Oddjob is a henchman to the villain Auric Goldfinger in the film and novel. In the film he was played by the Hawaiian actor Harold Sakata.
Oddjob is one of the most popular characters in the Bond series. He is superior in unarmed combat skills to Bond in both film and novel, and therefore must be killed by application of superior cunning (by uncontrolled decompression in the book and electrocution in the film).
The character of Oddjob, from his unusual appearance, manners, strength and method of killing, forms the archetype for many privileged senior henchmen of the Bond film series, including Tee Hee, Jaws, Gobinda, Stamper, and Zao.
Novel
Oddjob's real name is unknown. He is named by Goldfinger as that describes his duties to his employer. Korean-born (all Goldfinger's staff are Korean), he is extremely strong, proven in one sequence where he breaks the railing of a staircase with his hand and a mantel with his foot. An expert at karate, Oddjob is also an expert with a bow and arrow, and with his metal, razor-edged "throwable" (anagram) bowler hat. Despite the fact that he is mute (due to a severely cleft palate), he is a ruthless killer, but also acts as Goldfinger's personal guard, driver, and manservant (though not his golf caddy, as depicted in the film). He has a taste for cats as food, apparently acquired in Korea when food was in short supply (Bond frames Goldfinger's yellow cat for destruction of surveillance film, and as punishment, sees the cat given to Oddjob for dinner). He is killed when Bond uses a knife to shatter the window next to his seat on an airplane, which depressurises the plane and blows Oddjob out of the window, a fate transferred to Auric Goldfinger in the film version.
Film
In the beginning of the film, Oddjob is first seen only via silhouette against a wall as he knocks Bond unconscious at the Fontainebleau Hotel, after which he or Goldfinger kills Jill Masterton (with whom Bond had spent the night) through "skin suffocation" by painting her entire body with gold paint. When Bond meets Goldfinger for a game of golf, Oddjob is seen for the first time in full. He only has four lines of sparse dialogue throughout the film: in the first, upon pretending to have found Goldfinger's missing golf ball, he exclaims "Aha!" The second time, after killing Tilly Masterton, he instructs his men to dispose of her body by merely pointing at them and saying "Ah! Ah!" In the third, he says "Ah!" to order Bond to put on a gas mask before entering Fort Knox. His final line is a scream of pain when he is killed.
Oddjob acts as Goldfinger's personal chauffeur, bodyguard and golf caddy. He wears what appears to be a bowler lined with a metal razor disk in the rim, using it as a lethal flying disc of sorts (this is a bowler hat in the novel, and as such, would have had a round top). It is very powerful, capable of decapitating a stone statue. He later uses it to kill Tilly Masterton by breaking her neck. Physically he is extremely strong and durable, demonstrating his strength in a number of scenes including one where he crushes a golf ball with one hand, as well as during the climactic fight scene with Bond in which he is struck in the chest by a gold bar thrown at him, and struck in the head with a wooden object used as a club. He barely flinches after both these attacks, and is otherwise practically invincible against Bond's futile hand-to-hand combat tactics. However, he is never mentioned to be a karate expert.
His demeanour remains constant throughout the film. Most of the time he is seen to smile broadly whenever he encounters Bondeven during their fight scene. The only time he shows anything resembling fear or wariness is when Bond attempts to use his own hat against him. When thrown at him, however, Oddjob simply leans to the side and dodges the hat with ease, causing it to get stuck between a pair of metal bars. When he goes to retrieve his hat and tries to pull it free, Bond grabs a sparking wire severed by the hat earlier on and thrusts the open end onto the bars. The electric current transfers to the bars and then to the metal in the hat's rim, which electrocutes Oddjob and kills him. (In the T.V. show "James Bond Jr.," it is suggested that Oddjob was merely knocked unconscious for the police to take him away.)
company.