108 replies to this topic

[Mr. Arlington Beech]

GOLDENEYE utterly owns CASINO ROYALE.

The only reasonable explanation for this statement is that you are confusing GoldenEye 64 (the videogame) with the overrated movie of the same name, and then you're thinking of Casino Royale as a part of Quantum Of Solace The Game.

[Dustin]

GOLDENEYE utterly owns CASINO ROYALE.

The only reasonable explanation for this statement is that you are confusing GoldenEye 64 (the videogame) with the overrated movie of the same name, and then you're thinking of Casino Royale as a part of Quantum Of Solace The Game.

No, it's the tv CR he talks about.

[Guy Haines]

Extremely overrated. A disgrace to Fleming.

It depends what you mean by a disgrace to Fleming.

A few months ago I watched the first two Bond films, and it occurred to me "what would someone who had never seen a Bond film before but had read the Fleming books make of these?" Unlikely in this day and age, but in 1962/63 quite likely.

I think some fans of the Fleming novels, approaching the films in the way I suggest, might consider the Dr No, From Russia With Love and all the films that followed "a disgrace". The knowing humour, the throw away one liners, the cavalier re-writing of the plots from the novels, the casting of an ex milkman from Edinburgh as an agent with roots in Eton, Fettes and London's gentlemen's clubs - I can easily see how a reader who enjoyed the Fleming novels at face value might have been disappointed by the first Bond film, let alone the twenty first. Not a view I hold, I might add. Casting Sean Connery in 1962 was as inspired as casting Daniel Craig in 2006, and a touch of dark humour is one of the elements which make the films watchable.

As for CR 2006? Overrated? No, it isn't.

[Guy Haines]

GOLDENEYE utterly owns CASINO ROYALE.

How does GoldenEye utterly own Casino Royale? Discuss.

[Dustin]

Extremely overrated. A disgrace to Fleming.

It depends what you mean by a disgrace to Fleming.

A few months ago I watched the first two Bond films, and it occurred to me "what would someone who had never seen a Bond film before but had read the Fleming books make of these?" Unlikely in this day and age, but in 1962/63 quite likely.

I think some fans of the Fleming novels, approaching the films in the way I suggest, might consider the Dr No, From Russia With Love and all the films that followed "a disgrace". The knowing humour, the throw away one liners, the cavalier re-writing of the plots from the novels, the casting of an ex milkman from Edinburgh as an agent with roots in Eton, Fettes and London's gentlemen's clubs - I can easily see how a reader who enjoyed the Fleming novels at face value might have been disappointed by the first Bond film, let alone the twenty first. Not a view I hold, I might add. Casting Sean Connery in 1962 was as inspired as casting Daniel Craig in 2006, and a touch of dark humour is one of the elements which make the films watchable.

Bringing Fleming into the equation means moving the discussion on very shaky ground, as you've shown there, Guy Haines. To do so requires not only having read Fleming - in itself not a given with most fans any more - but also understanding him; an even scarcer trait seldom seen by those abusing his name for whatever bias. Fleming was anything but serious about his books, never short of a good-natured laugh at his own - or Bond's - expense, and frequently was his own best parodist. Having a lesbian character with the name of 'Pussy Galore' falling - perfectly out of the blue - for his hero should end all discussion about 'seriousness'. Fleming laughed at such pompous pretension, and with good reason. He first and foremost wanted his work to succeed, and succeed by entertaining the readers. Fleming wasn't squeamish about his choice of means to achieve that goal. He used the hard-edged thriller, but didn't feel above stooping to the 'Road to...' approach when necessary. And I have little doubt he was proud about either method's success.

Overall I think we have to be very cautious about what might have been a 'disgrace' in his eyes. I suspect the first thing he perhaps would mention himself would be ignorance, not a bad choice in my view.

[Guy Haines]

My point wasn't so much about Ian Fleming's view of his creation as what those who had read the books might have made of the first films. Those who treated them as face value thrillers with hardly any humour might have wondered what had happened in translation when the books became films. Others who treated the books as a bit of a parody of the espionage genre would have appreciated what the film makers had done almost immediately.

This was a point I think Mr Fleming appreciated - I've read where he was asked his opinion of the film Dr No. He replied that it was a wonderful film, although those who were expecting it to be exactly like the original novel might be a little disappointed. Which often happens when a book is translated to the silver screen.

[Dustin]

My last post didn't point in your direction at all, Guy Haines. Sorry if that came across the wrong way.

[jamie00007]

Reading through this topic has given me a laugh. It any other Bond film was held up to the ridiculous scrutiny in some of these posts somehow I dont think they'd stand up as well as CR. I was particularly amused by the "disgarace to Fleming" remark. Yeah, somehow if Fleming were alive I think he'd be a little more approving of CR than most of the other films after Thunderball.

To answer the question, no CR is not overrated. It is easily, in terms of writing, directing, acting etc, the best Bond film in at least 30 years. Probably more. It is also one of the few Bond films that can stand alone not just as a franchise movie but a great thriller just on its own.

[Major Tallon]

Reading through this topic has given me a laugh. It any other Bond film was held up to the ridiculous scrutiny in some of these posts somehow I dont think they'd stand up as well as CR. I was particularly amused by the "disgarace to Fleming" remark. Yeah, somehow if Fleming were alive I think he'd be a little more approving of CR than most of the other films after Thunderball.

To answer the question, no CR is not overrated. It is easily, in terms of writing, directing, acting etc, the best Bond film in at least 30 years. Probably more. It is also one of the few Bond films that can stand alone not just as a franchise movie but a great thriller just on its own.

Absolutely spot on.

[Miles Miservy]

I watched Quantum of Solace at a friends house today, and we had a bit of a Bond discussion and Casino Royale obviously popped up. Now, I've always been a massive fan of Casino Royale, and constantly praised it, but thinking about it carefully and the points my friend raised, I decided to rewatch it. Now, this is probably the first time in ages that I've watched Casino Royale giving it my full attention. I usually watch a film I've already seen whilst doing something else. I don't think I've ever watched Casino Royale since it's DVD release and totally, 100%, followed the story. So tonight, I sat down and watched with no distractions, and I've come to the conclusion, that Casino Royale might be quite overrated.

I'm just going to put my thoughts into bullet points because I'm rather tired and cannot be bothered to write in full paragraphs. Anyway...

• If you watch carefully, half of it doesn't make any sense.
• Why would Felix offer Bond all of his winnings, and say that "Does it look like we need the money?". Evidently yes, it does. Considering the whole Miami Airport affair, you would think that the CIA would need quite a lot.
• Why does it not bother Le Chiffre that the people who have threatened him have just been killed and thrown in a car boot? As he suspects Bond anyway, you would think that he'd see him as some kind of ally. The whole thing is never mentioned again.
• The whole thing with Bond and Dimitrios in the Art Gallery is just stupid. They follow eachother around for a bit then he stabs him and kills him. It wasn't intense, they were just staring at eachother.
• Something I've never really understood, but kept quiet about it. I don't understand how Bond suddenly thinks Mathis is a traitor, and I don't understand why in Quantum of Solace he thinks he isn't? It looks like Bond has just made assumptions and is going with them. This is probably the most confusing part about the entire movie. I always put it down to Mathis contacting Vesper at the Dinner Table instead of him. Considering Mathis was Bonds contact. But even if this was the case, it just doesn't make any sense, and just because he contacted Vesper, it still doesn't make Mathis a traitor. You'd think that both Mathis and Vesper had a rather close friendship during the Poker Game. Considering they were always together.
• The film itself is very uneven. I love the Pre Title Sequence, and I've never thought much of the Madagascar Chase, but I think the film only really picks up when Bond gets to the Casino. The entire final act is awfully paced and the entire first act is pretty much the same. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I find the pacing of Quantum of Solace to be a lot better, Casino Royale feels really loose in comparison. It kinda just feels overly long, and not tied together at all. The entire first half just feels like a filler.
• I don't think Eva Green was a good choice for Vesper, and this is the point that has bothered me the most. This is where I think the film failed. Casino Royale was trying to tell a love story, this was the main point of it. Bond falls in love and gets his heart broken. It just wasn't believable in the least for me. There's just something about Eva Green that's just wooden and cold and desolate. You would think that the producers would want to cast someone who you would naturally warm to so you could actually feel Bonds betrayal, as well as feeling sorry for Vesper at the same time. To me, Vesper just comes across as the 'bitch in the red dress'. I don't feel sorry for her at all, and it completely stumps me how Bond can fall in love with her. I didn't find it too belivable in the novel either. I felt much more sorry for Solange, and Fields for that matter. They were both in the wrong place at the wrong time and considering Vesper is the ultimate Bond girl for Bond, I felt no emotional connection to her at all.
• The dialogue in parts is really cringeworthy. "That's because you know what I can do with my little finger.", "Half Monk; Half Hitman!", "Ego Ego, Blunt Instrument.". The one liners are fine, and very witty, but the some of the dialogue is just... really out of place. I don't want to bang on too much about Quantum of Solace, but I really do find the flow of dialogue in there a lot better. I much prefer Camilles line to Bond about his prison being in his head to "I have to Armour left... You stripped it from me..."
• I also think that Martin Campbell has very little artistic flair. Granted he did out do himself on this film, compared to the likes of GoldenEye, but the cinematography wasn't anything brilliant, and very straight forward. The thing I really admire about Quantum of Solace was the interesting cinematography. It was full of interesting, beautiful shots. Yes, Casino Royale felt classic in terms of this, but some of it was just a little bit boring for me.

I really do feel that people overlook all of this, due to the fact that Casino Royale came directly after Die Another Day, and everything in this film was a massive step up from it. I do admire the production team for sucessfully bringing Bond back into the 21st Century and doing something different. The point I'm trying to make, is that Casino Royale, whilst a good film, maybe isn't as good as everyone makes it out to be. Don't get me wrong, I very much enjoy it, and probably rank it a low 4/5. I just think it's incredibly overrated. The only truly amazing parts of the film for me, is the PTS/Main Titles and then Bond at the Casino right up untill the torture sequence. The rest just feels like really uncessary padding. It could've been done a lot better, but it's good for what it is.

You strike me as one who is very taken with the details. With that in mind, I must ask your thoughts on the place settings at Bond's & Vesper's dinner. Or do you think that LeChiffre's all black tuxedo was too "over-the-top"? CASINO ROYALE is certainly not the first OO7 movie to take creative license and go a bit overboard to get a point across. That is one aspect that has allowed the films to endure... decade after decade.

CASINO ROYALE was the perfect vehicle with which to recharge the franchise's batteries. Like GOLDENEYE before it & THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS before that, CR is a well-balanced, 3-act play which (1st act) - AIRPORT SCENE - re-introduces the character and sets the plot in motion; (2nd act) - THE CARD GAME - re-establishes him in the most modern of contemporary settings and, (3rd act) - BETRAYAL OF LOVER - resets the standards & raises the bar new and improved villains & plots of evil.

As each new tenure of the OO7 mantle is endured, its shelf-life is determined by the growth and/or age (if you like) of the actor playing the lead. That being said, I doubt I'm alone in thinking that Pierce Brosnan stayed in for just one too many films (to be fair... I'm not blaming him for my disappointment in DAD. That was a film that shouldn't have been made). THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH would've been a fine send-off as his final adventure.

I don't think Timothy Dalton was given a fair opportunity to show off his OO7 chops. Were there no legal wranglings in the early 1990's, I think his 3rd outing, (whatever the script might've been) would've stood the test of time among Bondian lore. Six years in hiatus, however certainly allowed him to read the writing on the wall.

Many people squabble about the Bond career of Roger Moore and when the curtain should've come down. For me, I think his last & finest movie SHOULD have been FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. It was a gripping re-visit to what the spy-thriller USED to be. Make no mistake, I enjoyed OCTOPUSSY as well a A VIEW TO A KILL. I just cannot escape the sense that I might've enjoyed the last two even more if there wasn't this OLD GUY doing it.

So, where does that leave us w/Daniel Craig? He's given us two reasonably cool adventures; another promised this year, and is under contract for another two. Considering that OO7 movies are no longer cranked out with stringent 2-year timetable of the 1st three decades, will Mr. Craig's hand at the helm endure the length of his contractual obligation? Only time will tell us that.

Remember, you're only as good as your last movie.

...oh and, Pierce Brosnan got fired with a voicemail.

Edited by Miles Miservy, 17 September 2012 - 07:36 PM.

[DR76]

We all have our opinions on the movie. And none of us will ever agree anyway.

Remember, you're only as good as your last movie.

If that is the case, then I'm glad that Craig is still playing Bond.

[Gothamite]

I certainly don't consider it over-rated, not by a long shot. It's very much up there with the very best of the series. I've only noticed the lag in pacing in the third act in my most recent viewings (but the torture scene makes up for it). Perhaps the dialogue between Tracy and Bond at the rehab clinic is a bit off, but I never had a problem with any other aspects of the screenplay.

As for Vesper's death becoming sympathetic in the end, I think the filmmakers wanted to emulate the loss of Tracy in OHMSS and give Bond a similar character arc (and a motivation for revenge in the following film) moreso than the complete dismissal of Vesper in the novel.

I can't say enough about how much I love Daniel Craig as James Bond.

[Iceskater101]

Yeah I voted and said that this was rightfully placed. This was a great revitalizing of the series.

[seawolfnyy]

Rightfully placed. Loved it in 06 and still do. Although not as much as TSWLM, which is my all-time favorite Bond film.

[David_M]

I'm not really worried about whether CR is "overrated," my only concern with a film is whether I enjoy it, and I did enjoy CR. As for why it went over so well with general audiences, I think it's because it seemed so revolutionary and innovative an entry for a series that was getting so long in the tooth and mired in formula. Much as audiences seemed to like Brosnan (probably the "safest" casting in series history), I think most folks had long since given up on Bond films being anything other than what they had been since before many of us were born, and while that bred a certain degree of comfortable familiarity (indeed, we pretty much *demanded* it), it wasn't exactly a recipe for excitement. Which is to say, just by being so different -- yet somehow, surprisingly, also GOOD -- CR generated a lot of enthusiasm and hope that the series had some legs in it, yet.

That said, obviously it's not perfect. But if I expected perfection from Bond films, I'd have moved on to something else decades ago.

Here's a minor quibble I noticed the other day when watching the film: Bond gets the bomb-maker's phone and, using M's laptop, traces the last received call to a club in the Bahamas. Once at the club, and noticing the surveillance camera at the front of the building, he plays a hunch and sneaks a peek at the surveillance recordings, catching Dimitrios in the act of placing said call as he exits his Aston Martin. Now the first couple times I saw this, I was so amused by Bond's method of distracting the security guards, and so busy saying, "There's the DB-5!" that it never occured to me what an incredible, CSI-worthy stretch it is for Bond to decide that if the call was placed from the club, it must have been placed in the parking lot, in view of one particular security camera, and naturally he just happens to pick exactly the right one.

Also I have to wonder: isn't it just conceivable someone else in the club placed a call at the same time? And if he'd picked a recording of a camera in the bar, or the lobby, mightn't he have been just as likely to see someone else making a totally different call? Of course Bond is right all along, but there's really no reason he should be, beyond blind luck.

[Gothamite]

Here's a minor quibble I noticed the other day when watching the film: Bond gets the bomb-maker's phone and, using M's laptop, traces the last received call to a club in the Bahamas. Once at the club, and noticing the surveillance camera at the front of the building, he plays a hunch and sneaks a peek at the surveillance recordings, catching Dimitrios in the act of placing said call as he exits his Aston Martin. Now the first couple times I saw this, I was so amused by Bond's method of distracting the security guards, and so busy saying, "There's the DB-5!" that it never occured to me what an incredible, CSI-worthy stretch it is for Bond to decide that if the call was placed from the club, it must have been placed in the parking lot, in view of one particular security camera, and naturally he just happens to pick exactly the right one.

Also I have to wonder: isn't it just conceivable someone else in the club placed a call at the same time? And if he'd picked a recording of a camera in the bar, or the lobby, mightn't he have been just as likely to see someone else making a totally different call? Of course Bond is right all along, but there's really no reason he should be, beyond blind luck.

Those really are the kinds of things you can explain away with the assumption that for the sake of pacing, we're not seeing the entirety of events transpiring (maybe Bond pored through different security discs and we just happen to see that one, etc). Long story short, I don't care. Good point, nonetheless.

One thing I'd like to point out: people criticise the increased violence in the Craig films. I've always felt that the violence in the Daniel Craig films is far more in line with the violence that Fleming intended, as opposed to the violence-for-violence's sake in say LTK. None of the particularly violent scenes in CR are out of place in a Fleming novel, the way some of the Dalton-era scenes are ("Looks like he came to a dead-end!").

[seawolfnyy]

Save for the torture scene though, for the most part, Casino Royale is no more violent than any of the other films.

[Iceskater101]

^ Yeah I agree. The torture scene was bad, but I have seen worse.

[Judo chop]

Here's a minor quibble I noticed the other day when watching the film: Bond gets the bomb-maker's phone and, using M's laptop, traces the last received call to a club in the Bahamas. Once at the club, and noticing the surveillance camera at the front of the building, he plays a hunch and sneaks a peek at the surveillance recordings, catching Dimitrios in the act of placing said call as he exits his Aston Martin. Now the first couple times I saw this, I was so amused by Bond's method of distracting the security guards, and so busy saying, "There's the DB-5!" that it never occured to me what an incredible, CSI-worthy stretch it is for Bond to decide that if the call was placed from the club, it must have been placed in the parking lot, in view of one particular security camera, and naturally he just happens to pick exactly the right one.

Also I have to wonder: isn't it just conceivable someone else in the club placed a call at the same time? And if he'd picked a recording of a camera in the bar, or the lobby, mightn't he have been just as likely to see someone else making a totally different call? Of course Bond is right all along, but there's really no reason he should be, beyond blind luck.

I remember slow-mo’ing through this bit of investigation way back when, because I was concerned about this very same stretch of believability. Now, it’s been a loooong time since then, and I’ve had many, many strong drinks during that time, but I think I remember being satisfied upon a closer review. I think I remember the trace of the call being more specific than just the “club entire”. I think I remember Bond seeing the trace pinpointed directly outside the front doors of the club. So as he’s rooting through the files of camera footage, he knows exactly which camera’s footage he’s after.

Maybe someone can confirm that before I rewatch CR and do it myself.

But if I find myself standing corrected, well, hell… let’s call it a nod to MOONRAKER where Bond escapes death-by-waterfall, hang-gliding over miles and miles of untracked jungle, only to land just outside the backdoor of Drax’s hidden silo, which Bond would still never have spotted if it weren’t for that siren-like beauty just returning from her errands to kindly guide him in. Could happen.