Brutal Bond

Brutal Bond - Shooting Dent

By MI6 Staff

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Over the next few months, MI6 will explore the scenes where James Bond is at his most cold-blooded and hardcore across all 23 adventures to date. Voting will then open to find 007's most brutal moment in the series.

Sean Connery's debut outing as 007 in the very first James Bond film, 1962's "Dr No", would cause waves with cinema-goers and censors around the world for a multitude of reasons. Nobody had quite seen anything like it before. But one scene in particular drew attention due to the un-gentlemanly way Bond disposed of a would-be assassin.

When 007's taxi driver fails to eliminate Bond, Professor Dent is put on the case. He proves to be one of Bond's top suspects in the case of the missing Head of Section after he discovers that Dent gave Strangways a report declaring a sample of rocks from island of Crab Key as 'clean' when they were really very radioactive. When Dent realizes Bond is onto him he makes contact with Dr. No who tasks the Professor with the planting of a black widow spider in Bond's bed.

Dent meets a brutal end when 007 spends an afternoon with his cohort, Miss Taro. Dent arrives at Taro's home to do away with Bond, only to find him ready and waiting. Dent unloads his clip into what he believes is a sleeping Bond, but it is just a pile of pillows 007 case placed as a diversion to lure the assassin. When faced with the scheming Professor, Bond does not hesitate to use his licence to kill.

Professor Dent shot "Bond" (actually pillows in bed) six times. After some plot point explanation by Bond, Dent lurches for his gun, but it's empty, hence Bond's line, "That's a Smith and Wesson, and you've had your six." As a kind of payback coda, Bond shoots Dent once, and Dent flips off the bed onto the floor. Bond then fires five more rounds into Dent's back. Censors scaled this back to two total shots, with just one to the back.

The killing of Dent was originally filmed in a slightly different way. Some members of the production team were a little worried about the way that Bond cold-bloodedly guns the man down and arranged for a new sequence to be shot in which Dent fires one last bullet at Bond and misses - Bond then kills him in self-defence. This actually explains why Dent is shown firing a seven-shooter, rather than a six-shooter. Terence Young, wisely, opted for the cold-blooded approach.