Year Released: 1963
Directed by; Terrence Young
Starring: Sean Connery, Daniela Bianchi, Robert Shaw, Pedro Armendáriz, Lotte Lenya
(PG, 115 min)
Genre: Thriller, Mystery and Suspense

“Twelve seconds. One day, we must invent a faster-working venom. –Ernst Blofeld

Best of the Best. Sean Connery is the best Bond and From Russian with Love is his best outing. No wonder is was named the 9th best British Film of All Time by Total Film Magazine in 2004, the only Bond film to make the list.

Forget Goldfinger, often touted as the top Bond film. This film has it all. Glamorous locations and exciting set pieces, great acting and performances, or as Ricky D of Tilt says,

From Russia With Love is tightly-plotted, and the shortest of the entire series. It moves at a brisk pace, features memorable villains and Connery is in top form. It’s vividly directed, well written and aptly blends intrigue, romance, and action into a satisfying whole. It doesn’t get any better than this.

This was before the Bond series got too dependent on gimmicks, science fiction fantasies, or the dour psycho dramas that became its swan song.

James Bond willingly falls into an assassination plot involving a naive Russian beauty in order to retrieve a Soviet encryption device that was stolen by S.P.E.C.T.R.E.

Following the success of Dr. No, Connery’s first outing as 007, United artists “greenlit” a sequel and doubled the budget. And it paid off in critical and commercial success, taking in a cool $78 million worldwide. Sean Connery also seems more confident and comfortable in the role his second time out, too.

That might be because he got to chose his Russian love interest, Tatiana Romanova himself. She was the lovely 1960 runner up for Miss Universe, Daniela Bianchi, who actually trained for the ballet as her character mentions in the film.

Apparently the screen test was the scene where Bond finds her in his hotel bed.

Tatiana: You look surprised. I thought you expected me.

Then a bit later,

Bond: You're one of the most beautiful girls...
Tatiana: Thank you, but I think my mouth is too big.
Bond: No, it's the right size. For me, that is.

It is reported that the above scene later became the traditional screen test for prospective Bond actors and Bond Girls.

Bond villain, Red Grant, is played by Robert Shaw, looking nothing like bleary-eyed shark obsessed fisherman Quint in Jaws just 12 years later. He is tall, blond and ripped, a “homicidal paranoiac, superb material” as his trainer reports. Some have ventured to say that he steals each scene he is in.

And Grant has a few comebacks that rival the wit and arrogance of Bond, too, even if not Bond’s acquired sophistication. In fact, he uses that to his advantage as well.

Bond: Red wine with fish. Well, that should have told me something.
Grant: I might not know my wines, but you are the one on your knees.

He and Sean Connery did most of their fight scenes themselves, which took three weeks to film. They was actually violent enough to cause some worry among the crew.

This mano a mano or hand to hand combat is one reason Different Drummer loves the earlier Bond films, sadly missing in so many of the newer vehicles, in particular those with Pierce Brosnan, a good Bond, but scripted to be a machine gun warrior too much of the time.

And the gimmicks are light here, too. Bond has a tear gas rigged attaché case with a detachable knife, a sniper rifle, and 50 gold sovereigns. Grant has a gun and a garroting wire concealed in his watch, plus his homicidal tendencies, but they seem enough.

One character that stands out, so much so that I have never forgotten him even after almost 6 decades, is Pedro Armendáriz, the Mexican actor who plays Bond’s contact in Turkey. He has a contagious charm and humor. For instance, when his shapely mistress beckons him to her bed, his resigned response is, “Back to the salt mines.”

Charming, but he had not such a charming real life. He was filming The Conqueror, a Howard Hughes film in 1956 in the state of Utah while the US government was conducting nuclear testing in Nevada. Ninety-one of the 220 involved in the production died of cancer or its complication within 25 years. (John Wayne was also in that film and died of cancer, along with many other film icons.)

Armendáriz was terminally ill and in great pain during the shooting of From Russian with Love, but he did so “to assure his family financial resources.” Actually he died before the film was released. That he could be in such pain and sadness and still evoke such charm and humor is a testament to his talent and dedication.

***

Much of the film takes place on a train, evoking memories of many great classics, such as Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train, as well as North by Northwest, not to mention Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express ,which in fact, is the very train where Bond, Tatiana, Kerim Bay, and Red Grant have their showdowns, featuring arguably one of the best fight sequences in 60 years of Bond.

As Different Drummer observed way back in Appetite for Murder: A Mystery Lover’s Cookbook

It’s always better when it happens on a train. Whispered words of passion muffled by clacking wheels, narrow lovemaking in the upper berth, a grisly murder behind polished mahogany. Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, and that grand master Alfred Hitchcock all knew that even the mediocre was infused with drama when it rode the rails.

And who can forget that final scene in a Venice Hotel room, when all seems safe and secure and we see the S.P.E.C.T.R.E hag, Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya) enter disguised as a hotel maid. Those cold eyes, that plain face, and the even plainer dull, black shoes…

Worth watching again to remember vintage Bond. Connery – probably the best actor of the bunch, except perhaps for Daniel Craig – cool, commanding, and controlled, a presence that graced our screens and lives for almost 60 years, just as the Bond franchise has.

Now all the Bond films are free on Amazon Prime in celebration of that 60 year anniversary. A must watch and rewatch for all.

–Kathy Borich
🥁 🥁 🥁 🥁 🥁

Trailer

Film-Loving Foodie

One of the most riveting scenes is at the gypsy camp where Bond and his Turkish MI6 Laison, Kerim Bay encounter many surprises. One is completely politically incorrect fight between two gypsy girls in love with the same man. And let’s not forget the very exotic belly dance just before that, where Bond, of course, is a magnet for our beautiful and talented performer.

Bond requests the fight discontinue, and the compromise is that he will choose the winner in his own way. If you wonder what that means, then you are not fully immersed in the Bond magic.

But the final twist takes everyone by surprise – a sudden and lethal attack by a rival band of gypsies.

Not much time to enjoy the hospitality, let alone sit down for a meal. Well, perhaps a fast one, a light and delicious Gypsy Salad as simple as it is authentic.

Afiyet Olsun

Gypsy Salad (Cingen Pilavi)

Although the original name, Cingen Pilavi means Gypsy Pilav when translated word by word, this is a salad. It is only known in a small region in Western Turkey. It is a very simple recipe that mainly consists of tomatoes and peppers with olive oil dressing. The key ingredient here is a kind of curd called “cokelek”. It is a byproduct of the process used in making butter. It is sort of like cottage cheese, except it is very dry and flaky. This salad is part of a typical Turkish breakfast in the summer, but, commonly served with lunch as well. For the lunch version dry onions are added to the recipe. I cannot find this special curd in California, so I substitute feta cheese. You can also substitute cottage cheese. But if you do that, I suggest that you put it in a strainer first, letting the juices drain before adding to the salad. –Yasemin Ari

Ingredients:

2 large tomatoes diced
2 sweet green peppers, thinly sliced
3 tablespoons of olive oil
1 small onion, cut in half and thinly sliced (optional)
½ cup curd (cokelek) or feta cheese, crumbled
1 teaspoon dry oregano (optional)
3-4 black or green olives for decoration
Salt to taste

Directions:

Mix tomatoes, peppers and onions(optional) in a bowl. Transfer to a serving plate. Add crumbled feta cheese to the top. Sprinkle dry oregano(optional). Garnish with olives

Yasemin’s Kitchen. com