Dr. No (1963)

Must See Movie...

The first must-see film of the year.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

When 1962 the first James Bond film came on the big screen, no one had expected the success of the legendary agent to survive for so many years. I also have to admit that this agent is my favorite hero. He is always on the move, visits different parts of the world, always has the most beautiful women around him and can kick the villains in the ass. The start of this legend is captured Famos by Oscar winner Sean Connery. A smart guy with a lot of British charm (though Connery is Scot), always looks elegant, is very world-class and can radiate masculine hardness in serious situations. Certainly it is also a male worldview of men in the early 60s, but Connery hits the nail on the head. Of course, there is no such thing as the sensual Playmate of James Bond: Ursula Andress! How it rises from the sea is simply stunning! (not only because I'm also a Swiss). But it adorns the typical Bondgirl of the Connery era: beautiful and vulnerable. But can be very tough in difficult moments. Joseph Wiseman mimes the first Bond villain Dr. No. With his elegant and dry way, he wants to subjugate the nations of the Earth. Certainly he is also only a chess figure, but can already offer Bond's forehead. Dr. No is dry, devilish and deadly and always with a goal in front of the eyes: World domination! Certainly, the first Bond adventure is still timidly implemented. The action and the effects are cheap. But it sets the genre or franchise the stamp on how the adventure of the British agent should go on. Conclusion: A successful start that still plays with the handbrake. There is still a need to improve. But I certainly have no doubts about James Bond 007!

I'm watching a few James Bond movies for a term paper I'm writing about Spy Fiction and since Dr. No marks the beginning of the most influential espionage movie franchise in history it was definitely a must see for me. I was not impressed, to say the least.First of all I'm not a James Bond fan. I'm not much of an action movie fan either, but once in a while I watch one and there's a few I like, so it's not that I am completely opposed to the genre, but take my review with a grain of salt.If you're a fan of James Bond movies in general, this is your movie. It's the normal Bond formula with several pretty girls by his side, an investigation with some action that sooner or later leads to the villain and then the defeat of said villain. If that's your thing, totally do consider this movie. It is great if you can turn off your brain for two hours and just want to be entertained. If you can't do that, don't pick up this movie. If you expect something deep James Bond just isn't your thing and that's completely fine. Different people have different tastes. I for one don't really like it.I guess I can handle the weird decisions such as Bond breaking into the air vent in his prison cell with a shoe but somehow that air vent also connects to a water pipe (I feel like I totally missed something here, someone please explain that scene to me), but what really destroyed my enjoyment was the Bond girl Honey Ryder.Bond usually has several love interests just like in this movie. I don't like it, but fine, I don't expect much. That's just James Bond and I bet a lot of people enjoy this and that's cool. But Honey Ryder... She's special. Special because she's somehow really stupid. She talks in this little girl way that made me uncomfortable throughout the whole movie and she's depicted as not much more than that. A naive little girl in the body of a hot blonde (I actually found out through my research that they chose the actress pretty much because the one they actually wanted to use wasn't "voluptuous" enough on screen). There's several instances where they show her as explicitly being stupid and honestly I couldn't look past this and I really can't understand why so many people see her as the best Bond girl when we get girls with actual agency like Vesper Lynd in Casino Royale from 2006. When Honey gets taken away by Dr. No's guards she is wearing pants. Later when Bond rescues her she's only in her bikini panties. I don't want to think about those implications to be honest.

I thought it was a pretty decent film. Although if I din't know James Bond was a mega franchise, I would have never expected that sort of film to be the start to something this big. I find it odd the credits were only like ten seconds at the end. Sean Connery gave off a pretty good performance, although I guess that is not his best film. The first ten minutes really confused me but after that I sort of started to understand what was happening and I was able to enjoy it after that point. My favorite part of the film was the part when it was showing the spider crawling up his body and he was just laying there is stillness waiting for it to get off him before he reacted. I was also surprised it took 50 minutes for the love interest to show up. I would she would have been in the first twenty minutes. Although I did role my eyes at the black guy dying when nobody else did. Or the villain only being in the last fifteen minutes. Overall, I would say a 8.5/10. It kept me entertained and that was what is important for movies of that type.

"Dr. No" is the first of what would become more than two dozen movies about British Secret Agent 007, James Bond. The special agent of Britain's MI-6 is the creation of Ian Fleming. Fleming was a journalist for Reuters and when World War II broke out, he was recruited for Britain's Naval Intelligence. After the war, he managed a newspaper office and took up writing his spy novels. He introduced the world to his famous James Bond in his first novel, Casino Royale in April 1953.The Bond movie series has stretched over more than 50 years, as of the date of the last movie, "Spectre" in 2015. Half a dozen different actors have played Bond, but Sean Connery established his identity from the start. I haven't read any of Fleming's novels about Bond, nor books by authors who have continued the Bond series. But, It's interesting to note that each subsequent movie seems to get a little more detailed, complex and with associated gimmicks. Compared to the last of the films, starring Daniel Craig, this first film seems mild. But it's a good thriller, nevertheless, and it introduces 007 to the world. Bond's humor gradually picks up in later novels and movies. But, in "Dr. No" we get a glimpse of it. After a hearse chasing Bond on a mountain road swerves to avoid hitting a construction vehicle, it plummets over the cliff and explodes as it rolls down the mountain. Bond gets out of his car and watches with a road worker. He comments, "I think they were on their way to a funeral." In another scene, he drives up to the British Consul with a dead hit man in the back seat. He gets out of the car, points at the passenger, and says to the guard standing nearby, "Sergeant, make sure he doesn't get away."The film introduced Swiss actress Ursula Andress to movie audiences in her first role of any significance. Her performance here earned her a Golden Globe as the most promising female newcomer. Most of her 46 film and TV movies have been forgettable.