Five Weeks in a Balloon (1962)

Curiosidades

• Baseado em: Cinq semaines en ballon

Five Weeks in a Balloon is a 1962 American adventure film loosely based on the 1863 novel of the same name by Jules Verne filmed in CinemaScope. It was produced and directed by Irwin Allen; his last feature film in the 1960s before moving to producing several science fiction television series. Although set in Africa, it was filmed in California. Balloonist Don Piccard acted as the film's technical advisor. For visual effects, a model of the balloon was used as well as a full-sized unicorn gondola hung from a crane. A novelisation of the screenplay was written by Gardner Fox.

Production

In 1955, Tony Curtis announced plans to produce and star in a version of the novel for his own company, Curtleigh, and hired Kathleen Dormer to write a script. He wanted the treatment to be comic and to co-star with Alec Guinness. The film was not made.

In 1956 it was reported a British company wanted to film the novel starring Robert Ryan. This film was not made either.

20th Century Fox had a big hit with Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1959), based on a Verne novel, and made plans for two similar follow ups, The Lost World (1960), based on the novel by Arthur Conan Doyle, and Five Weeks in a Balloon.

In June 1961, Irwin Allen, who had made The Lost World announced he had secured rights to the novel after six years of negotiation and would likely make the film at 20th Century Fox. The book was mostly in the public domain but was still in copyright in some countries. Allen wanted to release the film in 1962 in time for the one hundredth anniversary of the novel.

Cedric Hardwicke, who had just enjoyed a Broadway success in A Majority of One, was cast in the lead. Fabian, who had a long-term contract with Fox, signed to play a support role. Another key role went to Red Buttons who, like Fabian, had just been in Fox's The Longest Day (1962).

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