Brief Synopsis: - James Bond is sent to Jamaica to investigate a possible source of interference with American space launches. On the island of Crab Key, Bond and adventuress Honey Ryder find the answer to the mystery and come face to face with the diabolical Dr. No.
Release Date: Rating:
Plot: - The toppling (throwing a missile of course with a radio beam) of U.S. space launches.
Box Office Results:
Awards/Nominations:
- 1964: Laurel Awards-Top Action Drama (2nd place)
Running Time: Gadgets:
Issued Sidearm: - Walther PPK
- *In the scene where Bond kills Prof. Dent, he uses an FN Model 1910 - the prop department was unable to find a suppressor for the PPK prop.
Director:
Screenplay:
- Richard Maibaum
- Johanna Harwood
- Berkley Mather
Starring: Henchmen: - Anthony Dawson as Professor Dent
- Zena Marshall as Miss Taro
- Various Actors as The Three Blind Mice
- Reggie Carter as Mr. Jones
- Marguerite LeWars as Freelance
Bond Girls: Supporting Cast:Filming Locations: - London, UK
- Kingston, Jamaica
- Crab Key
Best Quotes: - Bond: "Bond...James Bond"
- M: "When do you sleep, 007?"
Bond: "Never on the Firm's time, sir." - Armour: "Walther PPK, with a delivery like a brick through a plate glass window."
Mistakes: - In one scene, Bond prepares to hit one of Dr. No's anonymous henchmen with his right hand. After a change in camera angle, Bond finishes off the baddie with his left. Bond is fast, but not that fast.
- (Minor) The launch scene used one of the earliest Titan I ICBM test shots, not a NASA vehicle.
Distinguishing Features:
- Bond's first film with his iconic PPK. HIs trusty Barretta is replaced by the armorer because it's more suitable for a "woman's handbag". Bond disagrees and tries to sneak the Barretta away from M's office, but M's no fool, and Bond is forced to work with the PPK.
- The first Bond film, which begins four decades of subsequent encounters with our favorite Double-O agent.
- M, Moneypenny, and Felix Leiter make their debut. These characters reoccur more often than any others throughout the Bond films.
- The initial use of the ubiquitous James Bond theme by Monte Norman.
- The only official Bond film so far to open immediately with the title sequence. Every other Bond film has the gun barrel, then an action teaser/prelude before the titles. But after the gunbarrel, the Dr. No titles appear straight away.
Around The World With 007 - Dr No was shot entirely on location in Jamaica, with interior scenes filmed at Pinewood Studios near London. Chris Blackwell was employed at the age of fifteen to assist the location manager in finding suitable shooting sites for the production. Blackwell today is the owner of Ian Fleming's Jamaican home, Goldeneye.
Bond Statistics:
- Women in Bed: 3
- Martinis: 2
- Kills: 5
- "Bond, James Bond": 1
Title References: - The film's mastermind, Dr. No, shares his name with the title of the movie.
Detailed synopsis:
The section chief for Station J (Jamaica),
Strangways, is murdered by the
Three Blind Mice after playing cards at the the Queen's Club in Kingston. Soon after, his secretary,
Mary Prescott, is also killed, and when the pre-arranged check-in time goes overdue, MI6 is alerted, and Agent 007, James Bond, is called in to investigate, interrupting an evening of Chemin DeFer at the gaming tables, where he met one
Sylvia Trench.
007 is briefed by
M about the Jamaican situation, linking it with some suspicion of "toppling" American missile launches from Cape Canaveral, Florida, informing him that the CIA already has a man,
Leiter, investigating. 007 is then issued a
Walther PPK pistol and holster by the Armourer at M's insistance. Though Bond tries to smuggle his favorite
Beretta as he leaves, M spots the ruse, and Bond, chastised, leaves the firearm on his boss' desk.
 |  | Bond's intoduction |
Bond returns to his room and prepares to go to Kingston when he walks in on Trench playing golf. After the customary Bond treatment, Bond heads to Jamaica. He arrives at the airport and is approached by a chauffeur named
Mr. Jones who appears to be there to take him to Government House. Bond phones Government house and they tell him that they didn’t send a chauffeur to pick him up. While trying to lose a tail, the chauffeur pulls off down a side road and Bond confronts him. As Bond is asking Jones who his employer is, Jones swallows a
cyanide-laced cigarette and dies.
Bond arrives at Government House and is told by the head, Pleydell-Smith, that the last people to see Strangways were himself, an ex-general, Potter, and a metallurgist,
Professor Dent. Bond asks to meet the other men socially and the Pleydell-Smith arranges for him to join them at the Queen’s Club that night. Bond goes to Strangways house and finds a receipt from Dent’s lab and a picture of Strangways with a local fisherman. Bond returns to his room and secures his attaché case with talcum powder, the doors with a strand of hair, and then heads out to Queen’s club. When Bond meets with Pleydell-Smith, Dent, and Potter, he finds out that Strangways latest hobby was fishing, and that he frequently hired a native Jamaican named
Quarrel. Bond heads to the docks and questions Quarrel but he offers no help. Bond follows Quarrel to a beach-front bar, where he’s ambushed by Quarrel and the bar tender, Puss-Fellar. As Bond turns the tables on Quarrel and Puss-Fellar, Felix Leiter arrives and explains that the two men are working with him.
As Leiter and Quarrel debrief Bond about Strangways work, a photographer,
Freelance, who took Bond’s picture at the airport tries to take his picture at the bar. Quarrel grabs her and Bond asks her who’s employing her. She won’t tell, so Bond takes the film and lets her go. After talking for a bit, they decide to go to Crab Key because this is where Strangways got the rock samples that he gave to Dent for analysis. Quarrel tells of how some friends of his went fishing off of Crab Key and were never seen again. Leiter tells bond that Crab Key is a mystery, except that it contains a Bauxite mine and is owned by a man named
Dr. Julius No.
The following morning, Bond goes to see Dent to inquire about the samples he analyzed for Strangways. Dent tells bond that the samples were worthless and that they couldn’t have come from Crab Key because it was geologically impossible. Once Bond leaves, Dent boards a fishing boat and heads to Crab Key. When Dent arrives, he’s escorted to a large room with a skylight and a solitary chair. He is chastised by Dr. No via loudspeaker for visiting the key during the daytime and for not having Bond killed. He’s instructed to kill bond with a large spider that’s sitting on a table in the corner. Dent leaves the island.
Bond returns to his room to find that his attaché case and closet door were tampered with. He pours himself a drink and then heads to bed. While sleeping, the spider appears under his covers and makes its way to Bond’s head. Once the spider moves onto his pillow, Bond flicks the spider off and kills it with his shoe.
The following morning, Bond visits Fleydell-Smith and asks about Dr. No. According to his secretary,
Miss Taro, the files on Dr. No and on Crab Key were last checked out by Strangways and they’re missing. Fleydell-Smith apologizes and gives Bond a package that came from London. As Bond is leaving, he catches Miss Taro listening at the keyhole and invites her to dinner that evening.
Bond meets up with Quarrel at the docks and opens his package, which turns out to be a Geiger counter. He tests the spot in the boat where Strangways laid his rock samples and figures out that they were radioactive contra to what Dent told bond. When Bond asks Quarrel to take him to Crab Key, Quarrel tells him he’s afraid because there’s
a dragon there, but reluctantly agrees.
Bond returns to his hotel and phones Miss Taro. She asks him to pick her up at her apartment at the top of the mountain. As Bond is driving to her apartment, he’s chased by another car. Bond loses the other car with some fancy driving and arrives at Taro’s apartment. Taro is surprised that Bond has made it to her apartment, but they bed down as Taro tries to keep bond occupied for a few hours. Bond tells Taro that they should go out to eat and phones a taxi. When the “taxi” arrives, it’s actually the police and they take Taro away. She spits in Bond’s face as the car is pulling away. Bond returns to Taro’s house and makes the bed up to appear like he’s sleeping in it. In the middle of the night, Dent shows up and shoots at the bed. Bond is waiting for Dent and kills him.
 | Bond meets Honey |
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Bond heads down to the dock and meets up with Quarrel and Leiter. They leave for Crab Key. When they get close to the island, Bond and Quarrel leave Leiter with the power boat and take a canoe the rest of the way to the island. Once on the island, Quarrel covers the canoe and they get some sleep. Bond awakes to a beautiful woman collecting shells. He finds out that her name is
Honey Rider and that Dr. No probably spotted her coming up to the island. As they’re walking on the beach, a powerboat arrives and shoots at them. The men in the boat announce that they’ll return with dogs. Honey leads Bond to a small pool where they use reeds to hide under the water to and wait for the dogs to pass.
Honey leads Bond and Quarrel to a hiding place. As Quarrel takes the first watch, Honey tells Bond that she thinks Dr. No killed her father who was a marine biologist. Quarrel spots the “dragon” which turns out to be a tank, armed with a flamethrower and painted to look like a dragon. As Bond and Quarrel are shooting at the tank, the flamethrower opens up on Quarrel and he’s burnt to death. Bond and Honey surrender to the men driving the tank and are taken to Dr. No lair. When they arrive at
his lair, they’re forced to shower in order to wash the radiation off them. Bond and Honey emerge from the decontamination chamber to a modern room and are greeted by Sister Rose and Sister Lily. Lily and Rose show Bond and Honey to their room. Bond and Honey drink the coffee, which turns out to be laced with a sedative.
When Bond and Honey awake, they dress with the clothes provided by Dr. No and prepare to meet him for dinner. At dinner, Dr. No tells Bond that he was an unwanted child and worked for the Tongs, one of the Chinese mafias, from which he stole 10 million dollars to buy Crab Key and build his lair. The guards take Honey away and Dr. No reveals that he works for
SPECTRE. After dinner, the guards beat up Bond and take him to a cell. Bond escapes the cell through a ventilation shaft and makes his way to the control room for the facility's nuclear reactor. Bond steals a hazard suit and impersonates one of Dr. No's technicians. Bond alters one of the reactors which causes it to begin to lose containment as a rocket is fired from Cape Canaveral. Bond and Dr. No fight over the boiling reactor cooling tank and Dr. No slides into the tank to his death.
Bond locates Honey who’s chained down in a room that’s flooding. Bond and Honey steal a boat and escape the island before it explodes. The boat runs out of fuel before they make it back to Jamaica which provides the perfect opportunity for… you guessed it… Bond to get the girl before Felix shows up to tow them back to land.
James Bond will Return in: