The new James Bond movie certainly re-invigorates the franchise. As Bond, Craig is serious. To him, it matters. It's not just a game to him. He isn't cool and suave, he is intense and brutal. He always knows the one switch to pull, the one place to shoot, to make everything blow up. It totally works.
We were completely sold during a 20-minute long chase scene at the start, with Craig chasing Sebastien Foucan, freerunning/parkours style. This chase starts strong and builds to ridiculous. This modern school of action film-making - the Tony Jaa, Run Lola Run, Luc Besson, total balls-out energy style is, I believe, the reason film was put on earth. It looks like Craig is pushing himself to and past his limits to keep up. When you see him with his kit off, you can believe he is capable of almost anything.
There are any number of departures from the style and content of the series, but also many echoes, reflections and origins-of. In the credits, an animation of playing cards, we see a fractal development of the club, with each knob growing a smaller club, with smaller clubs growing on each of them. I think that's a clue to the fractal, self-similar nature of this film, drawing from all periods of Bond, as well as it's own period.
I haven't read the book, so I can't say how closely this film followed it. It doesn't share much with the previous movie, although there is a card game, and Bond is drugged. However, in the earlier film, he sees bagpipers. Here he goes into cardiac arrest. This is an improvement.
However, the earlier film had a slow motion pillow fight with Ursula Andress set to Dusty Springfield singing "The Look of Love". So maybe that is still my favorite Bond movie. But Daniel Craig is the best Bond ever.
In conclusion:
- More parkour in action movies.
- Is this Casino Royale so good it ends the franchise?
- Nothing beats Ursula Andress and Dusty Springfield.
2 comments:
You are absolutely right: best James Bond ever. No clever gadgets this time, just guts and smarts. That chase scene at the beginning was the best.
No fancy gadgets except the adrenaline injector/defibrillator thingy - which has a loose connection that almost kills him.
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