Casin Royale A Worthy Addition To The Series

Rating: 8/10 (18 May 2009)

Casino Royale is a worthy addition to the series there are a few flaws but it's still an entertaining action adventure. The film tells the story of Bonds early years when he's promoted to 00 status. Daniel Craig has the difficult task of playing the iconic British spy James Bond coming in after Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, and most recently Pierce Bronsan who have also played the character. Craig is great in the role and completely believable as Bond the British spy who is willing to kill in order to protect his country. The supporting cast overall turn in solid performances including Eva Green as Vesper Lynd a potential love interest for Bond, Mads Mikkelsen as the villain corrupt banker Le Chiffre, and Giancarlo Giannini as fellow agent Mathis. Jeffrey Wright as CIA Agent Felix Leiter and Judi Dench as M make the best of their small roles in the film who are Bond's allies in his quest to stop Le Chiffre. The rest of the cast also turn in good performances. The action which can get over the top sometimes is exhilarating and everything else in the film works. One of the movies flaws is the the running time of 144 minutes did make it feel sort of long and the pace was slow at times. Another one was the lack of a real bad ass villain (which some recent films also lacked). I mean Mikkelsen does what he can with Le Chiffree but his character isn't that menacing or scary (like most recently the late Heath Ledger's Joker or Anthony Hopkins Hannibal Lecter to name a few). He seemed like an average villain and not much of a threat to Bond. But other than that it's still a good action movie with equally impressive performances by it's cast. Well done.