Casino Royale

Rated: PG-13 (intense sequences of violent action, a scene of torture, sexual content and nudity)
Runtime: 144 minutes
Directed by: Martin Campbell
Written by: Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, Paul Haggis
Starring: Daniel Craig, Eva Green

Bond movies have a special place in guys’ hearts. Whether it’s the exciting world of espionage, the fancy tuxedos, the clever gadgets, the infinite arsenal, the savvy attitude or the knowledge that you’ll always get the girl, I think most of us want to be 007. And so we tend to love these movies – good, bad or ugly. Lately, the series has been VERY ugly, with such horrid installments as Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day. Now that Pierce Brosnan has retired his cufflinks and will no longer reprise the role of Britain’s most beloved spy, Daniel Craig has the honor/challenge of filling the polished shoes of author Ian Fleming’s adored secret agent. There’s been some heavy internet backlash towards Craig playing Bond. Personally, I like the guy and think he fills the role quite nicely – he looks and acts the part. After seeing his performances in Layer Cake and Munich, I was convinced he’d do Bond justice. But it takes more than a good Bond to make a good Bond flick. So how does Casino Royale fare? Not spectacular, but definitely not bad.

The film takes a huge leap back in time as we start with Bond prior to his 00-status. Thanks to two rapid assassinations, he earns the title of 007 and gets his first assignment spying on a terrorist in Madagascar. After a brilliantly choreographed chase sequence (one of the best action pieces in cinema this year), things go somewhat awry, leaving MI6 rather infuriated at Bond. After independently following a lead to the Bahamas, Bond discovers that Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelson), a terrorist banker, is plotting to raise a large sum of money in a winner-takes-all poker game at Le Casino Royale in Montenegro. Bond is assigned to play against him by MI6, and the cards are drawn. Along the way he meets the sultry and mysterious Vesper Lynd (Eva Green, The Dreamers, Kingdom of Heaven) and finds himself playing additional games of a more libidinous nature.

As stated before, Craig is great as Bond. He carries himself about with a smug arrogance that’s altogether likeable. As this is Bond in his early years, he falters occasionally, showing varying weaknesses. But what’s interesting is watching him adapt – you get to see Bond learn his customary traits as the film progresses. Green is gorgeously cast as a Bond girl. She emotes a subtle vulnerability through her tough exterior and exhibits a very sexy sophistication that tends to be lacking in such a role. Dame Judi Dench is still very good as M, and Giancarlo Giannini and Jeffrey Wright give adequate performances. Mikkelson is effective as a Bond villain, but lacks any real third dimension. The rest of the cast (and some of the aforementioned characters) are too underdeveloped to note.

Martin Campbell, who helmed Goldeneye, directs with a very sophisticated and technically polished flair. The cinematography is vibrant, infused with hyperkinetic movements and dramatically kitschy angles. The movie makes decent use of the widescreen frame, and always displays a very epic scope.

The script, written by Neal Purvis and Robert Wade (who wrote The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day) and Paul Haggis (Crash), is mildly adequate. Dialogue is straightforward for the most part, with the occasionally snappy quotable moment. The problem for me was that the story is a little too disjointed and anticlimactic. There isn’t enough of a sense of immediacy about the plot, and aside from the opening chase (which I have to plug again – it RULES!), there isn’t a whole lot of action in the flick.

Among my favorite of moments are when Bond kills two baddies and returns to his suite to clean up, staring at himself in the mirror, affected by the morbidity of his line of work, and a scene where he realizes he’s been poisoned and rushes to his car where he gets instructions from MI6 on how to cure himself. Little moments like these give us a glimpse into the genesis of this iconic character, of how he evolved to such an immortal, larger than life status.

While still imperfect, I would by no means condemn this as a failed Bond film. Honestly, it’s the best and only good one since Goldeneye, which was the best installment featuring Brosnan (perhaps Campbell should continue to direct the series?). While everyone knows that Connery is and forever will remain Bond, Craig should rally many to his support with his freshman effort. Bond is here to stay, and Craig should be along for the ride for quite some time.

My Rating: B –