Bondfest: From Russia with Love
Mission Dossier: From Russia with Love
The Year: 1963
The Director: Terence Young
The Bond: Sean Connery
The Girl: Daniela Bianchi as Tatiana Romanova
The Baddie: Rosa Klebb of SPECTRE, ably assisted by buff henchman Red Grant
The Scene
Dinner, beer, James Bond. An awesome Sunday night.
The success of Dr No (1962) ensured a sequel followed only the year after in the form of From Russia with Love, one of the most beloved films of the series, especially in critical terms. The film opens with what I think to this day is one of the best opening sequences of all the Bond films. James Bond himself is seemingly killed in the sequence. However it turns out that it is merely an enemy training mission using live adversaries.
Once again SPECTRE are up to their old tricks in this film. The central premise of the script is a clever one, with the evil organisation playing the Brits and the Russians off against each other in order to get their grubby little paws on a cipher decoder thingamajig. This brings together Bond and Russian spy Tatiana Romanov, played excellently by Daniela Bianchi. Their relationship is a pretty developed and deep one when compared to most of Bond’s romantic liaisons over his 50 years onscreen. The SPECTRE arc is probably the most convincing and best of all the multi-film arcs in the entire series and this film fleshes out the organisation a lot more. We get to see more of the scope of their organisation with their training camps and weaponry suggesting they are a fair match for MI6. The main villain is SPECTRE’s Number 3 Rosa Klebb who has recently defected from the Russians. The film is at pains to make clear that SPECTRE is not the Russians. In the books the adversarial organisation went by the name SMERSH which was the USSR secret service, but the filmmakers were not keen to inflame any tensions whatsoever. This film also gives us our first glimpse of Ernst Blofeld, who will go on to become the series’ greatest ever villain. It is only a brief cat-stroking glimpse, but a glimpse nonetheless.
The other iconic character to make a first appearance in From Russia with Love is Desmond Llewellyn’s Q. There is none of the joking with 007 that will eventually make him a fan favourite, rather he just drops off Bond’s high-tech suitcase to him and then goes on his merry way. Once again, this is another cracking early Bond script. It is a bit of a slow burn, there is not too much action in the first half hour. But it ramps things up after that, especially in a large scale battle at a gypsy camp which has the epic feel of a final showdown but comes not even halfway through the film. Bond’s one-liners are a lot more prevalent in this film and Connery seems to have a whole lot of fun delivering them. Actually I was surprised by how genuinely funny this film is and not just in terms of one-liners. There are some nice jokes built up throughout, especially in Bond’s interactions with M’s secretary Moneypenny. Performance wise Connery is once again excellent in the role. The villains are really good in this too. Especially menacing is Lotte Lenya as Rosa Klebb who gives quite a chilling turn despite not being onscreen particularly long. Robert Shaw, who would go on to play Quint in Jaws (1975), brings a terrific physicality to the role of Red, a SPECTRE henchman and his fistfights with Connery’s Bond are raw, painful looking and believable.
The two main women of From Russia with Love
From Russia with Love continues on in the excellent vein of Dr No whilst also showing how the series would be able to remain relevant by changing up its output. The film is more grounded and character driven than the first film, conveying more a sense of the realities of The Cold War as opposed to maniacal taking over the world schemes. Not that there is anything wrong with that, I think for me Dr No is still a very slight favourite over this follow up effort.
Verdict: Pint of Kilkenny
Bondfest Leaderboard
- Dr No (1962)
- From Russia with Love (1963)
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Bondfest: Dr No
Mission Dossier: Dr No
The Year: 1962
The Director: Terence Young
The Bond: Sean Connery
The Girl: Ursula Andress as Honey Ryder
The Baddie: The titular Dr No & his crazyarse metal hands
The Scene:
Started Dr No in my Sydney hotel room. Unfortunately in a somewhat hungover state.
Whilst not Ian Fleming’s first James Bond novel, Dr No was the first to be adapted for the big screen. The result is a strong entry in the series that established many, but not all, of the iconic elements that would come to define the series over the next 50 years. Here is the gunshot start, but not the bombastic vocal theme song. The villainous lair is here, but Q’s bag of gadgetry is not on the scene as yet. The rest of the iconography would gradually be bedded down over the next few films.
The storyline of the film is basically that Dr No wishes to more or less take over the world. He works for the evil organisation SPECTRE, with whom our Jimmy will have numerous run-ins with, especially throughout the early entries into the series. The character of Bond in this first film is an interesting one. For much of the film he is not the lone, ‘man apart’ figure that crops up in many later films. Especially through the early parts he is a team player, working with the local police chief, the CIA’s top man Felix Leiter and local fisherman Quarrel to try and solve the mysterious death of British operative Strangways. The first half of the film is more mystery flick than spy thriller, as Bond works his way around the island of Jamaica gathering clues and following up leads, which is great fun. The last 45 minutes sees the action shift to Dr No’s island where we see Ursula Andress make her famous entrance onto the screen. Has there been a more iconic first appearance by a character in film history? I doubt it. This is a cracking part of the film. The island is a great setting, as Bond, Andress’s Honey Ryder and Quarrel make their way through thick jungle by wading through the river. When they are captured and taken to No’s lair, the impressive set design takes over. The lair has become a bit of a cliché, thanks essentially solely to the Bond films. But there is a care and creativity to the design of this one that is impressive, some of it even bordering on the surrealist.
Andress making her iconic entrance
Bond films, whilst understandably not every film fan’s cup of tea, have always been well made. While I was only watching a DVD copy of Dr No, it still looks so sharp all these years on, with excellent cinematography. Sean Connery definitely has the physical presence to play Bond well, but in addition to that he is also a very good actor. He is believable, delivers lines well (helped here by a script that leaves cringeworthy one-liners to a minimum) and even shows the occasional, tiniest glimpses of vulnerability. Also great in a small role is Bernard Lee as M, with him and Connery’s Bond showing an immediate onscreen rapport that the two would build on in ensuing films. I touched on the script briefly, but I will mention it again. It is a very good one with a deftness and lightness of touch that is present in all of the best James Bond films. A lightness of touch that occasionally gets warped into pastiche in some of the lesser series efforts. There is also darkness here though, it is easy to look back on these early Bond efforts and forget that it is present. Late in the film Honey relates the tale of how she was raped when younger. She takes pride in the fact that she killed the perpetrator with a deadly spider, and is pleased that it took him a week to die. Pretty much straight after that Quarrel, a character that the audience has come to love, is burnt alive.
Dr No is a great start to the Bond series. It is not perfect, the first half of the film becomes a little repetitive with the endless attempts on Bond’s life and the action sequences would be tightened as the series progressed. But there is so much to love about this film and it is great to see where it all started, in this one of the stronger Bond films.
Verdict: Pint of Kilkenny
Bondfest Leaderboard
- Dr No (1962)
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