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Old 8th Aug 2006, 05:56
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aviate1138
 
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Originally Posted by robin
As an ATC cadet at the time, the Spanish Airforce and camera plane was based out of Bovingdon at the time - we had a Wing Parade marching around them
But Mosquito Squadron was, I think, purely a studio film. There were no aerial shots made for it - it used 633 Squadron and B & B stock shots.
I do remember, though, a big explosion during my Maths GCE and a Mosquito being set on fire for a crash sequence - but that was on the back lot of Elstree's MGM studio
Mosquito Squadron used Real Mosquitos - 3/4 of them. 3 filming, one standby or u/s. Assembled by Doug Bianchi. Pilots were [in part] Neil Williams, Pat Fillingham, Sqd Ldr Taffy Rich. Farnborough Shackleton Mk 1 was camera plane and for a few days we were based either at West Raynham, Bovingdon or Blackbushe. Title sequence was shot over/off the North Norfolk coast. The Shackleton flew so low the prop wash was partly sea water from the wavetops. West Raynham was the base for that and the Bloodhounds tracked our every move!
Bovingdon was for airfield 'strafing' scenes with an Me 108 as the aggressor [I think].
We were just finishing shooting when the whole BoB Airforce turned up.
From the control tower the sight of Mosquito, He 111, Spitfire, Hurricane, Me 109[Merlin] and the B-25 and Shackleton all together was a sight to see.
Blackbushe was used because the nearby Minley Manor was used as the French Chateau action sequence.
Script was poor, no money for Visual Effects and a Producer that said he would use library footage if he could, didn't help!
The above is true because I was there. The sight of 3 Mossies doing a running break and stream landing at Bovingdon is etched in my memory!
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