On June 7, 1974, the
production organised a day of entertainment at the Rajadamnem Stadium in
Bangkok, and free tickets to the four Thai boxing fights ensured the venue
was packed for the scenes where Bond and Scaramanga first meet, with
dialogue inspired by Ian Fleming’s description of the title character from
his 1965 novel. Following Andrea’s demise, Scaramanga escapes pursued by
Bond and Sheriff Pepper, with the chase filmed on Bangkok’s busy
Phitsanulok Road on June 12, 1974. To give the impression that
Scaramanga’s car could fly, wings were fitted to the AMC Matador, but the
actual aerial shots were completed at the former war-time US Airforce Base
at Bovingdon Airfield in Hertfordshire a month later. Special Effects
supervisor John Stears (returning to the Bond series after a two-film
absence) and his team constructed a remote-controlled model of the AMC
Matador for the scenes of the car taking off, and less-then-convincing
shots of the airborne vehicle were then intercut with the action captured
in Thailand.
Location filming was
completed on June 19, 1974, and the production returned to the UK to begin
work at Pinewood Studios beginning on June 25th. Upon returning to
England, cinematographer
Ted Moore fell ill and had to leave the
production. The decision was made to replace Moore with acclaimed Academy
Award-winning cinematographer
Oswald Morris, who had photographed Look
Back In Anger (1959) and The Entertainer (1960) for Producer
Harry Saltzman. Oswald Morris took over the six-weeks of studio work on
The Man With The Golden Gun (1974), although he was initially
reluctant about taking over from another well-respected cinematographer.
Ted Moore did not work on future James Bond films, but continued in the
industry until his death in 1987.
ABOVE: (top left)
Production Designer Peter Murton's concept artwork for M's office
on board the capsized liner RMS Queen Elizabeth in Hong
Kong Harbour, and (top right) the finished set at Pinewood
Studios. (bottom right) Christopher Lee and Roger Moore rehearse a
scene in Scaramanga's vast Solar Complex on Pinewood's ‘D’ Stage
while cinematographer Oswald Morris [centre] checks his script.
(bottom right) Another of Peter Murton's sets was the metallic
room that housed Scaramanga's large solar-powered weapon which he
uses to destroy 007’s seaplane.
Production Designer Peter
Murton and his team constructed sets at Pinewood Studios including the
interiors of the ‘Bottoms Up Club’, Beirut nightclub, the angled Queen
Elizabeth cabin standing in as M’s Far Eastern HQ, Q’s MI6 laboratory
and various aspects of Scaramanga’s island hideaway; these included the
funhouse and vast Solar Complex built on Pinewood’s ‘D’ Stage. For the
destruction of Scaramanga’s island at the climax of The Man With The
Golden Gun, the filmmakers looked to
Derek Meddings, who had joined
the series with Live And Let Die (1973) and created realistic
miniatures of Kananga’s poppy fields, which when combined with explosions
filmed at high speed proved a more cost-effective way of destroying large
sets. The same method was employed for The Man With The Golden Gun,
with the exterior of Scaramanga’s island built as a large-scale miniature,
and the destruction of the Solar Complex miniature intercut with
explosions on the full-sized set. Derek Meddings’ crew worked concurrently
with the main unit filming action with the principal actors on Pinewood’s
‘D’ Stage. Roger Moore and Maud Adams filmed Bond’s interrogation of
Andrea at Bangkok’s Peninsula Hotel on August 8th and 9th with
Moore required to show a harder-edged 007, in a scene at odds with the
style of much of the rest of the film and those that followed.
Desmond
Llewelyn returned to the series as Q after being absent from Live And
Let Die (1973) [due to commitments on the popular children’s ITV
series Follyfoot (1971-73)] and filmed his scenes towards the end
of production.
ABOVE: (left) Roger
Moore with Maud Adams, as Andrea Anders, in a scene filmed at
Pinewood Studios on August 8th and 9th, with Moore required to
show a harder-edged 007. (right) Derek Meddings and his crew
worked simultaneously on the destruction of Scaramanga's Solar
Complex and surrounding islands – which were filmed as large scale
miniatures in Pinewood's Paddock Tank. The miniature islands were
cleverly constructed and dressed with realistic foliage to match
the rocky outcrops filmed on location in Phuket, Thailand.
Principal photography on
The Man With The Golden Gun was completed on August 23, 1974, and
the film then underwent the process of editing, sound dubbing and scoring.
John Barry briefly returned to the UK to record his orchestrations after
finishing work on John Schlesinger’s Day of the Locust (1975) in
Los Angeles. His score for The Man With The Golden Gun was hastily
composed over three weeks, and five days of recording began on October 14,
1974 – although Lulu's title song had been recorded at CTS Studios in
Wembley on September 4th.
Maurice Binder assembled an early teaser trailer
centred on the proposed Christmas release. Interestingly the teaser
contains brief snippets and dialogue from a sequence ultimately deleted
from the final cut of The Man With The Golden Gun (1974); the scene
formed part of the duel between the two lead characters on Scaramanga’s
island, with Bond escaping by throwing a Molotov cocktail made from a
Thermos flask, causing Scaramanga to waste one of his golden bullets, only
for the villain to reveal he’s got another hidden in his belt. Maurice
Binder’s main titles were among the last elements completed for The Man
With The Golden Gun, with the designer filming much of the sequence
with dancer Carolyn Cheshire, who would later appear in the main titles
for The Spy Who Loved Me (1977).
