A sure thing
Daniel Craig restarts the ailing Bond franchise with the first story told by author Ian Fleming. A more serious take on the Bond character, who is getting started in this film, it’s a darker take on Bond’s life.
Newly promoted to ’00’, thanks to two kills, James Bond finds himself assigned to bring in a bomb maker hired by an outside organization that hasn’t been known to the MI6 group. When Bond ends up killing the man, and nearly being un-promoted, he goes on a hunt for this organization that is funding terrorism for profit. What he runs into is a man named Le Chiffre who gets his money from gambling with terrorist’s funds. When Bond disrupts one of Chiffre’s investments, Le Chiffre has to start a poker game at the Casino Royale with the stakes at $10 million dollars. If Le Chiffre wins the tournament, he keeps funding terrorism. Bond is the only one who can beat the masterful card player at his own game and stop a good chunk of terrorism, while getting closer to the unknown organization that hired Le Chiffre to hold money.
The story itself is solid. It is believable in every way and quite frightening if you think about it. Unlike previous Bond films, Casino Royale truly brings a realistic aspect to the franchise. How is the different from the other films? No gadgets. Not only no gadgets with Bond, but also no gadgets with the villains. Economics is the weapon in this new Bond film and it works so very well. With such a solid story, and a new direction that doesn’t include gadgets, the filmmakers and writers can completely focus on the characters. And guess what? That’s exactly what they did.
The characters in Casino Royale are probably the strongest ever in the Bond franchise. Typically, Bond himself is one-dimensional. He likes women, he likes drinking and he kicks ass. Here he brings intensity to that kick-ass, he brings a personality that is cold and unloving (which is perfect for a professional killer) and he clearly shows his intentions with women (treating them like objects ) without remorse or suave. It’s a very-well developed character. As for the villain, he’s unforgiving and driven. He isn’t your typical Bond villain as he doesn’t reveal his hand (in cards or in plans) and is sipmly ready to kill. Finally, the typical Bond love interest is very unusual. Played by Eva Green (who is just gorgeous to begin with) as accountant Vesper Lynd who is not helpless, she’s not lost in Bond’s eyes, she develops a solid relationship with Bond through awkward intentions and doesn’t let him in as much as he doesn’t let her in. In other words, she’s a very strong character.
So with a strong script, solid characters and no gadgets, what does that make Casino Royale? The perfect Bond film.
Blu eyes to lose yourself in
I didn’t purchase the first Casino Royale, as I was lucky enough to get to review it, but it isn’t as good as this one. While you get the same perfect audio and visuals on this Blu-ray (and they are perfect), there’s more here than meets the eye.
The features really take advantage of the Blu-ray format. Not only the BD Live feature, which is cool, but the slew of featurettes that are packed beautifully on the second disc in the collection. Each featurette is enormous, no less than 30 minutes a piece. You get every bit of information about the production, from the airport scene breakdown to how the hell they made a building sink in Venice. If you watched the film and wondered how it all went down, more than likely the features contain the answer. On top of this, you get some featurettes that include such things as how the stunts were performed and how Craig obtained the role of James Bond. There’s more reasoning than you think. All-in-all, these features are perfect (rocking menus, by the way!). Here’s what you get:
-Picture-in-Picture commentary
-Crew commentary
-Ultimate James Bond Quiz
-Deleted Scenes (New ones)
-The Road to Casino Royale
-Ian Fleming’s Incredible Creation
-James Bond in the Bahamas
-Ian Fleming: The Secret Road to Paradise
-Death In Venice
-Becoming Bond documentary
-James Bond: For Real documentary
-Bond Girls are Forever
-The Art of the Freerun
-Catching A Plane: From Storyboard to Screen
-Storyboard sequence – Freerun Chase
-Filmmaker Profiles
-Music Video: Chris Cornell’s “You Know My Name”