Iron Man (2008)

Iron Man

Jon Favreau's film launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After a demonstration of his company's newest missile in Afghanistan, billionaire engineer Tony Stark is ambushed, gravely wounded, and held captive in a cave, where he builds the first of his armored suits. (IMDb)

Watches

Hublot Big Bang

Worn by Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark. Worn through the opening Afghanistan sequence: as Stark shelters behind a rock during the convoy ambush, a steel-cased sports watch with a rich blue dial and chunky screw-set bezel fills his wrist. The brand is genuinely unsettled. The first published reading called it a blue Big Bang, probably in tantalum and gold, and the same article was later amended, after readers supplied images of preproduction Bvlgari models lightly shown at Basel, to call the opening watch a gold Diagono Chronograph built on closely similar lines. That amendment sits awkwardly against a frame reading steel and blue rather than gold, and Theo & Harris splits the same way, its text calling the watch a Big Bang of some variation while its caption labels it a Diagono Chronograph. Downey has said he wore Bvlgari in the film under a sponsorship, which is the strongest argument for the revision. (aBlogtoWatch, Theo & Harris) Montres de Luxe independently reads the same watch as a steel Big Bang chronograph on a rubber strap, worn on the right wrist through the Afghanistan sequence, corroborating the Hublot reading over the later Bvlgari revision. (Montres de Luxe)

© Marvel Studios / Paramount Pictures

Bvlgari Diagono Retrograde Day-Date Moonphase

Worn by Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark. Worn in the Malibu workshop after Stark's return, and the most complicated thing in the film that is not a suit: a 42 mm rose gold Diagono running retrograde day and date across either side of the dial with a retrograde moonphase below, built in 300 pieces on brown alligator. Bvlgari supplied the film's watches under a sponsorship Downey has acknowledged, and the pieces shown were preproduction, only lightly announced at Basel when the film shot. (aBlogtoWatch; WorldWatchReview) Montres de Luxe independently names the Bvlgari Diagono as Stark's watch, without resolving it to this specific retrograde day-date moonphase execution. (Montres de Luxe)

© Marvel Studios / Paramount Pictures

Bvlgari (unidentified model)

Worn by Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark. After Stark's return to Malibu, aBlogtoWatch sees him in a tuxedo wearing "a Bvlgari Diagono Sport with a black face and black leather band", and notes that the screen watch has gold screws in the lugs holding the strap, unlike the catalogue example it compared. Downey has said he wore Bvlgari in the film because of the sponsorship. The source names the Diagono Sport line and no reference. (aBlogtoWatch)

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Breitling Navitimer

Worn by Terrence Howard as James Rhodes. Real-adjacent: a prop copy of a Breitling Navitimer, not a Breitling. Propworx, which sold Marvel's production assets, listed a Rhodes watch in two sales. The Iron Man Auction of 18 April 2010 offered a "Screen used Breitling wristwatch worn by Lt Colonel James Rhodes", which "Production labeled" as "the screen used watch worn by Terrence Howard", in steel with a white face on a black leather band. The Iron Man 2 and Incredible Hulk sale of 22 October 2011 says Rhodes wears the watch through the whole of the first film, "most noticeably while giving a tour to new recruits of the United States Air Force Base", and its technical description calls the piece a "Faux Bretling brand wristwatch" with an opening battery back. Both lot photographs show the Navitimer layout: a slide-rule bezel, three registers and a winged signature, with "125th Anniversary" printed on the dial, a date Breitling (founded 1884) reached a year after the film. (Propworx, 2010, lot 94; Propworx, 2011, lot 116)

© Marvel Studios / Paramount Pictures