Sean Connery’s ever popular third James Bond adventure, 1964’s Goldfinger, is included in this year’s line-up for the 22nd Los Angeles Conservancy’s ‘Last Remaining Seats’ film screening series.
Variety reports that the films are screened at several of downtown’s old movie palaces in order to ‘to increase awareness of Los Angeles’ once vibrant core of historic theaters on Broadway.’
Locations this year will include the recently remodeled Million Dollar Theatre, which was originally built in 1914, as well as the Los Angeles Theatre (1931) and the Orpheum Theatre (1926).
The event will run on Wednesdays at 8:00pm from 28 May through 2 July.
Other films to be screened include Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and Young Frankenstein.
Keep watching CommanderBond.net for all the latest James Bond news and coverage.
While Final Fling, the third and final novel in Samantha Weinberg’s The Moneypenny Diaries trilogy, hasn’t even debuted in hardback yet, a listing for the paperback has already appeared on amazon.co.uk.
The novel is scheduled for an unusually early release of 13 November 2008 considering the hardback doesn’t come out until this May (perhaps to capitalize on the theatrical release of Quantum of Solace during the same month).
The The Moneypenny Diaries: Final Fling UK paperback will retail for £7.99 and will be published by John Murray. Cover art is yet to be revealed.
Bond fans will recall that a March 2009 release date was originally mentioned for this paperback in early 2007.
Final Fling will be set in Jamaica, the Outer Hebrides (an island chain off the west coast of the west coast of Scotland), Cambridge, and London. The novel’s action is planned to be split between Jane Moneypenny’s 1964/65 diaries and the contemporary adventures of her neice, Kate Westbrook. The full blurb follows:
Final Fling combines the excitement of a cold war spy thriller with the mystery of a contemporary detective story. In the 1964/65 volume of her private diaries, Jane Moneypenny reports her demotion from the position of M’s secretary as the British Secret Intelligence Service is hit by a series of defection scandals. Facing considerable personal danger, she combines forces with 007 in a resolve to smoke out the mole she is convinced is buried deep in the heart of the Office. But, when Bond is sacked and M is forced into retirement, Moneypenny finds herself on her own…
Forty-two years later, Miss Moneypenny’s niece and heir, Kate Westbrook, starts to suspect that her aunt’s death was no accident. She is sure the clues to what happened lie in the search for the mole. As she pieces them together, however, she realizes that there are significant forces who are determined to prevent her finding the truth.
From the glamour of 1960s Jamaica to the treacherous beaches of the Outer Hebrides, Final Fling reveals just how far people are prepared to go to defend – or betray – their beliefs, and relates the life and death, and surprising final love, of the world’s most famous fictional secretary.
Keep watching CommanderBond.net for all the latest literary James Bond news. To keep track of all the upcoming 007 releases, events, television shows, and more–just keep your eyes on the CBn Calendar, located on the right panel of our main page.
20 March UPDATE: New guests have been added to the line-up. Article originally posted on 27 February 2008.
As with past years, several cast and crew members from the James Bond films will be attending the upcoming Memorablia event–the UK’s longest running and most established event for fans of movies, cult tv, comics, video games, sport & music.
The 007 stars for this upcoming event include:
Zena Marshall (Miss Taro, Dr. No)
Shirley Eaton (Jill Masterson, Goldfinger)
Catherine Schell (Nancy, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service)
David Hedison (Felix Leiter, Live And Let Die, Licence To Kill)
Jack Klaff (Apostis, For Your Eyes Only)
Vic Armstrong (Second Unit Director, Stunt Coordinator (Various 007 films, including You Only Live Twice, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World Is Not Enough and Die Another Day)
Memorabilia will be taking place from Saturday, 29 March (11:00AM – 5:00PM) through Sunday, 30 March (10:00AM – 5:00PM) at the NEC in Birmingham, UK.
There are many different ticket rates available for the event. Phone 0871 945 9446 for details or visit the official website here.
More Bond guests may be confirmed to attend in the upcoming weeks. Keep watching CommanderBond.net for all the latest details on James Bond events.
A new official Quantum of Solace newswrap video has made it’s way online at Reelz Channel featuring the cast and crew as well as location highlights for Daniel Craig’s second James Bond film.
Starting things off, director Marc Forster commented on the importance he places on the exotic locales in the world of 007: ‘The locations, I think, are characters themselves. When you choose a location, the location as much as an actor, speaks for itself.’
The video also highlights the Bond production shooting in then desert at Baja Caifornia, Mexico. Several shots of planes taking off and helicopters are included.
‘We’re down here filming the aerial sequence,’ said producer Michael G. Wilson. ‘We’ve had them throughout the career of the Bond films, but this one we wanted to kind of have a retro dogfight. These are propeller-driven planes, not jet planes. It’s the type of plane that drugrunners would have so it fits the location.’
‘For every one camera position up here in the mountains it takes three helicopter trips in and three helicopter trips out,’ said second-unit director Dan Bradley. ‘So it’s a pretty arduous task.’
Bond 22 director Marc Forster
‘We have aerial cameras. We’ve got two cameras on an Aerostar and spacecams on helicopters. Then we have some very long lens that go on the ground.’
DC3 pilot Skip Evans said of the requirements for this type of filming: ‘To work this airplane in the bottom of the canyons you’ve got to be physically strong just to maneuver the airplane.’
The video then transitions of the Bond production in Panama, highlighting some of the filming in the streets of Panama City, including a brief exchange between Bond and Agent Fields (Gemma Arterton).
‘We’re in Panama City right now and Panama really has a diversity of cities and looks which is really useful for us,’ said Forster.
As earlier mentioned today in the BBC One video, Arterton commented on filming at the location: ‘It was great working on the streets of Panama because you get a sense of what the real Panama City’s like. They’ve got so much life and character to them. It’s a brilliant location.’
Olga Kurylenko is Camille in Quantum of Solace
‘There’s also the party that will be shot here. It’s sort of a ruin I found that I really fell in love with,’ said Forster. The video shows a before-and-after comparison shot between the initial scouting of the location in October 2007 and it’s current redesign for the Quantum of Solace party sequence.
Arterton also spoke about the party location, calling it a ‘brilliant place.’
‘I think this set is beautiful. It’s stunning; amazing. I really love it. Finally the real fun is starting.’ – Olga Kurylenko (Camille)
In the action sequences with Craig that follow, keen-eyed viewers can also get a brief glimpse at Jeffrey Wright’s Felix Leiter as well.
Watch the full three-minute long Quantum of Solace newsrap online:
The first four James Bond films starring Sean Connery will be hitting the big screen this May as part of the year-round film festival at Chicago’s Music Box Theatre.
Screenings of Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger and Thunderball will make up the 007 film festival at the theatre.
The Bond screenings are scheduled from Sunday, 11 May through Wednesday, 14 May. Specific times are yet to be announced.
General admission ticket cost $9.25. With the exception of some special presentations, tickets are not sold in advance. Tickets can be purchased at the theater box office one hour before showtimes only (cash only accepted).
The Music Box Theatre is located at 3733 N. Southport Ave., Chicago, IL 60613. For further details, phone 773-871-6607 or visit the official website.
Keep watching CommanderBond.net for all the latest James Bond news.
Earlier today, BBC One’s Breakfast programme got an exclusive look into the filming of Daniel Craig’s second 007 film, Quantum of Solace.
The two-minute long video, which can be viewed at YouTube thanks to CommanderBond.net Forum member ‘Royal Dalton’, features the Bond cast and crew in California and Panama.
The video features several shots of Bond in the streets of Panama as well as a helicopter taking off in the California desert, a location ‘so remote that three trips had to be made each time equipment and the crew had to be moved.’ A scene of a plane taking off in the desert is also shown.
Panama’s El Casco Antiguo (Old Quarters)
Speaking on the Bond set in Panama City, Gemma Arterton, who plays MI6 Agent Fields in the film, said: ‘It was great working on the streets of Panama because you get a sense of what the real Panama City’s like. They’ve got so much life and character to them. It’s a brilliant location.’
Also included is a before-and-after shot of a local ruin that has been transformed into the location of a ‘key’ party sequence in the film that features Mathieu Amalric (Dominic Greene), Olga Kurylenko (Bond girl Camille) and Anatole Taubman (Elvis) in addition to Craig and Arterton.
Lastly, a brief look into an action scene with director Marc Forster and Craig is featured.
Watch the full video online:
Stay tuned to the CBn main page for the most up-to-date and complete coverage of Quantum of Solace.
The UK theatrical release date for Quantum of Solace has been pulled forward.
Empire Online reports that according to Sony Pictures, the 22nd James Bond film will now hit theatres on 31 October as opposed to the original 7 November release.
As reported by CommanderBond.net at the beginning of the month, the Quantum of Solace production was to be heading for Chile to continue filming.
An update posted at Merco Press notes that Daniel Craig is expected to arrive by private jet at the Chilean region of Antofagasta on 24 March.
Along with director Marc Forster, Craig will reportedly be taking part in a press conference for the James Bond film on the 26th of the month.
Filming is expected to begin the next day in Observatorio Paranal, the first of four locations. After those first scenes the 007 crew will then shoot in the nearby towns of Cobija, Baquedano, and Michilla.
The original report from Diario Noticiascadadia earlier this month notes that Olga Kurylenko and Mathieu Amalric are also expected to take part in this filming sequence.
Keep your eyes on the CBn main page for all the latest news and complete coverage of Quantum of Solace.
Sir Roger Moore will be co-producing a new two-hour television movie adaptation of The Saint–reports the BBC News.
Moore, was the star of the original 1962-69 TV series (as well as director and producer on some of the episodes), will be working alongside other producers, including his son Geoffrey, on this new project.
The Hollywood Reporter noted that this independently-produced pilot could be the basis of a new series. Filming is expected to start next month in locations including Budapest and Puerto Rico.
British actor James Purefoy, a name that occasionally comes up as a potential future James Bond, is reportedly in talks to play leading character Simon Templar.
The Young Bond Dossier informs us that an audiobook edition of Charlie Higson’s fifth Young James Bond novel, By Royal Command, is planned for release this upcoming September.
According to a listing on the amazon.fr website, the audiobook will be released on 4 September–the same day that the UK hardback edition of By Royal Command debuts.
While further details are yet to be announced, as Higson previously read the audiobook editions for the four previous Young Bond novels, it’s a likely bet he’ll be reading this one as well.
As earlier reported on CommanderBond.net, this new adventure sees Bond ‘forced to go on the run, pursued by enemy agents and the British authorities. James must choose between friendship and duty. His life will never be the same again…’ Locations include England and the Alps.
