Small Dials, Big Screens
A look at watches in the movies.
What do Speed, Pussy Galore, Ripley, Batman, Bishop, Willard, Bullitt, Paul Newman, Kamen Rider, Darth Vader, and Stargate, have in common, other than being connected to the movie industry? They are all nicknames of famous watches (Rolex, Seiko, Omega, Casio, Benrus) worn on small and big screens.
“My name is Bond, James Bond.” One of the most famous marriages between watches and Hollywood starts with this introduction. In 1962, Sean Connery was probably one of the first movie characters to become associated with a watch. Bond started his movie career wearing a Rolex Submariner Ref. 6538, before switching — much later — to Omega and its Seamaster line. But over the years, Bond also wore a Rolex chronograph 6238, several Seikos, including a famous Seiko Golden Tuna 7549-7009 (For Your Eyes Only), and even a — now very sought after — Tag Heuer “Night Diver” 980.031 (The Living Daylights). And of course, there’s the Breitling Top Time “Geiger Counter” from Thunderball, which was bought by a collector in an English flea market for 25 GBP!
Watches in movies sometimes become characters on their own, even telling hidden stories. One example is Coppola’s Apocalypse Now. Inside the war story is another one, about watches. In the late seventies, when Coppola shot the movie, another war was raging, called the Quartz Crisis. Japanese watches were disrupting an entire industry. What is the connection with the movie? Willard wears a Seiko 6105, Kurtz a Rolex GMT Master. Seiko versus Rolex, Japan versus Switzerland.
Choosing a watch for a movie can be tricky. One example is Once Upon A Time in Hollywood. Brad Pitt’s character, Cliff Booth, is seen cruising around LA with a gold plated Citizen Challenge Timer 8110 on his wrist. The watch is beautiful, especially on its custom leather strap. But this model was launched in 1972; the story is supposed to take place in 1969.
Some filmmakers go even further — like Christopher Nolan. Whether in Interstellar or Tenet, watches play a key role in the plot. But in both cases, the watches did not exist before the movie. They were made for those films by Hamilton, following Nolan’s instructions. Hamilton is a brand which has a strong connection with Hollywood; it provided a watch for Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. In Dunkirk though, Nolan chose a real vintage piece to strap on Tom Hardy’s wrist — a beautiful Omega CK 2129.
One of the most interesting non-existent watches in a movie is in Minority Report, where Tom Cruise wears a strange digital chronograph — branded Bulgari. As the movie is set in the future, this might have been a Bulgari-designed prop. But the watch is an Omega X33 with either a modified screen — or an inserted CGI screen. I’d love to know how the movie crew came up with this, but it seems that someone was a creative watch fan. Tom Cruise also wore the same watch in two movies that came out 36 years apart — a Porsche Design Chronograph 1, in Top Gun (1986) and Maverick (2022).
Often, actors are watch fans too. In the recent F1 movie, Brad Pitt’s character wears an IWC. The story is much more interesting than just a product placement though, because the green dial Ingenieur doesn’t exist. The model seen on the big screen is a vintage Ingenieur 1832, which was never produced with a green dial. This watch is also thinner than the original. This one-of-a-kind watch was made following Pitt’s requests, using a vintage 1832, removing the soft iron inner case, changing the caseback, and adding a green dial.
George Clooney is well known as an Omega ambassador. He is also a true collector. In the 2016 Money Monster, you can see him wearing a gold Speedmaster — not an unusual choice for a brand ambassador. But once again, there is more to the story. The exact reference of this gold watch remains a mystery as Omega was not making any yellow gold Speedmasters at the time. It turns out the watch came from George Clooney’s personal collection.
Some brands might not exist without the spotlight of the movies. Panerai falls in this category. In the mid-90s the brand woke up from a long sleep. At that time, Sylvester Stallone became a Panerai fan when he noticed a big watch on the wrist of the photographer Monty Shadow. It was a pre-Vendome Panerai Luminor. In 1995, Stallone wore the watch — on his right wrist — in the Hollywood hit Daylight, and the rest is history.
TV also played a big role in wristwatch history. In 1964, two years after Dr. No, Brian Kelly (Flipper the Dolphin) appeared on TV screens wearing a Nivada Grenchen Chronomaster Aviator Sea Diver and a Rolex Submariner.
In the 60s, Thunderbirds was a very unusual show. This sci-fi TV series was filmed using scale models and electronic marionettes. Colonel Jeff Tracy was one of the main characters. Despite being a puppet, he became famous within the watch world for checking his — real — Omega Speedmaster in Episode 19 of the Series 1.
Many years later, the legendary Magnum PI, Tom Selleck, became popular for his Hawaiian shirt and his Pepsi Rolex GMT Master, which came later in the show, as Magnum’s first watch was a lesser known Chronosport SeaQ 300M.