The James Bond gun barrel sequence is an iconic opening to every official (EON Productions) James Bond film beginning with the first, Dr No in 1962. The sequence is credited to Maurice Binder, a famous title designer who worked on 14 Bond films. The look of the sequence was achieved with a pin hole camera shooting through a real gun barrel until the mid-1990s when it became computer-generated.

Because Maurice Binder had designed the gun barrel sequence to feature James Bond only in silhouette, he used stunt man Bob Simmons, rather than Sean Connery to film the scene in Dr No.

In the sequence, a series of flashing white dots scrolls across the screen from (the viewer’s perspective) left to right. Upon reaching the extreme right of the screen, the dot changes to the view down the barrel of a gun (the rifling within forming a distinctive spiral pattern). The gun barrel is seen from inside—looking directly at a walking (right to left) James Bond against a plain white background. Bond quickly turns and shoots at the viewer; the scene reddens signifying the spilling of the gunman’s blood from above. The gun barrel dissolves to a circle, which again often then roves around, and the film begins with the first scene generally appearing within it as it expands.

The iconic gun barrel shot is copyright to EON Productions and used widely for advertisement and merchandising purposes.

Evolution of the sequence: The first person to portray the role of James Bond in the sequence was not Sean Connery, but rather Bob Simmons, a stuntman who filled in for the role of agent 007 in the sequence shot and used for the first three films’ gun barrels (Dr No, From Russia with Love, and Goldfinger). In 1965, when the series began to be shot in the anamorphic format, a new version of the sequence was required. For this, the producers used Sean Connery for the first time. Since then, every actor to portray Bond has been filmed in the scene.

From Dr No to Diamonds Are Forever, the sequence, filmed by Simmons, Connery, and George Lazenby, featured Bond wearing a hat. This was dropped when Roger Moore played the role in Live and Let Die in 1973, although the character continued to wear a hat occasionally within the films into the 1980s. Notably, Lazenby, Moore, Timothy Dalton, and Pierce Brosnan all wore dinner jackets for their renditions.

Critic James Chapman has suggested that this sequence from The Great Train Robbery (1903) acted out by Justus D Barnes, may have influenced the James Bond gun barrel sequence.

Beginning with 1995’s GoldenEye, the gun barrel was computer-generated, allowing for variations in the spiral rifling pattern as the light reflection alters with the movement of the barrel. Die Another Day introduced a CG bullet zooming from Bond’s gun towards the viewer and disappearing, suggesting that 007 has shot straight up his opponent’s gun (If one actually looks carefully, one will recognise that the bullet is the same one used in the opening part of the title sequence in GoldenEye). This sequence is a one-time only effect to commemorate the release of the 20th James Bond film as well as the 40th anniversary of James Bond on screen.

The sequence changed again for Daniel Craig’s first outing as 007 in the 2006 film Casino Royale. It differed from every previous film by not opening the film with the sequence, but instead ending the pre-title sequence with it where the viewer actually sees the assassin about to shoot Bond before he turns to fire on the assassin. Casino Royale is a reboot of the official franchise and is supposed to be Bond’s first mission. Like the previous iteration of the sequence, it is expected to only be a feature of Casino Royale with Bond 22 returning to the more traditional style.

See also:

• Gun barrel sequence: Trivia