From Russia with Love (1963)

Plot

The criminal organisation SPECTRE wants revenge for the death of Dr. No and, in the same stroke, the Soviet cipher machine Lektor. Chess grandmaster Kronsteen devises the plan, and renegade KGB officer Rosa Klebb carries it out: young cipher clerk Tatiana Romanova is to make James Bond believe she has fallen in love with his photograph and wishes to defect to the West with the machine. Ice-cold assassin Red Grant is then to kill the agent and disgrace him with a compromising film.

Bond flies to Istanbul, where the ebullient station chief Kerim Bey takes him under his wing. Together they spy on the Soviet consulate through a periscope in the underground cistern, survive a raid on a gypsy camp and dispose of the Bulgarian killer Krilencu. Tatiana turns up in Bond's hotel bed, hands over the consulate plans inside Hagia Sophia, and Bond steals the Lektor under cover of a tear-gas attack. With Kerim and Tatiana he escapes westwards aboard the Orient Express.

On the journey Kerim Bey is killed, and Grant presents himself as the British contact. Only in the sleeping compartment does he reveal his true face; in one of the most brutal fights of the series Bond kills him with the help of Q's booby-trapped attaché case. A helicopter and a speedboat chase follow all the way to Venice, where Rosa Klebb makes one last attempt with the poisoned blade in her shoe – and is stopped by Tatiana's bullet.

Facts

James Bond: Sean Connery
Director: Terence Young
Screenplay: Richard Maibaum and Johanna Harwood
Producers: Harry Saltzman and Albert R. Broccoli
Music: John Barry
Title song: „From Russia with Love“Matt Monro
Based on: Ian Fleming: „From Russia, with Love“1957
Running time: 115 minutes
Budget: $2 milliontwice the budget of Dr. No
Box office: $79 millionworldwide including reissues (Wikipedia en); about $24.8 million of it in North America
Release: UK: 10 October 1963US: 27 May 1964Germany: 14 February 1964

Travel route and filming locations

Gold numbers trace Bond's journey through the story, light markers show the real filming locations. Each layer can be hidden separately.

Bond's route · 16 stops

Total distance (great-circle)≈ 4,085 km

Fictional training island: in the pre-title sequence Red Grant garrottes a Bond look-alike. Position corresponds to the Pinewood filming site.
SPECTRE Island → Thames bank near Hurley · ≈ 19 km
Bond picnics with Sylvia Trench and is summoned to headquarters via the telephone in his Bentley.
Thames bank near Hurley → London, MI6 headquarters · ≈ 48 km
M briefs Bond on the Romanova affair and the Lektor; Q hands over the booby-trapped attaché case.
London, MI6 headquarters → Istanbul, Grand Bazaar (Kerim Bey's office) · ≈ 2,500 km
After landing at Yeşilköy, Bond meets station chief Kerim Bey; shortly afterwards a bomb goes off in the office.
Istanbul, Grand Bazaar (Kerim Bey's office) → Istanbul, Basilica Cistern · ≈ 1 km
Through a periscope in the underground cistern, Bond and Kerim watch the Soviet consulate.
Istanbul, Basilica Cistern → Istanbul, gypsy camp outside the city walls · ≈ 5 km
Kerim hides Bond with Vavra's clan; Krilencu's men attack the camp, and Grant secretly saves Bond's life.
Istanbul, gypsy camp outside the city walls → Istanbul, Krilencu's hideout · ≈ 4 km
Kerim shoots Krilencu with Bond's AR-7 as he escapes through the mouth of a giant film poster.
Istanbul, Krilencu's hideout → Bosphorus, ferry · ≈ 4 km
Secret meeting with Tatiana on the ferry; she describes the Lektor while Bond photographs her.
Bosphorus, ferry → Istanbul, Hagia Sophia · ≈ 3 km
Tatiana leaves the consulate plans; Grant kills the Bulgarian agent who tried to intercept them.
Istanbul, Hagia Sophia → Istanbul, Soviet consulate · ≈ 5 km
Bond steals the Lektor during a tear-gas attack and escapes with Tatiana through the cistern.
Istanbul, Soviet consulate → Istanbul, Sirkeci station · ≈ 4 km
Bond, Tatiana and Kerim board the Orient Express; Grant quietly follows.
Istanbul, Sirkeci station → Belgrade · ≈ 811 km
Kerim Bey has been killed en route; Bond breaks the news to his son and asks for help.
Belgrade → Zagreb · ≈ 368 km
Grant kills British agent Nash and boards the train under his name.
Zagreb → Hill country between Zagreb and Trieste · ≈ 137 km
After the fight with Grant, Bond stops the train, escapes with Tatiana in Grant's truck and is hunted by a grenade-dropping helicopter. Yugoslavia at the time, Slovenia today; exact spot unspecified in the film.
Hill country between Zagreb and Trieste → Istrian coast, Adriatic Sea · ≈ 77 km
Bond and Tatiana take Grant's boat; Morzeny's SPECTRE boats are stopped with burning fuel drums.
Istrian coast, Adriatic Sea → Venice · ≈ 100 km
At the hotel Rosa Klebb attacks with her poisoned blade and is shot by Tatiana; Bond drops the blackmail film into the canal.

Filming locations · 21

Interiors: M's office, hotel rooms in Istanbul and Venice, Orient Express compartments, replica of the gypsy camp
doubles for SPECTRE Island
Pre-title sequence in the grounds and SPECTRE headquarters with training camp
Picnic with Sylvia Trench, call on the car telephone
Bond's arrival in Istanbul
Kerim Bey's office and residence, Bond's arrival by Rolls-Royce
doubles for KGB office in Istanbul (Turkey)
Rosa Klebb recruits Tatiana in the courtyard of the caravanserai
Hand-over of the consulate plans, Grant kills the Bulgarian agent
Boat ride to the periscope beneath the Soviet consulate
Kerim and Bond lie in wait for Krilencu across from his apartment
doubles for Soviet consulate in Istanbul (Turkey)
Exteriors of the Soviet consulate, tear-gas attack
Bond and Kerim's drive to the gypsy camp along the city walls
Meeting with Tatiana on deck, views of Rumeli Hisarı and the Bosphorus shores
doubles for Belgrade and Zagreb stations
Departure of the Orient Express; the platforms also stand in for the Belgrade and Zagreb stops
doubles for Adriatic off Istria (Croatia)
First attempts at the boat chase, abandoned after a camera boat sank
doubles for Istrian coast, Yugoslavia (Croatia)
Bond and Tatiana reach the coast and take Grant's boat
doubles for Adriatic off Istria (Croatia)
Boat chase with the SPECTRE boats and the fuel-drum explosion
doubles for Adriatic Sea
Base for the Scottish shoot, boat footage in the Sound of Jura; site of Terence Young's helicopter crash while scouting
doubles for Yugoslav hill country (Slovenia)
Helicopter chase of the truck, Bond shoots the helicopter down with the AR-7
doubles for Tunnels of the Basilica Cistern (Turkey)
Reshoot of the rat scene with 200 wild rats, not permitted in Britain
Hotel exteriors at the end of the journey
Closing gondola ride, Bond throws the film into the water

Characters and cast

Bond

James BondSean Connery

Bond girls

Villains

Henchmen

Allies

MI6

Others

Vehicles & Gadgets

Vehicles

1934 Bentley 3½ Litre drophead coupé by Park Ward – a production example of the type from which Bond takes the call at the picnicPhoto: Calreyn88 · CC BY 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Bentley 3½ Litre Drophead Coupé
Car1935
Bond's private car with telephone, seen in the picnic scene
In his first scene Bond is picnicking by the river with Sylvia Trench when his pager summons him to headquarters; he takes the call on the telephone fitted to the Bentley parked open beside them – the first Bond vehicle of the series with a special fitting. The car is a 3½ Litre, the first Bentley model developed under Rolls-Royce ownership, here as a drophead coupé by Park Ward, the coachbuilder that clothed about half of all 3½ Litres. IMCDb instead identifies the film car as a 1938 4¼ Litre drophead coupé by Vanden Plas (chassis B4MR). The marque is a nod to Fleming, whose Bond drives Bentleys in the novels; on film it remained this brief appearance before Goldfinger introduced the Aston Martin.
Driven by
James Bond
Specs
3.7 L straight-six (3,669 cc), about 110 bhp, 90 mph
Sources: Bond's Cars: Bentley 3½ Litre · Wikipedia (en): Bentley 3½ Litre · IMCDb: 1938 Bentley 4¼ Litre Vanden Plas Drophead Coupé [B4MR] · Wikipedia (en): List of James Bond vehicles
1958 Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith – a production example of the car in which Kerim Bey's chauffeur drives Bond through IstanbulPhoto: Bob Adams from George, South Africa · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith Limousine (Park Ward)
Car1958
Kerim Bey's chauffeured car in Istanbul
Kerim Bey's chauffeur collects Bond at Istanbul airport and drives him through the city while the Bulgarian agents' Citroën follows at a polite distance – 'they follow us, we follow them', as Kerim Bey describes the well-rehearsed ritual. IMCDb identifies the black car as a 1958 Silver Wraith with limousine coachwork by Park Ward (chassis LELW21), an example from the end of the production run: Rolls-Royce supplied the Silver Wraith from 1946 to 1958 as a chassis for coachbuilders such as Park Ward, Hooper and H. J. Mulliner, from 1952 also on a long wheelbase for formal limousines. Older vehicle lists occasionally call the car a Phantom III.
Driven by
Kerim Bey's chauffeur
Specs
4.9 L (300 cu in) straight-six, power output never officially quoted
Sources: IMCDb: 1958 Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith Limousine Park Ward [LELW21] · Wikipedia (en): Rolls-Royce Silver Wraith · Wikipedia (en): List of James Bond vehicles
Fairey Huntress in the Bond exhibition at the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu – the type of boat in which Bond and Tatiana escape the SPECTRE pursuersPhoto: Karen Roe from Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, UK · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Fairey Huntress 23
Boat
Bond and Tatiana's getaway boat in the chase; SPECTRE's boats are stopped with burning fuel drums
After escaping from the Orient Express, Bond and Tatiana take over a white motorboat on the coast to make for Venice; Bond stops the SPECTRE pursuers in larger boats by throwing fuel drums overboard and igniting them with the flare pistol. The sequence was shot not on the Adriatic but off the west coast of Scotland near Crinan and Loch Craignish, after the Bosphorus had proved too rough – a hired camera boat had even sunk there. Fairey Marine of Hamble supplied several boats, some of them towed from the works to Scotland: Bond's Huntress 23, hull number 32 with an Interceptor V8 petrol engine, plus Huntsman 28s and further Huntresses as pursuers; the film boat 'Liberty' (no. 48) was offered for sale after restoration in 2017. The Huntress 23 derives from a design by the American Ray Hunt, reworked for Fairey by Alan Burnard; 241 of the hot-moulded deep-V wooden hulls were built between 1959 and 1979. A Huntress was displayed in the Bond exhibition at the National Motor Museum, Beaulieu.
Driven by
Bond and Tatiana
Specs
23 ft (7 m) hot-moulded deep-V wooden hull; film boat powered by a Ford Interceptor V8 petrol engine
Sources: Fairey Owners Club: From Russia with Love · Berthon: Fairey Huntress 23 LIBERTY (Hull no. 48) · Wikipedia (en): Fairey Marine · BMT 216A: Fairey Huntress 23 · Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film)
Hiller UH-12E at the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum, Oregon – a production example of the helicopter with which SPECTRE hunts Bond in ScotlandPhoto: Daderot · CC0 · Wikimedia Commons
Hiller UH-12E
Aircraft
SPECTRE helicopter that hunts Bond with hand grenades
Fleeing overland from the train, Bond is hunted by a yellow helicopter whose passenger throws hand grenades – a homage to the crop-duster attack in Hitchcock's North by Northwest. Bond lies in wait with the folding AR-7 from the attaché case and hits the grenade thrower, whereupon the machine explodes. Like the boat chase, the scene was shot near Crinan and Lochgilphead in Argyll and was hampered by the Scottish weather; a radio-controlled 1:4-scale model served for the explosion. The Hiller UH-12E is the civil version of the three-seat bubble-canopy light helicopter flown by the US Army as the OH-23 Raven; according to fan databases the film machine is still airworthy today.
Driven by
SPECTRE pilots
Specs
Military OH-23G version: Lycoming VO-435 flat-six, 250 hp, 95 mph
Sources: Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film) · 007.com: From Russia With Love Helicopter Attack · Wikipedia (en): Hiller OH-23 Raven · Wikipedia (en): Hiller UH-12 · BMT 216A: Hiller UH-12E
A Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits carriage – Bond and Tatiana travel from Istanbul to Trieste aboard the blue and gold Orient Express.Photo: Projet 154 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Orient-Express Istanbul – Belgrad – Zagreb – Venedig
Other
Setting of the sleeper-compartment fight between Bond and Grant
With the Lektor and Tatiana, Bond boards the Orient Express in Istanbul bound for Venice; after Kerim Bey's murder the sleeper compartment becomes the arena for the fight with Grant, which Bond wins with the throwing knife from the case and Grant's own garrotte watch. The compartment scenes were shot at Pinewood, running shots in Argyll and Switzerland; Sirkeci station in Istanbul stood not only for itself but also for Belgrade and Zagreb. The train follows the route of the Simplon-Orient-Express, which linked Istanbul via Belgrade, Zagreb and Trieste with Venice and Paris and whose blue-and-gold sleeping cars were provided by the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits.
Sources: Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film) · Wikipedia (en): Orient Express
1950 Citroën Traction Avant 11 BL – a production example of the car in which the Bulgarian agents tail Bond and which Grant later takes overPhoto: Palauenc05 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Citroën 11 BL „Traction Avant“
Car1948
Black saloon of the Bulgarian tail; Grant kills the driver and leaves the car outside the Soviet consulate
The Bulgarians working for the Soviets follow Kerim Bey's Rolls-Royce from the airport in the black Citroën saloon – a game both sides in Istanbul play with practised ease. Grant, who is covering Bond's mission from the shadows, kills the Bulgarian driver, takes the car and leaves it outside the Soviet consulate. IMCDb identifies the vehicle as a 1948 11 BL, the light version of the Traction Avant that Citroën built from 1934 to 1957 – the first mass-produced car with front-wheel drive and a unitary body, and for decades the archetypal police and gangster car of the movies.
Driven by
Bulgarian agents, then Grant
Specs
1.9 L inline-four (1,911 cc), 56 hp, 73 mph
Sources: IMCDb: 1948 Citroën 11 BL 'Traction' · Wikipedia (en): Citroën Traction Avant · Wikipedia (de): Citroën Traction Avant · Wikipedia (en): List of James Bond vehicles

Gadgets

Q's attaché case
Holds a folding AR-7 sniper rifle with scope, a throwing knife, 50 gold sovereigns, 20 rounds of ammunition in the sides and a tear-gas cartridge that goes off if the case is opened the wrong way. The original was made by the London leather-goods house Swaine Adeney Brigg, which Fleming already names in the novel; on the train the tear-gas trap saves Bond's life when Grant opens the case.
Sources: Bond Lifestyle: Swaine Adeney Brigg Bond Attaché Case · Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film)
Garrotte wristwatch
A wire garrotte pulls out of Grant's wristwatch, his preferred killing tool.
Sources: Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film)
Poison-blade shoe
A spring-loaded, poison-tipped blade hides in the toe of Rosa Klebb's shoe.
Sources: Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film)
Rolleiflex 2.8F (1964) – a twin-lens Rollei like the one in which Bond hides a tape recorder on the Bosphorus ferryPhoto: Luis Cozeto from Portugal · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Rolleiflex tape recorder
On the Bosphorus ferry Bond has Tatiana describe the Lektor and records her account with a tape recorder hidden inside a twin-lens Rolleiflex – proof for London that the machine exists and that the defector means it.
Sources: Casual Photophile: The Legendary Cameras of James Bond · Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film)
Cistern periscope
Kerim Bey spies on the Soviet consulate from below through a submarine periscope mounted in the Basilica Cistern.
Sources: Wikipedia (de): James Bond 007 – Liebesgrüße aus Moskau
Lektor decoder
The Soviet cipher machine at the centre of the plot – the bait in SPECTRE's trap.
Sources: Wikipedia (en): From Russia with Love (film)
1934 Bentley 3½ Litre drophead coupé by Park Ward – a production example of the type from which Bond takes the call at the picnicPhoto: Calreyn88 · CC BY 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Car telephone in the Bentley
A pager and a telephone in Bond's Bentley summon him from his picnic to headquarters.
Sources: Bond's Cars: Bentley 3½ Litre · Wikipedia (en): List of James Bond vehicles

Production and trivia

Shooting ran from 1 April to 23 August 1963 – far longer than planned, as the production fell behind schedule in Istanbul and Scotland and went over budget.
The $2 million budget was double that of Dr. No; the film went on to gross around $79 million worldwide and was the most popular film at the British box office in 1963.
President John F. Kennedy had named the novel among his ten favourite books; on 20 November 1963 he watched the film at the White House – the last film he saw before his assassination.
Pedro Armendáriz learned during the Istanbul shoot that he had inoperable cancer. Terence Young rescheduled his scenes so that he could finish them; shortly afterwards the actor took his own life.
On 6 July 1963 the helicopter carrying Terence Young, art director Michael White and a cameraman on a location scout crashed into the water off the Scottish coast. All three escaped with minor injuries.
The boat chase was begun off Pendik on the Sea of Marmara, but delays and a sunken camera boat forced the team to move it, along with the helicopter sequence, to the Scottish west coast near Crinan.
The fuel-drum explosion in Scotland seriously injured three stuntmen; Walter Gotell suffered burns to his eyelids.
Because British rules did not allow filming with wild rats – and white lab rats dyed with cocoa merely licked each other clean – the rat scene in the cistern was reshot in Spain.
Robert Shaw initially turned down the role of Red Grant; his fiancée Mary Ure talked him into it. The train fight, choreographed by former boxer Terence Young and shot over three weeks, was largely performed by Connery and Shaw themselves.
The chess game that introduces Kronsteen follows, move for move, Boris Spassky's win over David Bronstein at the 1960 Soviet championship.
The film established many of the series' trademarks: the pre-title sequence, Desmond Llewelyn as Q with a gadget briefcase, Blofeld as a faceless "Number 1", a title song with lyrics and the closing promise "James Bond will return".
Robert Brownjohn's title sequence projects the credits onto dancing female bodies – inspired by constructivist László Moholy-Nagy and formative for the series' later title designs.
Daniela Bianchi, 1960 Miss Universe runner-up, was dubbed by Barbara Jefford; her screen test in Bond's hotel bed became the standard audition scene for later Bond castings.
Cinematographer Ted Moore won the British Academy Film Award for Best British Cinematography; Lionel Bart's title song was nominated for a Golden Globe.
The German dub was produced by Ultra-Film in Berlin, with Gert Günther Hoffmann voicing Connery, Horst Niendorf voicing Robert Shaw and Alice Treff voicing Lotte Lenya. The German release on 14 February 1964 carried a 16 rating.