Calamity James: behind the scenes of the `jinxed` Bond film

A high-speed crash is just the latest accident to hit the set of the new Bond movie. Joseph Dunn of The Times examines what went wrong as the makers seek ever more realistic stunts.

It was to be one of the defining stunts of the new Bond film. Certainly it would be the best car-chase stunt seen in any recent Bond movie, the one to reassert the reputation of the franchise after the challenge posed by The Bourne Ultimatum, said by critics to have topped anything 007 has done.

The location was the narrow twisting road on the shores of Lake Garda in Italy, known as Gardesana. The sequence started well. The stunt drivers gunned their engines, the cameras rolled. Then - disaster. Two men injured, one of them seriously ill in hospital, and a break in shooting that will cost Eon, the production company, millions.

Worse still, coming on top of a spate of other mishaps - including an accident that sent a £120,000 Aston Martin DBS into the lake - the crash has left the latest Bond film, Quantum of Solace, with the reputation of being jinxed. How did it all go wrong-

Filming of the stunt was due to begin 10 days ago and even by the standards of modern action movies it was daring. Four vehicles - two trucks and two cars, both Alfa Romeos - were to be involved in a spectacular, metal-wrenching crash. Edited together, the sequence would form part of the dramatic opening 15-minute car chase that cinema-goers will see when the film is released in November.

The Alfas chase Bond’s Aston Martin DBS along the twisting shoreline of Lake Garda at hair-raising speeds. At one point the pursuing Alfas get stuck behind a slow-moving truck, and one tries to overtake, resulting in the high-speed, head-on smash with an oncoming truck. It was this sequence that the crew were filming when things went wrong.

To look realistic, the Alfa would have to collide with the truck at a closing speed of about 100mph. On the set, the lorries were driven by Peter Miles and Rowley Irlam (although it is unclear which driver was in which truck). They are both experienced stuntmen, Miles having credits that include Gladiator and the Bond film The World Is Not Enough, while Irlam had appeared in The Bourne Ultimatum and Casino Royale. In one of the Alfas was Aris Comninos, a Greek who lives in London, and Bruno Verdirosi.

The second Alfa, which was to be involved in the collision, was driverless. It was attached with steel rods to the side of the truck that it was supposed to be overtaking, giving the illusion that it had drawn level.

The plan was that as the second truck bore down on the Alfa, the car would be released by detonating small explosive charges at the base of the steel rods. Freed from the carrier truck, the Alfa would be totalled in the crash, but because there was nobody driving the risks were minimal.

Initially, the plan worked. As the oncoming truck approached the Alfa, the driver of the other truck got ready to detonate the charge and release the car. Moments before impact a switch was flicked in the cabin, followed by muffled explosions and the Alfa was freed. Seconds later something went wrong. Instead of crumpling beneath the wheels of the oncoming truck, the Alfa, perhaps because it hit the kerb, was catapulted into the air by the force of collision. The crew looked on in horror as it cartwheeled across the road smashing into the second Alfa, driven by Comninos, just above the B-pillar on the driver’s side.

The force of the impact threw Comninos off course and the car smashed through a guard wall at the side of the road before it came to a halt. The danger was not over. Half of the car, with driver and passenger still inside, hung over a 50ft drop, with the other half wedged against the wall.

“It was like the final scene in The Italian Job, where the bus is pivoted on the edge of the cliff,” said a source. “Bruno managed to clamber out but Aris was trapped inside wearing his racing harness. The crew were all clambering onto the car trying to get him out while others sat on the other end of the car to stop it plunging off the drop. They were all incredibly brave; the car could have fallen off at any time and if it had there is no way that Aris would have survived.”

Last week Comninos was said to be in a stable condition after being flown to Borgo Trento hospital in Verona.

However, the atmosphere behind the scenes remains charged. “Everyone is being very professional, but this has already been by far the most eventful shoot I have ever been on, and we are still only halfway through,” said one stunt driver. Even discounting the crashing of the DBS, which was driven not by a stuntman but by an Aston Martin delivery driver, the Bond film looks set to be one of the most accident-prone films in history. Three weeks ago another stuntman was injured in a car chase.

Part of the reason is the increased complexity of the stunts, which, along with gadgets and girls, are a defining motif of the franchise and must become ever more elaborate and realistic. No longer is it acceptable simply to have a car driven on two wheels along a narrow alley as Sean Connery did in Diamonds Are Forever. And computer generated imagery (CGI), though impressive in science-fiction blockbusters such as Independence Day, is still not good enough to fool audiences.

Before the release of Casino Royale, billed as the first in a new line of grittier Bond movies, Gary Powell, stunt co-ordinator for the Bond movies, said CGI would not be taking over from the real thing. “It’s back to basics,” he said, “stunt people doing real stunts.” He couldn’t have asked for more authentic footage.

Sinking feeling

Fraser Dunn is either the luckiest or unluckiest man alive, depending on which way you look at it. On the plus side, he escaped with his life after skidding off the road, crashing through a barrier and plunging into Lake Garda. On the downside, he committed the worst sin in the delivery driver’s handbook: if he’s found to have been driving too fast he’ll be lucky to keep his job.

The 29-year-old was delivering the £120,000 Aston Martin DBS to a press event on the Bond film set two weeks ago, when he lost control. The incident made headlines around the world, not least because Dunn miraculously survived in a car that was crushed beyond recognition.

He claims to have been knocked out by the impact before coming around in the car at the bottom of the lake, freeing himself, possibly through one of the smashed windows, and swimming to the surface. “All I remember was that the road was wet and I wasn’t going that fast. The next thing I remember is swimming up to the surface,” he said from his hospital bed.

“How I managed to get out I will never know. I do feel lucky to be alive. I have been told I was 150ft down. The whole thing was a bit James Bond-like. I just kicked out of the car and swam to the surface. My lungs felt as if they were going to explode and my chest still hurts now. Apart from a few bruises I’m fine. It’s actually embarrassing. I’d like to try and forget the whole thing.”

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