Well, I'll first admit I didn't pay much attention to the plot. I watched it for: The Aston-Martin The exotic Bond settings (Nassau, Montenegro, the casino) Mads Mikkelson as Le Chifre I didn't miss: The campy, over-the-top gadgets Q Honorable mention: Tobias Menizes (Rome's Brutus ) as M's assistant, Villiers. Bottom line: If you're like me, you see the Bond actors on a spectrum, with Moore and Brosnan near one end (let's call it the "crappy" end), and Connery, Dalton, and now Craig near the other. Hopefully we can look forward to many more movies just like Casino Royale. (IMO!)
I finally bought and watched it Friday night. I'm old school, so Connery will always be the ultimate Bond to me, but I'll honestly have to say that I thought CR was the best Bond film ever, and Craig is the best Bond since Connery. I think Craig captured the character, as written by Ian Fleming, better than anybody ever has. Connery just had that screen presence.
Just watched Casino Royale tonight with my housemate and his gf, and was most impressed. Not knowing any of the story beforehand the last half hour had me squirming in the chair, since in any other movie the scene on the boat would have been the end, but knowing Bonds character it was obvious stuff had to inevitably go wrong.
I like the lack of CGI, Bond bleeding, and the emphasis that he's of value in his profession because he doesn't follow rules and works off the grid.
"Made you feel it, did he? Well, don't worry. They say the second is..." *thip* *crash* "Yes. Considerably." (I've seen it about six times now... )
Man, I loved the movie. Even the poker scenes, while a bit over the top in the actually hands, actually made decent sense from the psychlogical stand-point of the game. The chase in the beginning was awesome as well. Hell, it was ALL awesome.
^ Ah well, the poker game. It's always the same in movies - the whole table has hands you maybe see once in a whole night As for the chase scene in the beginning, I thought it was a bit too long. Too much 'look at me, look at me! I'm new and non-CGI!'.
