Young turns in what many argue is the best film of the series, and it is tough to dispute them. SPECTRE plots the simultaneous assassination of 007 and the theft of a Russian decoding machine. The film boasts a masterful script by Richard Maibaum (who was involved in most of the Bond screenplays until his death in 1990). The advent of detente was foreseen early by the Bond team, and it is noteworthy that while nearly all of Bond's literary adversaries - even Goldfinger - were being backed by the Soviets, the driving force behind most of the early villains in the screenplays by Maibaum & Co. was SPECTRE, an independent group (although the Red Chinese were backing Goldfinger on screen, and were SPECTRE's paymasters in You Only Live Twice).

The tradition of the pre-credit sequence began in this film with a suspenseful dress-rehearsal of Bond s murder as a Bond impersonator is stalked through a moonlit garden and strangled by the SPECTRE assassin Grant, portrayed by Robert Shaw. The pre-credit sequences are often good enough to be stand-alone short films, and became progressively more imaginative in each succeeding film, but the tightest and best made are in my opinion this one and Goldfinger s. This also is an innovation that has been adopted for many TV and cinema films.

Sean Connery hits his stride as James Bond in his second outing, smooth, resourceful, witty, sardonic-and deadly. Many maintain that Goldfinger was Connery s best outing, but I must respectfully disagree. The other characters are well-developed. From Russia, With Love rewards the viewer with arguably the best ensemble acting of any fim in the entire series. The handling of the Grant character, especially giving him no dialogue until late in the film, heightens the sense of menace. Robert Shaw turns in a brilliant, chilling performance, proving that sometimes when it comes to acting, less is more. Lotte Lenya, in an unusual piece of casting (she was by all accounts a sweet, refined lady), perfectly projects one of Fleming s nastier characters, the toadlike Rosa Klebb. Vladek Sheybal is well suited to the chess-playing planner Kronsteen. Note especially the arrogance he projects in his early scenes. At the chess match, Kronsteen makes a move and then closes his cigarette case and draws it closer to him. He s ready to leave the table, knowing damn well Macadams can do nothing but surrender-and he does.

Mexican character actor Pedro Armendariz as Kerim Bey (in his final film) is a worthy Bond ally, although his character is not fleshed out quite as much as Fleming fans might like-Fleming s descriptions of Kerim s lust for life and his storytelling would, unfortunately, have damaged the pace of the film. Sadly, Armendariz was dying of cancer, and had taken the part to be able to leave some money for his family. His health was failing so rapidly that his scenes were shot first, and Terence Young himself doubled for Armendariz in long shots and scenes that called for Kerim not to face the camera (it is Young, not Armendariz, who fires from behind an up-ended table during the gypsy camp battle). After the picture wrapped, Armendariz managed to smuggle a gun into his hospital room at UCLA Medical Center and killed himself. He left a legacy to the series, however-his son, Pedro Jr., plays Isthmus President Hector Lopez in Licence To Kill, the only instance where a cast member s child makes a credited appearance in a later film in the Bond series (although Eunice Gayson s daughter was an extra in the GoldenEye casino scene).

Ernst Stavro Blofeld appears for the first time; we see only his hands and his white cat. Although uncredited, the hands belong to Anthony Dawson (Prof. Dent in Dr. No), and the eerie voice belongs to character actor Eric Pohlman.

Walter Gotell makes his first appearance in the series as the SPECTRE supervisor Morzeny, giving us our first look at the famous poison-tipped shoe before coming to a fiery end in the boat chase (Bond's escape method - setting fire to the fuel slick with a flare gun - was "borrowed" by Maibaum from his own screenplay for 1953's The Red Beret, directed by Young and produced by Broccoli). Gotell, of course, returned to the series fifteen years later, portraying KGB General Alexis Gogol in The Spy Who Loved Me through The Living Daylights.

Let s not forget the contribution of fledgling actress Daniela Bianchi as the beautiful lure , Tatiana Romanova. Although dubbed, she does a very creditable job, projecting the naiveté and the sensuality of the defecting cipher girl.

Look for:

• The man in the white sweater leaning on a cane as the Orient Express thunders by-I can t prove it, but for years I've thought it s author Ian Fleming, making an Alfred Hitchcock-style cameo during a visit to the set. Is it or isn't it? Fire up the VCR and decide for yourself! No less an authority than Raymond Benson has told me he believes this is not so, but the man is dressed remarkably like Fleming was in a visit to the set of From Russia, With Love (pictured at left, leaning on a shooting-stick). Fleming had once hoped to enlist Hitchcock to direct Dr. No, but the director turned EON down flat. Nonetheless, the scene where the SPECTRE helicopter chases 007 on foot is an interesting homage to Hitchcock s North By Northwest-whether or not it s intentional.

• The savage, claustrophobic hand-to-hand battle between Connery and Shaw in a compartment on board the Orient Express-it s one of the best staged, shot, and edited fights in cinema history! Unfortunately, until recently it has been butchered by editors in television showings.

• The billboard Krilencu tries to escape through. It s for Call Me Bwana, the only non-Bond film Broccoli & Saltzman produced together. The sharp-eyed viewer will detect their names at the top left of the sign. Interestingly, Bob Hope s co-star Anita Ekberg, pictured on the billboard, was at the time married to Rik Van Nutter, who would play Felix Leiter in Thunderball.

Although none of them seems to get the respect they deserve today except from die-hard Fleming aficionados, Dr. No, From Russia, With Love and On Her Majesty s Secret Service stand as the most faithful renditions of Fleming s work in the entire series, and even today From Russia, With Love-in both its literary and cinematic incarnations-can be justifiably regarded as one of the classic spy adventures of all time.

Works consulted in the preparation of this article:

• Fleming, Ian. Doctor No. Jonathan Cape Publishers, 1958.
  
• Fleming, Ian. From Russia, With Love. Jonathan Cape Publishers, 1957.
  
• Pfeiffer, Lee and Lisa, Philip. The Incredible World of 007-An Authorized Celebration of James Bond. Citadel Press, 1992.
  
• Benson, Raymond. The James Bond Bedside Companion. Dodd, Mead, & Co. 1988.
  
• Rubin, Steven Jay. The James Bond Films. Arlington House, 1981.
  
• Rubin, Steven Jay. The James Bond Movie Encyclopedia. Contemporary Books, 1990.
• Schenkman, Richard. The Terence Young Interview. Published in Bondage Magazine, 1981, by the James Bond 007 Fan Club (USA).

James Bond returned in