From Russia with Love (1963)

From Russia with Love is a British thriller film first released in 1963, directed by Terence Young.  The film stars Sean Connery, Daniela Bianchi, Pedro Armendáriz, Lotte Lenya and Robert Shaw.  Our overall rating for this film is: excellent.


Working for the international crime syndicate SPECTRE, chess grandmaster Kronsteen has devised a foolproof plan to steal the Lektor decoding machine from the Russians.  Not only will the theft worsen Anglo-Soviet relations, it will also allow SPECTRE to eliminate James Bond, the troublesome British agent who dispatched one of the organisation’s key operatives, Dr No.  Tatiana Romanova, a clerk at the Soviet embassy in Istanbul, is recruited by Rosa Klebb, a former Soviet security agent who is now in the employ of SPECTRE.  Believing she is working for Mother Russia, Tatiana is tasked with stealing the decoding machine, the bait that will lure agent 007 into a deadly trap and humiliate the British secret service.  As Bond and Tatiana get to work, they are closely watched by Red Grant, a SPECTRE agent whose mission is to assassinate Bond and seize the Lektor.  One thing that Kronsteen has not allowed for is Bond’s resourcefulness, and his appeal to the opposite sex...

The second of the James Bond films is easily the best.  Spared the tight budgetary constraints that impaired the first Bond film, Dr No (1962), From Russia with Love exhibits the stylish design and lavish production values which audiences loved and which would become de rigueur for every subsequent film in the series.  This is where the Bond movie formula solidified, although regrettably it would prove to be an artistic straitjacket that would prevent the Bond films from progressing much beyond what we see here. 

Dr No had already established many of the conventions for the series.  From Russia with Love completes the job by introducing the pre-titles sequence, Bond’s reliance on clever gadgets and an arresting (and slightly silly) theme song.  The film also marks the first appearance of Bond’s arch-nemesis, the cat-loving Ernst Stavro Blofeld (referred to as Number One in this film), here played by Anthony Dawson and voiced by Eric Pohlmann.   Oh, and Desmond Llewelyn plays Q, the gadget man, for the first time.

Sean Connery is at his best in his second outing as agent 007, a tad more charming and slightly less sadistic than he was in his first Bond film, but still rougher and moodier than any of his successors in the role to date.  Connery cited this has his favourite of the Bond films he starred in, not surprising given the calibre of the cast and technical crew he was working with.  After this film, the actor would soon become complacent as he grew increasingly tired of the role and the attention it brought him.

The honour of playing the second Bond girl (after Ursula Andress) went to Daniela Bianchi, an Italian actress who had won the Miss Rome beauty contest and was runner-up for Miss World in 1960.  Owing to her imperfect command of English, she was dubbed by another actress, Barbara Jefford.  Bianchi may be pleasing on the eye but audiences were far more likely to remember Lotte Lenya in the role of the villainous SPECTRE agent Rosa Klebb.  A renowned Austrian singer, Lenya first found fame in the original 1928 production of The Threepenny Opera, for which the music had been composed by her husband, the celebrated German composer Kurt Weill.  The sequence in which Klebb attacks Bond with a deadly switchblade shoe is one of the most iconic in the series.

No Bond film would be complete without a Bond villain and From Russia with Love gives us one of the best, in the guise of Red Grant, played to perfection by Robert Shaw.  This is the part that effectively launched Shaw’s career in Hollywood; he would win acclaim for his performances in films such as A Man for All Seasons (1966), Young Winston (1972) and The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974).  Shaw is rarely as compelling as he is here, a chilling physical presence that makes a worthy adversary for Connery’s seemingly indestructible Bond.

On a sadder note, the instantly likeable Mexican actor Pedro Armendáriz (who plays Bond’s helpmate Ali Kerim Bey) was diagnosed with terminal cancer whilst filming in Turkey.  Armendáriz struggled to keep working but in the end the pain of his illness overwhelmed him and he returned home to take his life before his work was completed.  His remaining scenes were filmed using a stand-in.  From his performance in this film, no spectator would suspect for a moment that Armendáriz was not in perfect health.

The first of the Bond theme songs was composed by Lionel Bart, who had recently scored a notable West End hit with the musical Oliver!  The popular singer Matt Munro provided the vocals to which is assuredly one of the least memorable theme songs in the series.  (Can anyone remember anything after the first line?)  John Barry turns in another of his great Bond scores, including frequent snatches of the Monty Norman Bond theme which was first heard in Dr No.

From Russia with Love is the most visually alluring and sophisticated of the Bond films.  Not only is it beautifully shot, with some stunning location photography in Istanbul, it is also intelligently scripted and directed with immense flair by Terence Young.   The action sequences (which include an obvious homage to Hitchcock’s North By Northwest, as well a memorable tussle on the Orient Express, alas without Hercule Poirot) are exceptionally well realised - far more realistic, less contrived and hence more convincing that in later films.  The tongue-in-cheek humour (which Connery is particularly adept at delivering) effectively offsets the tension without undermining the realism of the drama.  From Russia with Love is what every Bond film aspires to be, but sadly rarely is.  Here, the formula was fresh and exciting; it would soon become stale and predictable, with subsequent films far too dependent on the three Gs – girls, gadgets and gimmickry.

On its first release, From Russia with Love won widespread critical acclaim and was a major box office hit.  Made on a budget of two million dollars, the film grossed 78 million dollars worldwide, a remarkable achievement for a British film at this time.  Work on the third Bond film, Goldfinger, was well underway when this film was released, and it must have looked to the films producers, Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli, that they had suddenly acquired the Midas touch.  They had.

© filmsdefrance.com 2009

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