Bernard Lee: An Appreciation Thread

Bear with us chaps.



Bernard Lee (1908-81)

We all of course know Lee as M, some people only know him as M, but having grown up on 'old' movies, I remember him for other roles and sometimes, watching these other films, you forget he was M. For instance, pictured, Dunkirk in 1958 where he plays a journalist who ends up taking his little boat over to Dunkirk and (SPOILER) killed by Stukas on the beach. Or The Blue Lamp, Morning Departure, his little turn in The Third Man...

Growing up I became a fan of Kenneth More, he still is my favourite actor for various reasons (playing Lee's adjutant in Morning Departure, rumoured to replace him in LALD if Lee's illness worsened) and growing up I wanted to be a writer. I figured, as a test, my first 'published work' should be a book on More. I had it all planned out, interviewing various people. Since, most of them have died. But lately I wondered, maybe a book on Bernard Lee. If his wiki page is anything to go by, his was at once an underappreciated life but also a tragic one.



Lee in some respects was typical of that postwar generation of actors. He had done things before the war, served in the war and then, he got into films and acting generally. There are so many actors who you see in films of the late 1940s, 1950s and 1960s. Sam Kydd, Victor Maddern, Robert Fleming, Cyril Chamberlain, Jack Warner, Robert Urquhart, etc, etc, etc, who seemed to be in every film going or had a certain presence that you noted them.
In the Blue Lamp (1950, Basil Dearden), Lee plays a a veteran Detective Inspector investigating the murder of PC Dixon (Jack Warner). His performance is understated, he's gentle with a young girl who is about to say what her father says about coppers and is cut off by a simple "I know what he says" sort of thing whereas when they close on the murderer (Dirk Bogarde) there's a grim simple expression. You get the impression that in this seemingly quaint past (where gruesome murders happened in reality despite what Ealing portrayed), Lee's DI has seen it all, is world weary and yet still determined to get the bastards.

In Dunkirk his journalist is also world weary, who doesn't buy what the official line is on the war (that Hitler's rolling up France at a rate of knots and could win) and takes the boat over, like real-life small boat owners, because the Navy don't know how to handle his boat or sees the point in letting them. Civilians were lost in Operation Dynamo, more violently then the 1958 film shows (superior to Nolan in my humble opinion) but Lee's performance feels nuanced. He dies doing his bit.



You have Battle of the River Plate where Lee plays the captain of a merchant ship sunk by the Admiral Graf Spee. It's an intriguing performance. At times, he's grim and bitter (his very first scene where he rages at being sunk), then there's humour and laughs (as he meets the other PoW's transferred from the Altmark). His scenes with Langsdorff (played by Peter Finch) are interesting in that I doubt they actually happened. They seem sympathetic to Langsdorff (no Nazi by any means) but Lee does so much by doing so little. Maybe I read too much in, I'm no expert for all my admiration of Hitchcock, Orson Welles et al.

Then in 1962 he appears in a film that had it not done well, would've been another film based on another book by another author, Dr No. He was the first, and the best. Dr No is perhaps his most close-to-the-book performance as M followed by OHMSS. Blunt, seemingly uncaring, but knows Bond is his best. When I read OHMSS at Quarterdeck, I can imagine Bernard Lee. Perhaps it helps that Lee was in the war. Did Fleming dare to supply nuggets to Lee as he watched filming? I doubt it, but there he is, Bernard Lee as M. He ended up doing spoofs of the role but managed to keep his end up all the way to Moonraker. Along the way there's wobbly moments brought on by the times perhaps and had things gone well, he would've been in FYEO. However, ill health caught up.

I heard I think John Mills in an interview, about Dunkirk, say that Lee's drinking was bad then and Roger Moore saying about his drinking in his books. He probably did like a drink, maybe he was an alcoholic but it seems tragedy played its part.

In 1972, year before LALD of course, his wife died in a fire at their home in which he managed to escape. He was hospitalised. A few weeks later, Lee was mugged by youths. It seems then he turned to drink, which I think, sad as it sounds, is understandable. It's no excuse but you can see why.

Apparently, he bumped into Richard Burton who gave him a sizable cheque to clear his debts. Lee recovered from his abyss. He remarried and apart from Bond, did the odd bit and piece.

He died of stomach cancer in the end. By most accounts a decent man.

Newer Bond fans won't necessary appreciate him as M (to some it seems, I'm told, Bond begins at Brosnan nowadays), they won't certainly see him in his pre-Bond films but if they do, they hopefully appreciate what a fine actor he was.

Your last sentence there ... it's appreciated that they had the good sense to have a portrait of Lee's M in the 'alternative' MI6 HQ in TWINE.

Bernard was one of the greats, yeah he's best known for playing M but he did so much besides and he always did it well.
I was watching him just last week in Whistle down the wind where he gives a great performance as father to three young children whilst trying to run his farm, the children steal the limelight here but Lee gives wonderful support to Alan bates and Hayley mills.

I forgot about Whistle Down the Wind, haven't seen it in ages.

He so embodied the noble spirit in Fleming's character that you can't help but always picture him with bow tie and pipe clenched determinedly. The only thing is that I wish they could have worked in more of the book's usage of M calling Bond by his first name when speaking personally.


I really do need to see some of his other roles besides the bigger ones.

The only first name usage by Lee I can recall is TSWLM's 'Well done, James', when it seems that 007 has outwitted Triple X.

The only other one I can recall is Dench's 'See what your charm does, James?' in QOS about Fields' unfortunate fate.

Good points, he refers to Bond as James in Moonraker (novel), I think OHMSS (novel) but in the films, Lee's M certainly doesn't really do it.

I rewatched Blue Lamp last week and Lee is but a small cog in a larger chain but some chain. It's not Hamlet but there's something in his performance that speaks volumes. Once Dixon is killed, of course they want to get the killer but there's an understated feel in the film (as I guess in those days you can't have all sorts of language and stuff) of the coppers looking for Bogarde. At the end it's Jimmy Hanley's young PC (who Dixon was mentoring and indeed, giving board to) who has the honour of collaring the crim. Lee wasn't leading man material but he mastered the supporting role well.

No matter what I see Lee in regardless of the role he always has such a sense of innate warmth and strength.
"I'm so glad to have met you, sir.  I've read quite a few of your books..."

The name flipping was Fleming's way of showing M's personal side and that it was that rare instance where it was an off the clock, off the books problem to be discussed with his surrogate son. Such as Drax cheating at Blades, FYEO etc.

In the films it's very fleeting but there are more human moments that are absolutely beautiful: the Beretta removal, the discussion of the fantastic nature of Tanya's bait in FRWL, the snobbery discussion in OHMSS and many more.

Blunt Instrument wrote:

The only first name usage by Lee I can recall is TSWLM's 'Well done, James', when it seems that 007 has outwitted Triple X.

He also says "well done, James" in MR when Bond corrects Q about where a rare orchid was discovered. One of the many rehashing of TSWLM done on MR!

Heh, indeed. That's what comes of having Christopher Wood write 2 of them in a row.

hegottheboot wrote:

He so embodied the noble spirit in Fleming's character that you can't help but always picture him with bow tie and pipe clenched determinedly. The only thing is that I wish they could have worked in more of the book's usage of M calling Bond by his first name when speaking personally.


I really do need to see some of his other roles besides the bigger ones.

It is impossible that Fleming's M could have been cast better than Bernard Lee. He was perfect.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

hegottheboot wrote:

He so embodied the noble spirit in Fleming's character that you can't help but always picture him with bow tie and pipe clenched determinedly. The only thing is that I wish they could have worked in more of the book's usage of M calling Bond by his first name when speaking personally.


I really do need to see some of his other roles besides the bigger ones.

It is impossible that Fleming's M could have been cast better than Bernard Lee. He was perfect.

100%.

When I read the novels, M is virtually the only character I picture as their on-screen iteration.

Just been watching The angry silence...Bernard lee and Geoffrey keen, Lee plays the shop steward at an engineering firm run by Keen, after a strike vote between the workers over safety conditions Lee supports the intimidation of Non strikers which includes, Richard attenborough who gives a sterling performance, as always Bernard also delivers in spades

Today is forty years to the day that Bernard Lee passed aged 73.



further salutations to a man who has forever set the benchmark on the role and was a delight in the majority of his non-Bond roles.



Mm

Lee and Brown in that last pic?

Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang wrote:

Lee and Brown in that last pic?

It is indeed. I found it when browsing images last night. Apparently it's from a short-lived TV series of 1966-67 called King of the River. Lee played the patriarch of a family who still run sail barges on the Thames and are struggling to survive. Only ten episodes, none of which survive.

Without looking, I think it may well be the only time both of them acted together.

Heh. Little did they know, etc.

Very much so, Lee four years into his tenure and Brown miles away from any Bond appearance. Both jobbing actors you might say and both close friends of Moore by what Moore wrote in the past.

If only there was a photo of Judi Dench across Lee's knee.

Lee was the perfect M. I doubt there will ever be anyone as good as him in the role. The only other M I approve of is Brown.

Phantom Commander wrote:

Lee was the perfect M. I doubt there will ever be anyone as good as him in the role. The only other M I approve of is Brown.

Agreed about Lee but Dench in Brosnan’s era and Skyfall was fantastic. Brown was solid and Fiennes was strangely both overused yet wasted.

Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang wrote:

Fiennes was strangely both overused yet wasted.

Well put.

Damned shame really. Had the potential to be a great M if they'd kept him in the old Lee/Brown mould, rather than making him part of The MI6 Avengers out in the field supporting Bond.

CJB wrote:

Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang wrote:

Fiennes was strangely both overused yet wasted.

Well put.

Damned shame really. Had the potential to be a great M if they'd kept him in the old Lee/Brown mould, rather than making him part of The MI6 Avengers out in the field supporting Bond.

Regarding M, all ll I recall from Spectre is that the Fiennes and Harris scenes zapping the pace dramatically, and then the former undercutting his brilliant “now we know what C stands for" by adding “careless” after a beat. And of course, from NTTD, the whole Heracles subplot was so unremarkably told and missed an opportunity to truly complicate and deepen his characterisation, and do something genuinely interesting with him. Perhaps NTTD would have worked better by scrapping Nomi completely (the most underwhelming and ineffective spy Bond’s teamed up with), allowing more screen time to deal with M’s guilt and the political/moral ramifications from green-lighting the program.

Nomi (thanks for reminding me of her name - haven't watched NTTD in 2 years) existed solely to stir up controversy around a "black female 007" and to stroke Babs' ego and whatnot. You could comfortably remove her from the film.

CJB wrote:

Nomi (thanks for reminding me of her name - haven't watched NTTD in 2 years) existed solely to stir up controversy around a "black female 007" and to stroke Babs' ego and whatnot. You could comfortably remove her from the film.

TTtD would have been considerably better without her. Classic case of ideology trumping merit and degrading quality.