During the 1950s, several attempts were made at making a film of the infamous novels by Ian Fleming. Yet, no one succeeded in getting the funding and the go-ahead of a major studio in order to make an effective movie. No one, that is, until Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman teamed up to produce a film of the infamous spy in the early 1960s. After the rights were secured, the funding was found and a director was hired, a then unknown Scottish actor named Sean Connery was cast as the spy in the film Dr. No.
Connery was given personal instructions in how to act and carry himself by the director, Terence Young. Young took Connery to Saville Row to get his shirts, showed him how to behave like a gentlemen and how to fight like a spy. Much of what Connery showed in the first two Bond films was pure Young. Young also chose a young lady by the name of Ursula Andress for the role of the Bond girl. Joseph Wiseman played the villain, Dr. No.
The film was an effective tale of excitement but was still rather static in it's cinematic approach, like the films of the 1950s. (It was only a few years later that the film editor Peter Hunt developed his own editing style to make them more dynamic.) Dr. No is still very much a film of the 1950s when you now look at it. Still the beginnings of the Bond franchise are there.
There is a great actor playing Bond, a very sexy Bond girl, a terrific (if somewhat underused) villain and a very memorable Bond theme, composed by Monty Norman and orchestrated and performed by John Barry. (There has been a lot of discussion of this later but so far everything points to the effect that Norman composed it originally for a musical and Barry reorchestrated and performed it.)
Aside from the somewhat static feel of the film, there is a good deal of humour and excitement in it. Also, there is a scene in which Bond kills Professor Dent quite coldbloodedly, which caused a little bit of a stir back in the sixties. This was simply not done for a hero, yet Bond had no compunctions whatsoever. The same goes for the way he beds Miss Taro and subsequently has her picked up. Humour indeed.
If one were to rate Dr. No now, it comes across as fairly tame material but nevertheless all the elements for the franchise were already in place. Visually, the film is already striking with impressive sets by Ken Adam. Yet, the key word in this film seems still to be 'realistic'; meaning next to no gadgets or special effects.
And it does come down to Connery's presence, which immediately convinces you he is Bond. From his opening shot, he exudes coolness and suave sophistication. Connery never has to prove himself: he is Bond right from the Go.
When I first saw the film in the mid-1970s, I was a bit disappointed with it to be truthful. I did not think it was spectacular enough but I was a young kid at the time who did not know better. Dr. No was a film that for it's time was as effective as the 2006 Casino Royale was. It scored big at the box office and soon left very little doubt about Bond's future. We would soon see more of this intrepid secret agent.
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