From the Archive
007 Issue #13 (1983)

Moving on to You Only Live Twice (1967). Up to that time all outer space SFX were compared to Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). Were you aware that you were going to encounter problems of comparison between your SFX and those in 2001?
Of course you could never hope to duplicate the SFX of 2001 because of the limited time and money at your disposal. No, we didn’t give it a thought really. What we did was pretty current; whereas 2001 was supposed to be set 2001. We used techniques and hardware that was contemporary at the time. In fact one of the ideas we had for doing the interception (subsequently changed in the final film) NASA hadn’t thought of, and they have developed it since then. I still have long talks with NASA about things.

I believe the sequence involving the helicopter flight over the volcanoes contained a degree of model work, together with Wing Commander Ken Wallis’ ‘Little Nellie’.
Yes, I’m still very great friends with Ken. In fact I’ll be seeing him shortly.

How much of the gadgetry was real on ‘Little Nellie’?
Nearly all the rockets were real, and the sidewinders – only the machineguns were pyrotechnic FX, and certainly ‘Little Nellie’ could fly with all those gadgets for real. But before her missiles could be fired in actual flight I had to carry out a significant number of calculations and tests. I had visited Ken at his workshop at Reymerston Hall where we had a long discussion about how exactly we could attach all the missiles and gadgets to his autogyro. There were a lot of factors to be considered, like none of the additions should get in the way of the landing gear; affect the slipstream of the aircraft or the aircraft weight. Being an aircraft buff myself, Ken and I worked extremely well together from the word go. Incidentally, Ken also made all the components for his flying machines himself, being not only an accomplished pilot but also a superb engineer. His workshop was an Aladdin’s cave!

Everything I need to do the job had to be handmade. Nothing existed from stock! The missiles were a problem, inasmuch they had to fire in a straight line ahead of the autogyro, which would be doing around 120 knots. The missiles had to have the power to accelerate away from Little Nellie’s flight line, and also there had to be no chance of the aircraft catching the missiles or them turning back to hit her. I was not concerned about the cluster missiles as they were a known ballistic, and I had used the Icarus rockets before with various types of exploding payloads of my own making. But the two long air-to-air missiles were an unknown factor. I had to devise them from scratch. My problem was, they had to be lightweight and stable in flight – not an easy combination to achieve. I made a drawing and had Ken check it out to see if the autogyro could handle two of them in the position indicated in my drawing.

Getting the okay from Ken, Bert Luxford (part of my SFX team) went ahead and made our prototype, which when completed gave me the exact weight factor necessary to calculate how much thrust I needed to get direction, speed and stability required. I was looking for a one-to one thrust weight ratio or better, with duration of at least eight seconds burn time. There was no time to develop a rocket motor myself so I had to use what was available. The only choice was Shermuly’s Line Throwing Rocket, which provided around seven pounds of thrust. I could arrange four of these in the tail of the missile, which gave me 28lbs of static thrust. The missile with the rocket weighed approximately the same.

Now the moment of truth. Did I have enough power? Did I have the centre of gravity correct? How straight would it fly – if at all? Bert had built a launching ramp and installed it on the roof of the art department building at Pinewood Studios. I remember it was after lunch. The day was grey with an overcast sky. There was no wind. Perfect for a first firing. Other SFX team members Jimmy Ackland-Snow (1905-1975) and Joe Fitt (1924-2002) were also there to watch. We were facing toward the end of Black Park’s pine trees – which run the perimeter of the studios’ fence – so if the rocket overshot the lot it would get stopped in the trees, which were wet, and wouldn’t cause a problem.

There was some set construction going on to the right of us, well out of our line of fire, and in shouting distance. Everything was ready. I called out to the riggers on the set being constructed, ‘Fire in the hole!’ They acknowledged, ‘OK John!’ Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one – fire! I pressed the ignition button. The missile paused for a moment – then off it went! No problems, perfectly straight, no wobbles, as if designed by NASA! It was flying exactly where it was supposed. The burn time was perfect the motor stopped. But instead of the missile nosing over and coming down, it stayed exactly the same height and made a perfect right turn through 180 degrees then straightened out – coming back toward us at 150 mph! One problem was, the construction crew were in the way – and they couldn’t see it coming. We all yelled out for them to take cover and get out of the way. I don’t know where I thought they could go – they were on scaffolding! As luck would have it the missile sailed past them about 30 feet away and landed at the bottom of the building we had launched it from!

I heard the construction crew talking later, discussing how clever the effect boys were, ‘They even make their own guided missiles!’ If only they’d realised.

I imagine the Ninja attack on Blofeld’s volcano headquarters in You Only Live Twice must have entailed very detailed preparation?
Yes. I mean this is where Bond started getting really extravagant in terms of sets and things, and you couldn’t really control things as much as you wanted to because, although I was in Japan on location, I had to leave pretty early to come back and set up the volcano shot, so you’re leaving things with other people, you can’t avoid it, but one would have thought it better if we could have had more time. But it was a time when returns on investment had to be fast, labour rates were sky-high and we had to cut corners on time.

And of course with 2nd and 3rd units filming different sections, presumably there wasn’t the close communication that was a part of the earlier films?
Well, it started getting difficult.

You worked for Harry Saltzman on a film called Toomorrow (1970), which I believe was only screened once and then withdrawn due to a legal argument. But it was supposed to have had quite brilliant SFX in the sci-fi style?
Well it was a bit like E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) really, although we didn’t have an ET like E.T. I think actor Roy Dotrice played the part, but yes there were good FX.

How big was the model of Piz Gloria in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969)?
I’m not sure, not too big, about the size of this room, I think about 1:48 scale.

Were any of the helicopters in the attack on Piz Gloria sequence models?
Yes, for certain scenes.

Were they more complex than the model used in From Russia With Love?
No, the same thing.

Moving to The Man With The Golden Gun (1974), the final James Bond film you worked on – what was your biggest problem on that picture?
The biggest problem was with the aircraft. The problem was I was working with a full-sized aircraft and I was basing everything on the power I could fly the model with, and I was given the specification of an American jet engine that would do the job, and they were two months late delivering the engine. And when it did finally arrive there were so many problems with it, it just wasn’t on. It was a prototype, and I had to change everything at the last minute and we just got away with it. The power we eventually had was so marginal for the type of aircraft that if the barometric pressure was high I couldn’t get it off the ground, but if it was too low, i.e. a stormy day, I would get uplift and I could fly it – so we just got away with it!

You’ve just finished working on The Hound of the Baskervilles (1983). What FX did you supply for that production?
Well, backups on the dogs. We had six hounds of various sorts, but it’s not our picture, we were just asked to go in and help with the hounds.

Now that you are freelance and have your own company you must get a lot of offers for different projects. What makes you choose one film in preference to another?
Oh well, I’ve been doing this now for nearly 30 years and I don’t want to know if there are going to be problems with the crew, an inexperienced crew, or insufficient money on the table or not enough time. But I’m in the situation now where I’ve really got to do my own picture – there’s no question about that. I’ve been involved in making movies for other people for so long that I’ve got the opportunity now and that’s going to happen next year (1983), we start shooting around about June.

Is the film going to be in the Star Wars mould?
Well, it’s going to be entirely different – but you’ll just have to wait and see.

In your career you’ve worked with American SFX technicians and American film crews – is there any difference in the way each other work?
No. They learn from us (laughs). No, joking apart, they got involved with the computerised camera, which works extremely well and all credit to them, but on the physical effects side, they had that gap when they went into TV and learnt from us. In fact I was in Hollywood recently and they are still behind us. Their pictures are still coming here for the FX.

With the success of films like Star Wars (1977) and the general feeling that the British are the best SFX technicians in the world, it seems strange there is still this reluctance to invest British money in films?
Well, I think I may be able to reverse that.

I take it you’ve got around that problem with your upcoming film?
Yes, that’s right, it has totally British backing. But on this question of backing, I think you could get more British money in films – but of course the biggest problem is, unless you have a hit in the States the film will be a flop financially. And how do you get your film on screens in the States because American investment controls the theatrical circuits.

You Only Live Twice (1967) FACT FILE

The Man With The Golden Gun (1974) FACT FILE