Sony Emails Reveal New Bond Movie SPECTRE Is Way Over Budget

When hackers broke into Sony's computer system, they stole a ton of information including emails from MGM president Jonathan Glickman, as MGM is a subsidiary of Sony Pictures Entertainment. Those internal memos contain some juicy information regarding the next James Bond film, Spectre. Most alarming, Glickman is worried about the film's immense budget. He says it currently "sits in the mid $300Ms," and wants the producers to cut it down to $250 million. CNN came across these emails and has this bit of additional info, "The shooting period already costs $50 million more than the previous film, Skyfall."

Glickman provided some suggestions to bring down the budget:

• Villa in Rome? It's a nighttime scene, so try doing it in London instead.
• There's fighting on a train! Again! But use fewer carriages -- three instead of four.
• Forget the dramatic finale in the rain. It'll lower the cost of visual/special effects.
• Earn an extra $6 million by showing "the more modern aspects" of Mexico to maximize "the Mexican incentive." (The makers of Spectre are getting paid to film there.)

Glickman comes off fairly sensible as he recognizes that fans of the series expect a big-budget spectacular, but he has to do what he can to reign in the spending. "This is not about 'nickel and diming' the production," Glickman wrote to producer Barbara Broccoli. She wrote back, "cannot find the cemetery or villa in the UK," and she refused to back down on 4 train carraiges.Sony Pictures co-chairman Amy Pascal jumped into the discussion with, "It's insane and you know with no script this movie is gonna go overbudget."

The emails also show that director Sam Mendes wants to cast Andrew Scott (who plays villain Dr. Moriarty in the Sherlock TV show) as Bond's intelligence agency boss, "C." And MGM can afford it, because they can pay Scott $1 million less than they were going to pay Chiwetel Ejiofor.

A few more tidbits: There's a "lesbian bad lady." And yes, we will meet Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the evil genius behind the creepy, secret transnational organization SPECTRE.

A cryptic message from Bond’s past sends him on a trail to uncover a sinister organisation. While M battles political forces to keep the secret service alive, Bond peels back the layers of deceit to reveal the terrible truth behind SPECTRE.

SPECTRE - Directed by Sam Mendes ("Skyfall") and Written by John Logan and Neal Purvis & Robert Wade. The returning cast includes Daniel Craig, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Ben Whishaw and Rory Kinnear. Newcomers include: Christoph Waltz, Léa Seydoux, Dave Bautista, Monica Bellucci and Andrew Scott. The 24th James Bond adventure is set for global release on November 6, 2015.