For Your Eyes Only: Film – Trivia- This was the first Bond film to be based on one of Ian Fleming’s short stories (instead of one of his novels). Interestingly, there are several scenes in this film lifted from other Fleming tales. Examples: The assault on the smugglers’ boat and warehouse is lifted intact from a short story entitled “Risico”, and the sequence featuring Bond and Melina being dragged through the coral is actually lifted from the climax from the book, “Live and Let Die”. The Identigraph appeared in slightly different form in the book, “Goldfinger”.
- The license plate number of the black Everflex top white Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow – Silver Wraith II belonging to Aristotle Kristatos was E 667.
- Sheena Easton becomes the first and only ever vocalist to appear during the opening titles sequence of a James Bond film.
- Cameo: [Michael G. Wilson] a Greek priest at a village wedding in Corfu.
- The story involving the sinking of the ship the St.Georges off the Albanian coast was inspired by an international incident on 11 April 1968 when a Soviet submarine was blown-up and sank in the Pacific Ocean. Seventy personnel died and the US Navy located the wreck using the nautical Glomar Explorer, a mission funded by Howard Hughes, whom the Willard Whyte character in Diamonds Are Forever (1971) was based on.
- The character of the father of Melina Havelock (Carole Bouquet), Sir Timothy Havelock played by Jack Hedley, was inspired by oceanographer Jacques-Yves Cousteau. He was once personally acquainted with James Bond creator Ian Fleming.
- Last EON Productions James Bond film soley released by United Artists. They would merge with MGM before the release of the next Bond film, Octopussy (1983).
- The company Autosafe provided the car alarms stickers for James Bond’s Lotus Esprit which read “BURGLAR PROTECTED”.
- The film’s MacGuffin, the ATAC computer device which sinks with the St. Georges spy ship, was an ultra-low frequency coded transmission machine which was used to launch ballistic nuclear missiles. The ATAC acronym stood for Automatic Targeting Attack Communicator.
- This has been the only ever cinema-released James Bond film to date not to feature the M character. The M character did not also appear in the telefilm “Climax!: Casino Royale (#1.3)” (1954).
- Wide public interest in the 1980 Lake Placid USA Winter Olympics was the inspiration for the production to use a Winter Olympics location and to include story action within its associated sports. The film used the Italian Alps location of Cortina D’Ampezzo which had hosted the 1956 Winter Olympics. As such, there are sequences set at Cortina D’Ampezzo’s Winter Olympic venues. Winter sports featured in the film include the biathlon, ski jump, ice hockey, downhill skiing, ice skating, cross-country skiing and bobsled toboggan run. Cast member Lynn-Holly Johnson (now Givens) was a professional ice skater and her character in the film was an aspiring Winter Olympic medalist funded by Aristotle Kristatos.
- Roger Moore announced that he was reluctant to play 007 again, but was lured back at the last moment for an undisclosed sum. To avoid any continuity problems associated with a new actor playing Bond, the scriptwriters included a scene in which 007 visits the grave of his murdered wife.
- Director John Glen had previously edited and was second-unit director on a number of previous Bond films.
- This was the first James Bond script to be written by regular James Bond writing duo team Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson. This writing partnership would continue until Licence to Kill (1989). It was also the first James Bond film directed by John Glen whose first Bond film he worked on was On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) as second unit director.
- A major problem occurred during production which threatened to stop the filmmakers filming. The monks who lived in the monastery on top of the Meteora Mountain placed sheets and plastic on top of the roofs and external infrastructure so as to halt filming. They allegedly did not like the violence associated with James Bond. Reportedly, Roger Moore told them that he had once been a Saint! [See: “The Saint” (1962)]. A special court hearing was convened where a panel of judges decreed that the monks only had rights over the interiors of the mountain-top monastery but the exteriors were the domain of the people and the local government. The film crew were eventually able to film at the location which included a gigantic fall by stuntman Rick Sylvester. They did not actually film inside the monastery (known as St. Cyril’s in the film) but built a set on top of a neighboring rock for some of the hideout’s exteriors. The interiors were filmed back at Pinewood Studios on a set designed by Peter Lamont.
- Topol asked producer Albert R. Broccoli to invite former co-producer Harry Saltzman’ to the Premiere and he did.
- Topol was injured when he was hit by flying debris during the dockside action sequence.
- Playboy Magazine, which had had a long association with James Bond, ran a competition in the magazine for a reader to become a Bond Girl in 1980. The winner was Robbin Young and she appeared in the flower shop scene when motorbikes crash into the florist’s front window. Playboy published some of the James Bond short stories by Ian Fleming including “The Hildebrand Rarity” in 1960 and the James Bond character was seen reading a copy of the magazine in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969).
- Regular James Bond film production designer Ken Adam did not work on the film because he had gone to work in Hollywood on Herbert Ross’s musical, Pennies from Heaven (1981).
- Roger Moore has said that he took a small amount of Valium and drank a glass of beer before some of the scary climbing sequences.
- The opening scene where James Bond visits his late wife’s grave was an idea conceived by director John Glen.
- A line of dialogue had to be cut from the opening helicopter sequence due to legal reasons involving Kevin McClory. The bald man could not be called Blofeld as Kevin McClory had won a court case some years previous and owned the rights to the use of SPECTRE and Blofeld. The line read something like “I thought we should celebrate the tenth anniversary of our last meeting”, which ten years previous was 1971 and Diamonds Are Forever (1971). This was the last time the character of Blofeld had appeared in an EON Productions Bond film.
- Stuntman Paolo Rigoni died during the filming of the bobsled chase.
- The pre-title sequence is a dig at Kevin McClory, who owns the rights to Ernst Stavro Blofeld and SPECTRE. The unnamed man in a wheelchair is obviously meant to be Blofeld, and disposing of him so early was producer Albert R. Broccoli’s way of saying that the success of 007 did not depend on him.
- To enter the identigraph booth, Q enters a five digit code. Those five digits were the first five notes to the chorus of “Nobody Does It Better”, the theme to a previous Bond film, The Spy Who Loved Me (1977). James Bond responds by entering the final two notes. See also Moonraker (1979).
- Bernard Lee, who played M for the last eleven 007 films, died while preparing for the role. As a mark of respect, Albert R. Broccoli refused to recast the role, changing the script to say that M was on leave.
- One of the Bond girls was played by Caroline Cossey, stage name Tula, who was later revealed to once have been a man.
- Director Trademark: [John Glen] [pigeon] Bond almost loses his footing during his climb to the monastery when a pigeon from a nest unexpectedly flies in his face.
- The character of Countess Lisl was played by Cassandra Harris who, at the time of filming, was married to future Bond actor Pierce Brosnan. Brosnan would be offered the part just five years later but be unable to appear as Bond in The Living Daylights (1987) due to “Remington Steele” (1982) commitments.
- The close-ups of Carole Bouquet and Roger Moore for the underwater scenes were actually filmed in a studio with a windfan to produce the effect of floating hair. The scenes were then played in slow motion with the bubbles added in.
- The original poster for the film, the image of Bond framed by a pair of sexy legs, was banned in some cities as being too suggestive. The film received a “Special X” rating (equivalent to today’s NC-17) when it was first released in Saskatchewan, Canada, despite it being rated PG or equivalent virtually everywhere else. The rating was later downgraded.
- Julian Glover, who played Aristotle Kristatos, was a candiate to play James Bond in the sixties.
- In the opening sequence, James Bond visits his deceased wife’s grave at Stoke Poges Church. The gravestone reads “TERESA BOND 1943 – 1969. Beloved wife of JAMES BOND. We have all the time in the world.” The last section is both a quote and name of the title song from On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969). This was the film in which Bond’s wife was killed by Ernst Stavro Blofeld (Telly Savalas).
- The stunt double for Cassandra Harris (Lisl) was injured when hit by the dune buggy in the beach scene.
- Topol was cast after Albert R. Broccoli’s wife Dana Broccoli met him at a party.
- Emile Locque (Michael Gothard) does not have a single line in this film, although we do see him talk on a phone inside his car at one point.
- At one point, it wasn’t certain that Roger Moore would return. Actors considered for the role of Bond included: Lewis Collins, David Warbeck, Michael Billington, David Robb, Michael Jayston, Nicholas Clay and Ian Ogilvy. Oglivy, like Moore, spent several years playing The Saint on TV (More in “The Saint” (1962), Ogilvy in “Return of the Saint” (1978)), and would years later play a Bond-like character in a TV commercial.
- Roger Moore has said he considers this his best Bond film.
- “For Your Eyes Only” and the other Ian Fleming short stories used as the basis for this film were originally conceived in the 1950s as scripts for a never-produced James Bond TV series.
- First credited appearance of MI6 Chief of Staff Bill Tanner, played here by James Villiers. The character had previously appeared (played by an uncredited Michael Goodliffe) in The Man with the Golden Gun (1974). The character would be resurrected as a regular in the Brosnan Bond films, played by Michael Kitchen in GoldenEye (1995) and The World Is Not Enough (1999).
- Steven Spielberg was very much interested in directing a James Bond film and did have talks with Albert R. Broccoli to direct this film, but at the same time George Lucas offered Spielberg the script for Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981).
- Deborah Harry (Blondie) recorded a theme song for this film, which was rejected by the producers. It appears on their 1982 album “The Hunter”.
- The reason the underwater close-ups of Carole Bouquet had to be faked was that the actress had sinus trouble that made it impossible for her to dive or remain underwater.
- Was originally planned for production and release in 1979 as the follow-up to The Spy Who Loved Me (1977). It was even announced as such in the closing credits of the earlier film. However, it was decided to make Moonraker (1979) instead, which delayed production of For Your Eyes Only for several years. Following the release of Moonraker (1979), some newspapers erroneously announced that the next James Bond film would be called “The Sea Wolves”. Roger Moore did make a film entitled The Sea Wolves (1980) between making Moonraker (1979) and this film… but it was not a Bond film.
- The bald man who tries to kill Bond at the start of the film is not referred to by name, but is intended to be Ernest Stavro Blofeld, the cat-loving supervillain who appeared in several earlier Bond films. Several books on Bond film history have suggested that this cameo was intended as a direct response to producer Kevin McClory, who at the time owned the rights to Blofeld and was planning to mount a rival Bond film production (eventually released as Never Say Never Again (1983)) featuring Blofeld.
- Begging Bond to spare his life, Ernst Blofeld baffles viewers with the cryptic line “I’ll buy you a delicatessen, in stainless steel!” It is reported that the phrase is attributable to Albert R. Broccoli, who recalled accounts of 1930s New York mafia gangsters offering full-service delis as a bribe to cohorts, complete with stainless steel countertops.
- John Moreno is dubbed.
- John Hollis is dubbed.
- John Wyman is dubbed.
- The film saved United Artists from financial ruin. At the time of the film’s release, the studio was still reeling from Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate (1980), a notorious $40,000,000 bomb that was about to force UA to file bankruptcy. When this film took in a worldwide gross of $194,900,000, the studio was saved and afterwards turned its focus toward blockbusters and less on personal films.
- This was the first James Bond film to have a music video produced in association with the film. This was the song sung by Sheena Easton who for the first time was the first artist to appear in the opening titles. Since For Your Eyes Only and the rise of the MTV Generation, all Bond films have had music video tie-ins.
- The license plate number of the metallic copper colored Lotus Turbo 2.2 sports car with ski-racks that James Bond drives in Cortina D’Ampezzo was OPW 678W. It was not colored white (as with the earlier car) due to potential schematic color clashing of the white of snow and ice with the car. The white version of the car seen earlier in the film had the license plate number OPW 654W.
- Director John Glen estimated that every foot of film shot during the attempted drowning of Melina and Bond by Kristatos cost about £ 2,700 UK pounds.
- Melina Havelock’s yellow Citroën was a 2CV Deaux Cheveaux and its license plate number was M – 1026 – A.
- A helicopter of General Gogol was a hired Polish Mil Mi-2 (standard Soviet light helicopter, manufactured in Poland), with registration SP-SAP repainted to 8P-8AP and a factory pilot.
- Charles Dance’s first screen film role was as the thug Claus in this film.
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- Entry created: December 28, 2006; 8:59; Last modified: August 14, 2009; 23:52
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