Facts > Films > On Her Majesty's Secret Service
On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969) Facts
| Director(s) | Peter R. Hunt |
| Producer(s) | Harry Saltzman, Albert R. Broccoli |
| Featured Cast | George Lazenby, Diana Rigg, Telly Savalas, Bernard Lee, Desmond Llewelyn |
| Total Facts | 77 |
"Nymphalis polychloris," the species of butterfly that James Bond detects at M's home, is a fictional taxon.
Ilse Steppat's only ever English language role was as Irma Bunt in this movie. She was not able to enjoy her new success. She died of a heart attack less than a week after the release of this film. The character of Irma Bunt was intended for a time to return in the next James Bond movie, Diamonds Are Forever. But because of her passing, the character did not return.
Sean Connery was offered a then very large salary of $1 million to make this film but declined.
George A. Cooper is often wrongly credited with being in this film.
Gabriele Ferzetti's voice was dubbed by David de Keyser, who would later appear in the next Bond film, Diamonds Are Forever.
Joanna Lumley makes one of her first screen appearances in this movie. Unlike other "Avengers" actors and actresses (Patrick Macnee, Diana Rigg, Honor Blackman), she is the only one to have appeared in a Bond movie *before* starring in The Avengers. Despite having a very small part as one of Blofeld's girls, she spent two months on the production, dubbing the voices of a whole line up of international beauties in German, Chinese and Norwegian accents, in addition to teaching many of the actresses who played Blofeld's patients how to crochet, which some of them can be seen doing on film. With time, some of the women preferred crocheting garments over attending parties for the cast. Joanna Lumley has also read an abridged version of the Ian Fleming novel On Her Majesty's Secret Service on BBC Radio 4.
George Lazenby also bears the distinction of being the only 007 actor who was born and raised outside the United Kingdom. He's from Australia. (Pierce Brosnan was born in Ireland but moved to the UK when fairly young.)
George Lazenby wanted to do most of his own stunts but the studio wouldn't allow him. During the shooting of one of the stunt scenes, Lazenby actually broke his arm, thereby delaying the filming of many of his later scenes. When Bond is taken to Blofeld's lab at Piz Gloria, Lazenby's broken arm in its cast is hidden by his coat which was draped over his arm. Blofeld's guard removes it from him as Lazenby was unable to do so. The guard removing the jacket was played by Yuri Borionko who ironically had had his nose broken by Lazenby in the screen test fight scene that the actor had done to land the part.
George Lazenby was previously a car salesman with a part time job as a male model. He was also well-known in Britain as "The Big Fry man," after the chocolate bar commercials he starred in, carrying an outsize bar on his hunky shoulder.
Peter R. Hunt originally wanted to direct You Only Live Twice but when that assignment was given to Lewis Gilbert, he walked off the series and went on a round the world trip. Ironically he was in Tokyo when he bumped into Albert R. Broccoli and Gilbert who were prepping "You Only Live Twice". Broccoli asked Hunt to direct the second unit on that film with the promise of directing the next entry in the series.
George Baker provides the voice of Bond when 007 is pretending to be Sir Hilary Bray.
Ian Fleming wrote the James Bond novel "On Her Majesty's Secret Service" while Dr. No was being filmed. Fleming included a mention by name of Ursula Andress in the book. The title was shared by a rare British nautical novel of the 19th Century which was discovered by Fleming's friend Sir John Nicholas Henderson (aka Nicko Henderson) at a Portbello Road book stall in London. In the book's sequel You Only Live Twice, Fleming named the character Dikko Henderson after Nicko Henderson.
Willy Bogner performed some spectacular skiing feats for the filming of chase sequences for this movie. These included skiing backwards downhill with a hand-held camera, sometimes placing it between his legs and being towed behind a bobsleigh along the bobsled course.
A double was used for Diana Rigg at the ice rink as the actress did not know how to skate.
A Rolex worn by George Lazenby drew a bid of $40,373 at Christie's in London in 2003.
A scene showing Bond murdering an enemy agent who is following him was shot, but left incomplete as George Lazenby was injured and Peter R. Hunt deemed the scene extraneous to the thrust of the plot.
A tagline on an unused piece of poster artwork read: The New Bond. 007 and Bride.
Actors considered for the part of Tracy Draco included Brigitte Bardot and Catherine Deneuve. Reportedly, Bardot was the first choice of director Peter R. Hunt but she ironically decided to star opposite the former James Bond Sean Connery in Shalako. Diana Rigg was finally chosen partly because of her appearance as Emma Peel in British TV's spy series The Avengers.
Actors considered for the role of Bond included: Adam West, Bob Campbell, Anthony Rogers, Hans De Vries, Jeremy Brett, John Richardson, and Roy Thinnes.
As Bond passes a janitor in Draco's headquarters, the man can be heard whistling the Goldfinger theme.
As of 2009, George Lazenby is the youngest actor to portray 007 at age 29 during filming. The rest of the actors and their ages, in no particular order: Sean Connery - 31, Roger Moore - 45, Timothy Dalton - 40, Pierce Brosnan - 41 and Daniel Craig - 38.
At least for the German audience the jump from Sean Connery to George Lazenby wasn't as sharp as for the rest of the world: He still sounded the same. Actor Gert Günther Hoffmann, the regular German voice of Connery, dubbed the new James Bond as well.
Blofeld's headquarters was a partially completed restaurant on top of Mount Schilthorn. The owners allowed filming on condition EON paid $125,000 to refit the interior and construct a helicopter pad. When the restaurant opened it was given the name Piz Gloria used in the film. The only public access to the restaurant is by cable car (from Mürren or Stechelberg). The Piz Gloria was the first established revolving mountain restaurant in the world.
Bond and Tracy's wedding day took 5 days to shoot.
Bond's sliding along the ice whilst firing a machine gun in the attack on Piz Gloria was a spur-of-the-moment idea from director Peter R. Hunt.
Cameraman John Jordan developed a special helicopter harness for filming aerial shots of the mountain slopes and the film's action sequences. He would hang eighteen feet below the chopper from a large round metal support apparatus.
Certain film techniques appear in the James Bond series for the first time in this picture: slow motion (when Bond is knocked out in his bedroom), flashback (Bond remembering Tracy being captured). Often "breaking the fourth wall" is named as a technique that is (for the first time) used in this movie, but in fact is isn't: George Lazenby does not look into the camera, when he says; "This never happened to the other fellow". And though it seems to be a self referential remark (Lazenby replaced Sean Connery as Bond) it also has a meaning in the context of the story.
Director Peter R. Hunt had previously edited many 007 movies, the job of editor (and second unit directing) went to John Glen.
Ernst Stavro Blofeld was named after Tom Blofeld with whom James Bond creator Ian Fleming went to school at Eton. His son is cricket commentator Henry Blofeld. Blofeld's birthdate as given in the literature is the same date as Ian Fleming's birthday which is 28 May 1908.
Every year the Swiss army dynamite certain dangerous mountainsides to remove the threat of avalanches. As the storyline called for such an avalanche, the film production worked alongside the army in scouting appropriate sites for filming. Having chosen one, they were dismayed to discover that the avalanche occurred naturally before the crew could get there to film it so the resulting one seen in the film is a combination of stock footage, special effects, and clever use of close-ups and sound.
Features the only signature gun barrel sequence of all Bond films in which Bond drops down on one knee while shooting at the audience. It's also the only version of the sequence where the descending blood completely erases Bond's image, leaving only the red circle.
First film since From Russia with Love to use an instrumental opening theme. The decision to forgo the usual song was prompted by the conclusion that any lyric composition that attempted to include the full title of the film would be awkward and at best sound like a humorous Gilbert & Sullivan song, which would be inappropriate for the film series. As of 2009, no other film in the series since has done so.
First film since Dr. No to put the production credit over the gun barrel intro.
First time M's home (called Quarterdeck in this movie) is seen in a James Bond movie in the series. Casino Royale was the second. M's home is also seen in the unofficial Casino Royale.
For the opening sequence, railway sleepers (railroad ties) were buried under the sand to allow Bond's Aston Martin to drive on the beach.
Former ITN newsreader Carol Barnes filmed scenes with the Angels of Death after showing up to the set with her friend Jenny Hanley. She can be briefly seen serving drinks at the first meal Bond attends.
Greek actor Takis Emmanuel, hired to play Draco's henchman Klett, refused to rehearse for the beach fight in the opening sequence, and so he was fired and replaced by stunt man Bill Morgan, a high fall and trampoline expert. Because the wedding scenes were filmed before the beach scenes, Emmanuel can be seen a few times in the film -- meaning both men technically played the same character in the same film, an unintentional first considering no plot points revolve around it.
In order to help get himself the part of James Bond, George Lazenby went to the same tailor and barber that worked with Sean Connery so when he showed up at Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman's production offices, he'd look more like Connery. Coincidentally, Broccoli was present in the barber's shop when Lazenby showed up for his haircut. This in part did help him establish an image and led to getting the role of James Bond.
In the original take of the final scene featuring Tracy's death, George Lazenby came to tears. Director Peter R. Hunt then made them shoot the scene again because he said that, "Bond does not cry." There were only two takes shot.
James Bond is said to be a descendant of Sir Otto Le Bon. 16 years after this movie, Simon Le Bon and his band Duran Duran sang the music video for A View to a Kill, wherein Simon Le Bon makes a pun about himself and James Bond.
James Bond tells Draco, regarding Tracy, "Her price is far above rubies or even your million pounds," The first six words are from the Bible's Proverbs 31:10, which describes a worthy woman.
Last full length feature film of Brian Worth.
Lyrics were originally intended for John Barry's main theme, but were later rejected in favor of Louis Armstrong's memorable rendition of "We Have All The Time In The World". This love theme composed by John Barry and written by Hal David was the last song ever recorded by Louis Armstrong. A re-mix of the song "We Have All The Time In The World" was a No. #3 hit in the UK twenty five years after the movie was originally released. The song has also been covered by Iggy Pop and it can be heard on the David Arnold Bond song compilation album, "Shaken and Stirred: the David Arnold James Bond Project". This album also features a cover of the film's OHMSS main title theme performed by The Propellerheads.
Many Olympic ski competitors as well as other ski experts contributed as body doubles, extras and supporting roles for performing the necessary skiing sequences in the movie. The principal actors were not allowed to ski in the movie due to insurance regulations.
Most close-ups of principal actors skiing were actually filmed back at Pinewood Studios as back-projection process shots. The principal actors were not allowed to ski in the movie due to insurance regulations.
Most of Brian Grellis's performance was removed from the final print.
Novelist Simon Raven was brought in to polish the dialog, notably the exchanges between Tracy and Blofeld.
Product placements, brand integrations and promotional tie-ins for this movie include the Aston Martin 1969 DBS; Hennessy Brandy; Playboy Magazine; Campari; the Ford Motor Company, particularly the 1969 Ford Mercury Cougar Convertible; Jack Daniel's Whiskey; Schilthorn Piz Gloria Revolving Restaurant; Krug Champagne; Dom Perignon Champagne, particularly a Dom Perignon '57; and Rolex Watches including the Rolex Submariner 5513 and Rolex Chronograph 6238 watches.
The John Barry score for this movie was the first in the EON Production series to extensively use synthesizers and electric guitars.
The film performed admirably, out-grossing its nearest competitor almost two to one at the U.S. box office where, according to Variety, it was the most popular film in the country for four solid weeks. It generated enough rentals at the box-office to claim ninth position on the box office chart for the year 1970. The persistent belief that it was a flop arises from its disappointing showing in comparison to the previous three Sean Connery Bond films, all of which made more than 100 million dollars worldwide, whereas this film grossed 87 million worldwide.