Cellphones! Cards! Cellphones!

Rating: 7/10 (31 August 2007)

If your idea of a good movie is lots and lots of scenes of people looking at cellphone screens, people playing cards, people talking into cellphones, and people looking at cellphone screens, this is the film for you! Seriously- this is a far better than average Bond film, but if you take out all the scenes dominated by cellphones (why are they so fascinating to the producers? They are hardly glamorous technology in 2006) and card-playing (anyone else think that Mathis's narration of the game-- "there is now fifteen million in the pot....there is now one hundred million in the pot.." especially when you consider he was speaking to a TREASURY AGENT who just MIGHT be capable of ADDING was more than a little annoying?), you've got maybe forty minutes of action.
You also have to ignore a few major plot holes- the password Bond chooses is so blatantly obvious. How could the Secret Service fail to protect Bond after the game was over, and before he could transfer the money? Why wasn't the money transferred as soon as the game was over? How did LeChiffre know that Bond wouldn't' run over Vesper with his car- he barely missed her- and why didn't that tip off Bond that LeChiffre already had the account number out of her? How could Vesper spend the entire card game sitting at the bar and not bother to watch to make sure Bond's drink wasn't poisoned? Why did Bond chase that guy up the crane instead of just waiting for him to come down- did he think the bomber was going to jump into a hot air balloon and fly away at the top? I could go on, but what's the point?