Thunderball (1965)

Director:

Terence Young

Writers:

Richard Maibaum (screenplay) and
John Hopkins (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

29 December 1965 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Thriller

Tagline:

Look Out! Here Comes The Biggest Bond Of All! (British quad poster)

Plot:

James Bond heads to The Bahamas to recover two nuclear warheads stolen by SPECTRE agent Emilio Largo in an international extortion scheme.

Plot Keywords:

British | Bahamas | Extortion | Island | North Atlantic

Awards:

Won Oscar. Another 3 wins & 3 nominations

Cast

Sean Connery	...	James Bond
Claudine Auger	...	Domino Derval
Adolfo Celi	...	Emilio Largo
Luciana Paluzzi	...	Fiona Volpe
Rik Van Nutter	...	Felix Leiter
Guy Doleman	...	Count Lippe
Molly Peters	...	Patricia Fearing
Martine Beswick	...	Paula Caplan
Bernard Lee	...	M
Desmond Llewelyn	...	Q
Lois Maxwell	...	Miss Moneypenny
Roland Culver	...	Foreign Secretary
Earl Cameron	...	Pinder
Paul Stassino	...	Palazzi
Rose Alba	...	Madame Boitier

Also Known As:

Ian Fleming's Thunderball (UK) (complete title)
James Bond, Secret Agent (International: English title) (original script title)
Longitude 78 West (UK) (original script title)

Runtime:

130 min

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Westrex Recording System)

Certification:

Canada:PG (Manitoba/Ontario) | Canada:13+ (Quebec) | Canada:A (Nova Scotia) | Iceland:12 | Singapore:PG | Germany:12 (DVD rating) | West Germany:16 (nf) | South Korea:15 | Brazil:12 | Portugal:M/12 | Canada:PG (video rating) | Argentina:13 | Australia:PG | Finland:K-16 | Netherlands:12 | Norway:15 (re-rating) | Norway:16 (original rating) | Peru:14 | Sweden:15 | UK:PG (video rating) (1987) | USA:Approved (original rating) | USA:GP (re-rating) (1970) | USA:PG (re-rating) (1994) | UK:A (original rating) (passed with cuts)

Filming Locations:

Anet, Eure-et-Loir, France

Company:

Eon Productions

Trivia:

The first line of the "Thunderball" James Bond novel read: "It was one of those days when it seemed to James Bond that all life, as someone put it, was nothing but a heap of six to four against." The last line of the "Thunderball" James Bond novel read: "Then she gave a small sigh, pulled the pillow to the edge of the bed so that it was just above him, laid her head down so that she could see him whenever she wanted to, and closed her eyes."

Goofs:

Revealing mistakes: In the last underwater fighting scene Largo, who is supposed to be an one-eyed man, has a hole in his eye-patch revealing his second eye.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Madame LaPorte: The coffin - it has your initials: J.B.
Bond: At the moment, rather him than me.
Madame LaPorte: At least you've been saved the effort of removing him. Colonel Bouvar passed away in his sleep, so they tell me.
Bond: Mm...
Madame LaPorte: You sound disappointed you did not kill him yourself.
Bond: I am. Jacques Bouvar murdered two of my colleagues.

Movie Connections:

Spoofed in Filmpje! (1995)

Soundtrack:

Thunderball

We've got ourselves a Broken-Arrow, James Bond style

Thunderball is the fourth entry in the ever ongoing James Bond franchise and in my opinion one of the better installments. This film features the secret services arch-enemy SPECTRE and I must say that in this episode of James Bond adventures it works better than in From Russia with Love. What I liked about this film, was that there were a lot of good one-liners from Connery, that there weren't too many goofy stunts / henchmen / gadgets and that the film was able to maintain exciting throughout. I've read quite a few comments stating that the underwater scenes dragged on too long, but I must say that I felt even that bit to be quite entertaining and thrilling. I actually have only one criticism and that regards the ending. I felt that the whole out-of-control boat thing was really stupid. I mean I understand that they tried to make it look spectacular, but in using the same technique they used to buff up the fistfights, they made it look cheesy and cheap. Luckily this is just one short moment in the film and the film is not ruined by something as a dreadful character or a bad actor. All in all this is one of the better Bond films and well worth watching if one sets out for 2 hours of pure adventurous entertainment with a standard-formula story.

7 out of 10