Dr No

The first Bond film, made comparatively cheaply but effectively establishing a formula for the series - basically a high-tech gloss repackaging of the old serials - and setting up a box-office bonanza with its gleeful blend of sex, violence and wit. As memorable as anything in the series (the arteries hadn't hardened yet) are modest highlights like Bond's encounter with a tarantula, Honeychile's first appearance as a nymph from the sea, the perils of Dr No's assault course of pain. Looking back with hindsight, one realises the extent to which the later films got bigger but not better, relying on expertise rather than creativity, and reducing film-making to committee decisions. One Bond film can be tighter, wittier, better cast, more outrageous than the next, but basically soulless, they remain as individually unmemorable as computer printouts.