Dr. No is a 1962 spy film and the first film in the James Bond series, starring Sean Connery as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Co-starring Ursula Andress, Joseph Wiseman and Jack Lord, it was directed by Terence Young and adapted by Richard Maibaum, Johanna Harwood, and Berkely Mather from the 1958 novel by Ian Fleming. The film was produced by Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli of Eon Productions, a partnership that continued until 1975. In the film, James Bond is sent to Jamaica to investigate the disappearance of a fellow British agent. The trail leads him to the underground base of Dr. No, who is plotting to disrupt an early American space launch from Cape Canaveral with a radio beam weapon.
Although it was the first of the Bond books to be made into a film, Dr. No was the sixth of Fleming's series, which began with Casino Royale. The film makes a few references to threads from earlier books, and later books in the series as well, such as the criminal organisation SPECTRE, which was not introduced until the 1961 novel Thunderball. Produced on a low budget, Dr. No was released by United Artists on 5 October 1962 and was a financial success. While the film received a mixed critical reaction upon release, it has gained a reputation over time as one of the series' best instalments. Dr. No also launched a genre of secret agent films that flourished in the 1960s. The film spawned a comic book adaptation and soundtrack album as part of its promotion and marketing.
Many aspects of a typical James Bond film were established in Dr. No. The film begins with an introduction to the character through the view of a gun barrel and a highly stylised main title sequence, both of which were created by Maurice Binder. It also introduced the iconic theme music written by the film's score composer Monty Norman. Production designer Ken Adam established an elaborate visual style that is one of the hallmarks of the film series. Dr. No was followed by From Russia with Love in 1963.
Plot
John Strangways, the Station Chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service in Jamaica, is murdered, along with his secretary, by a trio of assassins. Strangways had been helping the CIA investigate radio jamming of rocket launches from Cape Canaveral. After the Service loses radio contact with the station, James Bond is sent to investigate by M, the head of the Service. Before leaving, Bond has an intimate encounter with Sylvia Trench, a woman he met while playing chemin de fer.
Landing in Jamaica, Bond accepts a ride from an enemy agent. He overpowers the agent who kills himself by biting into a cyanide-laced cigarette. Bond arranges with the principal secretary Pleydell-Smith to meet those who saw Strangways last, including geologist Professor Dent. At Strangways' home, Bond finds a receipt from Dent and a picture of Strangways and Quarrel, who tailed Bond from the airport earlier. Bond finds Quarrel and they fight, but CIA agent Felix Leiter intervenes, explaining that Quarrel was helping him and Strangways search for the radio jamming source. One island in the area, Crab Key, is controlled by a mysterious man named Dr. No, and is generally off limits. Under the cover of night, Quarrel and Strangways had obtained rock samples from the island.
Bond visits Dent, who falsely claims that the radioactive samples were iron pyrites. Dent travels to Crab Key, where Dr. No instructs him to kill Bond with a tarantula. Bond kills the spider, then arranges to meet Pleydell-Smith's secretary Miss Taro, who is behaving suspiciously. On the drive to her home, assassins try to run Bond off the road, but they crash and die. Bond has sex with Taro, then has her arrested. Dent arrives to kill Bond, but Bond kills him instead.
Quarrel takes Bond to Crab Key, where they meet Honey Ryder, a shell diver. The trio trek through the jungle to avoid armed guards who are searching for them. At nightfall, the trio enter a contaminated swamp and encounter a flame tank, which kills Quarrel. The tank operators capture Bond and Ryder, then take them to Dr. No's base, where they are put through a decontamination process to eradicate the radiation from the swamp. They are taken to comfortable suites and given clothes and coffee. The coffee is drugged, and puts them to sleep.
That evening, Bond and Ryder dine with Dr. No, revealed to be a Chinese-German scientist with prosthetic metal hands. Dr. No was a member of a Chinese tong, but now works for the criminal organisation SPECTRE, which intends to disrupt a Project Mercury space launch at Cape Canaveral. When Bond refuses to join SPECTRE, Dr. No orders his guards to beat Bond, then imprisons Bond and Ryder separately. Bond escapes his cell through an air vent, disguises himself as a worker, and infiltrates the base's control centre.
Bond overloads the nuclear pool reactor as the launch commences. Dr. No fights him, but falls into the reactor pool and is boiled to death. As the base's personnel evacuate, Bond frees Ryder. They escape the island by boat moments before the base is destroyed. Felix finds the pair adrift at sea after their boat runs out of fuel, and has them towed by a Royal Navy ship. As Bond and Ryder kiss, Bond unhooks the towrope, setting their boat adrift again.
Cast
Sean Connery as James Bond: a British MI6 agent, codename 007 Ursula Andress as Honey Ryder: a local shell diver, making a living by selling Jamaican seashells to dealers in Miami Andress' spoken dialogue was dubbed by Nikki van der Zyl, and her singing voice was dubbed by Diana Coupland. Both were uncredited. Joseph Wiseman as Dr. No: a reclusive member of SPECTRE Jack Lord as Felix Leiter: a CIA operative sent to liaise with James Bond while he is in Kingston. This was Lord's only appearance as Leiter. Bernard Lee as M: the head of the British Secret Service Anthony Dawson as Professor R. J. Dent: a geologist with a practice in Kingston, who also secretly works for Dr. No John Kitzmiller as Quarrel: a Cayman Islander who was employed by John Strangways to secretly go to Crab Key to collect rock samples. He also worked with Felix Leiter before Bond's arrival. Zena Marshall as Miss Taro: the secretary to Mr. Pleydell-Smith at Government House in Kingston. She is actually a double agent working for Dr. No. Eunice Gayson as Sylvia Trench: a woman who meets Bond during a game of Baccarat at the London club Le Cercle Michel Mok as Sister Rose: another warden working at Dr. No's lair Lois Maxwell as Miss Moneypenny: the secretary to M Peter Burton as Major Boothroyd: the head of Q-Branch. Boothroyd is brought in by M to replace Bond's Beretta M1934 with a Walther PPK. This was Burton's only appearance as Q. Yvonne Shima as Sister Lily: a prison warden working at Dr. No's lair Louis Blaazer as Pleydell-Smith: Chief Secretary at Government House in Kingston Reginald Carter as Mr. Jones: a henchman of Dr. No who was sent to pick up 007 at the Palisadoes Airport Marguerite LeWars as Annabel Chung: a photographer and one of Dr. No's operatives who trails Bond Timothy Moxon as Strangways: the head of the Kingston station for the MI6, murdered by Dr. No's henchmen impersonating three blind men Moxon's dialogue was dubbed by Robert Rietti. Neither Moxon nor Rietti were credited.
Additional cast members include William Foster-Davis as Police Superintendent Duff, Dolores Keator as Strangways' secretary, Lester Prendergast as Quarrel's friend Puss Feller, and Anthony Chinn as Chen, one of No's lab technicians who was impersonated by Bond. Byron Lee and the Dragonaires appear as themselves, performing at Puss Feller's nightclub. Milton Reid, who later acted in The Spy Who Loved Me, appears as one of Dr. No's guards.
Production Ian Fleming first wrote Dr. No as a television outline for film producer Henry Morgenthau III to promote the Jamaican tourism industry. After this project fell through Fleming began meeting with Canadian film producer Harry Saltzman about making a screen adaptation. Although Fleming was not a fan of the "kitchen-sink realist" genre Saltzman was known for producing, after seeing Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, Fleming sold him the rights to all of the James Bond novels except Casino Royale and Thunderball for $50,000. After Saltzman gained the rights for the novel, he initially had trouble financing the project. Screenwriter Wolf Mankowitz introduced Saltzman to Albert R. "Cubby" Broccoli, who wanted the rights to the novels and attempted to buy them from Saltzman. Saltzman did not want to sell the rights to Broccoli and instead, they formed a partnership to make the films. A number of Hollywood film studios did not want to fund the films, finding them "too British" or "too blatantly sexual". Eventually, the two received authorisation from United Artists to produce Dr. No, to be released in 1962. Saltzman and Broccoli created two companies: Danjaq, which was to hold the rights to the films, and Eon Productions, which was to produce them. The partnership between Broccoli and Saltzman lasted until 1975, when tensions during the filming of The Man with the Golden Gun led to an acrimonious split, and Saltzman sold his shares of Danjaq to United Artists.
Initially, Broccoli and Saltzman had wanted to produce the eighth Bond novel, 1961's Thunderball, as the first film, but there was an ongoing legal dispute between the screenplay's co-author, Kevin McClory, and Ian Fleming. As a result, Broccoli and Saltzman chose Dr. No: the timing was apposite, with claims that American rocket testing at Cape Canaveral had problems with rockets going astray.
The producers' first choice for the director was Phil Karlson, who asked for too high a salary. They offered Dr. No to Guy Green, Guy Hamilton, Val Guest and Ken Hughes to direct, but all of them turned it down. They finally signed Terence Young, who had a long background with Broccoli's Warwick Films as the director. Broccoli and Saltzman felt that Young would be able to make a real impression of James Bond and transfer the essence of the character from book to film. Young imposed many stylistic choices for the character, which continued throughout the film series. Young also decided to inject much humour, as he considered that "a lot of things in this film, the sex, and violence, and so on if played straight, a) would be objectionable, and b) we're never gonna go past the censors; but the moment you take the mickey out, put the tongue out in the cheek, it seems to disarm."
The producers asked United Artists for financing, but the studio would only put up $1 million. Later, the UK arm of United Artists provided an extra $100,000 to create the climax where Dr. No's base explodes. As a result of the low budget, only one sound editor was hired (normally there are two, one for sound effects and another for dialogue), and many pieces of scenery were made in cheaper ways, with M's office featuring cardboard paintings and a door covered in a leather-like plastic, the room where Dent meets Dr. No costing only £745 to build, and the aquarium in Dr. No's base being magnified stock footage of goldfish. Furthermore, when art director Syd Cain found out his name was not in the credits, Broccoli gave him a golden pen to compensate, saying that he did not want to spend money making the credits again. From Russia With Love (Ultimate Edition, 2006) Production designer Ken Adam later told UK daily newspaper The Guardian in 2005:
Writing