''Submarine X-1'' is a 1968 British

war film War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about navy, naval, air force, air, or army, land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle s ...

loosely based on the

Operation Source Operation Source was a series of attacks to neutralise the heavy German warships – ''Tirpitz'', ''Scharnhorst'', and ''Lützow'' – based in northern Norway, using X-class midget submarines. The attacks took place in September 1943 at K� ...

attack on the German battleship ''Tirpitz'' in 1943. In the film,

James Caan James Edmund Caan ( ; March 26, 1940 – July 6, 2022) was an American actor. He came to prominence playing Sonny Corleone in ''The Godfather'' (1972), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, Academy Award an ...

stars as Lt. Commander Richard Bolton, a

Canadian Canadians () are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of their being ''C ...

, who must lead a group of

midget submarine A midget submarine is any submarine under 150 tons, typically operated by a crew of one or two but sometimes up to six or nine, with little or no on-board living accommodation. They normally work with mother ships, from which they are launched an ...

s in an attack on a German battleship.

Plot

In 1943, a Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve officer from Canada, Commander Bolton (James Caan) and a few surviving crew members of his 50-man submarine ''Gauntlet'' swim ashore after unsuccessfully attacking German battleship ''Lindendorf''. After a review, Captain Bolton is cleared of any wrongdoing and placed in charge of a small group of experimental

X-class submarine The X class was a World War II midget submarine class built for the Royal Navy during 1943–44. It was substantially larger than the original Chariot manned torpedo. Known individually as X-Craft, the vessels were designed to be towed to the ...

s. Bolton is assigned by Vice-Admiral Redmayne (

Rupert Davies Rupert Lisburn Gwynne Davies FRSA (22 May 191622 November 1976) was a British actor best remembered for playing the title role in the BBC's 1960s television adaptation of ''Maigret'', based on Georges Simenon's novels. Life and career Milit ...

) to quickly train crews to man the submarines and sink the ''Lindendorf'' while it is hidden away in a Norwegian

fjord In physical geography, a fjord (also spelled fiord in New Zealand English; ) is a long, narrow sea inlet with steep sides or cliffs, created by a glacier. Fjords exist on the coasts of Antarctica, the Arctic, and surrounding landmasses of the n ...

. Commander Bolton is to train three 4-man crews along the northern coast of Scotland for a trio of midget submarines equipped with side cargoes of explosives. He must overcome tensions with some of his former crew members, while keeping their activities hidden from outsiders and German airplanes. The crews successfully fend off an attack by German parachute

commando A commando is a combatant, or operative of an elite light infantry or special operations force, specially trained for carrying out raids and operating in small teams behind enemy lines. Originally, "a commando" was a type of combat unit, as oppo ...

s, who discover their base. Bolton is forced to make hasty preparations for his attack before their submarine base can be destroyed. Two of the submarines are lost while attempting to cut through submarine nets at the entrance to the fjord. X-2, is sunk by a German E-boat's depth charges, and a second, the X-1, is scuttled. One submarine crew is captured and taken to the German battleship for

interrogation Interrogation (also called questioning) is interviewing as commonly employed by law enforcement officers, military personnel, intelligence agencies, organized crime syndicates, and terrorist organizations with the goal of eliciting useful informa ...

. X-3, the surviving submarine penetrates the submarine nets in the fjord and places explosives under the German battleship. The submarine then manages to escape as the battleship explodes.

Cast

as Commander Bolton R.C.N.V.R * David Sumner as Lt. Davies R.N.V.R. * Norman Bowler as Sub. Lt. Pennington * Brian Grellis as C.P.O. Barquist *

Paul Young Paul Antony Young (born 17 January 1956) is an English musician, singer and songwriter. Formerly the frontman of the short-lived bands Kat Kool & the Kool Cats, Streetband and Q-Tips, he became a teen idol with his solo success in the 1980s. H ...

as Leading Seaman Quentin *

William Dysart William Dysart (26 November 1929 – October 2002) was a Scottish actor, known for his role as Alec Campbell in the 1970s television series '' Survivors''. Dysart also appeared in ''Z-Cars'', ''Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased)'', ''Doctor Who'' ( ...

as Lt. Gogan R.N.R. * John Kelland as Sub. Lt. Willis R.N.V.R. *

Kenneth Farrington Kenneth William Farrington (born 18 April 1936) is a retired English actor. He first came to fame playing the role of Billy Walker, wayward son of publican Annie, in ITV's longest-running soap opera, ''Coronation Street''. Following a brief per ...

as C.P.O. Boker Knowles * Keith Alexander as Sub. Lt. X-3 * Carl Rigg as C.P.O. Kennedy * Steve Kirby as Leading Seaman X-2 * Nicholas Tate as Leading Seaman X-1 * George Pravda as Captain Erlich *

as Vice-Admiral Redmayne (uncredited)

Production

The film was one of a series of war movies made by

Walter Mirisch Walter Mortimer Mirisch (November 8, 1921 – February 24, 2023) was an American film producer. He was the president and executive head of production of The Mirisch Corporation, an independent film production company which he formed in 1957 wit ...

in Britain with an imported American star in the lead. The real X-3 was the first fully operational x-craft but was lost during a training exercise although the crew escaped using Davis escape apparatus. X-1 and X-2 were in reality allocated to a submarine cruiser (scrapped 1936) and a captured Italian submarine, the latter later receiving the Pennant Number P711 instead. It was actually the midget submarine X-7 which successfully laid charges under the Tirpitz although the crew were captured shortly after. Another midget sub X-5 may also have laid charges but her fate is unknown.

References

External links

* * * *
''Submarine X-1''
at

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{{William A. Graham 1968 films British war films 1960s English-language films Films set in 1943 Royal Navy in World War II films Seafaring films based on actual events World War II films based on actual events World War II submarine films Films scored by Ron Goodwin Films directed by William Graham (director) 1960s British films 1968 war films English-language war films