Three Blokes and a Chick Watch: Casino Royale

You have to understand that there’s a reason I like Casino Royale so much. Put yourself in my position – you’ve just watched the Bond franchise fire a nail gun into its own ball-sack over and over for two hours in the absolutely dire Die Another Day, a film that didn’t just jump the shark, it strapped rockets to itself and then took off over Sea World. The film’s production team were tasked with honouring Bond’s 40th anniversary, and they created something that paid so much tribute to the Bond series that we ended up with a film that was a gurning, moronic self-satisfied cretin of a movie. Scarily, this might actually be what Bond films are like when you distil them down to their core elements (I don’t really believe this, but it’s possible).

I left the cinema that day in a state of disgust, and that rarely happens. I only go to the cinema to see things that I think I’ll enjoy, so it was a massive surprise that a fairly reassuring pillar of my film library should cause such annoyance. Frankly, beyond this point I figured that James Bond couldn’t get any worse.

I want to take you back to before Casino Royale, when Daniel Craig was announced as the new Bond. Pierce Brosnan didn’t know he’d been dropped until the last minute, and there was a massive outcry because “Bond shouldn’t be blonde-haired and blue eyed”. The Sun in particular ran a scathing article regarding the fact that Craig wore a life-jacket while riding a boat to a press conference – I can’t find the article, but I can find a Daniel Craig hate site that was set up pointing to a defunct Sun article. I’d like to point out that, at the time, I was one of a few who still had hope.

Die Another Day screwed up so badly that they had to bring back Martin Campbell, the guy helmed the return to the franchise several years earlier with GoldenEye. Casino Royale came out, and it was awesome. I was vindicated. Unfortunately, it appeared to divide the Bond fanbase in half as strongly as Marmite. In fact, this divide spreads between myself and the other two blokes – they never really liked Craig (up until recently when they saw Skyfall, anyway). The chick enjoyed the film but didn’t care about the whole “Craig Bond” issue as she’s never been fond of Bond anyway (women, am I right? Probably not).

Why am I telling you all this? Because this recap is going to have a bias to it. I’ll mock the film’s minor inadequacies for laughs, but know that I truly love Casino Royale. It’s in my top ten, possibly my top five. With that in mind, let’s proceed to give the film the dusting down we usually do!

Oh, and as a random bonus, I actually recorded the audio of us watching the film, mostly because I’m tanked on weekends and can’t ever remember anyone’s points afterwards. Am I going to put the whole recording up? Hell no, it’s damn near inaudible! I will however be interspersing the recap with highlights from the recording (not any of the bits where Siy was intentionally racist just to make me censor his audio though).

…I can’t think of a witty gambling-related pun¹ I can make to say there are spoilers, so just be aware that there are SPOILERS on the horizon.

What’s the film about?

It’s James Bond’s first mission as a 00 agent, and rather than save the world from some diabolical mastermind of some sort, he’s given the task of winning at poker against the master mathematician Le Chiffre – a gambler who funds terrorism via winning at gambling (not the safest economic model, if you ask me). Accompanied by a representative from the Bank of England, Vesper Lynd, Bond discovers quickly that it’s not just winning the card game he’s going to have to worry about…

Who are the characters?

• James Bond: Daniel Craig’s first performance, and technically James Bond’s. Apparently Bond was built like a brick shithouse in his younger days, as well as being blonde haired and blue eyed. Spends the film not particularly giving a damn.
• Vesper Lynd: This watery-eyed Bond Girl provides a memorable performance as the first (and last) person Bond falls in love with while on the job.
• Le Chiffre: A mysterious figure who’s name literally translates as “The Number”, Le Chiffre is an asthmatic who regularly weeps blood from one of his tear ducts. Most notable achievement: died scratching James Bond’s balls.

So what happens?

The film opens in black and white…

Casino Royale – Black and white isn’t old school

The familiar MGM and Columbia logos are included in the grayscale goodness, and we open on a swish office building at night in Prague. An older chap ascends the lift to the upper levels and enters his office, only to be greeted by his safe cracked wide open and Bond sat in a reclining chair. Bond informs the man, a fellow named Dryden, that the jig is up and M’s fed up with him selling MI6 secrets. He takes a seat and makes the blatantly obvious move of opening a drawer with a gun in it. Dryden berates Bond for not being a 00 agent, and he should know: he’s the section chief (ooooh, hark at you with your fancy title!).

The scene now cuts back and forth between them talking and Bond kicking the crap out of some guy in a men’s room. Dryden goes to shoot Bond, but Bond’s already removed the clip. We see that Bond throttled the guy he was fighting in the men’s room and drowned him in one of the sinks, which luckily just happened to be blocked and overflowing (much like the toilets he could have used instead).

Dryden mocks Bond for achieving his first kill, and is only halfway through his sentence when Bond unceremoniously puts a bullet in his head. Back in the toilet, Bond goes to fetch his gun, only for the drowned man to spring back to life. Bond spins on his heels and shoots him in an updated take on the classic “gun barrel point-of-view” shot. CGI blood runs down the screen as we cut into a trippy card based sequence with a rockin’ theme tune. Go on, check it out. Also the chick likes it, although that’s due to the lack of naked ladies dancing around.

Casino Royale – Sean loves the opening theme

So, it’s not been too funny so far, huh? Pretty f*cking awesome, though!

We cut to a young boy running through a camp in the pouring rain. The on-screen text informs us that this is Mbale, Uganda – because Uganda is relevant these days, right? He delivers two glass bottles of Coca Cola (I thought they stopped making it in glass bottles? I can’t buy it in glass but some kid in Uganda can?!) to a man in a military beret who’s playing pinball, while an older chap in a white suit who looks suspiciously like the G-Man from Half Life watches on disapprovingly. The General (guy with beret) lets the kid play pinball while he gets down to business with whitey (in that his suit is white, that wasn’t supposed to be a racial slur because the general is coloured and the suit guy is Caucasian oh bollocks I’m, really not that good at this). The General has asked to meet the man he’s going to trust with his money, and on cue a convoy of black jeeps arrive and out steps the man in question.

They present Le Chiffre with four boxes of cash, and he seems unimpressed (the expression on his face I would describe as “constipated”). He takes a hit off of his inhaler (because this is supposed to make him more relatable) and says that Mr. White (ohhh, that was G-Man’s actual name! Subtle, guys!) has probably promised that he’s a reliable banker. Bond’s villain for this film is a banker who loses everybody’s cash. Considering the global economic collapse that followed a few years after this film’s release, suddenly Le Chiffre becomes a total bastard that is beyond redemption. The General wants assurance that there’s no risk in depositing his cash, and Le Chiffre lies to his face (like all bankers). Despite clearly being a sweaty, weird scar-faced Danish man, the scene cuts to the militia loading the cash into the convoy of Jeeps. No sooner than the cash is in his grasp, Le Chiffre is on the phone to some guy² to bet against some shares or something. Typical sodding bankers. Mr. White stares on as the convoy leaves, lamenting how he won’t really play any significant role until Quantum of Solace.

Meanwhile, in Madagascar, Bond’s watching a snake vs. mongoose pit fight which, judging by the massive crowd baying for blood, must be a massive pastime in Madagascar. Sébastien Foucan (the creator of parkour) is chilling in the crowd with a beer and burns on his face, and it’s pretty evident that Bond’s after him (obviously the faffing around with jumping across rooftops and generally being a public nuisance didn’t pay off so he turned to crime). Sébastien answers his phone, and the modern audience pauses to say “Jesus, how old is this film as that phone is ancient” as it is somehow more jarring than the walkie talkies and brick phones you see in older Bond films.

Bond berates his co-agent for being useless by blatantly being an armed agent by holding his ear when communicating and revealing his weapon in public (bit unusual for Bond to be giving tips on subtlety given how he’s usually the worst “secret” agent ever). What ensues is Bond chasing Foucan through a building site and some pretty epic stunts all around. Much like in Skyfall, he gets the opportunity to drive the massive bulldozer-type vehicles he must have been driving before MI6 recruited him. Where Foucan leaps and bounds, Bond takes the more direct route (my favourite being a bit where he charges through a bit of drywall rather than leap over it). The most major casualty of the scene is a random worker with a blowtorch who flails at Foucan, only to get kicked off of his perch and exploded on the floor below when his gas tank lands on him.

The point is, people actually acted this sequence, which makes it pretty cool (even if Daniel Craig is quite clearly being played by a stuntman in most of the scenes). They didn’t try and make a CGI Daniel Craig and have him scale a CGI crane. It’s a small thing, but it’s important to me.

The chase leads to the Nambutu Embassy, which is a fictional embassy for a fictional African country. Foucan seeks solace there, but Bond decides that his 00 Agent status now means he can break international laws and so leaps a van over the wall of the embassy, finds Foucan and drags him outside, through the inevitable swarm of guards with AK-47s (this entire sequence feels a little bit like a video game). Bond gets cornered in the courtyard, but shoots the conveniently placed gas canister to scatter (not kill) the guards while he (kills Foucan and) escapes because that’s what the video game would have done. To be honest, I’m surprised Bond didn’t claim diplomatic immunity.

Although awesome, blatantly breaking into an embassy and killing a native in full view of a full crowd of eyewitnesses and cameras is probably not the best course of action that a “secret” agent could take (that’s more like it, Bond! Back in comfortable, incompetent territory!). For his efforts, Bond has stopped one man from using the shoddily-made pipe bomb in his backpack (for this he broke international treaties and helped contribute to the death of at least one flailing site worker).

On a boat somewhere, Le Chiffre beats a gambler at poker by pointing out that he’s got a statistical chance at winning, but not before crying some blood and pointing out that “weeping blood comes merely from a derangement of the tear duct”, and not because he cries blood because he’s evil. In his words (leaning in towards the fellow as if sharing a secret):

Le Chiffre: Nothing sinister.

The gambler, rather than accuse him of cheating by counting cards (something Las Vegas casinos will kick you out for), simply gives in. A henchman whispers in Le Chiffre’s ear, and he’s drawn to his laptop (A Sony VAIO – wayhey, product placement! Truly this is a Bond film!) where he checks out the one website where everyone gets their news. I know what you’re thinking: Reuters, the BBC…nope! We’re talking the news website.

Casino Royale – TheNews.com

Bond’s antics have made the worldwide press, which is probably what should have happened with most of the shit the previous Bonds got up to. Le Chiffre seems mildly concerned – we can see this by him taking another puff from his inhaler (it’s his “tell”).

Meanwhile in London, Judi Dench’s M storms out of a cabinet meeting cursing the Prime Minister, who would’ve been Tony Blair at the time (I think we all cursed him in one way or another). She pines for the cold war where disgraced agents would defect, which is a bit hypocritical as her first scene with Bond in GoldenEye involves her chewing him out for being “a relic of the Cold War” (if you can’t tell, I’m not overly fond of Judi Dench’s M – she’s overrated as a character).

Bond uses a laptop to run some imaginary software that all spy films have to trace the contacts on Sébastien Foucan’s mobile, which leads him to a hotel that’s apparently similar to the one from Thunderball according to bloke Will (I don’t know, I can’t remember, I hate that film).

It turns out that Bond has also broken into M’s apartment, and she’s not very impressed with his performance.

Bond: I’ll shoot the camera next time.

Well duh, that’s what all the gamers in the audience were screaming at you to do, you self-referential git! M chews him out for doing exactly the kind of thing Bond does (go to a lot of effort for a small fish in a big pond) while the audience contemplates if the mole on Judi Dench’s face is getting bigger between this film and Skyfall and whether or not it is skin cancer³(or at least we did, because we’re awful). M tells him to get lost for a bit while the tabloids have a field day.

Casino Royale – Meanwhile, the chick turns up and the blokes try and figure out the Bond continuity quandary

Bond goes to the Bahamas and tools around in some product placement for a while, making sure to navigate to his destination (the hotel like the one from Thunderball) using his Sony Ericsson. While the valet parks his product placement, Bond pretends to do up his shoes to check out the security cameras (his new arch nemesis). A guy I swear is supposed to be Auric Goldfinger assumes he’s a valet and demands that Bond parks his car.

Bond ensures to reverse the car into another car in the parking lot (guessing that Range Rover didn’t pay enough?). While Goldfinger and the security staff are distracted, Bond breaks into the security room and uses Foucan’s phone to check one of the “handshakes” – apparently the bomb maker thought it prudent to organise his highly confidential (presumably criminal) contacts and tasks into folders on his phone to make it easy for any agents of the law to track down associates, including phone numbers he might only ever use once. Bond matches the timestamp to one of the archived DVDs (a Sony DVD, nonetheless) to work out who answered the call. It turns out that a guy leaving an Aston Martin DB5 briefly looked at his phone at that time (I maintain that Bond stopped the footage not to check the timecode but because a friggin’ Aston Martin DB5 pulled up in the driveway). Bond gets the name of the Aston’s driver from the reception by claiming he nicked the door of the “1964 Aston Martin” (he knows the bloody year!).

Cut to a woman riding along a beach on a horse, and Bond emerges from the sea in a scene reminiscent of that bit from Dr. No, except that wasn’t intentional – see point 4 on this Cracked list (and then read the others as it’s a really interesting article). Bond checks out the horse rider.

That night, Bond logs into the secure MI6 server with his Sony VAIO (choice of Bond!) using M’s username and password, ostensibly to let them know where he is but mostly to show off. He then swaggers off to play poker with the hotel plebeians and Goldfinger gives him the eye at the bar when he makes the quick realisation that Bond wasn’t a valet.

Bond cleans up at cards and manages to win the Aston Martin off of the guy who briefly looked at his phone, a Mr. Dimitrios (here’s hoping that Bond picked out the right guy and that the chap didn’t just happen to check his phone at the wrong time!). Bond wins with triple aces (yay?) and then goes on to flirt with Mr. Dimitiros’ bit on the side. He doesn’t shag her though (*GASP!*) but leaves her expecting sex after he discovers that Dimitrios is headed to Miami (they tussle on the carpet for a bit, so we all had a good laugh at saying how Bond should avoid “rug burn”).

Bond takes a taxi from the airport and follows Dimitrios to a museum where they are showing that bloody creepy “Bodyworlds” exhibit where that mad german bastard with the same hat as me skins dead people and poses them for display (you know, when I do that people call me a psychopath and phone for the police. Apparently it’s all due to “context” or something). Bond sees Dimitrios leave a key on one of the exhibits (skinless dudes playing poker, because there’s a theme in this film) but doesn’t see him when he comes up behind Bond and holds a knife to his back. They grapple over the knife in the middle of the crowd and nobody seems to notice them do this. Bond manages to fake out Dimitrios by implying there’s someone behind him by looking over his shoulder (the old “hey look over there” trick) and sticks the knife into the man’s gut while he’s distracted. Bond leaves Dimitrios lying in a chair and doesn’t get to say the classic line “excuse my friend, he’s dead tired”. Not to worry, I’m sure that mad german bastard will have Dimitrios skinned and displayed in no time once he finds the corpse.

Bond steals Dimitrios’ phone and notices that the key has gone from the display. He runs outside and rings the number in Dimitrios’ phone, and the prat at the other end actually answers as he’s crossing the street. Bond follows the guy in a taxi to the airport, and we get a cameo of Richard Branson for no reason whatsoever.

A game of cat and mouse ensues as the bomber realises he’s being followed, ducking into a changing room and slipping into a security guard outfit. Bond twigs and pursues, calling to MI6 to get in touch with M to warn the airport. MI6 figure the bomber will be going after the new “Skyfleet” aircraft (it’s like a double-decker plane). The bomber sets off the fire alarm, grabs a gun from the locker room and sets off – in a thrilling sequence Bond engages in a car chase with the bomber (who hijacks a fuel tanker and rigs it with a detonator), putting countless lives at risk and acting like a complete terrorist in the process. I’m not going to describe the whole thing, otherwise there’s not much point in you watching it for yourself!

Bond manages to stop the tanker from crashing into the plane. When the bomber looks like he’s about to activate the detonator, he realises too late that Bond’s actually clipped it on his belt and attached it to his arse. As he’s arrested, Bond smirks as there’s a satisfying bang off-screen as the bomber’s backside gets exploded.

Le Chiffre’s stockbroker informs him that he’s lost a shitload of cash. Le Chiffre takes another hit from his inhaler while looking like he’s about to burst into tears (of blood).

The next day, Bond arrives at the hotel to find that Dimitrios’ lady has been killed and wrapped in a hammock, ruining the day for all the tourists while MI6 closes the place down to look for clues. M’s there to – what else? – pour on scorn and disapproval, and then exposit for a bit lest the plot suddenly lose all its plot threads. She informs Bond that Le Chiffre was connected to Dimitrios and that he’s “banker to the world’s terrorists”, so it’s nice to know that MI6 are being proactive in apprehending and stopping the criminals they’re well aware of. Le Chiffre is an Albanian chess prodigy and a “mathematical genius”, so this is basically that film where Bond goes up against Cronstine from From Russia with Love that nobody wanted to see.

To pour an extra layer of cynicism on everything she’s explained so far, M has Bond injected with a tracking chip like some sort of common house pet or beloved but excitable dog. M goes on to say that following 9/11…wait, you’re really going to do this? I mean it happened ten years ago but that’s still recent! Oh, I see, it gives the film more gravitas by invoking a real life event. Apparently. Anyway, someone made a mint out of airline stocks the day after 9/11 and it’s implied that Le Chiffre was behind the whole thing because that’s very tasteful now isn’t it, movie? Hey, you know what Marvel and DC Comics did during the whole 9/11 thing? They had superheroes helping out at Ground Zero and remarking how brave the local firemen and police were. You know what they didn’t do? Infer that Doctor Doom had orchestrated the whole thing in some grand conspiracy to undermine America. Comic books aren’t know for being tactful, and yet they still didn’t go there!

Either way, the tables have turned and it’s clear Le Chiffre has lost a lot of cash “betting the wrong way” on the plane Bond didn’t let get blown up. He’s holding a high-stakes poker game, and so MI6 are sending in a team of trained agents to sneak in, grab the guy and break up the whole- oh no, no they’re not. They’re sending in one man to play poker with him. They’re sending Bond, “the best player in the service”, to play against Le Chiffre, a “mathematical genius”. I can’t see how this could possibly go wrong!

Casino Royale – Meanwhile, the blokes and the chick are still trying to figure out James Bond continuity

Montenegro! While on the train a dark haired woman plomps herself opposite Bond and declares “I’m the money”.

It’s Vesper Lynd of Her Majesty’s Treasury, because even the most esteemed treasury service in the world isn’t against the plan to try and beat a villain by letting an agent have a flutter at cards. She flirts with Bond and the two apply some playful deductive reasoning to each other, both coming to the conclusion that the other is an orphan (Batman would be proud). Must be due to the fact they were looking at each other the same way that Bruce Wayne looked at William Blake in the Dark Knight Rises. Ignoring that this isn’t how people actually talk to each other when they first meet, it’s still excellent dialogue either way.

At their hotel, Bond instantly breaks cover by announcing to the receptionist clerk that he is James Bond and that the reservation was made under his cover name. To be honest, when you get assigned the name “Darlington Beech” it’s either break cover or spend the rest of the mission with people laughing at your name (it’s only one step below the name “Singeon Smythe“). Still, it’s reassuring that, unlike other incarnations, Bond is breaking his cover on purpose rather than by accident (best spy ever!). He seems perplexed when Vesper isn’t impressed by this and storms off.

The hotel clerk gives Bond an envelope, and inside are some mission orders. He reads them in his car and stuffs a silenced gun into the envelope before heading back into the hotel, gun-shaped bulge in the envelope apparently not a concern.

Bond and Vesper go to meet their contact, a dishevelled chap by the name of Mathis. He’s a smooth motherlover who reminds me of Topol or Kerim Bay. Within two minutes we see he’s a cunning badass when the local Chief of Police at a nearby table is arrested due to falsified evidence that he was being bribed by Mathis, when in fact he was being bribed by Le Chiffre.

Back in the hotel, Vesper and Bond have bought each other posh clothes because that’s definitely what people do when they’re working together and have only been in each other’s company for an entire day.

It’s poker night! …I don’t really have a lot to say, it’s a bunch of people playing cards. It’s very enjoyable though! Honest.

Casino Royale – Velvet suits and panty line, oh my

Bond deduces that when Le Chiffre gets a twitchy eye it’s his “tell”, and also manages to be completely distracted by Vesper wearing the dress he bought her (which was the effect it was supposed to have, except it was supposed to distract the other players. Bond fell for his own ploy). Then, after losing a round abysmally to Le Chiffre, he makes a cocktail up on the spot that’s probably strong enough to be an ingredient in horse tranquillisers, because if you’re going to lose at poker you might as well be drunk while you’re doing it. When the other players decide that they’d like to get smashed on Bond’s cocktail too, Le Chiffre gets annoyed and takes a puff from his inhaler (a more blatant “tell” that Bond never picks up on). Bond breaks away from the table to snog Vesper and inform Mathis and Vesper of his deduction of Le Chiffre’s “tell”.

4 hours later (in the film, not the film’s running time!), it’s time for a break. Le Chiffre is called away from the table and Bond takes the opportunity to slip a small metal bug into Le Chiffre’s inhaler, which was left on the table. Having owned an inhaler for most of my childhood, I can all too easily see Le Chiffre going to take a puff and nearly choking on the small metal rod loosely rattling in the casing.

Le Chiffre returns to his room only to discover an angry African warlord waiting for him. Hearing the commotion over his earpiece, Bond retrieves his gun-filled envelope from the front desk and heads up in the lift, retrieving his gun from the envelope. After threatening to cut off his girl’s arm and his head, the warlord and his lackey leave Le Chiffre’s room just in time for Bond and Vesper to pretend-snog in a doorway opposite. Unfortunately, the warlord’s lackey notices Bond’s earpiece and immediately goes to shoot him.

Bond manages to pull the lackey over the balcony of the fire escape and engages the warlord in hand-to-hand in one of the better Bond set-pieces. After the fight, Bond’s expensive shirt is covered in blood and there’s two dead black guys at his feet. Awkward! It would be if one of the hotel staff randomly walked in on them, anyway. Bond sends Vesper off to inform Mathis to dispose of the bodies while he does something straight out of a Hitman video game by hiding the bodies in the cupboard under the stairs.

A hot wash and a glass of whiskey later, Bond’s ready to play cards again (joy!). Le Chiffre makes an offhanded comment about Bond changing his shirt, assuming that he’s been sweating due to the game and apparently oblivious to the fact that Bond just got himself bloodied killing the guys who came to threaten him.

When he gets back to his hotel room, he finds a broken wine glass and Vesper curled up wincing in the shower, fully clothed. Oh. Ohhh. So that’s how a normal person reacts upon being exposed to such intense violence. It’s quite jarring, considering that Bond films aren’t known for displays of actual, fairly real emotion. Bond gives her a cuddle in the shower.

The next day, after presumably ordering another suit to be delivered, Bond watches Mathis’ next bit of handiwork as some tipped-off police search the car of one of Le Chiffre’s men only to find two dead black dudes in the trunk (awkward!). The dude is arrested as Le Chiffre watches on from his hotel window, weeping blood.

That night at the poker table, Bond calls Le Chiffre’s bluff. When the villain shows his “tell”, Bond thinks he’s on to a winner and raises the stakes. Le Chiffre goes all in, and rather than backing off Bond sticks to his guns and matches. Le Chiffre’s hand wins and Bond’s lost everything, all because Le Chiffre was faking his tell! You can even see the “oh shit” look on Bond’s face.

Out on the balcony, Vesper refuses to fund Bond’s return to the table (which is fair enough). Getting a drink to settle his nerves, we’re treated to the now-infamous exchange:

Bond: Vodka Martini.

Barman: Shaken or stirred?

Bond: Do I look like I give a damn?

A lot of Bond fans thought this was a middle finger to everything that came before (his attitude is a particular peeve of Will’s), but to be fair the guy has just lost a boatload of Her Majesty’s cash to a terrorist (and besides, does Craig strike you as the kind of guy who’d ask for a Martini at the bar?).

Seeing Le Chiffre’s contended face enter the room, Bond snatches a steak knife off of one of the nearby dining tables, presumably so he can cut himself a nice slice of Le Chiffre’s arse. Before he can do anything too rash, he’s stopped on the stairs by one of the chaps from the poker table (in particular the one who’s been losing since he started). He introduces himself as “a brother from Langley”, and we discover it’s our old CIA chum Felix Leiter!⁵

Leiter says he’ll give Bond the cash to play, so long as the CIA can have Le Chiffre once he’s done. Bond’s also allowed to keep the winnings (cha ching!). Hey, if they’re happy to pay for a guys who’s losing slightly less than one of their agents to probably lose some more, it shows they don’t need the cash!

With the burden of losing Her Maj’s cash lifted, Bond returns to the gaming tables supported by dirty, dirty American money. If he does lose it just means that American tax dollars are just going to terrorism (and that wouldn’t be the first time, am I right? Just kidding!). Le Chiffre feigns indifference to Bond’s return, but he’s secretly worried as the whole “fake tell” thing was the only trick up his sleeve – he goes to do it, realises it’s not going to work this time, and then embarrassingly lowers his pretences and continues to lose.

Since he’s all out of legitimate ways to win, Le Chiffre just straight up poisons Bond’s drink (one of those Vesper cocktails strong enough to mask the taste of any poison!). Realising that the queasy sensation in his stomach and the sudden sweat he’s developed isn’t due to alcohol poisoning, Bond excuses himself from the table and tries to vomit out the poison in the men’s room via ingesting salt water. The camera-work is particularly nice as everything’s shaky and blurry to reflect Bond’s perception. Bond vomits up into the sink.

It doesn’t do much, so he drunkenly staggers out to his car (almost getting run over in a busy road in the process), gets in to it (not needing to unlock it apparently – typical Bond, leaving his spy car unlocked!) and activates an emergency link to MI6. A doctor informs him he’s going into cardiac arrest, and begins talking him through how to use the portable defibrillator stowed in his glove compartment. Before he can give a jolt to his chest, he realises one of the defibrillator’s leads is loose and he passes out. Luckily, Vesper has been following him and activates it, bringing Bond back from the brink.

Meanwhile, Le Chiffre is effortlessly winning against Leiter at poker, which isn’t really how poker works. He’s just wiped out the man from the CIA and looks less than pleased when Bond reappears, because now he’s played the trick he had up his other sleeve he’s out of sleeves to hide tricks in.

It all comes to a head when two of the remaining players go all in (one looks like a typical Yakuza guy, the other a big black chap who reminds me of wrestling’s Mark Henry a.k.a. “Sexual Chocolate”). Le Chiffre raises, and Bond calls his bluff by going all in. Le Chiffre has a Full House (or “aces full of sixes” as the croupier announces it) but it’s not enough to trump Bond, who unleashes a Straight Flush.

It’s Le Chiffre’s turn to excuse himself from the table to throw up. He gives the croupier a chip for a million (and the guy just says “thank you very much”, although I’m sure he got drunk off his arse that evening) and hands over to Felix.

Bond has a quiet meal with Vesper, and Bond decides to name his new cocktail a “Vesper” (apparently he hadn’t named it before now, my bad). He casually deduces that Vesper’s necklace is an “Algerian love knot”, and I ponder when he had the time to look that up on Wikipedia. They have some more deep, witty banter and WHO CARES, let’s get on to the next bit! Vesper leaves when Mathis texts her and shortly afterwards it dawns on Bond that the guy might not be entirely trustworthy. He leaves the hotel just in time to see Vesper bundled into a car, and he gives chase in his Aston Martin. He’s driving so fast that he almost doesn’t swerve in time to miss Vesper lying in the road. The Aston flips over seven times in a World Record breaking stunt. All those gadgets, and yet not one of them built to detect a woman tied up in the middle of the road? Tsk. Also, what does Le Chiffre think he is? One of those old-school villains who ties women to train tracks? Le Chiffre’s men pull Bond from the wreckage and cut the tracer out of his arm.

When Bond comes to, he’s naked and tied to a chair with no seat in it inside a rusted ship’s hold. Le Chiffre has a knot of rope in his hands.

The plan is apparently to torture Bond by slapping his bollocks with the heavy end of the rope until he gives in. Come on Le Chiffre, even Orson Welles had a more elaborate (and surreal) plan than that!

Blokes all across the country crossed their legs in unison while watching this scene, it’s genuinely painful to watch. And then Bond starts yelling for Le Chiffre to aim “to the right a bit” and laughs that Le Chiffre is going to die scratching his balls. Le Chiffre’s goes to cut Bond’s balls off when the G Man, er, Mr. White steps in and puts one between his eyes (so he really did die scratching Bond’s balls!). Incidentally, perhaps this explains why Bond can’t stay in a stable relationship. Have you considered that he might be firing blanks after all the testicular trauma?

Bond wakes up in hospital, his scrotum presumably the size of a watermelon.

Casino Royale – Scrotum transplant

While recuperating he’s visited by Mathis and Vesper. Bond’s suspicious of Mathis, especially since Le Chiffre outright said that Mathis was his friend, not Bond’s. A couple of Bond’s associates taser Mathis in the back and drag him away.

I’ll summarise the next twenty minutes, as the film (rightly) needs some time to show us the luvvy-duvvy stuff where Bond and Vesper go off together as if they’re teenage lovers in order to make the final third of the film more dramatic. They get the money (Bond’s chosen password was “Vesper”, he might as well have chosen “12345” or “Guest”), Bond decides to quit and the pair go on a boating holiday to Venice. It’s all perfectly romantic and looks like it’s going to be a happy ending, up until M calls and asks Bond when they’re going to get the money back, just as Vesper goes for a stroll.

Panicking as they’ve just spent a whole load of cash on a gondola ride, a posh hotel and a holiday, Bond gets on the phone to the cheerful chap who handed over the money, who explains that the funds were transferred to his company’s account and that they’re currently being withdrawn. Rather than ask him to intervene and cancel the transaction (I guess he could do that since he can see them being withdrawn), Bond goes after Vesper. Wearing a shockingly obvious red dress, Bond has little trouble in tracking her to a worn out old building (older looking and more dilapidated than most Venice buildings, I mean). He encounters some armed goons and the fire-fight begins.

In the final impressive set piece, Bond takes on the small army while the building literally sinks around them. Vesper is locked in one of the elevators, which plunges into the water. When Bond goes to save her, she drowns herself to stop him. He finally manages to kick the doors open and bring her to the surface, but there’s no last minute bit of CPR to save her; she’s long gone. It’s a chilling scene, and you genuinely see why Bond cannot get attached to anyone, lest he suffer the consequences. Mr. White watches on from a nearby building, the money case in hand. Notably, the police and the emergency services aren’t on hand despite a building just collapsing (is this not considered an emergency in Venice?).

M debriefs Bond, revealing Vesrper’s Algerian boyfriend was kidnapped by the people behind Le Chiffre and she was blackmailed to steal the money. Bond’s back in agent mode, back to the task at hand – M says that he’s “learned his lesson”, and comments that Mr. White probably let him live after she made a deal with “them”. Amongst Vesper’s personal effects is her mobile, with one last message to Bond: Mr. White’s phone number. Alright, time to prank phone call the shit out of him!

Mr. White’s walking from his car to the front door of his house when his leg is nearly blown off by a bullet. Bond approaches, rifle in hand, and announces his name’s “Bond. James Bond”. The music stings into the Bond theme, roll credits. Now that’s how you end a Bond film!

So how is the film overall?

Really f*cking difficult to do a funny recap on! In all seriousness, I’ve skimmed over a lot of this film because I think you should go and see it for yourself. If you’ve avoided Bond films because of the legacy of 20+ films to sit through (which is silly because each is an individual story), now is the time to jump on the series and check it out, even if it is more Jason Bourne than traditional Bond. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea for a reason, but I genuinely hope that in years to come this is fondly remembered as ushering in a new era of Bond (for better or worse) the same way that GoldenEye is.

Definitely in my top ten!

P.S. Never again will I ever record one of these viewings! Maybe one day the full uncut, uncensored recording of me getting more and more drunk and annoying will one day grace the internet, but not today!

Post by Sean Patrick Payne+ | December 31, 2012 at 11:21 pm | Films, James Bond, Three Blokes and a Chick Watch | No comment

Tags: 007, Casino Royale, Daniel Craig, James Bond, movie recap, movie review