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By
NICK ZEGARAC
"Dr. No" is the movie that
introduced Ian Fleming's James Bond. Neither Bond
nor the movies would ever be the same again. Walt
Disney gets the credit for discovering Scottish
hunk Sean Connery. A former bodybuilder, Connery
was Numero Uno after appearing in Disney's "Darby
O'Gill and the Little People." In this, his first
outing as Britain's suave super spy, Connery cuts
such a dramatic swath from the moment he steps
before the camera that even today it remains
impossible to truly separate the man from this
immortal screen character.
To those weaned on contemporary Bond adventures,
the plot of this debut movie is tame by
comparison. Bond goes up against Dr. No (Joseph
Wise), an Oriental mastermind with no hands, who
is set on toppling American missiles launched from
Nassau. The formula of the series so familiar to
Bond-philes is absent from this movie, wholly
lacking in high tech special effects or gadget
driven vignettes that all subsequent Bond films
have actually abused. Ursula Andreas cuts a
handsome figure in her now iconic white bikini as
Honey Ryder -- a collector of seashells who finds
herself the unwilling guest of Dr. No.
Despite the lack of trademark moments, there are
several stellar scene stealers worth mentioning,
including the moment when Connery utters the
immortal "Bond… James Bond" line during a card
game in a crowded casino, a bedtime sequence in
which Bond discovers a tarantula spider crawling
up his torso, and the classic one-liner Bond
utters to Honey as she rises from the surf. "Are
you looking for shells?" she asks. "No," Bond
replies, "I'm just looking!"
Unfortunately, there's not much to look at on
MGM's DVD. Colors are strong at times, but often
quite gaudy and oversaturated. Flesh tones are too
orange. Night scenes have a muddy, softly focused
characteristic. Edge enhancement, fine detail
shimmering, aliasing and chips and scratches in
the original camera negative are all present
throughout the film. Pixelization is, at times, a
distraction. There's a digitally harsh feel to
some scenes. The audio is mono and strident. The
bass is very shallow sounding while the treble is
just too, too grating on the ears. MGM does get
top marks for its extras: two documentaries that
fully cover the Bond phenomenon and some nice
added touches, including a theatrical trailer and
audio commentary. One wishes that more had been
done to clean up the actual print of the film. |
