20 Things You Didn’t Know About Octopussy (1983)

11. 007 Was Here Octopussy

octopussy movie
MGM/UA

The main unit started filming Octopussy at Checkpoint Charlie in West Berlin on 10th August 1982 - the only time that the famous Cold War location featured in a Bond film.

Whilst the-then divided Germany was the film’s secondary location, surprisingly little of it featured in the movie, despite images of Roger Moore at Checkpoint Charlie and the Brandenburg Gate being used to promote it.

Double-0 Nine was pursued by malevolent knife-throwers, Mischka and Grischka through Black Park near Pinewood Studios and fell into the River Nene at Orton Lock in Peterborough, Cambridgeshire. Heatherden Hall at Pinewood Studios, which had featured as SPECTRE Island in From Russia With Love (1963), doubled for the British Embassy in West Berlin.

The Nene Valley Railway near Peterborough depicted a railway connecting East and West Germany. The fictional town of Feldstadt was constructed at Pinewood along with the interior of Octopussy’s Circus [which Christopher Reeve visited whilst making Superman III (1983)], whilst RAF Upper Heyford in Oxfordshire hosted the Karl-Marx-Stadt (now Chemnitz) and Feldstadt circus exteriors.

Despite Double-0 Seven's brief visit to Germany, an unknown artist wrote “007 Was Here Octopussy” in green spray paint on the Berlin Wall at the time.

Contributor

I started writing for WhatCulture in July 2020. I have always enjoyed reading and writing. I have contributed to several short story competitions and I have occasionally been fortunate enough to have my work published. During the COVID-19 lockdown, I also started reviewing films on my Facebook page. Numerous friends and contacts suggested that I should start my own website for reviewing films, but I wanted something a bit more diverse - and so here I am! My interests focus on film and television mainly, but I also occasionally produce articles that venture into other areas as well. In particular, I am a fan of the under appreciated sequel (of which there are many), but I also like the classics and the mainstream too.