How Stuntman Ross Kananga Used Real Crocodiles For This Wild Sequence in ‘Live And Let Die’

Outrageous behind-the-scenes footage shows just how dangerous this stunt really was. 

From piranha-infested pools to shark tanks, the James Bond films certainly have a penchant for exotic methods of extermination. But no matter how dangerous the situation looks, the audience knows it’s just a movie. Those aren’t real piranhas stripping Helga Brandt to the bone in You Only Live Twice; the crew just simulated the frenzied attack with bubbles from concealed water jets. Nor did a shark bite Jaws (or was it the other way round?) in The Spy Who Loved Me. It was just a quick cut from a real shark’s mouth to a lifelike rubber shark attacking actor Richard Kiel.

And so, for the longest time, general audiences thought James Bond ran across the backs of fake crocodiles (with the help of trick photography) for the iconic sequence in Live and Let Die. Then, in 2017, startling footage emerged of stuntman Ross Kananga putting his life at risk when he collapsed among the snapping reptiles*. Kananga did finally get the stunt right, but not without some close calls, as we’ll soon see.

Devising “Snake Pit” Situations

The stunt was the brainchild of screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz and director Guy Hamilton. Live and Let Die was their second collaboration on a Bond film after Diamonds Are Forever. The pair enjoyed thinking up “snake pit” situations that Bond could get out of in 50 seconds or less. While both were good at devising deathtraps from the comfort of an office, the idea for the crocodile sequence came from a location recce for the film. 

In Jamaica, the crew stumbled upon a sign emblazoned with the words: “Trespassers Will Be Eaten.” As intimidating as the warning was, it also mirrored a passage from the Ian Fleming novel Live and Let Die. In the book, Bond found the mauled and barely conscious body of CIA agent, Felix Leiter, with the message: “He disagreed with something that ate him.”

        Roger Moore standing in front of the sign at Ross Kananga’s crocodile farm.                                      Image: MovieStillsDB.com

Ross Kananga, Jamaica’s Crocodile Dundee

While the message in the novel referred to a shark attack, the sign warned rustlers against entering Jamaica Swamp Safari, a crocodile farm owned by Ross Kananga. The farm was the perfect location for a Bond film and would double as the villain’s secret heroin lab on the shores of Louisiana’s bayous. Mankiewicz also liked the name Kananga, so he named the film’s villain after him.

Kananga’s farm was located on 350 acres of mangroves in Trelawny, Jamaica. Locals and tourists visited the farm to see where the 1,217 crocodiles and just three alligators lived and bred. But it’s primary purpose was a farm, and Kananga raised the crocs for their valuable skins. He started the farm in late 1970, just two years before performing the famous stunt.

Kananga was raised around crocs. He had relocated from Florida, where he performed tricks with his father from a young age. “As a kid, he used to put his head in the mouth of the alligator. And one day [the alligator snapped its jaws shut] and he was in there for twenty minutes before the croc relaxed and let him out,” said Guy Hamilton. His father wasn’t so lucky. Kananga saw his father get eaten alive by a crocodile. “Ross knew which one,” recalled Roger Moore in the documentary, Inside Live and Let Die. “He said, ‘That one got my Dad.'” 

Ross Kananga

Nonetheless, Kananga had no qualms about doing the stunt for Live and Let Die. He had already used crocodiles in a film shoot. A year earlier, Papillon, the famed movie starring Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman, was partly shot on his land.

“There was one scene where a guard shoots a crocodile and orders Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman to retrieve it. But when they get there, the croc is still alive.

“We tied the croc down and bound its jaws. When the guard fired the blank, I poked it with a stick hidden in the water to make it move around a bit.

“Still, McQueen and Hoffman were pretty scared. When they got up to the crocodile, Steve said to Hoffman, ‘You take the head.'”

Roger Moore in Danger

Before Kananga performed the stunt, Roger Moore performed his scenes on the retractable bridge and small islet with Julius Harris, who played henchman Tee Hee. Kananga had relocated most of the crocodiles from the swamp. Many were replaced with foam replicas, but some of the real reptiles remained.

While the reduced numbers reduced the threat, there was still a danger. Kananga was on standby in case something went wrong. Crocs can jump 20-30 feet high out of the water, so acting on a bridge wasn’t entirely safe. Moore, who was forever seeing the lighter side of the situation, had asked wardrobe if he could wear crocodile-skin shoes for the sequence. But he soon regretted his decision when a crocodile came straight for him. “Well, gunshots went off. Ross Kananga himself got in,” recalled Jane Seymour who played Bond Girl, Solitaire.

“What a mistake. I had the skin of one of their cousins. They were out to get me,”  said Moore.

Five Attempts and 193 stitches

Moore got to die another day, and with the shoot over for the principal actors, it was time for Kananga to don Roger Moore’s outfit–including the crocodile shoes. Kananga had tied down the legs of the three crocodiles to reduce risk, but their jaws were unrestrained. One wrong move and Kananga would share the same fate as his father. 

After two takes, the situation became more dangerous for Kananga. The crocodiles had already seen the act twice, so they were waiting in anticipation for his next attempt. On the fourth take, one of his shoes was caught in a croc’s mouth. “The film company kept sending to London for more clothes,” Kananga revealed in a 1973 interview. “The crocs were chewing off everything when I hit the water, including shoes. I received one hundred ninety-three stitches on my leg and face.”

Finally, on the afternoon of December 31st, 1972, Ross Kananga successfully completed the stunt on the fifth take. Kananga received $60,000 for the stunt, which seems hardly worth the effort considering the repeated near-death experience he sustained with each new take. While the crocodiles didn’t get Kananga, a heart attack did. Ross Kananga died on 30 January 1978, while spearfishing in Collier County in the Everglades. He was 32.

The crocodile stunt has lived on. And in 2012, director Sam Mendes, who lists Live and Let Die as a favorite Bond film, created his own homage to the crocodile stunt when Daniel Craig leaps off the back of a komodo dragon in SkyFall. This time it was all CGI, but a fun tribute nonetheless.

Daniel Rennie

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