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What watch does Steve McQueen wear in The Great Escape?
In the classic war movie The Great Escape, Steve McQueen wears a Rolex Speedking watch. This can be seen on his wrist in some of the scenes throughout the film. Here, he plays Captain Hilts, who is also known as the ‘cooler king’. Sadly, the watch can be quite hard to make out at times due to the fact the movie was filmed in 1963.
This watch has particular significance to the movie and the context of it being a war film. Firstly, it was called the Speedking as race driver Malcolm Campbell broke the speed record in 1935 whilst wearing this watch. He broke over 300 mph and was apparently a big fan of the Rolex brand.
However, it was later known as the ‘POW’ watch due to its significance in World War II. To boost the morale of British prisoners of war, Rolex allowed them to order Rolex’s which could be paid for after the war. Due to being cheaper than other Rolex models at the time, the Speedking became a firm favorite with the POWs and was therefore named ‘The POW watch’.
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What watch does Steve McQueen wear in The Thomas Crowne Affair?
In the 1968 movie, The Thomas Crown Affair, actor Steve McQueen wears a yellow gold Jaeger LeCoultre Memovox Jumbo watch. This has a gold case, white dial and black strap. Even by today’s standards, you could say the watch has aged magnificently as it doesn’t look particularly vintage or dated.
In this film, McQueen played Thomas Crown who wore various watches, but this was the stand-out. Its reference number is 5103592 and movement is a Calibre K852
