A View to a Thrill

"It felt like we brought the entire shop up there," recalls Smith, "but nothing major ever broke, and the cars were just awesome."

The aforementioned Ice Castle, scene of a glitzy cocktail party earlier in the film, and an important element in the chase scene, was constructed in multi-story, full-scale form at Pinewood Studios in London. The script didn't initially call for the cars to be crashing through or driving in the castle, but, according to Tamahori, it was too interesting an opportunity to pass up. "Rather than it be a conventional set with fake walls, we decided to stage part of the car chase inside the Ice Palace as it's collapsing. That meant that we had to completely redesign the structural elements of a flimsy, fake set and turn it into a real solid one, so cars can race around in here." No wonder it costs $150 million to make a Bond film these days.

Another scene has the Jaguar being launched through the air, landing to a hostile end. Not too long ago, this would've been accomplished with scale models. But that wasn't going to be good enough for Vic Armstrong. Armstrong, a somewhat huskier Harrison Ford look-alike (he's actually stunt doubled for Ford), would settle only for a real XK8, or something that looked like one, in his fly-and-crash scene. So Special Effects stripped one of the cars to a shell and mounted a hollow steel tube just smaller than a telephone pole down its center from stem to stern. The tube was sealed at the front end, open at the rear. The unmanned car was then slipped over another just slightly smaller tube, and aimed like a cannon. "Fill the base of the tube full of nitro, and light it up. Just like blowing the wrapper off a straw, if, well, a bit more violent," grins the obviously pleased director. "Flies like a birdie."

After three movies' worth of German cars, the scuttle is that Pierce Brosnan is a happy Bond and is acquiring his own Vanquish. Look for him to return for at least one more Bond film.

Smith recalls when he was assigned the job of familiarizing Pierce Brosnan with the operation of the Vanquish's sequential/manual gearbox. "He got the hang of it immediately. We cruised around the lot a bit, and then he headed straight for the front gate. We had no paperwork, no number plates, nothing, and off we went. There we were, flying along in the car that was supposed to be saved for beauty photography. We were supposed to be out with it only for a few minutes, and we were gone for an hour or so. And Pierce is a very good driver. Everyone was worrying about where he was. It raised quite a fuss."

And what does today's 007 think of Bond being back at the helm of a proper British GT? "He quite liked it," says Smith. "He's getting one for himself." Bet he doesn't have to pay MSRP, either.

This story is dedicated to the memory of Desmond Llewelyn, who played Q in 18 Bond films, and Amanda Schofield of Eon Productions. "Die Another Day" opens Nov. 22.