9 replies to this topic

[tim partridge]

Has anyone else seen this obscure ski-themed movie? Bogner made a series of them, starting with FIRE AND ICE, which starred Bond ski performer John Eaves.

FIRE ICE AND DYNAMITE was the second in the Bogner "ski movie" franchise. Apparently it was Germany's third biggest grossing film of 1990! A cult favourite; largely plotless and silly, but the action sequences are MONUMENTALLY first rate. There's LOADS of knock-out ski stunts, which just go to show how silly and poor TWINE looked with it's Vic Armstrong directed ski sequences, but also the none ski action is equally as Bond like. There's even a bungee jump off the Lorcano dam- sound familiar? It makes me wonder how GOLDENEYE got away with it, personally!

Loads of Bond personnel too, like BJ Worth directing the aerial unit, including a phenomenal sky dive sequence reminisent of MOONRAKER, and also Remy Julienne supervised the car stunts.

The "story" has Sir Roger as a multi million(billion?)aire who fakes his death (the MOONRAKER stunt mentioned above), and leaves behind his assets to be won in an Olympic style sport competition. Sir Roger's lost family are grouped together and fight to win the competition. There's TONS of product placement, and loads of German popstars who were big at the time like Jennifer Rush and even Isaac Hayes! One of Sir Roger's heirs is actually played by Geoffrey Moore too (yes, they are related, apparently)!

The tone of the film is very much a family pantomime, with lots of goofy, cheap observational humour (imagine if Guy Hamilton, Blake Edwards and Richard Lester sat down together and designed a bunch of sight gags surrounding a sports event- cutaway shots of onlooking stereotype Bavarian yodellers, double taking as they pull their smoking pipes out of their mouths and bring their whole upper set of false teeth with them!

Bizarrely, Bogner is obviously big chums with AXEL F composer Harold Faltermeyer, who scored all of Bogner's ski movies (except the first one FIRE AND ICE, which he only made the title song for). Following the Bond connection, one of the Roger Moore heirs has a VERY John Barry Bond-style musical theme played on a Harpsichord. Apart from the very typical late 80s/early 1990s synthpop score, Faltermeyer also contributed a dozen or so pop songs used throughout the movie, performed by everyone from Hayes and Rush mentioned already, to Bonnie Tyler, Roger Chapman and Chris Thompson. Faltermeyer was not involved with the film's very random hard rock title theme by Deep Purple.

Peter Davies was the editor too, by the way!

The most miserable aspect of FIRE ICE AND DYNAMITE is that it had better, more authentic Bond action (from Cubby's remaining Bond family) than any of the Brosnan Bond films after GOLDENEYE (and even GE must have been influenced by that dam jump)! How truly CRAP those ski sequences look in TWINE compared to even the most least inspired ski shots from Bogner's movies. What was the excuse?? I know alot of folks here think that family= staleness, but what about "if it aint broken, don't fix it"?

Edited by tim partridge, 27 September 2008 - 09:48 PM.

[TheSaint]

I have it on tape because I'm a big Roger fan but I don't remember the action sequences being better than the action sequences in the Brosnan films. Will have to re-watch to refresh my memory.

[Bondian]

It's a good movie. I'm proud to have this on DVD.

[TheSaint]

I just re-watched it, and gave a watch to the ski sequences of TWINE. The ski sequences of FI&D are beautifully photographed but, in my opinion, they aren't better than TWINE's ski scenes.

I had totally forgotten about the bungee jump in FI&D. It did predate the Goldeneye one but, it's played for laughs. Also, I'm sure more people saw the Goldeneye version that the FI&D one.

[marktmurphy]

Sounds awful and somehow great.
It wouldn't be hard to be better than the TWINE ski sequence: one of the worst Bond action scenes ever, I'd say.

[tim partridge]

I just re-watched it, and gave a watch to the ski sequences of TWINE. The ski sequences of FI&D are beautifully photographed but, in my opinion, they aren't better than TWINE's ski scenes.

WHOA! I have to seriously disagree! TWINE's ski scenes were all poorly blocked out, sluggishly paced (in terms of movement, not editing) and seemingly shot for the most part from the worst, most static angles by a zoom lens on a camera bolted to it's tripod. It seems that David Arnold was given the burden of delivering all of the thrill and tension required for the action (and yes that's too much to demand from a composer alone). Every so often an unthrilling, poorly timed squib would go off, showering sparks that were obviously nowhere near Brosnan. You also had no sense of geography and character's distances from one another. Oh, and the visual elements really blew. FI and D by contrast has all of that dynamic Bogner, POV photography (think OHMSS, TSWLM, FYEO and AVTAK), and is choreographed by world class atheletes with the kind of precision you'd expect from a North Korean stadium display or a Stanley Kubrick film. It's beyond the ski work though- look at the car chases, the gravel ski, the mountain bike scene. All from Cubby's reliable Bond vets, with the kind of genuine thrill factor that, in my opinion, we saw none of with the Vic Armstrong directed Bond action scenes. Granted, the TWINE scenes are better WRITTEN and don't contain pantomime humour, product placement and garish shell suits, so from a content and tonal point of view I have to agree. As far as action direction goes however, TWINE, and especially it's ski sequences, just cannot hold a candle.

The point is that looking at FI and D, and also Bogner's other ski features WHITE MAGIC, FIRE AND ICE and 2001s SKI TO THE MAX, it really makes you wonder why Eon seemingly didn't at least beg Bogner to do TWINE (and maybe they tried to get him but it didn't work out)? I am guessing that Bogner was nolonger doing film work outside of his personal projects, maybe he wasn't interested in Bond unless he got to helm the whole movie (he'd predate Forster as the first Swiss Bond director ). Bogner seemed to be a much bigger family tie than Armstrong as well (look who did more Bonds). A bit of a plot hole in the publically known, behind the scenes stories of the Bond franchise. Maybe they'll save this for the next DVD reissues' doco section?

[sharpshooter]

It wouldn't be hard to be better than the TWINE ski sequence: one of the worst Bond action scenes ever, I'd say.

Yep. It is mine.

[Loomis]

TWINE's ski scenes were all poorly blocked out, sluggishly paced (in terms of movement, not editing) and seemingly shot for the most part from the worst, most static angles by a zoom lens on a camera bolted to it's tripod. It seems that David Arnold was given the burden of delivering all of the thrill and tension required for the action (and yes that's too much to demand from a composer alone). Every so often an unthrilling, poorly timed squib would go off, showering sparks that were obviously nowhere near Brosnan. You also had no sense of geography and character's distances from one another. Oh, and the visual elements really blew.

Agreed with all that.

[Blofeld's Cat]

It's a good movie. I'm proud to have this on DVD.

I have it on DVD too. Not proud I actually bought it though.

[marktmurphy]

TWINE's ski scenes were all poorly blocked out, sluggishly paced (in terms of movement, not editing) and seemingly shot for the most part from the worst, most static angles by a zoom lens on a camera bolted to it's tripod. It seems that David Arnold was given the burden of delivering all of the thrill and tension required for the action (and yes that's too much to demand from a composer alone). Every so often an unthrilling, poorly timed squib would go off, showering sparks that were obviously nowhere near Brosnan. You also had no sense of geography and character's distances from one another. Oh, and the visual elements really blew.

I always go on about this, but there's a bit where it's so confusingly edited that Brosnan actually appears to look at his own stuntman. Check it out: there's a close up of him looking down to his left; it cuts to a Bond stuntman doing a hotdog turn (as viewed from above; so effectively Brosnan's POV); it then cuts back to Brosnan, who then looks up from where we left him in the previous close-up! It's a bizarre and terrible bit of editing which seems to be actively trying to ruin the illusion: we're being told that Brosnan and the stuntman are two different people: not James Bond.

Unfortunately David Arnold turned in a slow dirge which made the sequence even less exciting.