42 replies to this topic

[George White]

On the commentary for Octopussy, John Glen says that the Bavarian village set at Pinewood was built for another production. Does anyone know what film or series? 

[Blofeld's Cat]

I thought that scene was filmed in the courtyard of the entrance to Pinewood Studios.

[marktmurphy]

I've always wondered about that set. It did seem a lot of effort to go to for such a short scene.

[Dustin]

Try as I might, I really cannot remember a Bavarian village in OCTOPUSSY. Admittedly it is not quite some time since I last saw it.

[Simon]

Where Bond steals the Alfa for the short but tense chase to the circus.

 

However, bearing in mind Armageddon is shortly to befall the world, I am not sure why Bond didn't just yank the lady out of the phone box.  I know he is a thoroughly nice chap 'n' all, Moore-Bond, but really...

[Jim]

Given where the US base is ostensibly located, would that really be Bavaria? I appreciate this question doesn't help the initial enquiry.

[Simon]

Excellent.

 

Perhaps he was unthinkingly substituting Bavarian for German...?

[Dustin]

Erm, having been born there I can assure you I never got a 'Bavarian' feeling from that location. Since the circus comes from the East it would be possible it was Bavaria. But Hessen (north of Bavaria) was always what I assumed. Wasn't the US base supposed to be close to Frankfurt?

[George White]

Glen says the set was a Bavarian village. I imagine it was constructed to double as Bavaria for something else. But Octopussy is not set there.

[Blofeld's Cat]

Pinewood studios old entrance....

 

[Dustin]

Ah yes, I remember. Also I watched the snippet where Bond steals the little Alfa. Frankly, nothing much Bavarian about the setting, timber framed houses are more often seen in the North of Bavaria. There are some but they are not necessarily typical, especially not in the mix with brownstone or clinker. The only US airbase of the time armed with tactical nuclear weapons would probably have been Rammstein in Rhineland-Palatinate/Rheinland-Pfalz, much more to the West; probably a sensible consideration to prevent Warshaw pact troops from rushing to the site and taking over the arms.

[stromberg]

Always been convinced that it was a studio setting, or that it was somewhere in England. But re-watching the scenes now, I'm not so sure about it any more. There's too many tiny little details in the background that tell me that it's either somewhere in Germany or that the set decorators did one hell of a job for such a small scene. Until now, I couldn't find a single evidence that speaks against a German location (but I have to rewatch it on a large TV  screen tonight to make sure, maybe it's even possible to actually read some of the signs).

 

As for the location where it's meant to take place, that's much easier. The Circus came from Karl-Marx-Stadt (now Chemnitz), and the only place where they could have crossed the border by train is Hof/Gutenfürst between Plauen (East) and Hof (West). The numberplates on the cars in these scenes make sense for that, they would be the ones that would have been seen in this area in West Germany: the Alfa has a Bayreuth plate, the Police cars are from Nuremberg and there's an R4 parked on the side with a plate from Erlangen. It's not in Bavaria but in Franconia (it's in the north of the federal state of Bavaria, but don't tell the people there they're Bavarian, it's the equivalent of telling a Scotsman that he's English).

 

The pursuit scenes were shot on and around the former AVUS race track, which is now a part of the Autobahn near Berlin. But the little square with the phone booth where he steals the car looks like nothing that can be found near Berlin. Remains mysterious, will have to dig deeper...

[marktmurphy]

Pinewood studios old entrance....

 

 

It doesn't look much like that to me. One thing I hadn't previously spotted is that it's cobbled: seems a lot of effort to go to, and yet it does look a bit set-ish.

[George White]

The fact that Brenda Cowling and Gertan Klauber were British actors (although Klauber was born in Czechoslovakia) suggests it was filmed on Pinewood. As for what it was constructed, I searched IMDB for Pinewood productions made in 1982-ish, and I am trying to think.

Top Secret (1984, a little late perhaps, but that was shot at Pinewood and set in Germany) comes to mind.

The Winds of War, maybe, but I'm not sure. 

I did think some miniseries, perhaps Lace, or Deceptions, or the Keep, but that was Shepperton not Pinewood. 

I initially though Auf Wiedersehen, Pet, but then that was Elstree. 

[stromberg]

That screenshot helped a lot. It's a real location, and it's in Germany (but not in Bavaria). Wasn't able (yet) to find the exact place, but it's in Braunfels, north of Frankfurt.

 

[marktmurphy]

It looks so much less convincing than that, though. If it were from Top Secret or something I could believe it.

[George White]

Yes, Top Secret also used the Nene Valley railway as East Germany. So maybe that's where I saw the resemblance. 

[Leo R.]

On the screenshot there is the name of a hotel (?). If it's a real location, the hotel is probably also real. Can anybody read what the sign says?

[stromberg]

As I wrote above (is my English really that bad?), it's a real location. The scenes were shot in the German city of Braunfels, north of Frankfurt (and you'll find several sources on the net if you google "Octopussy" and "Braunfels". The name of the hotel is "Zum Solmser Hof Hotel" (don't ask me how I deciphered that from the screenshot), and it still exists. According to various sources, the scenes were shot on the market place.

 

The problem is: what we see in this picture is definitely not the front of the hotel (which is located directly at the market place), and I couldn't find any images from the back or the sides. Also, I can't really find those pointed arches or the clock on pictures from Braunfels, and the well doesn't look exactly like the one that's on the Braunfels market place today*. But from the pictures I saw, there seem to be many wells in Braunfels. It's also very much possible that some work was done there in the past 30 years and that the place doesn't look like it did when they shot the movie.

 

That's what I meant when I wrote "I wasn't able to find the exact place", but the scenes were definitely shot there.

 

Unfortunately (thanks to some idiots) there's not much Google Street view available for Germany (only for 20 or so large cities) which would be very helpful for verification.

 

*Edit: to be precise: currently, there's no well at all on the Braunfels market place. Found some older pictures (from 2008) on which it still existed, but it's only very similar to the one that can be seen in OP, but it's not exactly the same...

[Leo R.]

Thanks Stromberg. In the meantime I've looked at the movie as well. Indeed the sign on the village square says 'Zum Solmser Hof hotel' but as you pointed out, the real hotel looks nothing like what we see in the film. My guess is, that the scenes with Roger Moore were shot on a set in the UK, while the chase shots (with the police cars) were shot somewhere in Germany without Roger Moore being present, probably partly on the race track as you suggested.

It definitely wasn't shot on the market place in Braunfels, whatever wikipedia may say (nor at the Pinewood entrance gate). The whole thing has something fake to it, in my view anyway. That said, why did they put the name of that particular hotel there? My guess is that some of the other shots (like the one with the car driving away and the policemen noticing it) may have been filmed around Braunfels.

[stromberg]

The chase scenes with the police cars were shot on the AVUS in Berlin (Exit "Hüttenweg"), that's a known fact (and I've been there myself). And the next time I have business in Frankfurt, I'm going to take a little detour to Braunfels and check it out myself (may take a while, though)...

[George White]

Yep, John Glen says on the commentary the scenes with Moore at the village is Pinewood, all the chase stuff was done in Germany by Remy Julienne, Arthur Wooster and a second unit. 

[Blofeld's Cat]

I don't know whether it's in a commentary or one of the making of doccos on the DVD, but I thought I heard/saw that the old Pinewood entrance was used with a lot of set dressing for the surrounding area.

 

If not, I've mis-remembered it.

[George White]

Other suggestions.

Ike the War Years was made at Pinewood. I think that had German scenes.

Nijinsky, perhaps. 

[Grard Bond]

Wow! One is learning everyday! Never thought about this. I always assumed that it was a real location. Thanks all for the information.

[marktmurphy]

As I wrote above (is my English really that bad?), it's a real location. 

 

It doesn't seem to be. Maybe some other shots (like the one of the Alfa sliding away) were done at Braunfels.

[George White]

Any more guesses?

[stromberg]

 

As I wrote above (is my English really that bad?), it's a real location. 

 

It doesn't seem to be. Maybe some other shots (like the one of the Alfa sliding away) were done at Braunfels.

 

Damn, I was so sure that it's real. Discussed this with other German fans and had a lengthy talk with a location expert who only recently had done some research on this. 

 

Looks like I have to do some backpedalling. We've come to the conclusion that it has to be a movie set. The mystery is in the details. Some of them are near perfect, like the timber frame houses, the well, the cobblestones and especially the hotel name (which is not just the name but even matches the original design) and all the signs – it's all very similar to the real place, without there being a real reason for it. The only thing that looks completely out of place is the big clock on the relatively small house in the background. My guess it that it was put together with pieces they still had from some other production (not necessarily something that was shot at the same time but a few years before).

 

The scene with the Alfa sliding around the corner: we're very certain that this was shot somewhere in Berlin (makes sense). The cobblestones in that scenes look like the kind they have in Berlin, and the advertising column is also an indicator for that.

[Dustin]

I suppose the answer would probably be that it is a set built after photographs of Braunfels with stuff they had in their vaults. Would explain the extraordinary detail and the lack of that slope we see in the Braunfels shot.

[marktmurphy]

Bear in mind that the shots of Bond attempting to hitchhike (presumably including that Beetle) were done in the UK.

I do just wonder about those cobbles.