Casino Royale makes up the middle half of the film, with Bond trying to bankrupt terrorist financier Le Chiffre (the rather excellent Mads Mikkelsen) at the eponymous casino. Over the course of the film, he slowly gets carved into something more like the Bond we’ve come to know.Ĭasino Royale as a movie is an interesting combination of film Bond and the Bond of the book. Bond isn’t even a 00 until the (admittedly not very good) title sequence rolls he doesn’t know whether he’d like his Vodka Martinis shaken or stirred he makes loads of mistakes and he has rubbish taste in dinner jackets. Since Casino Royale was the world’s introduction to James Bond, it seems fitting that this, the last of the Bond books to be filmed by Eon Productions, should be a reboot of the series. Throw Sean Connery to one side (if you can): there’s a newer, better Bond in town.
No, I’m not talking about Casino Royale itself, although that’s certainly in the top five Bond films*.
