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Southend Film Festival offers big screen outing of “Thunderbirds are Go”

By John Freeman on May 12, 2024

Southend Film Festival is offering a rare chance to see the Thunderbirds are Go on the big screen next month, as part of a packed programme of events.

The screening of the film in 35mm glory, the first of the two Thunderbirds films produced by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson in the 1960s, on Wednesday 5th June will be supported by the Thunderbirds episode “Trapped in the Sky”. The episode has been specially scanned in ‘Superfullframeation’, which means you’ll not only see what you were meant to see, but also what you weren’t meant to see!

In Thunderbirds are Go, blast off into more action and more adventure with the first ever feature-length film starring the International Rescue team.

Millionaire ex-astronaut, Jeff Tracy, his five stalwart sons, Brains, the inventor of the Thunderbird crafts and the fabulous secret agent Lady Penelope launch into action in this ‘Supermarionation’ classic, battling The Hood, and saving Zero X, the interplanetary spacecraft from disaster!

Sunday 9th June sees Mark Joseph present another exciting show headlined by one complete story from Dick Spanner, P. I., and the first part of an unfinished story with narration by the late Shane Rimmer. In attendance will be special guest Terry Adlam, who created this series which mercilessly parodied Raymond Chandler-like detective stories.

The show will also include episodes from iconic TV series’ Stingray (“Eastern Eclipse”, on 16mm, plus a 60th anniversary tribute) and Thunderbirds (an ultra-rare Japanese home movie version of “Trapped in the Sky”).

• For full details of the Festival and its schedule head to southendfilmfestival.com

John Freeman

The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.

Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.

He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.