Happy 50th Anniversary to "Thunderball"

Perdogg

On March 27th, 1961 "Thunderball" was published. The rest of course is history. Like one fewer Dalton Bond movie and one less Barry sounrack.

saunders

The trouble that story has caused in it's 50 years, it possibly could be attributed to Fleming's fatal heart attack, numerous legal battles, the removal of Blofeld and SPECTRE from the EON franchise, the bringer of excess style over substance and of course it spawned rival Bond NSNA! Anyway that notwithstanding happy birthday TB.

PrinceKamalKhan

Happy Birthday to the first Ian Fleming novel I ever read and to the novel that served the basis for my favorite Bond film(TB, of course, not NSNA).

Samuel001

What a great novels it is. Where ever the ideas came from. No doubt the Fleming novel with the most interesting history.

Thank you for the info @Perdogg!

dragonsky

@saunders why Blofeld was removed?

JB007LTK

1965 Thunderball was an Academy Award Winner.

BritishChap007

I recently rewatched that film. You see, my Grandmother passed away suddenly two weeks ago. Thunderball was one of the first Bond movies I ever watched. I went up to the video store with my grandmother and I can remember watching it back-to-back-to-back as she stared on in bewilderment in her beloved retirement condo in Florida. I was only in second grade. She wasn't to keen on the violence. Or the bath tub scene. But my Dad assured her I would turn out fine. And she was happy that I was happy.

In her memory, I sipped a martini and remembered the good days.

JB007LTK

Sorry Old Chap.
But you are very wise, you know.
1965 was a Very Good Year.
The Americans Invented the Mustang.
Named for that blasted Air Force P-51.
But let's drink anyway.
Cheers.

Luds

Quoting dragonsky: why Blofeld was removed?

Ian Fleming tried to write a movie script for Thunderball after having written several books. He worked on it with 2 other folks, Kevin McClory and Jack Whittingham. However, the project went nowhere. Fleming later used material from this Thunderball script in his Thunderball novel without acknowledging any work by McClory and Whittingham who sued Fleming. They claimed to be the ones who thought of Blofeld amongst other things, and the court ruled that further prints of Thunderball would have the following credit: based on a screen treatment by Kevin McClory, Jack Whittingham, and Ian Fleming

They decided to make Thunderball into a movie, and later on McClory caused more trouble, and due to several legal battles, EON who had purchased all the rights to Fleming novels (except for CR which was sold previously) could no longer use Blofeld and Spectre in their movies. This legal battle lasted a long time, and eventually EON decided to kill Blofeld in a Bond movie without actually naming or really showing the character. This was done in the pre-title sequence (PTS) of FYEO as you may recall, the helicopter was controlled by a bald man with a cat...

McClory owned rights to Spectre and Blofeld but could only produce movies based on the story he owned: Thunderball. He remade thunderball in 1983 as NSNA with Connery. He tried to make the story in the 90s as well, named Warhead but it never happened.

Now I forget the details, but EON now own all rights to Bond, they acquired CR in exchange from some Spiderman rights MGM or UA had with Sony who had acquired CR previously. I think they also have all TB/McClory material as well?

For more on this check
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderball_(novel)
and
http://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/movies/tb_production.php3?t=tb&s=tb

Pierce2Daniel

I recently read TB for the first time and I thought I'd share some of my views.

I liked it, I wasn't really blown away by it but I found it an enjoyable read. The problem I had with it was really that I didn't really feel like I got a big insight into 'Fleming's Bond'. So much of is made of Fleming's more dark, humourless tone to the Bond character but in TB he seems to take a back seat to the grandiose story Fleming has dreamed up. Bond is less of a character with an arc as opposed to cypher who's sole aim is to move the plot forward. In fact the plot is very grand and big, and I actually think is more akin to the scale of the Lewis Gilbert Bond film opposed to the gritty Dalton or Craig portrayals.

However, it is enjoyable as the story is so original and perfectly audacious. The novel is the perfect marriage of glamour, thrills and danger. Furthermore, it moves so quickly so you don't really get enough time to pick any holes in the thing. Fleming's great skill is to make the whole thing seem very feasible. I think the real highlight of the book is the introduction of SPECTRE, I loved the chapters where we spent time with them and the charming and deadly Blofeld. I liked how they are made up of some of the biggest movers of their day and how all their records are clean. I also think its interesting because the events of TB are their last ditch efforts before Blofeld winds down the company. This makes me even more excited to read Fleming's follow-up as it looks like Blofeld will be in a real state after the events of this novel. Another aspect of SPECTRE I like is how they deal with both the US, British and Russian Governments supplying and stealing secrets, in fact the SPECTRE of the book are rather different from the SPECTRE of the films and if anything are more akin to Quantum. An organisation lurking in the shadows.

Other highlights include the great working relationship between Bond and Leiter. I think the film of TB definitely exceeds its source material as not only is the large scale of the book fully realised but in some cases actually made grander. Also, the addition of Fiona Volpe was a good decision (she steals the movie). So all in all, a good enjoyable pacey thriller.

NapoleonPlural

The first 100 pages is for me the best Bond novel ever, at least, it's highly readable. It doesn't occupy the same world as FRWL however, I admit. Bond is a much lighter, more likeable character, we are meant to relate to him more. His disgust with health fads feels very contemporary. He is less the dark, sadistic, selfish killer of previous, perhaps cos Fleming was hoping to pitch it as a vehicle for Cary Grant but also cos Bond was more popular and so it made sense to make him more likeable generally, as was proved with the films in turn.

It goes off a bit latterly though, like Fleming didn't know how to finish it quite. Having Bond and Leiter bicker over the correct way of serving drinks and food in restaurants while on a mission seems a bit lame!

The intro of Spectre is masterly writing, and a shame stuff like this didn't get enlarged upon in the remake NSNA. In a way, Spectre gave Fleming a second wind in his writing, much needed, and so the book was important to the film series, because Spectre got used in a lot films that didn't feature it in the novel: Dr No, FRWL, DAF... In this sense the odious McClory sort of had a point, not sure if Spectre as portrayed was really Fleming's idea.

Ironically, Bond's young man appeal to Domino compared to the 50ish Largo got reversed in NSNA, where Connery was the older man. I think some of the submarine stuff of the finale in the book, including Bond gal as hostage, got used in TSWLM to put the kaiwash (sp?) on McClory's hoped for remake.