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Showing posts with label London. Show all posts
Showing posts with label London. Show all posts

Tuesday 10 November 2015

Bond In Motion (Part One)

My name is Bond...James Bond.

Location: London, England
Address: 45 Wellington Street
Date: Aug 2015
Website: www.londonfilmmuseum.com

  The London Film Museum at Covent Garden has been displaying the largest collection of James Bond movie vehicles ever assembled.  At the time of writing this post it has been extended until further notice.  It is also going to include vehicles from the latest Bond movie Spectre.  All of the items on display are originals used in filming.  When we were in London we could not pass up this opportunity as we have been enjoying the 007 movies our entire lives.   Below are some of the pictures we took during our visit.  We have presented them chronologically by film.  This is part one of two blog posts. ( Click here for Part Two. ) This post covers movies where Sean Connery, George Lazenby or Roger Moore play the role of James Bond.

Dr. No (1962)

From Russia with Love (1963)

Goldfinger (1964)
She's a Beauty. Phantom 337 isn't she?

James Bond plants a tracking device on this Rolls Royce which belongs to Goldfinger.  Odd Job shows James how he can decapitate a statue with his flying hat and crush a golf ball with his bare hands.  Then he drives Goldfinger away.  Goodbye, Mr. Bond.

Thunderball (1965)
Tow Sled.

One of the tow sleds used by Emilio Largo and his scuba diving army during the underwater battle scene.

You Only Live Twice (1967) 
Oh, she's a wonderful girl.  Very small, quite fast. Can do anything. Just your type.
Little Nellie got a hot reception. Four big shots made improper advances towards her. But she defended her honour with great success.

Little Nellie gets assembled from the parts kept in several cases.  Her weapons come in handy as Bond uses flame throwers,aerial mines and rockets to escape the pursuing helicopters.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969)
I suspect they´re trying to kill me.

Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo owns and drives this vehicle to help Bond escape after he is shot at in a phone booth.  The chase takes them onto a race track with a race in progress.  They finally make their escape as a snowstorm sweeps in and they take refuge in a barn.

Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
If you see a mad professor in a minibus just smile.

When Bond steals a Tectronics lunar buggy and breaks through a wall, he is pursued by several guards on these Honda ATCs.  He jumps out of the buggy and then he kicks one of the guards off his bike,steals it and drives away.

Relax you've got a friend named Felix who can fix anything.

After jumping off the bike, Bond gets into this mustang with Tiffany Case and has to elude police through the old Las Vegas strip.  He finally escapes by tipping the car up on 2 wheels and squeezing through a narrow alleyway.

Lower away. Bath-o-Sub to crane, lower away!

Bad guy Ernst Stavro Blofeld tries to escape in this sub by being lowered into the water by a crane. Bond uses the crane to swing the sub into the control room before the oil rig is ultimately blown to pieces.

Live and Let Die (1973)
What the F...?

Bond races this boat through the bayous of Louisiana and jumps it over Sheriff J.W. Pepper.  One of the boats chasing Bond goes straight into Sheriff Pepper's police car.  James' engine is hit by gunfire and he manages to bring the boat up on land again before switching vehicles.

The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)

Can you swim?

After sending Jaws' car off a cliff and into a house, Bond escapes from a helicopter by entering the water where this car converts into a sub.  A quick missile shot straight up at the copter and he and Anya Amasova are alone at last.

How did you know about that? I saw the blueprints for this car two years ago.

It doesn't last for long as some divers using this scuba equipment attack the car.  Bond escapes by emitting a black cloud like an octopus and by dropping a mine.  He then drives out of the water and up onto a crowded beach to the dismay of the sunbathers.

You did want me to drop in.

James rides this Wetbike in order to reach Karl Stromberg's Atlantis sea fortress.

Moonraker (1979)
Drax's Special Car

This is a drawing of one of the cars that Bond and Holly Goodhead take in order to sneak in as pilots onto one of Hugo Drax's space shuttles.

For Your Eyes Only (1981)
I love a drive in the country don't you?

Bond escapes with Melina Havelock in this little yellow vehicle.  It tips over but they are helped to right it again by some friendly villagers.  The chase continues down a windy road.  Bond's vehicle mostly takes the off road shortcuts down the hill.  The chase ends with the bad guys stuck in a tree.

We have a visitor below.

This is a model of the Neptune sub that Bond and Melina use to retrieve the ATAC console from the wreckage of a ship.  They also win a battle with another submersible but no sooner do they reach the surface then Aristotle Kristatos steals the ATAC console from them.

Octopussy (1983)
Toro?  Sounds like a load of bull.

James reverses this jacket to switch from a brown tweed outfit into that of a colonel so he can sneak into an army base.

Fill'er up please.

The plane is disguised as the rear of a horse in a horse trailer.  The plane drives out and the wings unfold so Bond can escape.  He takes off and is pursued by a missile.  He flies through a hangar and turns just in time to make it out the back door before the missile explodes inside.  Running low on fuel, Bond manages to land and pull the plane up to a gas station.

Rupee!! Easy come, easy go.

After fighting off his attackers with the help of some street performers, Bond escapes in his taxi.  He throws out his backgammon winnings into the street and the crowds rush to collect it blocking the pursuing cab from passing.  Ultimately, they tear through a billboard and another drops down in its place hiding their exit.

Every good spy should have at least one gator sub.
 I hear that island is full of beautiful women.  No men allowed.  Hmmm, sexual discrimination. I'll definitely have to pay it a visit.

Bond uses this gator sub to sneak onto Octopussy's private island.

Never Say Never Again (1983) 

A View to a Kill (1985)
Follow That Parachute!

Bond commandeers a taxi and then proceeds to jump the car onto the roof of a bus.  He then smashes through a traffic barrier that takes the roof off of his car. Another collision then splits the car in half before Bond abandons it and jumps from the Pont Alexandre III bridge and onto a boat before landing into a wedding cake.  Congratulations.

Killing Tibbett was a mistake.

Bond jumps from a horse onto this Rolls Royce while trying to escape, only to find that it is being driven by May Day (Grace Jones) and that his friend Tibbett is dead in the back seat.

This is part one of two blog posts.  Click here for Part Two .


Map of Our World
London Film Museum

Post # 78

Friday 25 September 2015

Look Kids. Big Ben. Parliament.

Hey isn't that Big Ben and Parliament over there?

Location: Lambeth, London, England
Address: Lambeth Bridge
Date: Aug 2015
Website: tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/congestion-charge/congestion-charge-zone

   We had just finished walking along the Thames from the South Bank area.  We stopped at Lambeth Bridge and looked back.  Hey look !  Big Ben and Parliament!  Hardly surprising as we could see them any time we looked across the river during our walk.  Now driving in this area would be a different experience altogether.  The Griswolds had this experience in the movie European Vacation.  Chevy Chase (Clark Griswold) drove his family into a roundabout and was unable to get out again.

Lambeth Bridge

  They drove over Lambeth Bridge and past the pointed columns called obelisks and entered into the roundabout.

Obelisk.

  Roundabouts may have been made famous in England, but they are becoming more popular around the world.  Instead of using traffic lights, the traffic from all sides enters into a circle.  The traffic already in the circle has the right of way.  You go around the circle until the road you want presents itself and you turn out of the roundabout.  Fairly simple unless you find yourself stuck in the inner lane of a busy roundabout.  The Lambeth Road roundabout is actually the least round of all the roundabouts we encountered.  It has more of an amoeba shape.  It is on a weird slope and has trees growing on it and also part of it has a bike only lane chopped through it.

There it is!  I know. I can't seem to get over to the left honey.

  We know that this is the same roundabout from the movie since it is the only roundabout in all of London that provides such a perfect view of Big Ben and Parliament.  If you found yourself stuck in the inner lane you would get that view each time you passed the Lambeth Bridge, again and again.  So even though the buildings surrounding it have changed since the Griswolds wreaked havoc across Europe in the 80s, we knew this was the right place.  One building which has not changed and is briefly noticeable in the film is the entrance to Lambeth Palace (pictured below).  Lambeth Palace has been the London residence for Archbishops of Canterbury since the 13th century.

Kids? Lambeth Palace.  And there's Big Ben and there's Parliament.

  There is a much rounder roundabout on the opposite side of Lambeth Bridge.  Chevy Chase would have been forced to drive through this one in order to get to the other side of the bridge.  He must have had only a simple turn to make and not ended up stuck in the inner lane.  Otherwise they would have spent the night circling this roundabout instead.

A Round Roundabout.

  Just in case anyone was thinking what fun it would be to take their rental car for a few spins around Lambeth roundabout we offer a word of caution.   London has a large area where vehicles incur a congestion charge. (See the website at the top of this post)  This charge is about 11.50 pounds and can be many pounds more if not paid properly and you receive a fine.  We did rent a car in London and we flirted with the western border of the congestion charge area.  We did make many wrong turns as we attempted to return to our hotel and we probably broke a few other traffic rules.  We also managed to never enter into that area and eventually reached our destination.
  Driving in London can be quite the experience on its own as most people need to adjust to driving on the opposite side of the road and sitting on the opposite side of the car.  If you are lucky you might even be able to take your attention off driving long enough to notice the view.
Kids?  We know, Big Ben. ... Parliament. 


Map of Our World
Look Kids. Big Ben. Parliament.

Post # 72

Friday 15 May 2015

MUSIC - Rock Lobster

Somebody went under a dock and there they saw a rock.

Artist: The B-52's
Song: Rock Lobster
Released: 1979
Where to listen: East Coast, Snorkeling, Aquariums & Beach Parties

    The B-52's were the first successful band to hail from Athens, Georgia.  They would be the most successful if it weren't for a band called REM.  While REM may have sold more records, The B-52's are much more fun.  This song is great for parties and summertime travel.  It would be perfect if you were at the beach with boys and bikinis and girls and surfboards.  This song also works when visiting any fishing towns in the Maritime provinces of Canada or the North-Eastern USA.  We visited a 55 tonne lobster in Shediac, New Brunswick that is sitting on a huge rock.  Now that is a rock lobster!
  This song is also great to help kids learn all the fish noises when visiting an aquarium.  The ending of the song is sort of an Old MacDonald of the sea.  Instead of moo, quack and oink it gets a little more complicated.  Let's look at some of the lyrics.

Here comes a stingray (wok ahh whuhh)  - The noises are hard enough to imitate let alone write downBelow are two southern stingrays from the Toronto Zoo.

Hey ray, what do you say?

There goes a manta ray (aya aya ayah) - Manta Rays are the largest rays and can reach widths of up to 23 feet.  We have never seen one or heard what it sounds like.

In walked a jellyfish (uuhhh) - We have seen lots of jellyfish, but they always seem very quietThe picture below is of a Japanese sea nettle from the New England Aquarium.  We don't know if Japanese jellyfish sound different or not, or if this one has been in Boston long enough to pick up an accent.

Mind mah stingahhs.

There goes a dogfish (reeawr) - Dogfish are a type of small shark.

Chased by a catfish (blrroooh) - The catfish below are from Sea Life London Aquarium.  You can always tell a catfish by its whiskers.  Actually those whiskers are not hair but skin.

You were expecting we would say meow?

There goes a narwhal (eehh  eehh) - A narwhal is a whale that lives in the Arctic and has a long tusk.  We did see this one on display at the Royal Ontario Museum.

Bye Buddy.  Hope you find your Dad.

While the song Rock Lobster may not be as educational as this blog post, it is always lots of fun no matter where you are vacationing.  Oh, and remember to watch out for that piranha!

Watch out for that piranha. (yayayyaayayayooo)


Map of Our World
Toronto Zoo (Stingray Bay) , New England Aquarium , Sea Life London Aquarium
Royal Ontario Museum

Post # 51