20 Things You Didn’t Know About Tomorrow Never Dies (1997)
1. “White Knight! Come In!”
An arms bazaar on the Khyber Pass was originally meant to appear in The Living Daylights (1987), but was discarded for time and budgetary reasons.
For Tomorrow Never Dies, the sequence cost $11 million and ran for four minutes. It was the first scene shot, captured at Peyresourde-Balestas Altiport in Hautes-Pyrénées, France - the highest airport in Europe.
Chris Corbould rigged numerous missiles to be fired from the Aero L-39 Albatros, each guided to their target by wires.
“In the course of the rocket attack, we blew up a missile launcher, a helicopter, and a truck,” Corbould explained. “They were not miniature, but for real. A jeep went up in a big bowl of flame. [Roger Spottiswoode] was very particular about not seeing the thing there after the explosion. He did not want to see any charred remains, but a total demolition job.”
To simulate the Royal Navy cruise missile destroying the terrorist arms bazaar, Corbould’s team created 30 smaller explosions from 400 gallons of gasoline and 30 pounds of dynamite.
Pierce Brosnan shot close-ups in a sawn-off L-39 cockpit against a backdrop, despite having the flu.
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