On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is the sixth film in the EON Productions James Bond series and the first and only film to star George Lazenby as British Secret Service agent, Commander James Bond. Lazenby was the second official James Bond, the first having been Sean Connery, who later returned to the role in the following film, Diamonds Are Forever (1971). This is the first and only Bond film to be directed by Peter R Hunt, who before was a film editor or second unit director on every previous film. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service was produced by Albert R Broccoli and Harry Saltzman.

Plot summary: The pre-title sequence shows Miss Moneypenny, M and Q discussing the whereabouts of Bond. Bond is in Portugal, driving on a coastal highway when a woman in a Mercury Cougar overtakes him. Bond follows the woman to a beach where she attempts suicide. Bond drives down to the shore, saving the woman’s life by carrying her back. As he brings the woman back to consciousness and introduces himself, two thugs try to kill Bond. After a fight with the thugs, from which Bond emerges victor, the woman jumps into Bond’s car, driving it back from the beach to the road, then transfers to her car and speeds away. Retrieving her discarded shoes, Bond looks at the audience and notes that “This never happened to the other fellow,” (a nod to previous James Bond Sean Connery).

Bond later encounters the same woman in a casino where she places a bet; a bet which she is unable to cover. On her behalf, Bond rescues the woman by paying her bet. The woman, Contessa Teresa “Tracy” di Vicenzo invites him to her hotel room to thank Bond for his deed. When Bond later visits Tracy’s room, a thug emerges behind Bond, Bond knocks him out then goes back to his room where he finds Tracy. Tracy threatens to kill Bond “for a thrill”; however, Bond disarms Tracy and questions her about the thug in her room. Tracy has nothing to say about that.

The next morning, Tracy leaves the hotel, and later, as Bond leaves the hotel, several men abduct him and take him to meet Marc-Ange Draco, the head of the European crime syndicate Unione Corse, who Bond recognises immediately. Draco reveals that Tracy is his only daughter and tells Bond of her troubled past, offering Bond a personal dowry of one million pounds if he will marry her. Bond refuses, but agrees to continue romancing Tracy under the agreement that Draco reveals the whereabouts of Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the head of SPECTRE.

Bond returns to MI6 but is told by M that he has been relieved from the task of hunting Blofeld, prompting Bond to resign. After M accepts the letter, Bond learns that as Moneypenny was recording his dictation, she had changed the wording to request two weeks’ leave instead. Realising he can pursue Blofeld on his time off and not quit MI6, Bond thanks Moneypenny and heads for Draco’s birthday party in Portugal. There, Tracy discovers Bond’s deal with her father and strong-arms him into providing Bond with the information he requested. Draco tells Bond that his next line of pursuit should be a law firm in Bern, Switzerland. After a brief argument, Bond and Tracy begin a whirlwind romance.

Bond and Tracy go to Bern with Draco to investigate the Swiss lawyer, Gumbold’s, connection with Blofeld. Searching the law office, Bond finds Blofeld’s correspondence with the London College of Arms: Blofeld is attempting to claim the title ‘Comte Balthazar de Bleuchamp’. His College of Arms correspondent is genealogist Sir Hilary Bray. Bond visits M at home and is granted permission to recommence investigation of Blofeld.

Posing as Bray, Bond travels back to Switzerland where he visits Blofeld, who has established a clinical research institute atop Piz Gloria in the Swiss Alps. In disguise, Bond meets ten young women, the Angels of Death, that are patients of the institute’s clinic. After having an uneventful dinner with them, Bond later that night, sneaks out of his room and meets one of them, named Ruby, in her room for a romantic encounter. But at midnight, Bond sees that Ruby and apparently each of the other ladies go into a sleep-induced trance while Blofeld gives them audio instructions for when they return to the civilization. In fact, the women are being brainwashed to distribute bacteriological warfare agents throughout various parts of the world. In that same night, Bond meets another woman named Nancy, who sneaks out of her room to visit his.

The next day, Bond meets with Blofeld again to persuade him to leave Switzerland to visit Augsburg outside Switzerland where according to the College of Arms, the ancestral home of de Bleuchamp, a royal family which may have historical research for Blofeld as his title of a Count. Bond knows that if he lures Blofeld out of Switzerland, the British Secret Service can arrest him without violating Swiss sovereignty. But Blofeld refuses, for he is busy with work at his research facility.

Bond’s lasciviousness betrays him to Blofeld’s henchwoman Irma Bunt, who captures him during a second visit to Ruby. Blofeld identifies Bond after he had made a small slip earlier that the real Sir Hilary Bray would not have made. Bond escapes imprisonment, skiing down Piz Gloria while Blofeld and many of his men give chase. Arriving at the village of Mürren, Bond is almost trapped at a carnival by Irma and her men, when Bond encounters Tracy. After another long car chase through the town and the nearby town of Grindelwald, they escape. A blizzard forces them to a remote barn, where Bond declares his love for Tracy and proposes marriage to her. Tracy accepts Bond’s marriage proposal. The next morning, Blofeld captures Tracy while leaving Bond to die in a manmade avalanche, which Bond survives.

Blofeld holds the world to ransom with the threat of destroying its agriculture using his brainwashed women, demanding amnesty for all past crimes and that he be recognized as the current Count de Bleauchamp. Bond enlists Draco and his forces to attack Blofeld’s headquarters, while also freeing Tracy from Blofeld’s captivity. The raid is successful as Bond and Blofeld are the last to escape before the institute is destroyed. The pair engage in a furious bobsled chase down Piz Gloria, culminating with Blofeld becoming snared in a tree branch while Bond drives away in the bobsled.

Bond and Tracy marry in Portugal, then drive away in Bond’s Aston Martin. Bond pulls over to the roadside to remove flowers from the car. As this happens, Blofeld (wearing a neck brace) and Bunt in a Mercedes-Benz 600 drive past the couple’s car, spraying bullets. Bond survives the drive-by attack, only to discover that Tracy has been killed by a shot to the forehead. A police officer pulls over to inspect the bullet-riddled car, prompting a stunned Bond to mutter, “We have all the time in the world,” as he cradles Tracy’s lifeless body.

See also:

• On Her Majesty's Secret Service: Film - Cast
• On Her Majesty's Secret Service: Film - Crew
• On Her Majesty's Secret Service: Film - Locations
• On Her Majesty's Secret Service: Film - Goofups
• On Her Majesty's Secret Service: Film - Soundtrack
• On Her Majesty's Secret Service: Film - Trivia