Jan 07 2009
“Dr. No” (1962) ****
Starring: Sean Connery, Joseph Wiseman, Ursula Andress, Jack Lord, John and Kitzmiller.
Directed by Terence Young.
“Dr. No” is the first feature film in the long-running James Bond film franchise which still continues to this day, launching the successful genre of the ’secret agent’ movie which blossomed in the 1960s. It is also the first to star Sean Connery as the character in question. Like many of the films, “Dr. No” is also based on an Ian Fleming novel of the same title name.
In “Dr. No”, the fictional M16 agent James Bond is assigned to investigate the death of a British Intelligence agent, John Strangways, in the lovely tropics of Jamaica. The murder case meets him with car chases, deadly traps, poisonous spiders, and traitorous allies with the exception of Quarrel, another secret service agent who partners with Bond. The trail leads Bond and Quarrel to the Dr. Julius No’s island of Crab Key, a reclusive member of the SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counter-inteliigence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion) organization who is using the island as a base for his atomic energy experiments for which he is planning his revenge on the Western world by interfering with American rocket launches at the neighboring Cape Canaveral.
They are met with Honey Ryder, a knockout seashell collector who’s father was murdered by Dr. No. She warns them of a ‘dragon’ that guards Crab Key, the dragon turns out to be a painted tank with flame throwers equipped to it - Quarrel soon meets his demise with the dragon while Bond and Honey are captured and brought to Dr. No’s lair. Dr. No proves to be a very menacing villain who lost his hands in a radiation accident and has since made use of two powerful prosthetic hands which add to his downfall in the climax of the film. Cary Grant was originally chosen for the role of James Bond but was eventually turned down due to his commitment of only one feature film, in addition, Grant refused the part because of his age (58). Sean Connery was cast because they like how he presented himself in the way that he was a big, tough-looking man who moved with grace (ala a cat).
As the fourth lowest grossing film in the series, “Dr. No” was budgeted at $1 million, grossing a total of over $16 million in the US domestic box office and over $59 million worldwide, equaling close to $389 million when adjusted to today’s inflation. It is the most straight-forward Bond film in terms of plot and entails only one major location and only one big special effects sequence. “Dr. No” is a very exotic and smart spy thriller that moves at a slow pace at first with lots of build up but promises a very exciting thrill-ride of a showdown in the impending climax. The first film in the series reminds us, despite all the horrid sequels, of what made this series so good to be begin with before some of future films became all bent out of shape with the Bond character.
RATING: ****
