After the Roger Moore era of the James Bond franchise came to an unceremonious end with A View to a Kill, the producers had to do something radically different to keep the franchise alive. Enter Timothy Dalton, whose darker, edgier take on 007 made The Living Daylights and License to Kill a refreshing tonal change of pace following the slapstick-driven Moore movies.
Dalton ended up departing from the role of Bond after just two movies, but Eon planned a third Dalton film that never came to fruition. Mi6-HQ.com, the most visited Bond news site, has collected all the known information about the unproduced Property of a Lady.
10 Property Of A Lady Was Originally Scheduled For Mid-1991
After the release of License to Kill in 1989, the next Bond movie was scheduled for mid-1991. However, this release date ended up being delayed three times.
When new writers were brought aboard to rework the script, it was pushed back to December 1991. Then, when the producers became embroiled in legal issues, it was pushed back to late 1994. Ultimately, the role of Bond was recast and the entire script was rewritten as GoldenEye, which finally made it to multiplexes in November 1995.
9 The Pre-Title Sequence Was A Chemical Weapons Factory Explosion
One of the hallmarks of the Bond series is the pre-title sequence. Before the opening credits of every Bond film, the producers treat the audience to an action-packed 007 adventure that’s usually unrelated to the main plot and serves to showcase the impressive work of the stunt team.
The pre-title sequence of Property of a Lady saw Minister of Defense Nigel Yupland leading a bomb squad into a chemical weapons factory. The set-piece would’ve culminated in the factory exploding when a machine malfunctions.
8 The Story Was About Bond Preventing World War III
The plot of Property of a Lady began with Bond being sent to investigate a wealthy businessman named Sir Henry Lee Ching. He teamed up with a fellow spy on the brink of retirement and the “Bond girl” was a jewel smuggler named Connie Webb.
Along the way, 007 would run afoul of the Chinese Secret Service in Hong Kong. Ultimately, Bond would’ve stumbled upon a plan to kickstart World War III (a plot point in many a Bond film).
7 John Glen Parted Ways With The Franchise
These days, the Bond producers work with a wide variety of directors. But back in the day, they tended to hire filmmakers on a long-term basis. Terence Young directed three Bond movies, Guy Hamilton directed four, and John Glen directed five.
Glen handled the transition between Moore and Dalton’s tenures. He elected (amicably) not to return for a third Bond movie with Dalton – as did 13-time Bond screenwriter Richard Maibaum – so the search was on for a new filmmaker to take the helm.
6 Property Of A Lady Would’ve Brought Back The Aston Martin DB5 With New Gadgets
Bond’s most iconic vehicle is the Aston Martin DB5, which made its debut in Goldfinger. But after Thunderball, the DB5 didn’t appear in a Bond movie for more than three decades. George Lazenby, Roger Moore, and Timothy Dalton all came and went without sitting behind the wheel of a DB5 (although Moore did drive a DB5 as the self-parodying Seymour Goldfarb, Jr. in The Cannonball Run).
The DB5 finally returned to the Bond franchise in GoldenEye, but it was originally planned to return slightly earlier in Property of a Lady. In the unproduced movie, Dalton’s Bond would’ve driven a DB5 fitted with mines, flares, twin ejector seats, and a rear bulletproof shield.
5 John Landis Was Rumored To Be In The Running To Direct
When Glen departed from the director’s chair, a number of prolific filmmakers were rumored to be on Eon’s radar to replace him. Animal House director John Landis, who worked on a draft of The Spy Who Loved Me during its infamously stalled development, was rumored to be under consideration. First Blood director Ted Kotcheff was also reportedly considered.
Other directors rumored to be up for the job include John Byrum, Michael Carton Jones, and Martin Campbell, who ended up directing GoldenEye (the movie this one morphed into) and Casino Royale.
4 The Original Screenwriter’s Ideas Were Too Close To True Lies
In 1993, Variety reported that screenwriter Michael France had been hired to write Dalton’s third Bond film. France got to work on a script while the producers were dragged into a legal squabble between MGM and United Artists.
These legal problems delayed the production of Property of a Lady for so long that the ideas in France’s script were eventually done by a different movie. James Cameron’s Bond-inspired spy thriller True Lies hit theaters in 1994 and Eon had to scrap France’s eerily similar script and find a new writer.
3 Two Indiana Jones Writers Were Rumored To Replace France
After True Lies came out and France needed to be replaced, Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz were rumored to take his place. Huyck and Katz are best-known for writing Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, the subversively dark Raiders prequel that divided audiences.
When George Lucas brought the idea for the Indiana Jones series to his friend Steven Spielberg, Spielberg famously saw it as an opportunity to give American cinema its own answer to James Bond.
2 The Finale Took Place At The Villain’s Underground Lair
The final set-piece can make or break a Bond movie. The climactic action in Property of a Lady would’ve seen Bond and Connie infiltrating the underground control center where the villainous Sir Henry is trying to start World War III.
At the end of the sequence, the control room would’ve been flooded, stopping the nuclear countdown. Sir Henry would’ve escaped with a pair of night-vision goggles and Bond would’ve killed him in grisly fashion with an acetylene torch.
1 Dalton Dropped Out
It’s often mistakenly reported that Dalton’s third Bond film was canceled because License to Kill underperformed at the box office. The producers were committed to giving Dalton a third movie, but the actor chose to drop out of the role because development of Property of a Lady stalled for so long.
Dalton dropping out necessitated yet another reboot, and the producers replaced him with Pierce Brosnan within a couple of months. Interestingly, Brosnan was the producers’ top choice for The Living Daylights, but he was unavailable so Dalton was cast as a runner-up.
from ScreenRant - Feed https://ift.tt/3mY3HIn
via IFTTT
No comments:
Post a Comment