GoldenEye

Bond films seem to be highly fertile territory, not just for helicopter explosions but highly creative helicopter explosions.

Bullets and surface-to-air missiles are apparently far too mundane for Bond screenplay writers and GoldenEye doesn’t disappoint, with yet another unique combusting chopper. (Oo-er. If Roger Moore were writing this piece, that would be worthy of a cheap double-entendre.)

GoldenEye re-invigorated a franchise that had become stagnant during a six-year legal dispute over licensing rights. During this period, Timothy Dalton quit as Bond having been harshly deemed a failure – mainly due to the poor commercial performance of License To Kill.

Although his first Bond film, Goldeneye also represented the zenith of Pierce Brosnan’s stint as 007 – which soon descended into self-indulgent tripe, culminating in the risible Die Another Day. This movie managed to convey was a tense climate of post-Cold War espionage, with redundant or retired spies using their skills in other pursuits.

But enough cerebral chit-chat. GoldenEye is just a bloody cool film. The opening scene, with a sort of metallic Eastern Bloc soundtrack, was electrifying and quintessential Bond: bungee jumping off an enormous dam into a Russian chemical weapons base, before meeting up with 006 (Sean Bean as Alec Trevelyan) and wiring the place to explode.

During the mission, and throughout the film in fact, there is unintended light relief in the form of Sean Bean’s posh accent. Posh, that is, if you’re from East Yorkshire and Bean is from Harrogate. Just before his faux execution, Bean shouts at Bond: “Do it fer Englund, James. Blow ‘em all t’hell!” If he’d added: “Ecky thump” at the end, you could have sworn you were watching a lively episode of Last of the Summer Wine.

The high-point of the film though, is Robbie Coltrane’s scene-stealing turn as Valentin Zukovsky. It’s easy to imagine Coltrane licking his lips while reading the script for his part as an ex-KGB agent turned arms dealer and gangster.

His lines are delivered with a charisma and venom that make him utterly convincing as a ruthless Russian crime boss, still bitterly nursing a permanent limp after Bond shot him in the leg years ago.

His first scene with Bond has a fantastic exchange that’s worth repeating. After Bond asks for a favour, Zukovsky says: “You want ME to do YOU a favour?” (Ironic Brian Blessed style bellow, then a pause).  “My knee ACHES every day. Twice as bad when it is cold. Tell him how long the winter lasts in this country, Dmitri.”
[Weedy voice of Dmitri off screen[: “Well, it depends on…”
Zukovsky: “SILENCE!!!”

Coltrane, however, only narrowly pips some other inspired pieces of casting in the effort to refresh the Bond brand: Judi Dench brilliantly portraying M; Samantha Bond as a sassy, modern day Miss Moneypenny; and Famke Janssen as sadomasochist assassin, Xenia Onatopp.

Janssen’s Bond girl, in particular, was a brave move. The sadomasochistic elements, including tight leather outfits and crushing a man to death mid-coitus, are quite explicit for what people had come to expect of a Bond film. She even appears to orgasm while laying waste to some innocent civil servants with a machine gun.

As a youngish man at the time, I found her character a little confusing. Confusing in the sense that I was unsure whether it was okay to really fancy a murdering dominatrix and find her proclivities a bit of a turn on. It was a bit like when the seven-year old me saw a woman in a bra for the first time - in my mum’s Littlewoods catalogue. In both instances, I eventually decided it was more than okay.

Back to the film though, and its back-to-basics plot. Bond and Alec Trevelyan (Bean’s 006) infiltrate a Russian chemical weapons plant with the intention of blowing it up. It all goes wrong when 006 is captured and seemingly executed by a cruel-looking Russian general.

Bond escapes in magnificent style, motorcycling down a mountain runway and skydiving without parachute into a plummeting Cessna, which he eventually brings under control and flies away as the plant explodes. Several years later, a plot unfurls in which the same renegade general steals a secret Russian space weapon on behalf of a sinister but unseen criminal mastermind, Janus.

This, it turns out, is Yorkshire’s finest secret agent, Alec Trevelyan, who is revealed as the son of Lienz Cossacks. (Who knew the Soviets had colonised Pontefract?). Anyway, via a series of glamorous locations, Bond ends up in Cuba with the attractive but fairly dull Izabella Scorupco - although she’s perhaps unfortunate to appear as a computer programmer in a 007 film where the other main Bond girl is a leather-clad, murdering, sex maniac.

In the process of looking for Trevelyan’s base in the Cuban jungle, a chopper appears of out nowhere. A rope drops down, followed swiftly by randy vixen Onatopp, clearly in the mood for some more murder-sex.

As she squeezes the life out of Bond and screeches with desire, he manages to reattach her to the jump-rope and uses her gun to shoot at the hovering chopper. The panicking pilot loses control, and Onatopp is violently wrenched away only to become anchored to a tree.

She lets out a blood-curdling scream as the chopper vs. tree combination crushes her to death. She remains pinned to the tree, acting as a kind of human anchor for the ‘copter, which plummets to the ground and explodes in a massive fireball.

But we shouldn't forget another equally interesting helicopter explosion. Earlier in the film Bond and Natalya are captured and tied up inside a special stealth helicopter that's been booby-trapped.

Its missiles automatically fire and loop round to come straight back at the vehicle. Luckily, Bond manage to headbutt the ejector seat button and our heroes are shot out of the stationary whirlybird seconds before the missiles hit.

Artistic merit

Quite strong. Some thought clearly went into these fireballs. If it were a steak, it would be a nice, meaty sirloin. Not quite a filet mignon, but a luxury cut nonetheless.



Exploding helicopter innovation

Much like our blog on The Spy Who Loved Me’s underwater car-to-chopper rocket and Tomorrow Never Dies’ rusty washing line, I can’t recall another chopper being brought down by being attached to a human anchor. Well done, James.

Also we have never before seen anyone escape from a helicopter via ejector seats. As you can imagine the presence of 20-foot long, whirling metal blades makes ejecting from a helicopter a tad problematic. But in this chopper the blades are first ejected before Bond and Natalya are thrust into the sky inside a self-contained pod from which parachutes eventually emerge.

If none of that sounds terribly plausible, please try and remember this is a Bond film so why would it.

Number of exploding helicopters

Two.

Positives

The sheer originality and brutality of what brings the chopper down. No expense is spared on the black and orange fireball either.

Negatives

Frankly, the sad demise of the horny Onatopp. And the really bad pun from Brosnan afterwards: “She always did like a good squeeze”.

Interesting fact

Not that interesting and quite well known, but the film was named after Ian Fleming’s estate in Jamaica. The film was also the first in a three-film product placement tie-up with BMW, which saw Bond driving a sky blue Z-3, probably much like the one your mum’s hairdresser has. It was controversial at the time, and still is frankly.

Review by: Jindy

Still want more? Then check out the Exploding Helicopter podcast episode on GoldenEye. Listen to it on iTunes, Stitcher, Podomatic or YourListen.

Die Another Day

Pierce Brosnan always wanted us to believe that he was the heir to Sean Connery’s Bond. But after Die Another Day we discovered he was a lot closer to Roger Moore than he may ever have cared to admit. 

Like one of Roge’s latter appearances in the role, the film is full of implausible gadgets and a relentless stream of sexual innuendo, that made the ageing Brosnan resemble an inappropriately flirtatious uncle at a wedding. 

The other major problem with Die Another Day is the action set pieces. They’re as grand we’ve come to expect from the series, however, there’s never a sense of jeopardy. Whenever Brosnan’s in trouble there always a clever gadget to hand (invisible car? Puh lease!) and he can sail suavely on his way. It all feels a little too easy.  

This issue was brought into sharper focus by the release of another espionage-flavoured action film a few months earlier. The Bourne Identity offered a darker, more serious hero, who was reliant only on himself.  

Brosnan and the Bond producers had discussed doing a further film after Die Another Day. But the disappointing box office and critical reception nixed that, and the franchise went into mothballs. Bond, it seemed, had lost his licence to thrill. 

Exploding helicopter action

Still, the film isn’t without any merit, especially if you’re into exploding helicopters. Bond impersonates a arms dealer in order to assassinate a North Korean Colonel. However, after 007’s true identity is discovered, the Colonel decides to reveal his hand in flamboyant fashion.  

Taking a tank buster gun, supposedly to demonstrate it to Bond’s, he fires a depleted uranium shell at Bond’s helicopter blowing it to smithereens. Bond it seems, will need to walk home. 

Artistic merit 

Director Lee Tamahori earns points for showing the helicopter explode from a number of different angles. However, irritatingly the viewer is deprived of the full exploding helicopter experience by cutting to reaction shots from Bond and the Colonel's staff. 

Exploding helicopter innovation 

Whilst we’ve seen helicopters taken out by grenade launchers before, but this is the first known destruction of a helicopter with a depleted uranium shell. 

Positives 

There is other pleasing helicopter sequences in the film. During the film’s finale Bond and Jinx (Halle Berry) escape the fatally damaged transport plane they’re aboard. 

They fall out the back of the airplane in a helicopter which Bond desperately tries to start whilst plummeting to the ground. In classic nick-of-time style, Bond is able to start the rotor blades and prevent the chopper becoming a helicopter pancake. 

Negatives 

Little demonstrates better that the fact the Bond franchise had lost its way than the scene where Bond’s return to the UK is soundtracked by London Calling by The Clash. 

This clunking lack of imagination is evident throughout the film. Did any thought go into naming one of the henchmen “Mr Kill”? 

Interesting fact 

Even Roger Moore, a man who made no apology for Moonraker, thought Die Another Day was rubbish.  

The World Is Not Enough

After GoldenEye successfully rebooted the franchise, it didn’t take long for the rot to set back in. The World Is Not Enough may be only Pierce Brosnan’s third outing, but the worst excesses of the Roger Moore era don’t merely creep in - they storm the place like a lager-fuelled stag do.

The film is crammed with embarrassingly crude double entendres, ham-fisted comedy, and gadgets so daft they make Moonraker look like gritty realism. 

Evidence that the franchise was now locked in a self‑inflicted arms race arrives immediately. The pre-title sequence - the longest in Bond history - is a sprawling, hyperactive attempt to “top” past adventures.

From there, the film pinballs from location to location, each serving mainly as a backdrop for a greatest-hits package of past Bond action sequences. We get a ski chase (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service), submarine antics (The Spy Who Loved Me), bomb defusing (Goldfinger), and even a mine-based showdown (A View to a Kill). And in between, Brosnan is forced to deliver gratuitous sex jokes and wince-inducing comedy with Q (Desmond Llewellyn) and his irritating apprentice R (John Cleese).

All of which is a shame because somewhere inside The World Is Not Enough’s 007 karaoke lies the outline of a much better film. Bond actually has personal stakes this time, and Sophie Marceau’s Elektra King is one of the most fully realised female characters in the franchise’s 60-year history. These story elements offer tantalising glimpses of a more dramatically serious Bond, the sort that Daniel Craig would later perfect. Unfortunately, the filmmakers lacked the nerve to commit to that version.

Exploding helicopter action

The plot - such as it is - concerns attempts to control the world’s oil supply via the usual Bond villain method: stealing nuclear weapons and doing something vaguely apocalyptic.

Bond follows a lead to a caviar factory, but the villain soon gets wind of his presence and dispatches two helicopters from her mining operation to kill him.

These choppers come equipped with enormous rotating saw-blades dangling beneath them - basically giant flying food processors. They slice through the factory buildings where Bond is interrogating a suspect, sending metal and caviar flying.

After some obligatory dashing about, Bond uses a remote control to summon his car. He hops in, activates the onboard missile system, locks onto the first helicopter, and vaporises it with a single shot.

The chopper explodes and plunges vertically into a stack of oil drums, triggering yet another explosion - because in Bond films, all containers are 90% petrol.

While Bond admires his handiwork, the second helicopter swoops in and neatly slices his car in half. After more running around, Bond opens a gas pipe, sending a plume of flammable vapour into the air. 

He then fires a flare gun into the cloud, igniting it and blowing up the conveniently hovering helicopter.

The detonation sends the cutting wheels hurtling through the air like deranged, helicopter‑sized ninja stars.

Artistic merit

Underwhelming. There’s a strange absence of danger in these scenes - a problem that infects much of the film. Destroying the first helicopter with a single prod of the car’s missile button is so effortless it feels like Bond is cheating.

The second explosion at least requires some improvisation, but even then the whole thing feels like exploding‑helicopter‑by‑numbers. It doesn’t help that Brosnan looks immaculate throughout - tumbling over machinery, dodging blades, sprinting through explosions, and yet his suit remains flawlessly tailored. His tie stays perfectly knotted until he performs the traditional “now the danger’s passed, let’s loosen it” gesture.

It’s a glib observation, but it exposes a deeper flaw: if Bond never seems vulnerable, it’s hard to invest in the peril. Without the sense that he can be hurt, the action becomes weightless - a eunuch of an action sequence, robbed of any real vitality.

Exploding helicopter innovation

Not the first time Bond has blown up a helicopter with a missile fired from his car — Roger Moore managed the feat in The Spy Who Loved Me from the comfort of his submerged Lotus.

Number of exploding helicopters

Two.

Positives

The hanging rotary cutting tools are admittedly fun, in a super‑villain‑home‑improvement sort of way. But the helicopters have to move so slowly to use them that I’d fancy my chances of jogging clear of their deadly spinning cogs.

Negatives

The scene is tainted by the modern Bond trademark: shameless luxury-brand product placement. The car’s targeting system is embedded directly into the centre of the steering wheel — neatly framed within the logo of a well‑known German manufacturer. Exploding helicopters should not be cheapened by becoming glorified car adverts.

Also, the Russian accents are some of the worst ever recorded. Robbie Coltrane (Valentin Zukovsky) leans into pantomime territory; Robert Carlyle (Renard) sounds like he’s from the little-known Russian oblast of Glasgow; and as for Goldie (Bullion)… your guess is as good as mine.

Interesting fact

Apparently Joe Dante (Gremlins, Innerspace) was considered as a possible director. I can’t fully believe it either, but I read it on the internet - so it must be true.

Review: by Jafo

Still want more? Then check out the Exploding Helicopter podcast episode on The World Is Not Enough. Listen to it on iTunes, Podomatic, YourListen, Stitcher, or Acast.

Tomorrow Never Dies

A James Bond film is much like a Christmas pudding. It contains a combination of ingredients that you just don't get elsewhere. Someone will always try to take over the world. A series of zany gadgets will be deployed in exotic locations. Impossibly beautiful women will fawn over 007, and there's always a strong possibility a helicopter may explode.

And, much like a Christmas pudding, you only ever get it once a year. 

Those ingredients are mixed-up and served to us again in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997) - Pierce Brosnan’s second Bond outing after the hugely successful GoldenEye. Tantalisingly, the film opens with in an arms bazaar in mountains bordering Russia.

I say tantalising because the impressive array of military aircraft on display suggests that the viewer might be about to witness one of the earliest helicopter explosions in celluloid history.

Alas, it's not to be. Whilst a helicopter lurks enticingly in view, we never get to see it explode - even when the entire mountain top is vaporised whilst Bond escapes in a fighter plane.

This begins a convoluted plot in which a media baron attempts to to boost his fortune by secretly triggering World War III. It's curious plan at best. Especially as Jonathan Pryce’s Elliot Carver seems not to have considered the fact that survivors of a nuclear holocaust are unlikely to see reading a newspaper as much of a priority. No matter, this is Bond after all, so plots as thin as a sheet of newspaper are good enough to carry the film.

So, to the exploding helicopter action. This occurs after Bond teams up with Chinese agent Wai Lin, played by Michelle Yeoh. After escaping Carver's clutches, the pair jump off a skyscraper in central Saigon (this is Bond after all) and race through the city on a motorbike hotly pursued by some anonymous henchmen.

Eventually, they find themselves stuck on a busy street. The chasing chopper pitches forward, using its rotor blades to clear the street and rip through a couple of hundreds of market stalls like some kind of aerial garden strimmer. (It’s unclear why one of the henchmen doesn’t just lean out with his machine gun but as the director didn't trouble himself with this detail we won't either).

Cornered in a dead end street, Brosnan improvises boldly - throwing a washing line into the chopper's tail rotor.

Our heroes take cover while the helicopter very slowly hits a a corrugated iron shack before immediately combusting as if coated in dynamite. We then cut to Brosnan casually taking a post-explosion shower with Yeoh. Well, at least she’s roughly his age.

Artistic merit

After such an elaborate build up, including a stunt in which Yeoh climbs over Brosnan on a moving motorbike, the pay-off is quite disappointing. The chopper seems to explode at the slightest of touches, although the fireball is satisfyingly expensive looking.

Worst of all though, are the clearly visible crash test dummies sitting in the chopper as it goes up. You would think the budget could stretch to some models that don’t have hinges showing.

Exploding helicopter innovation

None at all. It feels as if a day’s shooting needed to be completed so rather than inject a tailspin or a prolonged and dramatic tumble from the air, the chopper just gently pokes a paper house with its nose. It’s all over in about three seconds.

Number of exploding helicopters

1.

Positives

The director should at least be applauded for injecting a helicopter into a chase scene in downtown Saigon, when an automobile would easily have sufficed. And I can’t think of many other films where a helicopter has met it’s demise with a piece of washing line.

Negatives

You have to wonder what seasoned thesp Jonathan Pryce was thinking when he took this role. Perhaps he thought “It hasn’t done Dame Judi Dench any harm has it?”. But then she’s never been asked to wear a despot chic Nehru collar suit whilst trying to take over the world with a small, wireless keyboard.

Interesting fact

Teri Hatcher was three months pregnant when she played Bond’s other love interest, Paris Carver. Are there no depths to which he will not stoop?

Review by: Jindy

Dante's Peak

When you think about it, disaster movies are rather like volcanoes. The genre lies dormant for decades before violently and unexpectedly erupting.  

The Seventies, of course, saw the most famous eruption of disaster films. But after a 10-year run of films with bloated plots and casts stuffed with past-it actors (think Earthquake or Meteor), the genre went quiet. 

More recently, efforts to revive films featuring world-ending calamity have hampered by movie-makers desire to show off the CGI wizardry they now have at their disposal. 

Neatly avoiding all these pitfalls is Dante’s Peak, which deftly combines impressive visual effects, a believable plot, and a credible cast. And while there are genre clichés aplenty, the with which director Roger Donaldson keeps the film rattling along means they're never around long enough to irritate you. All told, Dante's Peak (1997) one of the most enjoyable disaster movies I’ve watched.

Pierce Brosnan plays volcanologist Harry Dalton. He’s sent to the small town of Dante’s Peak to investigate some peculiar seismic readings. Brozzer warns that the dormant volcano is about to explode and calls for the town to be evacuated. But his sceptical boss fails to heed the warning until it is too late. Just as the town are finally considering the possibility of a precautionary evacuation the volcano explodes panicking the townspeople. 

A dastardly helicopter pilot, who earlier in the film had demanded a pay bonus to rescue an injured man, offers to fly wealthy residents out the town for a nice juicy cash sum. Brosnan’s boss tries to warn the pilot of the dangers of flying with the skies filled with volcanic ash, but is ignored. 

The mercenary helicopter pilot takes off with the towns well-to-do citizens, but quickly falls prey to the predicted engine problems. Meanwhile Brosnan is desperately racing up the mountain in a truck to save the children of the town's Mayor. 

Out of nowhere the helicopter appears in front of his truck and crashes nose first into the ground before catapulting over the vehicle in a miraculous close shave. The chopper somersaults forward and crashes into a nearby building before exploding. 

Artistic merit 

The exploding helicopter neatly provides a deserved death for the treacherous pilot whilst providing Brosnan with another peril to face. The explosion is well executed but it’s just one big explosion and you can’t see any of the helicopter within it. Full marks for having the helicopter bounce over the truck. Most unexpected. 

Exploding helicopter innovation 

First known helicopter to be downed by an exploding volcano. I’ve also never seen a crashing helicopter bounce on impact with the ground. Perhaps it landed on an unseen trampoline. 

Do passengers survive? 

No. The pilot was marked for death earlier in the film when he started renegotiating his pay rates to rescue an injured man. The passengers were all rich making it acceptable for them to meet a fiery chopper death. 

Positives 

We learned that helicopter apparently can bounce on impact with the earth, opening up the prospect that’s possible to survive crashing into the ground. 

Negatives 

There’s no point surviving the crash into the ground if you finally land on a combustible building.

Favourite quote 

“Send in the chopper right now!” 

Interesting fact

Michael Douglas was originally slated to play Brosnan’s character.