Film: Casino Royale.
There are two questions which must be asked when considering a new James Bond movie:
For Casino Royale, more than any other Bond outing, it is the second question which has become a major concern. Daniel Craig, the new James Bond, fairly drips with boyish charm, and one glance at his face will tell you that comparisons to Steve McQueen are inevitable. This has caused many to wonder if Casino Royale is really a James Bond film at all.
In order to answer that question completely, it is first necessary to visit another long standing American franchise: Batman. By the early 1980s, Batman was a franchise which had grown somewhat stale, and which had disolved over a period of years into self-parody, helped along by the campy 1960s TV show of the same name. Sound familiar? By 1986, when Frank Miller introduced "The Dark Knight Returns", the franchise was well overdue for a revamp. Batman remained moderately popular due to one simple fact: Batman is, was, and will always be an iconic archetype, a simple formula which appeals to everyone at the gut level. An orphaned child, strong themes of revenge and honor, a strong sense of discipline. Batman fights powerful enemies using only his wits and his willpower.
When anyone thinks about Batman these days, they're more likely to call up an image of the 90s cartoon series version, or the Michael Keaton or Christian Bale versions, all of which bear more than a passing resemblance to Frank Miller's Dark Knight, thus proving that a character of iconic quality can change with the times. Characters such as James Bond and Batman are iconic precisely because they are simple enough that they can reflect society's current temperment without compromising what makes the characters work.
With Casino Royale, James Bond has succesfully undergone this transition. Daniel Craig is not Ian Flemming's James Bond, any more than Micheal Keaton was Bob Kane's Batman, but the interperetation works because Craig retains the elements which drew us to the character in the first place, while paring away the more frivolous elements that seem out of place today.
So what has changed with Casino Royale? James Bond is now blonde. Get over it. Also, there is far less emphasis on gadgetry in this film, an excellent choice by the filmmakers. After all, who is really going to be impressed by a bow-tie camera in the day of the ubiquitous cell-phone digi-cam? Also we see a younger, less experienced James Bond than we are used to seeing. Part of the effectiveness of the movie lies in its careful dissection of who Bond is, and how he does what he does. We see Bond's human side. He makes mistakes, something we would rarely have seen from previous incarnations of 007. Normally, this would be a mistake, but it works here because with each mistake he makes, we get the sense that the new Bond will never make them again, paving the way for his later exploits. All of this serves to add an extra dimension and a layer of depth that is rare in this series (though it has been seen before, most notably in "From Russia With Love", and "The Living Daylights", IMHO).
What hasn't changed? Well, Casino Royale is still just an action movie. There's nothing really new here, but this time out it's action done well. Go see this movie, just for fun. When all is said and done, it really is Bond, James Bond.
Update: It has been brought to my attention that the new Bond is in some ways closer to the original Flemming Bond than earlier film representations. Some of the things included in Casino Royale were simply not acceptable to a public audience in the 60s, including a particularly painful torture sequence, and a much colder Bond character overall. I guess I'll just have to read Casino Royale for myself.
- Was it good?
- Was it Bond?
For Casino Royale, more than any other Bond outing, it is the second question which has become a major concern. Daniel Craig, the new James Bond, fairly drips with boyish charm, and one glance at his face will tell you that comparisons to Steve McQueen are inevitable. This has caused many to wonder if Casino Royale is really a James Bond film at all.
In order to answer that question completely, it is first necessary to visit another long standing American franchise: Batman. By the early 1980s, Batman was a franchise which had grown somewhat stale, and which had disolved over a period of years into self-parody, helped along by the campy 1960s TV show of the same name. Sound familiar? By 1986, when Frank Miller introduced "The Dark Knight Returns", the franchise was well overdue for a revamp. Batman remained moderately popular due to one simple fact: Batman is, was, and will always be an iconic archetype, a simple formula which appeals to everyone at the gut level. An orphaned child, strong themes of revenge and honor, a strong sense of discipline. Batman fights powerful enemies using only his wits and his willpower.
When anyone thinks about Batman these days, they're more likely to call up an image of the 90s cartoon series version, or the Michael Keaton or Christian Bale versions, all of which bear more than a passing resemblance to Frank Miller's Dark Knight, thus proving that a character of iconic quality can change with the times. Characters such as James Bond and Batman are iconic precisely because they are simple enough that they can reflect society's current temperment without compromising what makes the characters work.
With Casino Royale, James Bond has succesfully undergone this transition. Daniel Craig is not Ian Flemming's James Bond, any more than Micheal Keaton was Bob Kane's Batman, but the interperetation works because Craig retains the elements which drew us to the character in the first place, while paring away the more frivolous elements that seem out of place today.
So what has changed with Casino Royale? James Bond is now blonde. Get over it. Also, there is far less emphasis on gadgetry in this film, an excellent choice by the filmmakers. After all, who is really going to be impressed by a bow-tie camera in the day of the ubiquitous cell-phone digi-cam? Also we see a younger, less experienced James Bond than we are used to seeing. Part of the effectiveness of the movie lies in its careful dissection of who Bond is, and how he does what he does. We see Bond's human side. He makes mistakes, something we would rarely have seen from previous incarnations of 007. Normally, this would be a mistake, but it works here because with each mistake he makes, we get the sense that the new Bond will never make them again, paving the way for his later exploits. All of this serves to add an extra dimension and a layer of depth that is rare in this series (though it has been seen before, most notably in "From Russia With Love", and "The Living Daylights", IMHO).
What hasn't changed? Well, Casino Royale is still just an action movie. There's nothing really new here, but this time out it's action done well. Go see this movie, just for fun. When all is said and done, it really is Bond, James Bond.
Update: It has been brought to my attention that the new Bond is in some ways closer to the original Flemming Bond than earlier film representations. Some of the things included in Casino Royale were simply not acceptable to a public audience in the 60s, including a particularly painful torture sequence, and a much colder Bond character overall. I guess I'll just have to read Casino Royale for myself.
posted by Q. at 9:43:00 AM
1 Comments:
Meh. I wan't all too impressed. I guess I'm just one of those people who go specifically for all the gadgetry. Besides, I've always been a Connery or Dalton Bond-fand.
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