Capturing 007’s Skiing Designs : WILLY BOGNER

Willy Bogner is the sort of man who skis--backward or forward--at speeds of 50 miles per hour. He usually does this with a motion-picture camera in his arms, or occasionally between his legs. The ski sequences in the last four James Bond movies were all shot by him in one manner or another.

Bogner also provides Bond with his ski wardrobe. In the double life he leads, Bogner--not Bond--heads the multimillion-dollar Bogner ski wear and sportswear company. A former West German Olympic ski-team member, he inherited the company from his father, also an Olympic skier, who founded the Munich-based business in 1932.

Ask the younger Bogner which life comes first, and the athlete-tycoon just grins. “I always try to be a universalist, not a specialist,” says Bogner, about 6 feet tall in his reptile cowboy boots. “I adjust my priorities according to the most important project I’m involved in at the time.”

For now, that means the clothes will have to wait. Bogner’s attention is focused on “Fire and Ice,” a movie six years in the making, which he wrote, directed and photographed.

What’s it about? Skiing, of course.

“It’s a musical sports fantasy,” Bogner explains in his suite in the Beverly Hills Hotel. “It has a story, but the story is there to provide the thread that leads through the whole film. Some people say it’s a cross between ‘Fantasia’ and ‘Flashdance.’ ” Starring skiers Suzy Chaffee and John Eaves, the film premieres in Los Angeles Tuesday as a fund-raiser for the United States Ski Team. Bogner will attend.

Naturally, the actors are clad in his firm’s ski clothes.

Bogner says the movie has already made a fashion impact in Europe, where it was released last year. People want to look like the New York break dancers who dance in the snow wearing graffiti-covered ski suits.

“Today you will hardly see a skiing line without graffiti-inspired designs,” Bogner maintains.