Professional Spies Cannot Afford Emotional Involvement

Rating: 8/10 (24 November 2006)

I think Daniel Craig is a good James Bond, I must say. Because he's blonde or because he's too stern or because he's too emotional are all ridiculous reasons to knock the new Bond. There's always a reason to knock the new bond. Ever since 1973 when Live and Let Die was released minus Connery, there's always been a reason to knock a new Bond. He's blonde, yes, and very young for someone who's been dodging bullets and killing several people all fighting against him at once since 1962, and who has, every two years on average, been doing so relentlessly ever since. He's very agile, strong, sexual, elusive and lacking in gray hairs for someone who should be Sean Connery's age, so there is no point in discouraging Daniel Craig, who has always been a fine actor, from the Bond throne. As for the stern and emotional nature of Craig's 007, that effect is caused by the direction of Martin Campbell, who directed Brosnan as well in GoldenEye. So, Daniel Craig delivers as 007.
The problem to be concerned about is its inconsistencies as a prequel. Casino Royale is supposed to be James Bond's very first mission. It begins as he gains double-0 status. However, M is still being played by Judi Dench, whose character is introduced in GoldenEye, the seventeenth Bond film. At the very beginning of the series, M was a barrel-chested, round-headed, feisty yet refined Englishman, played by Bernard Lee. Also, the technology, the portrayal of the political crises, even the brief mentioning of 9/11, all date the film as the most recent and brand spanking new you can possibly make it. This is a huge inconsistency to overlook, so I'm sure that it's in perspective somehow, and I perhaps am uninformed, but equipped with a friend of mine who for months before this movie's release was constantly sending me posters, updated trailers, production announcements, etc., I feel like it would've been difficult to miss something.
From the very beginning, Casino Royale is established as a turning point in the Bond series. From now on, we know that the 21st century has completely taken hold of the already very faddish series. The required format for the films is not scrapped, but varied upon. As the film progresses however, you realize that Campbell does not transcend the rest of the series, despite the fact that this is by far the highest point in his own filmography. He and Craig flesh out a Bond that is in his most accurate form. Yes, Connery was the best and Brosnan the second, but James Bond, the way he was initially created, was a dark, mysterious, overconfident, elusive, and guarded rogue, and his weaknesses were the romantic emotions he would learn the hard way to keep in check and the ego that deprives him of the strength to back down or retire from a conflict with humility. Craig hits the nail on the head, and so at times we see a Bond that we simply are not used to seeing. Connery had the darkness, the complicated mystery, the roguish qualities, and yet he was very earthy and coldly suave, sometimes quite mean. Lazenby could've been any other action hero. Moore was all face value; too airily chipper and full of light-hearted English playboy charm, maybe that of a country club regular more than a secret agent. Dalton was the closest to home, but without the charm and suavity. Brosnan was so well-liked as 007 because his portrayal compared so well to Connery's. Craig, perhaps, is better at registering Bond's internal emotion rather than playing it as a cocksure indifference and so we see that rarely recognized true Bond.