On
making the original TVTL Productions (1997) version...
Vengeance Comes To Those Who Hate (working title Kiss
of De'Ath) was the fourth Thames Valley Time Lords fan film.
Once I had written the script for Vengeance' in early
1997 I asked fan club member David Roberts, an expert on James
Bond, if he could have a look at the script and alter some of
the dialogue so it sounded more Bondesque. He did a good
job of peppering the script with familiar sounding dialogue taken
from the James Bond movies.
I built a few props for the fan film. These included a fake
bomb, registration plates etc. I also had to build a very scrappy
looking laptop using cardboard and an old PC keyboard. The
original idea was to use a proper laptop, but a colleague who
promised to loan me their laptop for the day didn't come up with
the goods so I had to make something at very short notice.
Filming started with the final scene near Farnham, and ended with
what became the new final scene (after a re-write) near Reading.
The main bulk of filming was done in April and May of 1997, the
last scene being a few months later.
The most difficult day of filming was at a ruined church in Oxfordshire.
You would think a ruin, miles away from anywhere would be an easy
trouble free place to film, oh no. Planes, birds, horses and ramblers
thinking we were a BBC TV film crew helped hamper proceedings.
By the time we got all the scenes taped we were all starving.
We soon retired to a local pub for a late Sunday lunch.
Editing the original version of Vengeance' took about
two weeks. I would get home from work and painstakingly
fast forward and rewind the Sony Camcorder back and forth, play
the relevant scene and record it onto the Sony VCR, editing the
scenes together by a combination of skill and luck. I edited into
the early hours on most nights. The most tricky scene was the
one on the motorway bridge. There wasn't a lot a footage to hack
together to make a coherant scene.. I don't know how many times
I heard Lorna Livingston say 'Just one press of this little red
button!'
There was a mistake in the editing in the original version. In
the scene where Bond rescues Stephani by deactivating a bomb that
has been strapped to her I should have put a caption saying
'M4 England' after the take where Bond's burgundy Vauxhall
Astra pulls up - and not before it. It gave the impression that
the M4 was a dusty disused lane! (It was funny at the time anyway.)
The audio edit was done by David Roberts. He used excerpts
from the soundtracks of the Bond movies From Russia With Love,
Moonraker and Licence to Kill. The opening instrumental
and the closing theme song were performed by Coral Bliss.
At the time she was the lead singer of the popular local band,
CuckooLand.
With Richard Allen's help (in using Quark Express for the text)
I made a video cover using the cut and paste method to match the
previous three TVTL productions. The difference with Vengeance'
was that the cover featured artwork instead of a photograph.
The acrylic and pencil painting of Sam Smitter as James Bond was
created by myself.
The first screening of Vengeance Comes To Those Who Hate
was at fan club member, Jason Stevens' house in Reading in late
1997.
On the Bond Fan Films / Redemption
Films (2000) online version...
In the year 2000 I was approached via the internet by a James
Bond fan called Daniel Dykes. He asked if he could stream
an edited version of Vengeance' on his Bond Fan Films
website. David Roberts created a shortened VHS edit of the
film which was sent to Thomas Waldek of Redemption Films in Austria
for editing and conversion into an online version. Thomas
created a short trailer for Vengeance Comes To Those Who Hate
- The Special Edition but as far as I know the full version
was never completed.
On the VortX Productions
(2005) version...
Since the VHS to digital online edit of Dr Who - Assassin
worked well, I set out to do the same for Vengeance'.
The intention being to put a tighter edit of Vengeance'
up on the VortX website to accompany SpyGlass.
I soon hit a problem, because of the use of music on the 1997
version of Vengeance' I couldn't simply edit the VHS
version down. If I did the music track would jar badly.
So intstead I decided to convert the original video8 tapes to
digital miniDV, import the footage onto the iMac and edit from
there.
The tighter 2005 version of Vengeance' is ten minutes
shorter than the original. It features a new, original, soundtrack
by musician Joe Gooch, and a new theme song performed by The Haunting
AD. There are a few different camera angles and previously unused
scenes in the re-edited version too.
On
the TVTL / VortX Productions 2006 fan film DVD...
A DVD featuring
Vengeance Comes To Those Who Hate, SpyGlass and the trailer
for Never To Have Loved At All (plus a few extras) was
produced by Shivering Cactus in October 2006. This is the only
DVD of the TVTL / VortX Productions James Bond fan films. 12
copies were produced, for cast and crew only.
By Paul Vought 2000 and 2005, 2006.
|
