Casino Royale Review

Overall Rating

Fast paced, refreshing view of an well known character. Good entertainment. Escapist but believable.

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Daniel Craig has brought his own stamp to the James Bond genre. He is his own Bond, rather than trying to emulate any of his predecesors.

The action sequences are stunning and very well-filmed. There are surprises in store. On at least two occasions I jumped in my seat when something happened without warning. So often the background music 'warns' you of impending action. Not in this film! The plot is both up to date, dealing with terrorism, and historic, in that it tells the story of how James Bond became a '00' agent, i.e., licensed to kill. To do so he needed to have two 'authorised' kills to his name.

There are no flashy gadgets involved, which I appreciated as, over the years, these have become more exotic and I felt that the storylines tended to become extreme in order to incorporate the gadgets.

The whole story is believable, with no megalomanic personalities involved, planning world domination, which I think is, nowadays, an outmoded plot line. However the humour element has been retained. Keep your ears open for the references to other well known characters in the dialogue.

The special effects are good, but then these days the audience is blase about such things and takes them for granted. The acting is good and the sub-plots, which help to explain how the character of James Bond evolved, are well-defined and make sense of the man we know as Bond.

I would recommend this film to anyone who wants a classic Bond movie. By classic I mean a good, action filled film, with a suave main character, some beautiful women and some mean opponents.

Bond lives in 2006, his name is now Daniel Craig, a worthy successor to the title.