Rating: **
Director: Terence Young
Production Design: Ken Adam
Cast: Sean Connery, Joseph Wiseman, Ursula Andress, Jack Lord,
Bernard Lee, Lois Maxwell
"Unfortunately, I misjudged you. You are just a stupid policeman."
James Bond's first outing is a bit cheesy and lackluster, but still fun nonetheless. British Secret Service Agent 007 is sent to Jamaica to stop the evil Dr. No (Joseph Wiseman) from achieving world domination. Sexy Ursula Andress makes her mark on the world and cinematic history when she rises out of the sea to meet Sean Connery on the beach. Sean Connery looks stiff and uncomfortable in the role that would dominate his life for years to come, and his delivery is best described as "cautious." Countering that is Joseph Wiseman's sinister and supremely creepy portrayal of Dr. No, which is extremely unsettling. It's weird enough that he's made up to look Chinese, but he never moves his head or his eyes, and his eyes are always fixated on something behind the viewer, giving the impression that he's blind. On top of that, his speech patterns are monotonic and he comes across as an evil robot. Of course, the metal hands don't help.
As the first film in the series, most studios avoided it due to the exploitive source material, and it was obviously made on a lean budget. As a result, it's light on action and the visual effects are pretty janky. However, where it really shines is with Ken Adam's production design. His sets look absolutely amazing, and stylistically defined the visual language of the series throughout the 60s and 70s. Similarly, the bad dialog and tongue-in-cheek innuendo set the humorous tone of the series, which lightens the grim and violent nature of Bond's life and work.
Interestingly, in Ian Fleming's novel, Dr. No dies by being suffocated in bat guano. This is definitely a case where the film adaptation improves on the original.