Kerim Bey is a Bond ally from the James Bond film From Russia With Love. He was played by Pedro Armendariz.

Kerim Bey (right) with James Bond in ‘From Russia With Love’.

Novel biography: Darko Kerim was born in Trezibond (now Trabzon) to a Turkish father, a fisherman, and an English mother, a governess. At the age of twenty he too was a fisherman, and was recruited into MI6 by a Major Dansey who wanted information about the Russian oil installations and naval base at Batoum, only 50 miles away. He later infiltrated Soviet Georgia as a strongman and wrestler in a travelling circus. He became Head of Station T in Istanbul in the late 1930s. He uses his many sons and uncles as agents, running a business trading spices as cover. In his office Bond notices certificates showing that he has two Mentions in Dispatches and the military OBE. He is described as 6 feet 2 inches (1.88m) tall, powerfully built, dark, with a broken nose. He smokes Turkish cigarettes (naturally), and has an insatiable appetite for food, coffee, alcohol, and women.

He meets Bond and arranges for false papers in order for Bond and Tatiana to leave the country. Later he takes Bond through a rat-infested tunnel to a periscope he had installed below the Russian Embassy. This gives Bond his first look at Tatania. He then takes Bond to the Gipsy Camp (also used by Kerim as agents) where they witness the girl-fight, before being attacked by “The Faceless Ones”, Bulgarian thugs employed by the Russians. Afterwards Kerim (with Bond’s help) kills Krilencu, leader of the Bulgars, with a sniper rifle concealed in a walking stick, as the Bulgarian attempts to leave his apartment using an escape hatch hidden behind a film poster. He then accompanies Bond and Tatania on the train out of Turkey. He arranges for two of the three MGB men following Bond to be arrested, but is stabbed to death by the third, killing his assassin in the process.

Film biography: Kerim Bey works in Istanbul. He meets up with Bond in Istanbul and guides him around and helps him getting the Lektor device. When Kerim is almost killed by a bomb planted on the outside wall of his office, he and Bond try to discover who tried to kill him. They find out it was Krilencu. When going to a Gypsy Camp, Bond and Kerim are interrupted by Krilencu’s men who attempted to kill Kerim. Kerim survives and says that he must kill him even after getting shot in the arm. Kerim kills Krilencu, with Bond’s sniper rifle. He then helps Bond get on the train with the Lektor device, but is killed by Red Grant on the train.

See also:

• Bond allies