Thunderbirds Are Go | |
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Film poster, depicting the Thunderbird machines and primary puppet cast
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Directed by | David Lane |
Produced by | Sylvia Anderson |
Screenplay by | Gerry and Sylvia Anderson |
Based on | Thunderbirds by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson |
Starring |
Voices of:
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Music by |
Barry Gray Songs: |
Cinematography | Paddy Seale |
Edited by | Len Walter |
Production
company |
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Distributed by | United Artists |
Release date
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12 December 1966 |
Running time
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93 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Budget | £250,000 |
Thunderbirds Are Go is a 1966 British science-fiction film based on Thunderbirds, a 1960s television series starring marionette puppets and featuring scale model effects in a filming process dubbed "Supermarionation". Written by Thunderbirds creators Gerry and Sylvia Anderson, directed by David Lane and produced by AP Films, Thunderbirds Are Go develops the franchise with a plot focusing on the futuristic spacecraft Zero-X and its manned mission to Mars. When Zero-X suffers a mechanical failure during re-entry, it is up to International Rescue, with the aid of the Thunderbird machines, to save the astronauts on board before the spacecraft is obliterated in a crash landing.
Filmed from March to June 1966 and premiering in December,Thunderbirds Are Go includes, in a first for an AP Films production, cameo appearances from puppets of real-life celebrities Cliff Richard and The Shadows, who also contributed to the musical score. It is also the first motion picture to have been filmed with an early form of video assist technology known as "Add-a-Vision", and incorporated landscape footage that was shot on location in Portugal.Special effects pieces, produced under the supervision of Derek Meddings and including rocket launch sequences, space shots and a miniature representation of the Martian surface, required six months to complete.