Casino royale - thoughts? (aside from the poker)

[Stelvask]

For those of you who saw this flick (especially those of you who are bond fans), i'm curious what you thought about it.

[Molina]

[Xaston]

[Felonius_Monk]

I liked it a lot but the editing is a little lazy. They could easily have trimmed a little fat from it and it would've felt a lot tighter and less waffley. A couple of characters and set pieces were a bit needless.

The series needed a reboot desperately and I think they've gone very much the right way about it - Craig's bond is much more believable and so far he's up their with Dalton and Connery as my favourite Bonds. Suggestion the character was going to be more like the Bond in the novels was untrue IMO, he was very different from previous Bonds and yet also very different from the Bond in the novels (which I didn't think would work well in a modern-day blockbuster anyhow).

They're basically trading on the big-selling name of Bond to spend a lot of money and yet produce a good film, which is a nice way to do things. It's worked well lately with other "big name" franchises too, where they've gone for the "trade on the name whilst making the film less of a typical blockbuster and thus much more interesting" like the batman reboot, and to a lesser extent the x-men films (1 and 2 anyhow).

The Eva Green character was terrific and for me she totally stole the film, which is very un-Bond-like; a not typically attractive (but still v beautiful) Bond girl who has more screen charisma and presence than Bond himself. Usually they're very one-dimensional but throughout the film I wanted to know more about both her AND Bond, so the two characters felt like the had more depth to them, which made the relationship more believable.

Some of the action set pieces were a little disappointing, the fight in the Venitian building at the end being especially dull, like they kind of ran out of ideas. The action pieces with the most impact were the Parkour chase at the start (absolutely brilliant! One of the best ever action sections in a Bond film, I was genuinely on the edge of my seat when they were on the cranes) and the bit where he's drowning the guy in the bathroom in the cold open.

I was surprised that all the product placement didn't seem to bother me as much as it had in the last few films. The contrast between the gritty visual aspect of this film, and the realism of many of the scenes, and the dreadful paper-thin cartoon visuals (and laughably bad special effects at two bits of the film) in die another day is striking, and I think that meant that when they were pushing Sony Ericson phones or whatever it looked more natural than in previous Bond films. The only cheesy bit was Bond driving a Ford in the Bahamas. James Bond does not drive a f'ing Ford, people....

Anyway, all in all I liked it, though I think they may have to take the "new" Bond in a different direction to make the forthcoming films interesting (they're still basically action films, albeit with a bit more depth in the "new" reboot, so re-running the same set pieces from Casino Royale in a similar story with a similarly cold and unlikeable Bond will get tired quickly - Bond needs to grow and change as the films go on, and they need to get the balance between tight action and narrative right in the next one, which could be a tough balancing act). The new Bond himself was only especially likeable in the scenes with Green, and even then Craig seems a bit cold and distant (he's like that in every film I've seen, so although the new Bond is MEANT to be cold and calculating, he's maybe not the ideal actor to play an anti-hero as he doesn't have that rebellious or interesting streak in the portrayal that makes audiences root for other tough/nasty hero characters. The stark violence probably doesn't help either). I thought he was very believable though and I like him a lot more than the absolutely one-dimensional Brosnan, who I thought was a crap Bond once you got past the fact he looked the part - kind of Roger Moore but without the comic timing and cheekiness. I'll be interested to see what they're gonna do with him now.

Anyone know what the next film is set to be? The problem with covering a lot of the books in a modern day setting is that most of them are anachronistic now (i.e. a lot of the best ones were set in the cold war - they even changed Casino Royale loads). IMO the best place to go with the new Bond character is a (guess it would have to be radically different) remake of the Man With The Golden Gun. That would have the potential to be absolutely kick-ass....

[Felonius_Monk]

[Felonius_Monk]

[SebQtaneus]

Question for you Bond AND engineering folks out there, were we supposed to believe that the Venetian building was floating on airbags?

[Felonius_Monk]

[kennyg]

[Xaston]

[black_knight6]

Great bond movie...seemed to have more story and less 'unbelievable' moments...the opening chase was really well done IMO.

The funniest part was the straight flush on the end when Shob and I obviously knew what he had before they were turned over, when the 57s flips a FEW people went 'oooooh', then when the cards were put into the flop, a slightly larger group when 'oooooh', then when the dealer announced straight flush, 60% of the audiance went 'OHHHHHHHH' (not, ooooooh, but ohhhhh)...and the rest had to ask the others what a straight flush meant

[Beavis68]

[Felonius_Monk]