Happy birthday, James Bond!

Happy birthday, James Bond!

David Beckham and U.N.C.L.E.: rumor and (apparent) reality

Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer
(Art by Paul Baack)

This weekend saw the (apparent) closure of the notion that former soccer star David Beckham was auditioning to star in The Man From U.N.C.L.E. movie.

In June, a website called Celebrity Fix PUBLISHED A POST that said that Beckham would be “be auditioning for the lead role” in the U.N.C.L.E. movie. This was after actor Henry Cavill said he’d be playing Napoleon Solo in the film while Armie Hammer would play Illya Kuryakin. Either the Solo or Kuryakin part would qualify as “the lead” in an U.N.C.L.E. film.

On Nov. 10, a British tabloid, the Daily Mail, had A STORY saying Beckham was appearing in the movie. No details on the part.

The Daily Mail had a mixed record where accuracy is concerned. On one hand, the publication has a reputation for stealing copy from other publications without credit. On the other hand, the Mail’s Baz Bagimboye had a number of scoops about the 2012 007 film Skyfall that were proven to be correct.

Bagimboye, however, didn’t write the Mail’s U.N.C.L.E. story. Meanwhile, Celebrity Fix’s claim that Beckham was auditioning for “the lead” in the Guy Ritchie-directed U.N.C.L.E. film seems to have been disproven.

Ritchie once directed an underwear commercial with Beckham, as described in THIS STORY by the U.K. newspaper The Telegraph.

UPDATE: On Twitter, some of the Cavill-Hammer fan people raise the question whether the Daily Mail is correct about Beckham filming a scene in the U.N.C.L.E. movie or in the Matthew Vaughn-directed THE SECRET SERVICE.

What if the early 007 films had Marvel-style teasers?

Thor: The Dark World was the No. 1 movie at the U.S. box office this weekend with an estimated $86.1 million in ticket sales. It also continues the Marvel movie tradition, begun with 2008’s Iron Man, of having a teaser in the end titles for future film adventures.

By now, such teasers occur not only in the films made by Walt Disney Co.’s Marvel Studios. They’ve also become part of movies made by other studios, such as X-Men at 20th Century Fox and Spider-Man made at Sony Corp.’s Columbia Pictures.

So what would have been like if the early James Bond movies had such teasers? It was a different time back then, of course. Still, it might have gone something like this.

DR. NO

After the end titles roll, the screen goes black. We CUT TO:

INT.-DAY-BLOFELD’S OFFICE
BLOFELD, whose face, we can not see, is at his desk, petting his cat. The telephone RINGS and he answers.

BLOFELD
What’s that? Dr. No is dead? How?
(a beat)
Well, that makes me quite displeased. We should take note of this Mr. Bond.

FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE

After the end titles roll, the screen goes black. We CUT TO:

INT.-DAY-M’S OFFICE
M is at his desk, smoking his pipe. His telephone RINGS and he answers.

M
Hello. What’s that? Unauthorized leakages? Involving gold? But why should it involve my deprtment?
(a beat)
Oh, I see. I’ll get our best man on it at once. He’s due back quite soon.

GOLDFINGER

INT.-DAY-BLOFELD’S OFFICE
Blofeld, whose face we still cannot see, is at his desk, petting his cat. The telephone rings and he answers.

BLOFELD
Yes, Number 2? Ah….splendid. Yes, please proceed. This will be the largest operation SPECTRE has ever undertaken. I am depending on you to make sure it becomes a reality.

Earlier posts:

MAY 2012: THE AVENGERS: THE POWER OF PLANNING

APRIL 2013: THE FAMILY MODEL (EON) VS. THE CORPORATE MODEL (MARVEL)

U.N.C.L.E. and the crowded U.K. filming scene

U.N.C.L.E. insignia from a second-season episode

The Los Angeles Times has A STORY TODAY about the booming U.K. movie industry. One of the people interviewed is Guy Ritchie, director of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. movie and an old hand at filming movies in England.

An excerpt from the end of the story:

Like others, English director Guy Ritchie, who has made two Sherlock Holmes movies for Warner Bros. in Britain and is now at work on “The Man From U.N.C.L.E,” is noticing his home turf getting more crowded. While shooting a car chase at the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich, which he had also used in his 2005 film, “Revolver,” and in “Sherlock Holmes,” Ritchie noted that the location has popped up in several other movies, including “The Dark Knight Rises,” “Skyfall” and “Les Miserables.”

“Maybe the novelty will wear off,” Ritchie said. “I quite like it, because I can go home at night. I don’t know who the chap is that got this going. Whoever he is, I’d like to take him out for a drink.”

The U.N.C.L.E. movie is based out of Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden. The site is a former factory converted into a movie studio for the production of 1995’s GoldenEye. Warner Bros. used Leavesden to film the Harry Potter movies. Warner Bros. bought the studio in 2010. Warners spent more than 100 million British pounds to rebuild and expand the studio, according to the official website for Leavesden tours.

The Los Angeles Times story by Rebecca Keegan provides details of how the movie boom came about, including tax incentives, the country’s ” tungsten northern light,” and work rules that appeal to studio bosses. The story also references a number of current and upcoming U.K.-based films. The list includes the next Star Wars film that will be shot at Pinewood Studios, the tradition home for James Bond films. To read the entire story, CLICK HERE.

Separately, the Henry Cavill News fan website PUBLISHED A POST of photos shot by a fan identified as marliimarl_ of an U.N.C.L.E. boat chase with stars Henry Cavill and Armie Hammer participating. The post includes a couple of videos that Henry Cavill News also uploaded to YouTube.