Now in its second century of filmmaking excellence, Pinewood ® Studios serves England as its biggest, most legendary motion picture facility. Located in the little village of Iver Heath, in the area of England known as Buckinghamshire, Pinewood is best known for its world-renowned Albert R. Broccoli/007 Stage, which stands as a constant reminder of the countless number of features --- some American-made, some British-made --- that were shot here. Pinewood also has a sister studio of sorts in its United Kingdom homebase, in the form of its longtime rival and next-door neighbor, the Shepperton Studio Centre ® at Shepperton Studios Road in Middlesex. Pinewood also has a third British home: Pinewood Cardiff and the Wentloog Avenue Environmental Center in Wales.
The Broccoli Stage honors the memory of the producer whose EON Productions Limited ® (EON, by the way, stands for the Broccoli family motto, "Everything Or Nothing") remains homebase of all 007 ® features, all of which are available on DVD and Blu-ray! --- including the 007 epics starring Daniel Craig, starting with Casino Royale™, the first Bond movie under a partnership between Danjaq ® LLC, MGM and Columbia Pictures; its action-packed follow-up, Quantum of Solace™......
Then, on the franchise's Golden Anniversary, the world's most famous licence to kill was renewed! Skyfall™, the 23rd official adventure of 007, now on DVD and Blu-ray, dared to merit its own unprecedented milestone, when it became the first Bond film to emerge triumphant at the Academy Awards! It was a truly fabulous Oscar Night for Adele and her co-composer/producer Paul Epworth, when the Skyfall™ title track won the Oscar for Best Original Song! And to further put the icing on the cake, on the Oscar Night in question, Academy Award winner --- and Bond Girl --- Halle Berry introduced a montage of the sights, sounds and memories of 50 years of 007 --- and the segment wrapped up as only it could: with the first-ever Academy Award appearance of Dame Shirley Bassey, singing (what else?) Goldfinger ®!
Previously awash in some $3.7 billion in debt, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer wasted no time renewing itself, having filed for bankruptcy protection and restructuring in November 2010. Skyfall™ was Daniel Craig's third appearance as 007; Academy Award winner Sam Mendes directed a screenplay by John Logan, along with Casino Royale™ and Quantum of Solace™ screenwriters Neal Purvis and Robert Wade. Co-starring with Daniel: Ralph Fiennes, Albert Finney, Berenice Marlohe, Naomie Harris, Dame Judi Dench, making her final appearance as M, and Javier Bardem as the vengeful Silva, a rogue MI6 agent with a personal grudge against M. Taking 007 through London, Edinburgh, Beijing, Shanghai and Istanbul, Skyfall™ also won the Academy Award for Best Sound Effects Editing.
And not only did James Bond return, so too did Sam Mendes. Bond's 24th movie, SPECTRE™, found Olivier Award-winning playwright Jez Butterworth joining the Logan-Purvis-Wade team. SPECTRE, by the way, is the Special Executive for Counter-Intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion, long associated with one of Bond's most frequent nemeses, that cat-obsessed Ernst Stavro Blofeld! But this isn't your father's SPECTRE, because now, there's a new evil genius at the top: Franz Oberhauser, played by Academy Award winner Christoph Waltz. The new story, set immediately after the events of Skyfall, also starred Ralph Fiennes, replacing Judi Dench as M, and Ben Wisham as Q. "I am very pleased that, by giving me all the time I need to honor all my theatrical stage commitments, the Producers have made it possible for me to direct Bond 24," Sam said in a statement posted last Christmas by Sony Pictures and Danjaq LLC. Now out on Digital DVD and Blu-ray, SPECTRE was once more distributed domestically through the aforementioned partnership of Danjaq LLC, MGM and Columbia Pictures. Sam Smith sings the main title song, "The Writing's on the Wall," which he co-wrote with Jimmy Napes --- thus becoming the first solo male British-born vocalist to sing a Bond theme song since 1965, when Tom Jones told the world how "he strikes like Thunderball." And more, Oscar honored Team Danjaq, Sam Smith and Jimmy Napes with the Best Original Song for a second consecutive year --- making Bond the first film franchise to win back-to-back in just this category! Visit Google, Yahoo! and Bing to see all the SPECTRE reviews!
And Daniel Craig has returned for his fifth and final adventure as 007! No Time to Die, Bond's 25th motion picture, is now officially in the can as of October 26th, 2019, under the direction of Cary Joji Fukunaga, and MGM and Universal Pictures will release the adventure in the U.S. on April 2nd, 2021. Ralph Fiennes, Ben Wisham, Rory Kinnear and Naomie Harris are all back as, respectively, M, Q, Tanner, and Eve Moneypenny. Returning on behalf of the bad guys is Christoph Waltz as the aforementioned Ernst Stavro Blofeld (previously disguised as Franz Oberhauser) with Lea Seydoux as Dr. Madeline Swann, back as well, along with Jeffrey Wright as CIA Agent Felix Leiter. As the main villain, the mysterious, mask-wearing, and super-sexy Safin, you have Academy Award winner and Night @ the Museum Trilogy veteran Rami Malek, who recently concluded the final season of his USA Network series, Mr. Robot; and the other newcomers are Ana da Armas as the enchanting Paloma, Dali Bendssalah, David Dencik as hanger-on Waldo, Lashana Lynch as Nomi, and Billy Magnussen. More, the No Time to Die making-of book, by Mark Salisbury, is out on April 14th from Titan Books.
In the new story, set shortly after the events of SPECTRE, Bond has left MI6 and is enjoying some down time in Jamaica. But it's not to last, because his old pal, CIA Agent Felix Leiter, needs Bond's help. Felix has been tracking down a mysterious new villain who, armed with the latest in digital technology, has kidnapped one of the world's most important scientists! It's a quest that will take Bond and Felix through the snowy fjords of Norway, and deep into Italy's more iconic landmarks.
Behind the scenes, a new squad joins Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson: executive producer Chris Brigham; screenwriters Scott Burns and Phoebe Waller-Bridge; director of photography Linus Sandgren; film editors Tom Cross and Elliot Graham; production designer Mark Tildesley; score composer-producer-supervisor Hans Zimmer; costume designer Suttirat Larlarb; 2nd unit director/supervising stunt coordinator Olivier Schneider; 2nd unit director Lee Morrison; and visual effects senior supervisor Chuck Noble. Returning to the creative team will be screenwriters Neal Purvis and Robert Wade; 2nd unit director-cinematographer Alexander Witt, B.S.C.; A.S.C.; special effects/action vehicle senior supervisor Chris Courbould, B.S.C.; and casting supervisor Debbie McWilliams, C.S.A.
And singing the title song is 18-year-old Grammy Award winner Billie Eilish, the youngest-ever recording artist to sing a 007 title song! Billie co-wrote the tune with her big brother, multi-Grammy Award-winning artist, Finneas O'Connell! Billie, Finneas, Hans Zimmer and fellow rocker and guitar hero Johnny Marr premiered the song during the British Recording Industry Trust (BRIT) Awards, which recently aired in England on ITV.
"We're thrilled to return to Jamaica with No Time to Die, Daniel Craig's fifth installment in the 007 series," say Barbara and Michael in their e-mail statement, "and it'll be wonderful shooting in the land where Ian Fleming created 007, and where Dr. No and Live and Let Die were filmed."
By the way, did we mention that Pinewood Shepperton has an American home, too? Indeed it does: Pinewood, in a joint venture with River's Rock LLC, controlled by the Cathay family, owners of the Chick-fil-A fast-food empire, controls the awesome Pinewood Atlanta Studios in Fayetteville, Georgia. Encompassing six soundstages on 288 acres just outside Atlanta/Fulton County, Pinewood Atlanta is a magnificent state-of-the-art facility, where the finest in movie, TV, web-only and video games are developed. Pinewood maintains a 40% controlling interest in Pinewood Atlanta, and also provides sales and marketing services. Pinewood also has a Canadian facility, Pinewood Toronto Studios, in the heart of Ontario's capital city. Pinewood has even gone Latino, with its Pinewood Dominican Republic Studios at Juan Dolio, San Pedro de Macoris.
But let's remember, for the purposes of this present website, that it was here on the Broccoli Stage in 1978 that cinematic history was made, when Alexander and Ilya Salkind and Pierre Spengler chose Pinewood to serve as production homebase for the first Superman ® movie. Team Salkind returned to Pinewood faithfully year in and year out from then on, filming two additional features with the Last Son of Krypton ..... and then, in August 1984, having completed their historic adventures with Kal-El's cousin Kara of Argo --- better known as Supergirl ® --- the folks who made the world believe that people could fly turned their attention to that other flight-capable, red-suit wearing permanent resident of the North Pole: the Man of Steel's next-door neighbor himself, Santa Claus!
With six studios, encompassing 74 soundstages in four countries on four continents, the Pinewood Group takes on the filmmaking challenges of a constantly expanding digital age, under the leadership of a team whose members remain committed to serving the filmmaking communities in five nations with a renewed strength unprecedented in cinema history!
And though some may still question the 007 Stage's ability to function, its fans continue to marvel at its incredible usefulness and inventive modernism!
New York City's all-superspy museum, Spyscape, 928 8th Avenue, Midtown Manhattan, brings you DRIVEN! 007xSPYSCAPE, the ONLY James Bond exhibition in the Big Apple. Specifically emphasizing 007's ride, his trusty Aston Martin DB5, the exhibit looks at the process that went into the development of the Bond movies. This unprecedented treasure trove has weapons and gadgets from Q's Workshop; sketches drawn by Production Designer Ken Adam; AND an interactive journey behind the scenes at the finale of Skyfall! Bond fans are guaranteed a fantastic holiday amidst these one-of-a-kind items from the secret caverns underneath Pinewood's Iver Heath facility. Tickets: $23, adults, $18, kids. Hours: 10 a.m-9 p.m.
We dedicate this portion of KQ5 to the memory of one of Bond's best friends: director Guy Hamilton, he of Goldfinger ®, Diamonds Are Forever ®, Live and Let Die ® and The Man with the Golden Gun ®, who passed away at a local hospital on the island of Majorca in Spain. He was 93. As most Salkind and Supermovie fans know, Guy had been forced to drop out as Superman: The Movie ®'s intended skipper, in that, being a British tax exile, he could not join the team that was about to shape the original Superman ® movie, setting the stage for the odyssey of Richard Donner, and all that eventually followed.
This segment of KringleQuest.com, v.5 examines the massive sets developed for Santa Claus: The Movie™ by its Production Designer, two-time Academy Award ® nominee Anthony Pratt, and takes a further look at Pinewood's Christmas history. For additional info on ALL the Pinewood Studios, click as shown above, or check out Yahoo! Britain & Ireland!