“Bond. James Bond.”
The James Bond Film Collection began with Dr. No. The film opens in Jamaica with a curious trio of men assassinating an influential British military officer. The murder or disappearance is a mystery, so the Brits send in our hero James Bond to investigate.
We first see Bond, played by Sean Connery, in a tuxedo at a card table. An iconic image. He wins and woos an attractive woman for a late-night meetup. But before they rendezvous, Bond is called into work at 3am. His boss, known as M, asks, “When do you sleep, Double-O Seven?” He is told to leave immediately for Jamaica. Bond then goes home to find that woman from earlier waiting. He tells her he must leave “immediately,” but she kisses him, and in classic Bond style he then says he must leave “almost immediately.”
Before his mission begins, Bond is told to hand over his gun. His weapon, a Berretta, is then replaced with a Walther PPK, the gun that will become synonymous with Bond’s heroism. Don’t worry he’s told, “the CIA swear by them.”
Which brings us to Felix Lieter, Bond’s frequent CIA contact in many films. The first Felix is played by Jack Lord who goes on to fame as the star of Hawaii Five-O. He gives his typical gritty performance in this film.
The name Dr. No has been mentioned, but the audience hasn’t seen him yet and there is very little info to go by. At this early point in the film you may wonder why it is called Dr. No. That feeling may linger.
In what will be a long list of silly names for female characters in the Bond Collection, the first film has Honey Ryder, played by Ursula Andress and Sylvia Trench, played by Eunice Gayson.
Plenty of action so far, but still no Dr. No.
Then Bond is caught and taken to a fancy lair where his coffee is drugged. [How dare they soil coffee’s good name and why would they drug him after they caught him and held him in a secure location?] Bond wakes up and finally we get to meet the film’s title character, Dr. No. He is unimpressive. He has some weird situation with his hands, and at the end he’s wearing a big plastic suit like a henchman, not like a master villain. No panache. No reason to almost like him, as an intriguing villain can often offer.
Before the final action scene, Dr. No makes the classic error of telling the hero far too much information before, well, you know, before the plan fails and the hero escapes. In this case, the error is especially baffling. Bond only knew that Dr. No wants to do some kind of world domination scheme with missiles. Bond doesn’t need to know anything else. But weird hand guy pulls the curtain back on a, up-to-then, secret organization called SPECTRE. Bond is unaware of SPECTRE’s existence, let alone involvement with Dr. No. We will see SPECTRE many times in these films.
And get this. SPECTRE is an acronym which stands for “Special Executive for Counterintelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion.” Forgive me, but that’s hilarious. Bond could’ve laughed at the title scope of their organization.
Then they fight. Bond wins, Dr. No loses. That’s that.
And in the Bond sense, that is that as this film lacks many of the identifiable characteristics of the Bond films we’ve come to expect and enjoy. For example, the opening is entirely different. The film begins with opening credits and music. No pre-plot big action scene, and no big title song from a big-name singer. There’s also no Q, and therefore no incredible gadgets (the guy who gives Bond his gun is unidentified). There’s also no globetrotting; the film begins in Jamaica, Bond flies there immediately (well, “almost immediately”) and stays there. These are significant contrasts from future Bond films.
The title is a bit odd, especially for Bond’s first film. As I mentioned before, the title character is missing in action throughout most of the film. Once the audience finally meets him, he’s weird and creepy and his total screen time is less than a supporting actor’s and not comparable to a title character. The film makers knew they had a treasure chest full of content from the Ian Fleming novels, so more films were going to happen, so then choosing this lackluster title of a lackluster one-time villain is a poor choice. Hindsight leans to simply naming the film James Bond, or Double-O Seven.
I love that the film doesn’t waste any time on background bull. Bond is a British secret agent, a Double-O. That’s all we need. His relationship with Moneypenny, M’s secretary, is already established and we don’t need any fill-in to understand what’s going on there (or isn’t going on may be a better way to phrase it). The introduction scene with the tuxedo, the high-stakes card game, and then the late-night tryst offers plenty of info on who Bond is.
Standing alone, it is a little tough to see how this film could spawn a multi-generational franchise. It is very fortunate that the Bond films got better. Their staying power has been exceptional and there’s little chance such success would’ve been possible had this film set the standard for the future. We will see another film set the, shall we say, gold standard, but not just yet as Bond will return next in From Russia with Love.