Casino Royale is (a little) overrated
TheMagus
Posts: 13MI6 Agent
I’ve been wanting to write a critique of 2006’s Casino Royale for a while now. I’m going to begin with my criticisms. The first – and this is merely a result of personal tastes – is that they changed the central card game from baccarat – which carries with it connotations of class and sophistication – to the much more low-brow Texax Hold ‘Em Poker. In my personal opinion, they should have kept it as baccarat.
The second is that the film is too long. It is too long because the story isn’t told very effectively. Think about it. Why do we need to see Bond foil Le Chiffre’s scheme only to have him defeat him at poker later on? To call it contrived would be an understatement. And, yes, I am perfectly aware that the Bond films are known for being contrived, but this was just ridiculous. Then there’s the collapsing building finale.
Here's how the story should have played out. The film opens with the pre-title sequence of Bond earning his double-o followed by the main title sequence. After the titles, we get a briefing scene with M in which she explains who Le Chiffre is, what has happened to him, and what Bond’s mission is (AKA the traditional briefing). The film then occurs as normal from Bond’s first encounter with Vesper on the train until the aftermath of the torture sequence in the hospital. This is followed by a trip to Venice where Vesper kills herself using sleeping pills, Bond discovers her body, and informs M that “the bitch is dead.”
The third is that the film is completely inconsistent. We have all had it pissed in our ears about how “Daniel Craig looks like a killer” and how Casino Royale is “grittier and more realistic.” Total horseshit. The only reason Daniel Craig “looks” like a killer is because he has big muscles. Go back and watch some of the old tough guys like Steve McQueen, Clint Eastwood, or, yes, Sean Connery. They were genuinely believable as tough guys because they acted like tough guys.
And that’s not even mentioning the way the story plays out. Casino Royale is only “grittier and more realistic” when Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli aren’t at risk of losing any money. As a result, we get some very violent fight scenes and a brutal torture scene (trust me, I am complaining about neither), intermingled with some very piss-weak love scenes.
I know what a lot of you are going to say: “oh, if they put a sex scene or nudity in the film, the film would have gotten an R rating.” I have two responses to this. Firstly, would an R-rated, adult’s only Bond film really be so terrible? I for one would welcome such an enterprise.
And secondly, what I am referring to is the film’s attitude, not necessarily the inclusion of graphic sex scenes. I remember discussing this film with my uncle (who is also a Bond fan) and he pointed out that it is ridiculous to have Bond – an assassin who we are supposed to believe could slit your throat without batting an eyelid – cuddle Vesper in the shower. The entire film should have been permeated with a kind of cold inhumanity. James Bond is a cold-hearted killer – let’s never forget that.
Now, with all that said, do I hate Casino Royale? No, of course not. I happen to think that it is one of the better Bond films – not quite in my top five, but certainly within my top ten (I put it in seventh place in a ranking that includes Casino Royale 1967 and Never Say Never Again). Casino Royale does a superb job telling the story of how a man lost the last vestiges of his humanity. Fix a few of the problems I mentioned and this film would easily be in my top five.
Comments
Your paragraph about how the story should have played out drops most of the added material from the screenwriters and films the novel much more accurately. Was this your intention? Either way, I think you are right and this would have been a better approach, and retaining baccarat too.
It makes total sense to have Bond involved in Le Chiffre’s initial plan failing: I’m not sure why you wouldn’t do that. It is a film and I want to see LC get into his predicament, not just get told about it by M. And it is a Bond film, so I want to see Bond involved.
I get the issue about Poker, but it is a game that people do genuinely organise high stakes tournaments for, and it is a game of much more skill and variety than baccarat is. Baccarat is a little samey to watch and I’m not sure would have held as much attention in the film as poker does.
The only way I would say it is too long is the sinking house finale doesn’t really need to be there and feels like they added it because they think a Bond needs a big action climax, but I’m not sure the film wants to have one at that point
I agree with this. "Show, don't tell" is good cinema.
When it comes to Craig not looking like a killer I also disagree with TheMagus (sorry). I remember comments before CR came out about Craig looking too much like a henchman, bouncer or killer, Red Grant for example. I believe this was before the photos of DC with large muscles went public.
Yeah I'm not sure where he's going with that. Craig does move and behave like a believable tough guy to my eye. When I watch Brosnan now I do just feel that Bond is kind of missing.
The third is that the film is completely inconsistent. We have all had it pissed in our ears about how “Daniel Craig looks like a killer” and how Casino Royale is “grittier and more realistic.” Total horseshit. The only reason Daniel Craig “looks” like a killer is because he has big muscles.
I'm also not sure how this complaint about the reception to Craig's appearance, using quotes from where I'm not sure, has anything to do with the film being consistent or not.
Kinda agree with your opinion about this movie being overrated.
To be honest, I prefer how the novel told the story and even the structure
1. I don't liked the reboot with Bond being a 00 agent, in the books, it makes a lot more sense since it's the first book being published, but in the films, it's not, so, I think it doesn't makes a lot more sense, like it messed up with the continuity, I even have no idea where to put the whole Craig Era in the overall timeline, because it had its own separate continuity, but in the overall storyline or narrative, it gets convoluted, it's fine if they're setting it up for prequels of how he started and became the Bond that we all know in Dr. No onwards, but they've messed that up by adding SPECTRE and connected all of Craig Bond films, and make his era, a separate one from the Classic Continuity, now its weird watching all of the Bond films because the Craig Era felt too isolated, because there's this reboot thing instead of just being a prequel then proceed to the Classic Continuity, it would have been better had CR be the beginning of Bond's journey from him being a rookie, to him losing Vesper and learning his lesson, then him becoming an established Bond that we all know in Quantum of Solace, then doing basic missions in Dr. No onwards, but no, they've messed up.
2. Here, Vesper's betrayal could be smell miles away, because of how Vesper acted towards Bond, she's too abrasive to her, like I don't get but she's always criticizing Bond's ways, makes me sense her betrayal too early in the film, in the book she's almost elusive a la Kim Novak in Vertigo, she's acting innocent in the book which made it very hard to read her intentions, and when the plot twist happened, it's all the more shocking, because it's unexpected, and I'm not buying the romance in the film either, in the book, there's a development in their romance, from Bond underestimating and almost disliking Vesper to finally developing emotions for her, and falling in love with her when that sudden snap happened.
3. Vesper's death in the book was simple, yet more melancholic than the film, I'm sad when Vesper died in the book, because the ambience was silent, simple, yet there's an air of melancholy, there's Bond grieving and reading Vesper's note, in the film, I'm not that sad to be honest, because the mood was suddenly diverted to the action scenes, and there's also this CGI sinking building, like the supposed to be sad mood became exciting and tense.
4. And speaking of Vesper's death, in the book, it changed Bond for the better, he became more respectful of women in the next following books because of his regret over Vesper's death, he learned to work with them, he became this hopeless romantic because of him longing for love that he felt when he was with Vesper, Vesper opened Bond's heart for love, he learned to love because of Vesper, that's why he fell in love with many bond girls in the books after Vesper's death, he learned a lesson from Vesper's death.
In the film, it changed him for the worse, never to trust woman, actually it's the opposite of what happened to him in the books that from being a cold hearted to being a softer gentleman, in the films, Vesper's death made him more colder, brutal, and stoic, it changed him for the worse that never to bring baggage, never to love again.
5. Baccarat is a lot more to understand than Poker really, it's not confusing, Fleming explained the Baccarat clearer, reading the book makes me understand the plot more than the film where I was confused and at some point, it's slow paced that it's a bit of a snoozefest, there's no tension felt in the film, but the book made the tension more tighter, that it kept me to my seat.
6. I liked that it's Bond who's explaining all of his moves to Vesper in the book, makes a lot more sense than having it Felix Leiter in the film
But you know what makes taint CR for me, was the later interconnected storylines, since I've watched the whole Craig Era, watching CR again, I can't help but to think of it as a part of Blofeld's revenge against Bond.
Even the action scenes at the beginning, I still don't understand, it's confusing if I'm analyzing the plot.
It's not a perfect film (but few are, and it's probably the closest the Bond franchise gets in my opinion). But it's an improvement on the novel in most ways IMHO. I do not need to see Bond grousing about his office or waxing poetic about his idiosyncratic preferences in food.
More importantly, it's a film adaptation aimed at a large audience. Hence poker (played by most of the world) vs baccarat. The book is woefully short on action, which the movie rightly compensates for with its opening sequences.
And the action has a narrative point!
1.) The PTS establishes Bond as a new 00.
2.) The Madagascar sequence defines his character through action—no small feat that!—by showing him outwitting, outfighting, outlasting a physically superior opponent. And his carelessness in blowing up the embassy "shows without telling" that he is the loose cannon M later describes him as being.
3.) The Miami sequence, while not my favorite, puts the rest of the story into motion. LeChiffre has no reason to organize a desperate card game unless he is about to be hacked to pieces by his machete wielding clients. Miami establishes the stakes for him: win or die.
The movie obviously changes pace on the train to Montenegro and while I love the building of tension that follows, I can appreciate that Eon and its studio masters worried that all the card stuff would feel slow to the millions of moviegoers with teeny-tiny attention spans.
As for Vesper's death, I am glad for how it's handled in the film. The cinematic CR is a tragedy. Bond, the budding sociopath, has a brief opportunity to find love and escape becoming his worse self. But he is foiled by the organization we learn later to be Spectre. Instead he becomes the emotionally short-circuited assassin of the subsequent movies. In this telling he becomes a much more real and, as I said, tragic hero.
magus said:
the film is too long.
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it is a bladderbuster when watched in one sitting at the cinema, as was the last one. But it came out at a point where fewer people were watching films in the cinema and more were watching on dvd. Lord of the Rings had recently been released on dvd as three expanded editions, adding up to over ten hours, and I usually invest a whole week to watch that one. meaning people watch these films differently at home than they do at the cinema.
Casino Royale has a perfect break point exactly half way through, when M meets him after the airport sequence and delivers the exposition needed to set up the second half. I always watch it over two nights. Think of it as two films filmed at the same time. The two halves have very different tones and paces as well.
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magus said:
It is too long because the story isn’t told very effectively. Think about it. Why do we need to see Bond foil Le Chiffre’s scheme only to have him defeat him at poker later on?
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if I get a chance, I will dig up the link to info on Ben Hecht's abandoned script for a midsixties serious Casino Royale. it was structured the same way, except the first half was about le Chiffre's bordellos. I think you woulda liked it if you wanted more sex content, as there were to be fight scenes in the bordellos. The actual "funny" version finally made is also structured the same way, again with more traditional fights and explosions after the cardgame and torture ends
the Climax Mystery Theatre version was the only one that confined itself to the structure of the book
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magus said;
it is ridiculous to have Bond – an assassin who we are supposed to believe could slit your throat without batting an eyelid – cuddle Vesper in the shower. The entire film should have been permeated with a kind of cold inhumanity. James Bond is a cold-hearted killer – let’s never forget that.
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but thats the whole point of Fleming's book:. Bond is a cynical tuffguy who thinks girls are silly nuisances always hanging onto your gunarm, he's planning to seduce Vesper after he complete the mission as a reward to himself, thats all she's good for. Then after nearly getting castrated (and thinking the world might not be black and white as he'd previously believed), he instead falls hard for her, thinking of women in a very different, making himself more vulnerable. Only to find out she's been a double all along, he's made a mistake by letting down his guard, thus resolving his life mission to fight SMERSH.
I think the film does a decent job of covering Fleming's intended character arc, its just that shower scene comes earlier than the torture scene. but that might arguably be an improvement
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EDIT: here is Jeremy Duns's article on the unfilmed Ben Hecht screenplay for Casino Royale
Duns also wrote a followup article on Joseph Heller's unfilmed draft
They had Bacharach in the first Casino Royale though, I think they were trying to do something different.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
I have to disagree in retaining baccarat as the game. Baccarat is a complete game of luck, no skill involved at all, it’s the same as Blackjack in that there are a set if rules to follow depending on what cards are dealt and then what you should do afterwards - draw or stick. Poker is a game of skill where even the worst hand can win if you can bluff your way to making the other players fold or make them believe that they are holding better cards than yourself. It certainly made CR a better movie, even if the actual hands shown were convoluted and the usual cinematic string betting calls were used which are not allowed in real games. Also, good players would be betting differently from what they did, but the film has to add tension and it did it very well, even if it was inaccurate.
😀😀😀 John Barry was asked, but refused.
Yeah I completely agree: Poker makes it way more interesting and gives the players something to do and actually take charge of their own game. Baccarat would have been much duller to watch, as you may as well be playing snap or tossing a coin. I want to see Bond be clever and expert at something.
As for the complaint about it not being classy enough: I can see that, but then in the next book Fleming had Bond playing Bridge, which is more associated with old ladies in care homes than it is international playboys! 😀
I think we do get a quick clip of Born Free though, so he made an appearance whether he wanted to or not 😁
😀😀😀
David Arnold was not too bad 😉
As for CR being too long, I catch myself skipping the Miami Airport sequence on replays.
I know that it costed a lot of money and it showed one of Le Chiffre‘s moves, but it really doesn‘t excite me
Dalton - the weak and weepy Bond!
Nice to have you back being wrong about things, Higgins! 😃
While I feel @TheMagus is being a trifle harsh, I do understand his points. I also consider some of the reactions here very valid. CR isn't a dull film for me, chiefly because I am engaging with the characters much more. However I do find the Miami sequence a mite tedious. It always seemed laughable that Le Chiffre manages to set up this 'high stakes poker match in Montenegro' virtually overnight. Fleming's brothel idea, while being discomforting, feels more realistic and MI6 has time to infiltrate the game. For the film, perhaps Mollaka could have held some financial information which becomes obsolete once the British get it, costing Quantum millions. This removes the terrorist angle completely, so for modern [2006] eyes perhaps it wouldn't be topical enough. I can understand why the filmmakers wanted a bigger bang, as it were. While I am not so bothered poker being exchanged for baccarat, I dislike the disruption of the game for two incidents that almost kill Bond; one would have been plenty. I enjoy the ending in Venice. I think the film needed some vivid excitement at this point. It had slowed almost to a stop. Perhaps though a grandstandingly chaotic collapsing palazzo was a step too far.
I just remember watching it for the first time and being so caught up in the drama between Bond and Vesper (and something that tense hadn't really been done in a Bond film before) that the sinking building fight felt like it was actually getting in the way of the real meat of the film.
I'm surprised how few people enjoy the Miami scene; I think it's a great bit of action. And the whole plot of the film hinges around it, which most action scenes don't do.
Yes @emtiem I think you are right about the palazzo, it doesn't sit right in the manner the film was progressing. If this had been, for instance, something Le Carre had proposed, there is no way he'd have allowed such an elaborate ending. The Bond-Vesper relationship does feel as if it is a tragedy in waiting [even though I know it] and the action here feels somewhat over the top for that tragedy. It is a difficult one to call because in terms of pure action/adventure, a Bond film needs a satisfying thrill-a-second climax.
Miami, well, I think in the past I have written that the sequence felt too much like something Arnold or Bruce would have done. It's a very long suspense/action scene, if you take it right back to Bond leaving Solange in the hotel.
I take your point that it serves a purpose to the overall plot, but I do wonder why it had to feel so much like a reimagining of the parqourt chase, with Bond throwing himself about and destroying stuff, or maybe that's just me.
As everyone on this thread probably already knows, the scene in Venice was devised by Paul Haggis who was brought in to look at Wade and Purvis' treatment and told the producers 'It looks like you don't have a third act - would you like me to do something?' 'Yes please!' they said and so it is, the Vesper drowning scene awfully like the video to Duran Duran's Come Undone. It does end the film with a bang. However, I agree with the poster who suggested it's a film of two halves, I mean really I think the whole thing would work better as a four-part serial or more, it just doesn't pace as a movie for me, there's too much to cover.
Haggis was rewarded by being offered first dibs on QoS and a cool million for his trouble - the script got rejected because it dealt with Vesper's child from a previous relationship and it ended with Bond leaving it in the good care of a Romanian orphanage - doubly outrageous what we know about such places now (though I can't vouchsafe for any care home in the UK frankly).
Roger Moore 1927-2017
What I don't get is why Vesper needs to act so abrasive towards Bond, it's easy to smell her betrayal miles away, I don't get why she needs to criticize Bond's ways, she's so antagonistic towards him that her betrayal in the end wasn't suprising unlike in the book, where her innocence covered her betrayal, that it's unexpected.
And again, I don't get the reboot thing, they've already done the transition from Moore to Dalton before, but why make it different with Craig? Doesn't makes sense to me, I actually think it's just played as a part of the trend at the time with several films also went for a reboot at the time, Casino Royale could've continued from where Die Another Day left with still the same Bond, now it messed up with the continuity.
Like what I've said before, I have no problem with it before if they've made it as some sort of prequel to the Classic Bond, about how Bond started, typical like Bond Begins, with him as a beginner to him finally becoming the famous Bond we know in Dr. No onwards, but no, instead, they've made Craig as a separate series on its own, and the criticisms of killing him in NTTD doesn't makes sense to me because I think he's not the Bond of the Classic Films, he's a different Bond from the others, some even think that Craig's Bond is the son of Connery's Bond, look how it messed things up?
It would've been better had they made CR and QoS and SF a prequel, instead of adding that with SP and NTTD nonsense.
CR - Bond as a beginner 00, a rookie, fell in love with Vesper.
QoS - Him finding a solace for Vesper's death, learning his mistake.
SF - Back to basics mission, Judi Dench M died, Male M (Ralph Fiennes) was here! There's Q and Moneypenny again.
And that's how James Bond happened, now start watching Dr. No onwards, it makes sense.
And I also don't liked how Vesper's death changed Bond for the worse, it makes him much more colder and brute, and distrustful.
Vesper's death in the books changed Bond for the better, as it made him appreciate women rather than just belittling and underestimating them, and it made him a bit softer that he fell in love with almost every Bond Girl in the books to cover his grief, his pain from losing Vesper, Vesper thought Bond how to love, Bond learned his lesson of respecting women.
Personally I can’t find any fault with CR. I just wish Spectre and NTTD were even half as good.
“It is a difficult one to call because in terms of pure action/adventure, a Bond film needs a satisfying thrill-a-second climax.”
I always tend to look at Mission Impossible Rogue Nation, where a big action climax was planned, but they realised it’s just not where the film was going, and it became about simply trapping the baddie in a glass box instead. And even though MI is a series arguably more built around action than Bond is, they had the guts to allow the film where it wanted to go. Whereas with CR I think they felt that a Bond film needs a big silly bit of overblown action and forced it to happen, and I just don’t think it did need it.
I also think that child-of-Vesper plot created a massive problem, as it meant that Vesper committed suicide knowing that she was leaving her child in danger in the hands of the baddies, and that’s tougher to swallow than most of it.
Breaking down the story elements of what needs to happen at the end of CR, the climax becomes ever more over-the-top.
There are hundreds of ways to have executed these plot points with suspense, drama, and pathos that didn't involved sinking a Venice palazzo. It didn't help that the practical effects were so bad. But Campell and Eon did what they did. And at least we got Gettler being shot through the eye with a nail gun.
And of course they did even try to do Fleming's thing of Bond using his wristwatch as a knuckle duster.
I also just don't believe that a building can just sink down that far- how deep are Venice's canals supposed to be? And without collapsing either. Bond films are silly and that's fine, but that is very silly 😁
I think they did do the knuckle duster thing but it didn’t make the final cut.
https://www.ajb007.co.uk/discussion/45968/casino-royale-seamaster-as-a-knuckle-duster
Yes, as I say, they did try to do it but it mostly got trimmed out. I think there's a shot or two remaining where you can see it on his hand but they are more artefacts of something which got removed.
The latter treatment of CR does seem to have Bond as a beginner @MI6_Headquarters but such a concept was mooted in the late 80s (albeit not in any Casino Royale film) until it was realised that acc to Cubby the main appeal of Bond is that he's a man who knows a thing or two, audiences don't want to see him as a fledgling. But screenwriter Haggis was saying before Craig was cast that it was for a guy in his late 20s, learning the ropes and that's how the final draft reads, with M saying 'I knew it was too soon to promote you' or Bond trying to pick up that brunette outside the hotel where he seems a bit unsure, or trying on his tux or sorting out his drink, or even being mistaken for a car valet - these all suit the Henry Cavill actor but not Craig.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
I think it's quite clever how they did it: Bond was still the self-assured, unstoppable character we want him to be, but just had to learn to balance out the arrogant and dangerous sides of his personality with a touch of maturity a little more.
While CR was being made I hoped for an ending even closer to Fleming. That meant Bond finding Vesper after her suicide by pills. Then he phones M, delivers the line: "The b*tch is dead" and then hanging up. Finally the camera pulls away as Bond sits alone taking it all in.
I would still like to see this version of CR, the story as a dark cold war thriller. But James Bond movies aren't dark thrillers, they are big budget action-adventure movies at heart. That's why I think the ending we got was a good one. I'd prefer it if the "the b*tch is dead" line was given more punch, but I still like the movie's ending a lot.
I think coming out of James Bond's mouth, especially after we've seen him actually falling in love for the first time in 35 years, gives it quite a bit of punch anyway to be fair. And cleverly it still manages to give us a punch-the-air moment to leave the cinema with, something I guess it's arguable that NTTD (and OHMSS in fact) could have tried a bit harder to do.