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But I think the particular direction of CR and QOS could have well been a different one - had Cavill come out ahead of Craig. I don't think it's a given that the product had to be such a marvellous film as CR turned out to be (despite still having its own problems), and obviously Eon was not so sure about their own courage, or the tacked on action pieces wouldn't have been necessary and the QOS concept would have been developed during CR. I think CR with Henry Cavill would have been an entirely different film, despite the same director and a largely similar script and cast.
Certainly, a Cavill film would have felt very different. With Craig at least you get a hybrid, compromise Bond; a world-weary looking man of the world behaving like an arrogant youth and talking the kind of rubbish - see particularly the Vesper train scene - only an youthful idiot would emote. None of this sits well with Craig, at his best when the "Bond before he was Bond" crap isn't around: the meeting with Mathis, the card games, the post-game meal with Vesper, etc
Clearly, EON had a script which really was intended for a young Bond, Cavill or someone else like him. Whether there wasn't time to remove these references when Craig was cast, who knows? But it makes you wonder how much of a dead cert Craig's casting was and whether the idea of going with a much younger actor wasn't what EON had in mind before chickening out at the last minute...
And yes, the more one watches CR, the more out of place and uneccessary the action pieces before Montenegro are. And, of course, both the Madagascar and Miami airport scenes do little to differentiate indesctructible Craig-Bond from the equally ludicrous Brosnan-Bond.
David, I have some sympathy with your observations on Craig ("a world-weary looking man of the world behaving like an arrogant youth", etc.), and, yes, I'm pretty certain that the CASINO ROYALE screenplay was originally geared very much towards a twentysomething Bond.... but I suspect that if the film had been made with Cavill it would have overflowed with the sort of teenage angst more suitable for TWILIGHT.
In which case, I think Craig's "hybrid" Bond ended up saving the film, because at least he also injected some masculinity, toughness and world-weariness that I simply cannot imagine Cavill or any of the other young hopefuls being able to summon.
Sure, there are some "youthful idiot" aspects to Craig's Bond that seem a little awkward.... but he also brings plenty of Conneryesque alpha male-ness to the table. Without him, I suspect that CASINO ROYALE would have overdosed on youthful idiocy and embarrassing "emotion".
