Thunderball (film)
"Thunderball" is a 1965 espionage thriller film featuring the iconic British secret agent, James Bond, portrayed by Sean Connery. It is the fourth installment in the long-running Bond film series and notable for being the first to utilize a widescreen Panavision format and feature a runtime exceeding two hours, with substantial underwater scenes. The plot revolves around Bond's mission to recover two stolen atomic bombs from the criminal organization SPECTRE, which threatens to detonate one unless a ransom is paid. Throughout the film, Bond encounters various characters, including the villain Emilio Largo and the alluring Domino, who becomes a key ally.
The film was a significant commercial success, earning over $140 million worldwide, making it the top-grossing film of 1966 and holding the record for Bond films until "Skyfall" in 2012. It also won an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects and contributed to the enduring popularity of the Bond franchise, which has generated substantial revenue through merchandising and subsequent films. As a cultural touchstone, "Thunderball" encapsulates the blend of high-stakes espionage, advanced technology, and iconic character dynamics that define the James Bond series.
Thunderball (film)
- Release Date: 1965
- Director(s): Terence Young
- Writer(s): John Hopkins; Richard Maibaum
- Principal Actors and Roles: Sean Connery (James Bond); Claudine Auger (Dominique "Domino" Derval); Martine Beswick (Paula Caplan); Adolfo Celi (Emilio Largo); Bernard Lee (M); Desmond Llewelyn (Q); Lois Maxwell (Miss Moneypenny); Rick Van Nutter (Felix Leiter)
- Book / Story Film Based On: Thunderball by Ian Fleming
Thunderball is an espionage thriller about British secret agent 007, the fictitious James Bond who works for MI6. It is the fourth in the extraordinarily successful series of films starring the ultra-seductive spy with the "license to kill." Thunderball is also the fourth in the series to star Sean Connery as Bond, the first to be filmed in a widescreen Panavision format, and the first to have a running time above two hours. Almost a quarter of that time is spent under water.
Interestingly, Thunderball was scheduled to be the first Bond movie, but a lengthy legal conflict delayed filming. The Bond character was created by author Ian Fleming in 1953, and he published a novel titled Thunderball in 1961. However, two other writers sued him after the novel was released, claiming that the book was based on a screenplay they had earlier coauthored with Fleming. Today the movie rights for all of Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels are owned by Eon Productions, a company created by producers Albert Broccoli and Harry Saltzman in 1961.
By the time Thunderball was released, James Bond had already become a blockbuster phenomenon, which it remains to the present day. Thunderball was the biggest 007 hit until 1973, and in current dollars it is still one of the highest-grossing Bond movies. The franchise had earned more than an estimated $6 billion by 2015. With merchandising spinoffs, including a Bond action figure, Thunderball accounted for a very large portion of that total, perhaps more than a sixth.
Thunderball has all of the ingredients that Bond audiences love. His gadgets are ultra-high-tech but based in reality. In 1965 they felt like something secretive government agencies might be using. There were, of course, Bond girls—and even performers who became top stars, such as Julie Christie and Faye Dunaway, read for the part. And its theme song was another megahit. In the case of Thunderball, it was sung by Tom Jones who held the final note so long that he nearly fainted in the sound booth.
Plot
Thunderball features a plot that is no more implausible than any other Bond movie. It expands on the heavy reliance on special effects and technological wizardry that became a staple in Goldfinger.
The story opens with Bond attending the fake funeral of a SPECTRE agent, a colonel in the shadowy anti-democratic criminal organization against which 007 and his fellow MI6 agents fight. Bond pursues the man—disguised as his own wife—and kills him after a struggle. Bond escapes via a strap-on rocket pack and his tricked-out Aston Martin.
M sends Bond to a Swiss spa to recuperate. There he runs afoul of a SPECTRE operative he will have to kill later in the movie. He also discovers a murdered French NATO pilot has been replaced by a SPECTRE goon who has received plastic surgery to be able to take the pilot’s place aboard a plane carrying two atomic bombs. The SPECTRE henchman ditches the plane with the bombs in the ocean near the Bahamas. Emilio Largo, SPECTRE’s second-in-command and the villain of the movie, then murders him.
Largo recovers the bombs. SPECTRE demands £100 million in flawless uncut diamonds or it will set off one of the bombs in a city in Britain or the United States. Bond and the other 00 agents gather to address the menace.
Bond recognizes the murdered French pilot in a photograph, and the pilot’s gorgeous sister Domino is in Nassau. Bonds goes there and discovers that she is Largo’s mistress. Bond meets and befriends the beautiful young woman and begins a contest of wills with Largo at the gaming tables.
Felix Leiter, Bond’s recurring CIA double, and Q, the MI6 tech wizard, join him in the Bahamas. Bond is given an array of high-tech gadgets. He and Felix find the missing plane underwater. Bond then meets Domino while scuba-diving and tells her that Largo killed her brother. He enlists her help in trying to find the atomic bombs.
Domino is discovered and captured, but in the meantime Bond has infiltrated Largo’s team. Bond learns that Largo intends to set off the A-bomb in Miami Beach, but he is also discovered. Felix saves him, and U.S. Navy SEALS parachute into the area for an underwater battle with Largo’s forces. The SEALS prevail, but Largo flees in a hydrofoil—the former front of his ship—with Bond aboard. Largo gets the upper hand in his fight with Bond and is about to shoot the agent when Domino kills the villain with a spear gun.
Bond and Domino leap from the hydrofoil just as it slams into an island and explodes. They are fortuitously rescued from the waves by a Navy plane with a sky-hook.
Significance
The main significance of Thunderball is its fantastic success at the box office and in merchandising. It was released in December, 1965 and became the top-grossing film of 1966. It cost about $9 million to produce and earned more than $140 million worldwide, or around $1 billion in inflation-adjusted terms. Its net profit in 1966 was above $26 million. It was the best-earning movie of the James Bond series until Skyfall was released in 2012.
Like Goldfinger, Thunderball received an Academy Award, for best visual effects. The same story was used again in 1983, but not by Eon Productions, in Never Say Never Again. That movie featured Sean Connery reprising the role he had abandoned "forever" after shooting 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever.
According to Stephen Jay Rubin, the director of Thunderball lost interest in the project before it was finished. Young left it to editor Peter Hunt to finish the post-production work in time for the December 1965 release, and as a consequence the movie is riddled with continuity flaws. Although audiences at the time didn’t seem to care, finding all of the continuity errors is a game among James Bond fans.
Awards and nominations
Won
- Academy Award (1965) Best Visual Effects
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