“The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning.”

That’s the very first sentence of the very first James Bond novel. And it is all there, the glorious tone and setting and sense of worldliness. The decadence, the sophistication, the world weariness, the feeling of being on the brink of something dramatic or drastic, something of global importance. What’s been wrong with the Bond films, since about 1971 or so, with Diamonds are Forever, or perhaps earlier, is that they dropped whatever darkness the movies retained for comedy and wisecracks.
Casino Royale was published in 1953, and was quickly adapted into a TV show called Climax Mystery Theater in 1954 with Barry Nelson as an unlikely Bond, at least as we now know him. But after that, the annual Bond novel flourished only in England, not unlike the Patrick O’Brien seafaring novels, until someone reviewed them with such enthusiasm that suddenly 17 O’Brien books appeared in trade paperback virtually simultaneously. In the case of Bond, as is now famously known, JFK mentioned to a Life reporter that the Bond books were among his favorite reading matter, and if indeed he really read them and didn’t have a press secretary make something up on his behalf, it is clear to see why Kennedy might like the books. They mirrored his real life: saving the world, bedding the planet’s best looking chicks. Once the books started to become movies it was clear to see why they might appeal to the masses, especially a society that had grown easily airborne to exotic locations, and a reborn movie going public that was enjoying more freedom, fueled by the Pill, the Playboy philosophy, and the collapse of the movie Production Code.

The Bond world became so intoxicating that eventually directors from Spielberg to Tarantino expressed interest at one time or another, mostly out of sorrow than excitement, since the franchise preferred amiably competent hacks such as Guy Hamilton and Terence Young. Only recently have directors with more personality, such as Michael Apted, been ushered into the realm, but even then they still conformed to what ever still the decade demanded from them. In addition, eventually there was a lot of competition for the Bond market then there used to be. From Die Hard to Indiana Jones to Jason Stratham movies to Mission Impossible, to the Asian action films, diverse filmmakers smuggled a little of the glory of Bond into their films while exceeding them in excitement and gravitas. In fact, the new Casino Royale appears to be an awful lot like MI3, even down to the girlfriend-enacted defibrillation. It’s a sign that the Bond films have flipped places with other franchises such as Mission Impossible. Casino is an attempt to reconfigure the Bond films in the direction of the competitors. The typical Bond film will no longer be outlandish, wiseacre-filled comedies of world domination. They will harder, darker, character driven, with state of the art stunts.

Whenever there is a new Bond film key questions arise. One, is the theme song any good? Two, how are the credits? Three, how hot are the Bond girls? Four, what new toys does Q give Bond? Five, how is the villain? Six, when and how does he say, “Shaken, not stirred,” and “Bond. James Bond”? Creating anticipation for the answers to questions was a terrific marketing strategy, but so often without sufficient follow through, leading to post-cinemal disappointment.

And the big question comes whenever there is a new Bond, which has happened five times now since Connery. Does the new guy match up to Sean? (And yes, Virginia, someday, in 2046, there will be a female Bond.) Does he evince the blend of wit and sheer animal magnetism that we want out of a Bond? Connery is the template, sophisticated and lethal, and even resembling the book’s Bond, whom Fleming said he imagined looking like Hoagy Carmichael. Australian car salesman George Lazenby looked the part, but couldn’t deliver lines with conviction. Roger Moore was of the David Nivin school, vacuous and suave, the kind of British film figure who sniffs his nose at a poorly creased pant leg and is angered by improprieties toward women because they bespeak less then impeccable manners. Brosnan was in the Moore mode, and for three films Timothy Dalton was the last attempt to create a “darker” Bond. Unfortunately he had all the vices of Lazenby with few of the virtues of Connery.

First things first, Daniel Craig is a great Bond. He is handsome in a damaged boxer sort of way, can be suave when he needs to, but has lower class roots that give this Bond an edge of anger. He is a different Bond, a colder, harder Bond who is eventually shaken and stirred.

With Casino Royale, the hard drive has been erased. The series has begun again, as if the previous 20 films (or 22) (or 23) didn’t exist. The film has elements of an origin story without dwelling on it too much. There is little effort toward the Bondian witticism. There is an attempt at some repartee on the Chunnel train, but it is so far below the quality of Hitchcock’s NXNW that right now I can’t remember a single line of it. Craig isn’t built to banter. Rather, he is built to tear fire hydrants off curbs. He’s got the shoulders of a Transformer, with a tiny mashed potato of a head. He’s not so much Bond as the Terminator. He runs like Robert Patrick in Term 2, like a speeding bullet. At one point, when Bond is standing bruised and cut in front of a mirror, you half expect him to peel back his eye, like Schwarzenegger in the first Terminator.

And speaking of eyes, the villain this time is someone named Mads Mikkelsen, who played Tristan in King Arthur in a film with another Bond candidate, Clive Owen. His Le Chiffre has an eye that weeps blood, an unexplained physical phenomenon. He’s good looking enough to play Bond himself, so he makes a good match for Craig’s more battered Bond. He is a fine villain who has higher constraints on himself that give him plausible, anguished motivation. His blood seeping eye evokes the classic opening of each Bond film up until now, perhaps another symbol of “rebirth.”.

The Bond girls this time around are gorgeous model types, if slightly more serious and fully fleshed out (without showing much flesh). Eva Green provides a tad bit of eye candy with her Herculean cleavage,

Frankly, the plot is a tad hard to follow, but that is the lot of most action movies, since the important plot stuff is muttered as people are walking hurriedly from one spot to another in the boring scenes between fights and explosions. And there are some terrific stunts. The first 15 minutes or so is one long, exhausting chase scene through an Ugandan work site. And how do you make a Texas Hold-’em game interesting? Interrupt it occasionally with more exciting things, such as a a poisoning or a terrific staircase fight, with Bond and foes virtually chasing Green down the steps.

Casino Royale has a great beginning and a great punchline of an end, but parts of the middle are so-so. Giancarlo Giannini pops up as a aide to Bond in Montenegro, where the casino has been relocated. He begins by being the Bondian equivalent of John Madden, offering color commentary on the poker game that is supposed to be the center of the movie, as it was in the book (where the game was the more exotic baccarat), saying such exciting things as, “My god, James was right.”

And what would a contemporary film be without a torture scene? Fortunately, Fleming’s source book provides a nifty one, which Bond seems to endure with Stallonian resilience. This part of the film follows the novel closely, and it is well to do so, given the layers of motivation and morality it compresses.

For the rest, there is no Q and thus not much in the way of gadgets, excellent credits, an unmemorable but not annoying song by Chris Cornell, a clever way of introducing the bloody eyeball opening. And Craig does say, “Bond. James Bond,” and orders a martini, but you’ll be surprised at the results.

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