He rode a bike over the edge seven times. 
8. 10. The second half saw Worth diving after the out-of-control aircraft as it plummeted. The stuntman was never able to catch up with the plane as planned and, much to Worth’s frustration, the sequence was completed by VFX.
11. 11. The first draft screenplay was penned by Michael France, the screenwriter of Cliffhanger and a former editor of 007 fanzine Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. France noted: “The problem with my draft was that there was too much action. Wall-to-wall action. Every ten minutes you had a $20 million sequence.”
14. 12. Subsequent drafts were written by Kevin Wade, Jeffrey Caine and Bruce Feirstein. With ‘90s action cinema dominated by Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger playing blue-collar heroes, Campbell was keen to retain Bond’s air of sophistication.
17. 13. GoldenEye was the Bond movie that introduced the prototype BMW Z3 Roadster. Still, the filmmakers retained the classic Aston Martin DB5, making its first appearance since Thunderball, in the chase sequence with Russian assassin Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen) driving a Ferrari F355.

2. 14. Pierce Brosnan’s entry into the series was delayed, firstly by minor surgery for a back problem and then by severing a tendon in his little finger after reaching for a porcelain towel rail which snapped and cut him. “I feel like such a prat for making that one public,” he said at the time. “On the way to the hospital I was thinking, ‘I don’t believe it. So close to the role of a lifetime — and now this!” The injury kept him out of action for five weeks.
5. 15. Photography on GoldenEye began on January 16 on Leavesden’s A stage. The first scene shot involved computer programmers Natalya Romanova (Izabella Scorupco) and Boris Grishenko (Alan Cumming) inside the Severnaya control room.
8. 16. Due to insurance issues surrounding his severed tendon, it was stipulated that for the first fortnight, Brosnan could not do any physical scenes or even hold a Walther PPK, which rests on his little finger, and might exacerbate his injury. 
11. 17. Pierce Brosnan’s first scene was Bond’s encounter with Russian arms dealer Valentin Zukovsky (Robbie Coltrane) captured on January 18.

2. 18. The scene where Onatopp murders a Russian admiral by strangling him with her legs during lovemaking had to be reshot in a less racy version to get past the American censors.
5. 19. The Cuban radar-radio telescope was actually shot in Puerto Rico. The real dish, based at Arecibo, had created maps of Venus and, during 1974, beamed the Arecibo message, an interstellar radio message carrying basic information about humanity and Earth.
8. 20. A miniature version of the radar-radio telescope that could rise out of a lake was built back at Leavesden by Derek Meddings and his model crew.
11. 21. Other scenes shot in Puerto Rico featured Bond’s encounter with CIA agent Jack Wade, played by Joe Don Baker. Baker had previously appeared in the series as the villainous Brad Whitaker in The Living Daylights and reprised the role of Wade in Tomorrow Never Dies.

2. 22. On February 7th, Judi Dench made her first appearance as M, a characterisation inspired by the 1992 appointment of Stella Rimington, the first female head of MI5. 
5. 23. The high-tech train boarded by Trevelyan in St. Petersburg was dubbed the “Darth Train” by the crew due to its resemblance to the helmet of a particular Star Wars character.
8. 24. The St. Petersburg authorities initially agreed to let the production shoot the tank chase on the city’s streets but when the authorities intimated the filmmakers would be financially liable for any damage to the historical buildings, the decision was taken to relocate to Leavesden Studios.

1. 25. The Soviet tank, weighing 42 tons and capable of speeds of 35mph, was dubbed “Metal Mickey” by the crew. To maximise its impact, it was often shot with a minimum of four cameras and, on one occasion, six.
4. 26. Two crew members spent almost a week emptying approximately 90,000 cans of Perrier to avoid a fizzy explosion when the tank careened into a lorry.
7. 27. GoldenEye became the first 007 film to use the then cutting-edge computer generated technology (CGI), seen in the fight between Bond and Trevelyan on the radio dish. The film ultimately utilised 140 digital effects shots.

2. 28. Brosnan’s final day on the production — June 1, 1995 — saw the actor driving the tank around Leavesden. Principal photography wrapped on June 6.
5. 29. On July 19, a test audience saw a preview of the film at the Odeon Wimbledon in London. In a subsequent focus group quizzing viewers on Brosnan’s charisma, one participant observed, “You either have it or you don’t and Brosnan has it.”
8. 30. Following a glitzy world premiere at Radio City Music Hall in New York, GoldenEye went on to take over $350 million worldwide. Next up: Tomorrow Never Dies.