Dr. No

The James Bond Project #2: From Russia With Love (1963)

~ Randy Blazak ~ 27 Comments

December 28, 2024

This series is intended to evaluate each product of the James Bond film franchise through a feminist lens, and the relevance of the Bond archetype to shifting ideas of masculinity in the 2020s.

From Russia With Love (1963, directed by Terence Young)

With the unexpected success of Dr. No, United Artists doubled the budget for the sequel and the bet paid off. (The $2 million film took in more than $78 million worldwide.) We are now firmly in a franchise of films made by men for men and their dates, starring manly man Sean Connery. Although it should be noted that Johanna Harwood, who had worked on the script for Dr. No, played a large role in the screenplay for From Russia With Love. Producers cast Italian beauty queen Daniela Bianchi as Bond Girl #2 Tatiana Romanova, after actress Elga Gimba Andersson refused to sleep with a United Artists executive. Bianchi, who could barely speak English, had her lines dubbed by a British actress.

The film starts the Bond tradition of the opening credits being projected on to the bodies of scantily clad or nude women, firmly establishing that these are stories for boys. Instead of Jamaica, most of the action takes place in Turkey, although there are obligatory scenes in London and wherever SPECTRE Island is. There we meet the Dr. Evil of the Bond cinematic universe, Blofeld (or at least his cute cat). Leaving the Caribbean means we leave any and all black actors, and the primary Turkish character, Ali Kerim Bey, is played by Mexican actor Pedro Armendáriz. (In a bizarre side note, Armendáriz contracted neck cancer after filming a Howard Hughes film near a nuclear test site in Utah, and before he finished shooting his parts for From Russia With Love, shot himself with a gun that he snuck into his hospital room.)

From Russia With Love was filmed as the Cold War intensified and SPECTRE agents replaced Russian agents (who were the villains in Ian Fleming’s original Bond novel) to not further inflame tensions. President Kennedy told Life Magazine that From Russia With Love was one of his favorite novels. The film version premiered on October 10, 1963, the same day U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy (crazy guy’s dad) approved J. Edgar Hoover’s wiretapping of Martin Luther King, Jr.. The film was screened at the White House for JFK before he left for Dallas, where he was assassinated. From Russia With Love received mixed reviews, some saying it was slower than Dr. No, but has gone on to be held up as one of the best of the Bond series.

Here’s how FRWL charts with our five evaluations.

Driver of Action – Director Terrence Young had established a formula and he’s not going to break it on the sophomore outing. This is Bond in all his glory, now supplied with cool gadgets by MI-6’s Agent Q (played by Desmond Llewelyn, who remained as Q to 1999’s The World is Not Enough). There is a great “buddy” feature between Bond and Bey (similar to Dr. No’s Quarrel role) and a fun subplot about SPECTRE operatives Rosa Klebb and Kronsteen, groveling before Blofeld as they attempt to kill Bond for offing Dr. No. (The “R” in SPECTRE is for “revenge”- Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion. FYI.) But the story doesn’t happen without their dastardly plot to kill Bond and the delight of our man James foiling their fiendishness.

Role of Violence – There is considerably less violence in Dr. No’s sequel. There are some cool explosions after a helicopter attack and a boat chase, but 007 only kills one person, SPECTRE assassin Donald Grant (played by Robert Shaw, who will always be Captain Quint in Jaws to me). Grant’s death is the result of a beautifully choreographed fight scene in a train car on the Orient Express. (Fight scenes in train cars become something of a trope in the Bond franchise.) The most shocking violence in the film is Bond’s full-handed smack across Russian agent Tatiana’s face, after which she repeatedly tells him that she loves him. I bet that clip has showed up in a few “Sexism in Film” classes.

Vulnerability – Again, there’s no chink in James Bond’s armor. No glimpse inside. Even when Bond is literally on his knees prostrate before assassin Grant, we know he has a plan to quickly turn the tables.

Sexual Potency – The first shot of Bond in the film is him making out with Sylvia Trench (from Dr. No) in a floating punt, probably on the banks of the River Cam in Cambridge. He’s playing hooky from MI-6 to work his way around the bases with Trench. (Is there a cricket version of “third base”?). When Bond first meets Tatiana, she is naked in his Istanbul hotel bed. Later she asks him, “James, will you make love to me in London?” He answers, “Day and night.” There’s another strange segment where Bond must decide which of two young, attractive “gypsy” women will be awarded the man they both want. They arrive at his room to seductive music. “This might take some time,” he says. We see the women the next morning with broad smiles as James leaves. All these women are happy for a piece of 007’s sexual mojo, even when he slaps them.

Connection – The scenes with Pedro Armendáriz as Ali Kerim Bey sparkle. They have immense chemistry, enhanced by the knowledge of the great pain he was in from his cancer. Had he lived, one could see Armendáriz as Bond’s Morocco Mole sidekick in future Bond films. But both Armendáriz and his character are dead by the end of the film. His relationship with Tatiana is less mutual, even though they have to pretend to be a married couple while on the train, and she dreams of marrying him when they reach London. She even saves him from the venomous boots of Rosa Klebb in a hotel room in Venice and his heart is unmoved. Like the closing scene in Dr. No, we end with Bond and Bond Girl #2 romantically floating together in a boat, this time a gondola, with end credits urging viewers to get ready for Bond #3, Goldfinger, which will most certainly present us with Bond Girl #3.

Toxic Masculinity Scale: 7/10

Summary – From Russia With Love really front loads the male gaze on women’s bodies thing. From the opening credits, to the (very) long shot of Ali Kerim Bey’s girlfriend’s cleavage, to a very oily masseuse on SPECTRE Island, to the camera endlessly hovering on a belly dancer’s torso, there’s plenty to ogle. Then there’s the weirdly placed “duel” between two scantily glad “gypsy girls” that has zip to do with the plot. If there’s any sense of balance, we do get Bond wrapped in a towel, which probably had some men wondering what they needed to do to grow crops of hair on their chests.

There’s also an odd lesbian subtext with Rosa Klebb. Props to having a female antagonist in the second Bond film. In 1963, there was a narrative that Russian (i.e. “communist”) women were more manly, so that tracks. But to make the point that women on the other side of the Iron Curtain are not bound by the same gender rules, they add a suggestion of sexual predation when Klebb is informing Tatiana of her mission to seduce Bond. And Romanova doesn’t seem to shirk as Klebb evaluates her body and places her hand on her leg. Russians, they not like us. (Or are they?)

From Russia With Love is rough film to place. It’s the most realistic of all the Bond films from the classic era. There’s a nice complexity to the plot but we know even less about the person of James Bond. It’s almost like Sean Connery is playing James Bond pretending to be a caricature of James Bond. A lot of people think this is one of the greatest British films ever made, but it felt flat to me. And the slapping scene seemed very un-Bond, even if it served as a reminder of how normalized violence against women is in film. Where is Wonder Woman when you need her?

Next: Goldfinger (1964)

The James Bond Project: #1: Dr. No

The James Bond Project: #1 – Dr. No (1962)

~ Randy Blazak ~ 27 Comments

December 27, 2024

As a latchkey kid who grew up on the 4 O’Clock movie (with a father often away on sales trips), most of my young models of masculinity came through the family color TV. Those films offered me the standard trinity of white manhood: John Wayne, Elvis Presley, and James Bond. All three were good with their fists and spared few words for the ladies. John Wayne was the iconic “strong silent” man who solved problems with a gun. In the 2000s, I taught a summer class at Portland State University called, “Hollywood Elvis and Post-War Masculinity” that used Presley films to explore changes in parameters of male roles. But it was Bond that I most wrestled with as a feminist man. Was he a patriarchal archetype or a subversion of it?

After the 1996 film Swingers brought back lounge culture, I found myself fantasizing about the Sinatra swagger and the Bond confidence. I’d sit at the roulette wheel in casinos in Old Las Vegas, on Fremont Street, dressed in a vintage suit, surrounded by frat boys in khaki shorts and backwards baseball hats. Was I an agent of the backlash or mocking gender, the same way drag queens deconstruct femininity? And now, what is the relevance of Bond’s manly schtick in MAGA America, where sex offenders are running the show?

So I decided I need a winter binge to address the question. The James Bond Project is intended review every Bond film, from 1962 to the present, to glean insight into the gendered appeal of 007, genital warts and all. And here’s the matrix for our evaluation:

  1. Driver of Action – Team player or rugged individual?
  2. Role of Violence – Body count
  3. Vulnerability – Behind the mask
  4. Sexual Potency – Lady “killer”
  5. Connection – Autonomous into the sunset

Toxic Masculinity Scale  (1 to 10)

Dr. No (1962, directed by Terence Young)

The first Bond film is based on the sixth novel in Ian Fleming’s famous series on the British spy and is set against the backdrop of Kennedy’s Space Race. Producers cast Sean Connery, 31, after Carey Grant said he wasn’t interested in playing Bond more than once. Dr. No, released October 5, 1962 (less that two weeks before the Cuban Missile Crisis), introduces all the series staples; “Bond, James Bond,” “Shaken, not stirred,” a license to kill, SPECTRE and the underground lair, creative ways to kill the heroes, and Bond hitting on Miss Moneypenny.

My first thought watching it was that it was nice to see so many black people in a movie from 1962. I’m used to any film made before 1968 being made by, for, and about white people. Dr. No is set in Jamaica, so the cast diversity makes sense. The Caribbean was a common Bond locale (and where I saw my first big screen inter-racial kiss – more on that later). Jamaica was granted its independence in 1962, but in the film it still feels like a British colony. No reggae yet, just limp calypso and CIA officers hanging around airports. But it gave the world its introduction to 007 James Bond, the suave spy with a license to kill.

Driver of Action – There is no doubt that Bond is his own man. His boss, M, tries to replace his Beretta handgun with a new model, which James (unsuccessfully) tries to sneak out of the office. Other than that and a scene where Bond and Honey Ryder (played by Bond “Girl” #1 Ursula Andress) pass out after drinking Dr. No’s drugged coffee, there is never a moment where Sean Connery’s Bond isn’t in complete control. There are car chases, jungle chases, and scenes where Bond outsmarts would-be assassins (including smashing a tarantula to an epic musical score). Even though, for part of the film, he has a black sidekick named Quarrel and female accomplice (Honey Ryder), Bond drives the story and camera lens.

Role of Violence – 007 takes out a handful of baddies, including a corrupt geology professor and some blokes who go over a cliff in a fiery crash. “I think they were on their way to a funeral,” he quips. Compared to the massive body count of your average John Wick movie, there is surprisingly little violence in Dr. No. I found myself wishing 007 had watched a few of my favorite Kung Fu self defense reels on Instagram to better defend himself from henchmen and CIA operatives. Dr. No doesn’t even try to kill Bond, although he does strap Honey Ryder down to be drowned by a rising tide. Spoiler alert: Bond kills Dr. No in a radioactive pool.

Vulnerability – There is no moment when James shows any weakness or gives us any backstory. Was there (ever) a Mrs. Bond? Does he have a panic attack if his martini is stirred? Does he ever suffer from erectile dysfunction when bedding double agents? This may be the feature that resonates with men so much. Bond is a cartoon character of a man with no internal monologue, just commanding action.

Sexual Potency – This isn’t a Doris Day movie. Bond gets plenty of play. At the start of the film he beds a woman he meets playing baccarat in a casino. Her name is Sylvia Trench, and we’re off to the races for how women are named in Bond films. Then he spends a night between the sheets with MI-6 secretary Miss Taro, who is (of course known to James) working for the bad guys. Surprising to no-one, he ends the film in the arms of blonde bombshell Ursula Andress, bobbing in a dingy in the Caribbean. In the scene with Miss Taro, unprompted, he grabs her and kisses her, reminding me of Trump’s comments in the Access Hollywood tape. “You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful… I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star they let you do it. You can do anything.”

Connection – Bond has passing connections with Quarrel (played by John Kitzmiller) and American CIA agent Felix Leiter (played by Hawaii Five-O’s Jack Lord), but they’re just vehicles for Bond to complete his mission. Bond even seems briefly sad when Quarrel is burned alive by the bad guys. But James Bond is the model of the autonomous male. He is a self-contained unit who doesn’t “need” anyone. Sex is transactional, not romantic. Even the end scene with Honey Ryder is not a “and they lived happily ever after” moment. You get the feeling that Ryder, in her iconic white bikini, will be dropped off at the next beach as 007 jets off on his next mission.

Toxic Masculinity Scale: 5/10

Summary – Watching a young Sean Connery chew up every frame he’s in is infinitely entertaining. Yeah, Ursula Andres on the beach (knife in hand) is a classic male gaze moment where even Bond says, “I’m just looking,” but the gaze is all on 007. There’s even a scene where a female concierge in a Kingston hotel stares at Bond’s ass. James Bond is the spectacle. All eyes are on him. It’s man’s world. Dr. No is 55 years before Patty Jenkins ground-breaking Wonder Woman movie. Action is man’s work, with bikini-clad damsels in distress.

Fortunately, there is no homophobia or overt misogyny in Dr. No. Women are beautiful and disposable but also strong, with agency. No bimbos in Bondland and toxicity is toned down in the Kennedy era. The film establishes the archetype of the autonomous “love ‘em, and leave ‘em” hero franchise to be mimicked by countless others, from Matt Helm to Austin Powers. At his core, Bond is always cool and always in control. Men want to be him and women want to be with him. But we all want to know, its that all there is?

Next: From Russia with Love (1963)