Bond was reeling after the disaster that was Die Another Day. Though the film was a financial success and something that wasn't critically savaged the way I did earlier this week (EW, in its infinite wisdom, gave the film an A-), I'm not sure anyone was clamoring for another Brosnan film. His time was done. The movie landscape was changing (blockbusters were becoming dark and brooding), and someone needed to intervene and bring Bond into the new millennium.
My first reaction when I found out the next Bond film would be Casino Royale—the title of the very first Ian Fleming novel—was a hearty groan. Origin stories rarely age well, and it seemed like a pretty transparent attempt to rejuvenate the series for one film before falling back on the same old shit for its follow-up.
But there were signs of hope. Daniel Craig was a choice I dug. Blond hair be damned, the guy was a great actor, and his brutish charisma harkened back to Connery in what seemed to be a very promising way. Martin Campbell proved more than capable of crafting a fun, exciting Bond film with Goldeneye. And the writing staff was getting a boost of prestige with the scorching-hot Paul Haggis coming on as an advisor.
I remember anxiously checking RottenTomatoes for signs of reviews weeks before the film actually premiered in 2006. It was one of my first full years as a big-time cinephile (I was a freshman in college, incidentally), and Casino Royale was far and away my most anticipated movie of the year. When the reviews actually started showing up, and I saw ripe tomato after ripe tomato populate the film's page, I was ecstatic. And they weren't just positive reviews; They were straight-up raves. Amazing.
I couldn't possibly have been more excited when I settled into my seat the night before Thanksgiving 2006. Two and a half hours later (it's the longest Bond film by a small margin over OHMSS), I was stunned. This wasn't just a great Bond movie; It was a legitimately fantastic film. I honestly never thought a 007 adventure could be that good. I saw Casino Royale two more times that weekend and managed to squeeze in two more theatrical viewings later in its run. It's holds my personal record for most theatrical viewings of a single film.
The film opens in glorious black and white as Bond officially earns his "double-0 status." He must make two kills, and though one is a bloody mess, he succeeds, and the film cuts to Chris Cornell's killer title anthem, "You Know My Name".
There are three pretty distinct sections in the film. The first is mostly setup, but it contains the film's two standout action sequences—a stunning parkour sequence on a construction site in Madagascar and a brutal race against time to stop a bomb at the Miami airport. Later, Bond travels to Montenegro for a battle of wits at the poker table against LeChiffre (Mads Mikkelson), a banker who finances many of the world's worst terrorists. For the final third, Bond recovers from a very uncomfortable torture scene and forms a deep connection with Vesper Lynd (Eva Green), a government accountant who accompanied him to the Casino Royale.
I'll often compare the film to On Her Majesty's Secret Service because of the way it ends (Vesper, we learn, had betrayed Bond earlier in the film and dies while trying to set things right), but what Campbell and his team do here is infuse the tragedy of the Lazenby vehicle with crisper action and a more modern plot. The film's final note isn't nearly as tragic (because we get just a little more time to establish the character and set up the next film), but it works because Craig and Green have incredible chemistry and the romance angle is given time enough to breathe.
This is just a much different film than we've grown accustomed to, especially considering neither Q nor Moneypenny makes an appearance. M is on-hand (Judi Dench is the only holdover from the Brosnan era), but Casino Royale strays from the formula in ways no other Bond film has.
You could say the same thing about the film's follow-up (and the most recent James Bond film as of this publish date), Quantum of Solace. It's a true sequel—something the franchise has, surprisingly, never done before. And while it's nearly undone by some abysmal editing and shaky-cam action scenes, the continuation of the Vesper storyline takes Bond to places dark and interesting enough to forgive some of director Marc Forster's egregious missteps.
The action picks up literally 20 minutes or so from the conclusion of Casino Royale. Bond is speeding away from Mr. White's (Jesper Christensen) home with the man in the trunk of his car and a whole host of baddies with guns on his tail. Though it's impossible to tell thanks to the piss-poor camerawork and editing, Bond seems to get away relatively unharmed, and after a bizarre Alicia Keys/Jack White title song, M (still Dench) enters the picture and the official interrogation of Mr. White begins.
"We have people everywhere," the man says just before one of the anonymous agents on MI6 security detail whips out his gun and starts shooting up the room. After another incomprehensible chase, Bond goes rogue trying to figure out who exactly these "people" are and how could MI6 not know about them until now. His hunt takes him from Haiti to Austria and finally Bolivia, and along the way, he meets a beautiful woman (Olga Kurlyenko's Camille) with emotional scars not unlike his and an environmental billionaire with a sketchy business history (Mathieu Amalric's Dominic Green).
The title of the film relates both to the mysterious organization White and Green belong to and Bond's attempt to make sense of what happened to Vesper. The two connect tangentially, and though the explanation stretches believability, the road there is quality stuff, and Craig sells it brilliantly. He's not quite working on the level he did in Casino Royale, but a lot of that has to do with not having someone as good as Eva Green to work alongside him. Olga Kurylenko looks great, but the character is as flat as a pancake. Gemma Arterton has a similarly flat character, but at least she brings a good amount of charisma to the plate as fellow MI6 agent Strawberry Fields. Then, there's Amalric—one of the best actors in the world—who lacks the menace necessary to play a Bond villain.
That's Quantum of Solace. I'm rather mixed on it (probably more mixed than any other Bond film), but overall, despite Forster's best efforts, I give it a pass.
Casino Royale—Shaken
Quantum of Solace—Shaken
I've now gone through all 22 films. All that's left is my Bond Top 5s and a filmography post ranking each film in order of preference. Look out for that later this week!
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