On Bondage
Nov. 28th, 2006 01:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kickahaNot that kind, oddly enough.
Saw Casino Royale over the weekend, and y'know, I've been waiting 20 years for that film to be made - and it was worth the wait.
A couple of decades ago I ran across some old Ian Fleming James Bond books, and included in the stack of ones I recognized from the films was Casino Royale. It was the first Bond book, and the only one not made into a Broccoli production film. (It was made into a 1957(?) B/W American TV movie (Chevron Theatre I think) that made him into an American CIA agent named Jimmy Bond - I have a copy, and while not bad, it's pretty standard tv fare for the time.) (And yes, I'm utterly ignoring the Woody Allen spoof made in the late '60s. It wasn't even that funny, sadly.)
This book hooked me - it was dark, it was gritty, it didn't have gadgets, or a lot of flash. It was completely different than the Moore-era films I'd been most recently exposed to at that time, and it had all the elements I liked from the early Connery films and ramped them up to 11. Furthermore, it had something that none of the films had - character development. It was, after all, an origin story, and it introduced many of the attributes of the character that were just assumed in later books and the films. For one thing, Bond goes through a rather nasty set of traumas, both physical and emotional, that set the stage for him being the womanizing cold-hearted bastard later. In the book, these were just brutal. The film toned them down some, but I can understand why. (The chair scene, as written in the book, would have gotten the film a solid R, easily. The primary death had much more of an emotional impact in the book, but it wouldn't have translated well to film.)
The film kept the basic points of the plot (with a few changes that, while a bit disappointing for me personally, didn't fundamentally alter the story development - for instance, baccarat is a beautiful game, but considering that Fleming spent tens of pages explaining the game and the strategies, converting it to poker greatly simplified it for the movie), but it nailed the characters, which was my greatest concern. It just did. Bond goes from a relentless but rather unmotivated 'blunt instrument' of a quasi-thug with class issues to the determined, emotionally dead, arrogant, cynical, bitter bastard out to prove his manhood at every turn, that we've all come to love... and we see exactly why he's that way. I've heard people bitch that 'this isn't Bond'. Well, actually, this is. The movie franchise that Albert Broccoli created was something other than what Fleming originally wrote, and I cannot tell you how thrilled I am to see it return to its roots.
The film is smart, it doesn't bother explaining every little detail of what Bond is doing to track down the enemy, and you get the feeling that he really is just making it up as he goes along. They show him as not necessarily the brightest bulb in the bunch, but a master of improvisation and bulldog tenacity. He continually screws up, makes some poor choices, and has to scramble to compensate and catch up... but bit by bit, he keeps chipping away. A good combination of physical presence and intelligence, with a large dash of animal cunning. This is him learning the ropes, and finding a methodology that works for him. He is more *human* in this film than any other... although given the changes the character is put through, that may be the last of that for a while.
They tossed in some wonderfully well placed nods to the prior films that, with the exception of one rather cute pun, never felt forced, but were nicely woven in. The appearance of the '64 Aston Martin just made me grin, and I loved how they kept the off-the-cuff creation of the signature drink. It's the first time the full recipe is given on-screen. (I've used that for years as a stump-the-bartender drink - I've found *one* that knew what it was, and it turned out he was another Fleming-Bond fan.)
Daniel Craig has the potential, with a couple more films under his belt, to actually dethrone Connery in my mind as the definitive Bond. He's already firmly in 2nd place after just one outing. I hope this is a new direction for the franchise, and the fact that Albert's children have decided to reboot the continuity in this way after his death is a very good sign.
So yeah, I'm happy.
Saw Casino Royale over the weekend, and y'know, I've been waiting 20 years for that film to be made - and it was worth the wait.
A couple of decades ago I ran across some old Ian Fleming James Bond books, and included in the stack of ones I recognized from the films was Casino Royale. It was the first Bond book, and the only one not made into a Broccoli production film. (It was made into a 1957(?) B/W American TV movie (Chevron Theatre I think) that made him into an American CIA agent named Jimmy Bond - I have a copy, and while not bad, it's pretty standard tv fare for the time.) (And yes, I'm utterly ignoring the Woody Allen spoof made in the late '60s. It wasn't even that funny, sadly.)
This book hooked me - it was dark, it was gritty, it didn't have gadgets, or a lot of flash. It was completely different than the Moore-era films I'd been most recently exposed to at that time, and it had all the elements I liked from the early Connery films and ramped them up to 11. Furthermore, it had something that none of the films had - character development. It was, after all, an origin story, and it introduced many of the attributes of the character that were just assumed in later books and the films. For one thing, Bond goes through a rather nasty set of traumas, both physical and emotional, that set the stage for him being the womanizing cold-hearted bastard later. In the book, these were just brutal. The film toned them down some, but I can understand why. (The chair scene, as written in the book, would have gotten the film a solid R, easily. The primary death had much more of an emotional impact in the book, but it wouldn't have translated well to film.)
The film kept the basic points of the plot (with a few changes that, while a bit disappointing for me personally, didn't fundamentally alter the story development - for instance, baccarat is a beautiful game, but considering that Fleming spent tens of pages explaining the game and the strategies, converting it to poker greatly simplified it for the movie), but it nailed the characters, which was my greatest concern. It just did. Bond goes from a relentless but rather unmotivated 'blunt instrument' of a quasi-thug with class issues to the determined, emotionally dead, arrogant, cynical, bitter bastard out to prove his manhood at every turn, that we've all come to love... and we see exactly why he's that way. I've heard people bitch that 'this isn't Bond'. Well, actually, this is. The movie franchise that Albert Broccoli created was something other than what Fleming originally wrote, and I cannot tell you how thrilled I am to see it return to its roots.
The film is smart, it doesn't bother explaining every little detail of what Bond is doing to track down the enemy, and you get the feeling that he really is just making it up as he goes along. They show him as not necessarily the brightest bulb in the bunch, but a master of improvisation and bulldog tenacity. He continually screws up, makes some poor choices, and has to scramble to compensate and catch up... but bit by bit, he keeps chipping away. A good combination of physical presence and intelligence, with a large dash of animal cunning. This is him learning the ropes, and finding a methodology that works for him. He is more *human* in this film than any other... although given the changes the character is put through, that may be the last of that for a while.
They tossed in some wonderfully well placed nods to the prior films that, with the exception of one rather cute pun, never felt forced, but were nicely woven in. The appearance of the '64 Aston Martin just made me grin, and I loved how they kept the off-the-cuff creation of the signature drink. It's the first time the full recipe is given on-screen. (I've used that for years as a stump-the-bartender drink - I've found *one* that knew what it was, and it turned out he was another Fleming-Bond fan.)
Daniel Craig has the potential, with a couple more films under his belt, to actually dethrone Connery in my mind as the definitive Bond. He's already firmly in 2nd place after just one outing. I hope this is a new direction for the franchise, and the fact that Albert's children have decided to reboot the continuity in this way after his death is a very good sign.
So yeah, I'm happy.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-28 02:24 pm (UTC)Bah. Tease.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-28 06:06 pm (UTC)*mwah* ;)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-28 02:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-28 06:03 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-28 10:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-29 04:30 am (UTC)Oh, when I commented the original was terrible and
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-29 04:50 am (UTC)- a 1954 production
- live television
- for CBS's Climax Drama Theater
- they made him a CIA agent (Jimmy Bond)
- there's no sex or romance to speak of (which means no emotional development)
... it's not bad. It's more of a good example of mid-50's live drama, than good Bond, but it's not bad.
Casting Peter Lorre as Le Chiffre was brilliant, however. :)