Dr No - a template for Bond films to come
March 31st, 2008
I’ve always been a fan of the James Bond films, but nothing ever fanatical, I preferred Moore to Connery simply as it was the era I was born into. I then went on to prefer Brosnan thanks to Goldeneye, I played the game, but never bought the movie or any other Bond movies for that matter, certainly not on DVD (may have bought a video as a present actually).
So when they announced that the deluxe special editions were coming out I admit I was interested, if not vaguely curious about the older films. I looked on longingly as they released the box set, in a briefcase I think and about a month back I caved in and got the Casino Royale total box set which comes in a casino motif box on sale (not as cheap as they are advertising as of yesterday grrrrr).
Bloody hell it’s heavy.
Mainly, as I discovered when I got home thanks to poker chips in the middle which I suspect I’ll never use.
So last weekend I finally got around to watching the first movie; Dr No and absolutely loved it. I think I enjoyed it as much for the storyline and the acting for its wonderful retro feel, which of course at the time wasn’t retro and was probably quite modern.
There are a lot of mistakes in this film, to be absolutely fair, but I think they are all forgiven. The driving sequences would probably feel wrong if it wasn’t done with the stationary car and the film running in the background simulating the driving (did they have green screen back then?).
The scene where the spider crawls up Bond’s arm is great despite the obvious glass that Connery is pushed up against. Everyone picks on Raiders of the Lost Ark for the cobra reflection in the glass but I figure I wouldn’t let a spider crawl on me and I certainly not sitting in front of a cobra unprotected.
I know they cleaned it up for the DVD but Dr No looks crisp and clean, not only in the film quality but even in it’s production design. Dr No himself is very sharp in his clothing, and has the shiny black robot hands, Bond is always extraordinarily well dressed and the first movie is certainly no exception.
In fact Dr No is actually the perfect template for a James Bond story, meglomaniac trying to take over the world, banter with Moneypenny, some gambling, the immortal ‘Bond, James Bond’ and of course the beautiful Ursula Andress in that iconic scene coming out of the ocean and getting caught up in the world of international espionage.
Something I didn’t know about Ursula Andress is that she is the only Bond girl to be referenced directly in an Ian Fleming Bond novel, someone points the actress out in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. The other thing I didn’t know is that her voice was completely dubbed over except for the singing by a voice actress named Nikki van der Zyl, another woman did the singing.
Light on the gadgets which personally I don’t mind too much, I like the scene where he uses ‘no tech’ means to work out if someone has been in his room. The ‘dragon’ is pretty low tech itself but I love the dudes dressed in sci fi radiation suits running around doing henchmen things.
The music in Dr No is as iconic as the movie, and because this is the first one we are treated to it throughout the film. I wonder if they were aware how endearing and ageless the music would be?
It was a real treat watching Dr No and I realised whilst watching that I had never completely watched it from start to finish, I had seen scenes here and there but never the entire film. I’m sure all the Bond fans reading this are jealous of me being able to watch it with fresh eyes!!
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Categories: Movies | Tags: Casino Royale, Dr No, Goldeneye, Ian Fleming, James Bond, Nikki van der Zyl, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, Pierce Brosnan, Roger Moore, Ursula Andress
I’ve watched every Bond film except Casino Royal..
They sell áll films in a big suitcase overhere for over 200€!
I never bought any of the films, because they are on tv all the time. I probably watched most of them at least twice.
All Bond music is time-less. I recently bought a cd with 21 of the theme songs (up to Golden eye)+ the trailer version of the Golden eye song, it was only 4€, probably the best 4€ ever spent on a cd.
Arjan’s last blog post..Zoanthrope 2008: old skool
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Arjan - Casino Royale is actually my favourite of the Bond films, closely followed no doubt by Goldeneye. Casino Royale’s soundtrack is probably the most sophisticated of the soundtracks, not so much the title track (which doesn’t appear on the soundtrack may I add)but the music is thickly intertwined with the story.
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