Casino Royale Review

Back when this film came out in 2006, there wasn't much hope for the future of Bond. The last few films had been train wrecks when it came to getting a good critical response. With the exception of Goldeneye and two or three Roger Moore films, there hadn't been a truly good Bond movie since Sean Connery gave up the role. That was all about to change. Eon Productions brought back Martin Campbell to direct Casino Royale, his last Bond film having been Goldeneye. What little hope there had been for Casino Royale was completely demolished when it was announced Daniel Craig would be playing Bond. It was a huge gamble. (No pun intended.)

The film opens in the classic Bond manner, with Bond on a random mission which leads into a chase. Once we finally get to the actual story, we learn that a gambler named Le Chiffre (I'm still not sure how that's accurately pronounced) is joining a high-stakes poker game, and Bond is sent to join the game and beat him. It's immediately evident that this will be a different type of Bond film. Despite the fact that the movie would seemingly be all story and no action, it maintains an excellent balance, injecting action when the story starts to slow down.

Perhaps the thing that separates this film so much from all other Bond movies is the emotion that Bond shows. After so many movies showing Bond to be a calm, emotionless killing machine, we're finally shown here that he does genuinely care about people, and it's only because of this fact that he's so cold. The romance between Vesper and Bond makes what would already be a fantastic movie simply incredible. Bond finally gives up his playboy lifestyle and genuinely falls in love, even deciding to quit his job to be with her. Basically, he's finally human, and that's why this movie ultimately succeeds on so many levels.

The acting is spot-on. Daniel Craig is easily the best Bond to have ever graced the screen. He portrays Bond as a scarred individual who still feels deeply, despite his outward appearance of being cold. Eva Green doesn't quite stand out to the degree Craig does, but she does a good job with the role she's given. The cinematography was top-notch, and the editing was excellent as well. The movie never feels unbalanced or poorly paced. David Arnold's score is pure brilliance. The action tracks don't necessarily stand out nearly as much as the more emotional ones, but they are certainly satisfactory. Perhaps the reason for this is because this movie is ultimately a prequel. Bond is not yet the agent we're so familiar with. He's more vulnerable and emotional.

Overall, this is a simply fantastic film. I would recommend it not only to Bond fans, but to fans of action movies in general. You won't regret it. 5 out of 5 Aston Martins from me.

Comments

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Oh, The Force Awakens, you really thought you could show up on the scene and not be polarizing. You were so wrong. Spoiler alert for anyone who, by some magic, hasn’t seen this movie yet, because I’m about to dissect the heck out of this film and also The Phantom Menace’s plot. Let’s jump right into the story. The evil First Order has tracked a map containing the coordinates of the location of Luke Skywalker to a planet, where the Resistance races against time to get the map first. The Resistance pilot going after the plans, Poe Dameron, is captured; his droid, however, escapes with the map. Sound familiar? Well buckle up, kids. Familiarity is about to slap us in the face. Repeatedly. From there, the pilot is rescued by a dude in stormtrooper armor (to be fair, he is a stormtrooper), Finn. He’s a traitor to the First Order, and together they escape. The droid with the map, meanwhile, has made his way to a young adult female (why ...

Tomorrow Never Dies

Tomorrow Never Dies boasts what may be the most absurd plot of any Bond film. The head of a media outlet tries to start wars in order to have a monopoly on the media coverage of them. If you can’t comprehend the absurdity of that, let me try to give another example. CNN starts World War 3 and has journalists in place to report these events before anyone else can, and no one on the face of the earth thinks that’s shady in any way, shape, or form except for MI6. The question we should all be asking ourselves is how the heck this movie managed to actually be kind of good with a plot like this. The opening sequence is not quite as exhilarating as we’ve come to expect from Brosnan Bond movies, but it’s competent enough. From there, we’re plunged directly into the story. The first act takes its time, explaining delicately in a detailed manner exactly what the media mogul’s plan is, and how he’s going to carry it out. His plot may be absolu...

Dunkirk

Let’s be honest. It doesn’t matter what a Christopher Nolan movie is about; if he directed it, we’re going to watch it. Dunkirk focuses on an actual historic event, a first for Nolan. He executes it beautifully. Also, this is spoiler-free. Dunkirk, like many (or maybe all?) of Nolan’s films, places emphasis on time. In Dunkirk, three story threads are followed, each occurring over a different duration of time, but all converging in the end. This can make for a slightly confusing or even frustrating (in parts) narrative, but most of the time it’s all relatively easy to follow. I’ve thought about it for quite some time, and I’m quite certain that is done both for the sake of heightened realism and tonal consistency. The three interweaving plot threads help greatly in keeping the story interesting, and all three’s contributions to growing intensity make for one of the most claustrophobic and uneasy films I’ve ever seen. Because o...

SkyWorld

Search This Blog