Royale flush

Rating: 8/10 (15 November 2006)

Since his inception by Ian Fleming in 1952 and his first cinematic personification by Sean Connery in 1962, debonair British spy James Bond has become a contemporary icon. With now over a score of film installments, plus dozens of less-than-successful copycats and handful of spoofs, the pop culture-oriented public have since felt quite pleasurable excitement to this magnetic character.
However, as the film franchise continually expanded, it grew more and more formulaic and showed less than impressive results. While the Lee Tamahori-helmed "Die Another Day" had its moments, it suffered from failing to realize what the series is all about, focusing on too much mindless CGI-driven action rather than working on the old-fashioned charms of its lead character. Then Pierce Brosnan drops his license to kill and a relatively obscure actor in Daniel Craig is introduced, complete with those prejudicial criticisms and jokes (yeah, "James Blond", sheesh). By then, the outcome of the newest film from the 007 franchise was hanging on the edge.
Fortunately, just as with a glitched computer system that's got a tad too many running processes, director Martin Campbell ("Goldeneye") and scriptwriters Neal Purvis, Robert Wade, and (Hollywood It-Boy) Paul Haggis reboot the franchise in brilliant form with "Casino Royale" (based from Fleming's first Bond novel with the same name), reinitializing Bond back to his early days shortly after obtaining his double-O status. There's still enough action scenes but this Bond movie's less interested in the action than the actor. Consequently, there's more traditional trappings and less pseudo-technology.
Starting with a brief prologue shot in black-and-white and a retro-ish opening credit sequence, the film immediately proceeds to a mad chase scene across Madagascar between Bond (Craig) and a bomb-maker which ends up in a disaster. Reprimanded by M (Judi Dench) for his recklessness, Bond takes matters into his own and heads to Bahamas where he sees a possible lead in terrorism treasurer Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelsen). Eventually this leads him to Casino Royale in Montenegro where he crashes a high-stakes poker game with hopes of making the terrorism investments go bad while being paired with the sultry Vesper Lynd (Eva Green) as a secret agent for the British treasury.
Of course, much of the film's gist lies in its lead actor. And yes, Craig is excellent as Bond, exuding charismatic strength and emotional depth during the quieter scenes while providing an effective masculine drive when his character is in his element. Bond has absolutely never been well-played since Sean Connery yet perhaps only the first time given depth by a serious portrayal with little trace (if any) of the cartoonish qualities. He's ably supported by equally effective performances of Dame Dench, Mikkelsen, and Jeffrey Wright as a CIA detective. No Q and Miss Moneypenny, though.
As for the trademark Bond girls, Bond gets jiggy with two of them here - Solange (Caterina Munro) and Vesper (Green). Of the two, it is Green who gets more screen time in which she brings a highly intellectual charm coupled with just the right amount of fragility. Her chemistry with Craig, though, is a bit too enhanced by the script's romantic angle that veers dangerously close to getting the better of the movie's overall dynamism.
That said, the film drags towards the end with a little over two hours worth of running time. The climactic showdown in the canals of Venice also arrives a little too late and as such, feels less exciting than it could've been. But in the end, Craig and the filmmakers give enough reason for one to overlook such faults. Through their recreation of the legendary role, the cards are mostly played right with a film that wisely goes back to the basics.